When I was doing “Links of Note,” I would get myself oddly stressed out about not having things done and ready immediately with the post. Which is why when it kind of died down, it disappeared more than just became sporadic. Testing out this new format, though, has been kind of fun: I don’t find myself worried about having it ready to go immediately on Sunday morning. It’s more leisurely, and there’s something fun about sharing a wider range of reading from the week.
I did a great job timing a big book order with a couple other things I’d preordered, so this week I had a ton of books come through my door. Here’s what I bought (with links to Goodreads for further descriptions):
The Portable Dorothy Parker edited by Marion Meade — I’m making my way through this one right now, as I’ve never read Parker before.
Unruly Places: Lost Spaces, Secret Cities, and Other Inscrutable Geographies by Alastair Bonnett
Trip of the Tongue: Cross-Country Travels in Search of America’s Language by Elizabeth Little
Petty Theft by Pascal Girard — I read this one this week since it’s a short graphic novel.
Dirty Wings by Sarah McCarry — I read this months ago but needed my own copy to sit beside the first book.
The Complete Stories of Flannery O’Connor by Flannery O’Connor
A Tale for the Time Being by Ruth Ozeki
The Book of Unknown Americans by Cristina Henriquez
My husband’s started in on the Bonnett and Little titles, since he’s a non-fiction reader, and he’s said positive things about both so far. I’m hoping this week to make a dent in a couple more of these.
Here’s what I read this week:
Total Constant Order by Crissa-Jean Chappel: I’m glad I was able to track this one down. A solid read about a girl dealing with obsessive compulsive disorder and how she navigates her world with it. I’ll talk more about this one, I think, but it’d be a great read alike to Heidi Ayarbe’s Compulsion.
Not Otherwise Specified by Hannah Moskowitz (March 3, 2015): I know this isn’t out for a long time but it’s so good. Put it on your to-read list. It’s a story about a black lesbian dancer who wants nothing more than to get out of Nebraska and on with her life. There are some really great threads here about relationships, about friendship, about eating disorders and how they do/don’t manifest, and how people are far more than meets the eye. Etta, the main character, has a fantastic voice and her perspective of the world is great.
Petty Theft by Pascal Girard: An amusing graphic novel about a man who is getting over a breakup and is unable to pursue any of his passions because of it. He stumbles across a woman who steals from his local bookstore, and he’s determined to catch her and turn her in. Then he happens to sort of fall for her and things get even more complicated. I think I’ll talk more about this one soon — I don’t think I’ve read a graphic novel in translation before, and I’m a bit fixated on that now.
Reading from around the web this week:
- This giant, thoughtful list of LGBTQ books from Book Riot is such an incredible resource.
- I loved this piece that Sarah McCarry wrote about her inspirations behind writing the sorts of books she does.
- The anatomy of a cover design — this one for Leslie Jamison’s The Empathy Exams — is really neat.
- Jennie Rothschild shared her methods of organization via the bullet journal.
- How about an interview at the Library of Congress with Amanda Brennan, the meme librarian who now works for Tumblr? It’s really interesting and offers a lot of food for thought about what a librarian is, what a librarian looks like, and where a librarian’s skills can be put to work.
- A lot more details about Kid Lit Con went up this week. Here’s a piece about the con over at the Nerdy Book Club, written by Jen Robinson. They’re still accepting presentation proposals and registration is now open.
If you missed it earlier this week, I am giving away another copy of It Happens, too.
Thanks for spreading the word about KidLitCon, Kelly! I'm enjoying this new format for your posts.