Weekend Reads and Deep Thoughts

I think I got all the tags for this diverse assortment of reads, which I finished over the weekend. 

Happily Ever Island (by Crystal Cestari) 

Okay, this would have been an instant-DNF if not for the Disney angle; the writing is very tell, don't show and reads extremely young for a romance between alleged college-age adults. The chemistry of the romance pairings isn't amazing (the two leads could have fallen in love, making for a better developed romance, but instead they each have their own underdeveloped love interest).  The suspension of disbelief required for this magical Disney island is off the charts (none of it makes any sense, this review by Abigail on Goodreads nails it). The book is produced by Disney and is straight-up propaganda. But did I finish the whole thing and enjoy all the Disneyness of it all? I absolutely did. But this is for Disney mega-fans only.

Husband Material (by Alexis Hall) 

The sequel to Boyfriend Material and has the same Bridget Jones type of vibe. It shamelessly borrows the structure of Four Weddings and a Funeral, although the throughline isn't as well-established. But still laugh-out-loud funny and an enjoyable read.  

Sad Cypress (by Agatha Christie) 

A Christie that is very good, not mind-blowing, but extremely solid. The characters are compelling, the solution is satisfying.  The racism, while unfortunately present as it is in most of Christie's books, is at least minimal.  (Can they do a "cut back on the racism" edit of these books already?) Recommended for Christie fans.

70. Love After the End: An Anthology of Two-Spirit and Indigiqueer Speculative Fiction (editor Joshua Whitehead) 

A Read Harder pick for "an anthology featuring diverse voices."  I bought this from the publisher on paper to support the editor and authors. My favorite parts were actually the editor's note at the beginning and the final two stories! The editor's note from Joshua Whitehead has been in my head since I read it, for two reasons.  

Firstly, he interrogates the typical notion of post-apocalyptic fiction by asserting that for indigenous people, we have already been living in a post-apocalyptic dystopia. And I was like oh my god, of course we have. I realized how deeply my colonialist mindset had been embedded. Of course this is the dystopia. And not just in the "post-Trump-era" way that white people think of it, but in the post-colonial, post-slavery, post-indiginous genocide, post-smallpox and Columbus way. We've been in the dystopia all along. (Whitehead focuses the stories in this anthology on post-apocalyptic hope for native communities, and this is why.)

Secondly, there are a lot of queer stories here, and Whitehead brings up Annie on My Mind as the first queer YA with a happy ending. It was published in 1985, when I was 10 years old. I probably discovered it when I was 13 or so.  And in every other book I read, the protagonists were white and straight and cis.  No wonder I devour queer YA now.  No wonder it took me so long to realize I was bisexual, as I had absolutely no framework to think about it before that. And my child at age 10-13 will be growing up with a world of representation that we didn't have a generation ago. It's really amazing to me.

Anyway, that one paragraph in the introduction made the book worth it, but the stories are also enjoyable all the way through, and I recommend checking it out!