Year-End Book Wrapup 2019

My goal this year was to read 70 books and to complete the Read Harder Challenge. Achieved! You can see all my Challenge books on last-year’s wrapup post.

This year, I read 93 books: 65 by women, 26 by men, one by a nonbinary author, and one by a “xenofeminist collective.” I also added a fifth California library (San Bernardino) to my list, but honestly the Los Angeles Public Library is the best one. If you're a California resident who is ever in the Los Angeles area, and you check out ebooks, pick up a library card.

Top five books of the year:

1. Sounds like Titanic

I have tried to evangelize this book to everyone I know, yet somehow have not succeeded! It is amazing. A fantastic story, so well-written. Absolutely fell in love with this one.

2. Circe

In sharp contrast to Sounds Like Titanic, I feel like everyone I know has read and loved this one! And if you haven’t you should. An erudite, feminist, and oh-so-satisfying retelling of a familiar Greek myth. Song of Achilles is also very good, but Circe is a masterpiece.

3. The Great Believers

This one is very personal for me, as it strongly echoes the life of my biological mother in the 1980s. I have never met or spoken to her, but I’ve read some of her correspondence, and she lost many very close friends due to AIDS. This book is highly acclaimed and I do recommend it, but acknowledge I have personal reasons for appreciating it as much as I do!

4. Optic Nerve

Already the Tournament of Books is so much better than last year’s, when I liked almost nothing. This year I’ve already read a handful that I really like, and discovered Optic Nerve, a wonderful book in vignette form about the meaning of life and the meaning of art. Looking forward to discussing this in the Tournament!

5. Convenience Store Woman

I think this discovery was courtesy of the Read Harder Challenge in the category “A translated book written by and/or translated by a woman” (although Optic Nerve is by an Argentinian woman and would also have qualified). This is a wonderful, quirky novel from Japan about a woman who works at a convenience store and is at one with the life of the store. Fabulous.

Honorable mentions: The Testaments, Stag’s Leap, Looker, Eliza and Her Monsters, The One, Evvie Drake Starts Over, We Are Never Meeting In Real Life, The Bees, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, Fleishman Is in Trouble


Bottom three books:

I now give up on books if I don’t like them, for the most part, so slim pickings for bottom of the year.  I'm proud that I manage to do this; for a long time I was a completist and I had to learn that life's too short! Anyway, I have a list of “meh” but only three that I disliked enough to list here:

1. The Xenofeminist Manifesto

This is as pretentious as you might think a book written by a “xenofeminist collective” might be. This was a Read Harder Challenge book and a gift from a loved one, so I stuck with it. But alas, it was dumb.

2. Fall; or, Dodge in Hell  

I loved the premise of this, and then it ended up being so much white male privileged patriarchal bullshit.  This made me mad.

3. The Lifeboat

This one could have been great too, I was waiting for an awesome unreliable narrative twist, but instead it just dragged and was endlessly boring.

Next year my goal once again is to read 70 books and complete the Read Harder Challenge. I secretly want to read 100 since I got so close this year, but that seems like overkill. As usual, I’ll be updating this post as I get through the challenge and use a label on my posts so you can follow along. Any recommendations for these categories are welcome!

Here are the categories:

Total: 24/24

[X] A YA nonfiction book: The Borden Murders
[X] A retelling of a classic of the canon, fairytale, or myth by an author of color: Ash
[X]  A mystery where the victim(s) is not a woman: A Lady's Guide to Etiquette and Murder
[X]  A graphic memoir: Quiet Girl in a Noisy World
[X]  A book about a natural disaster: The Fires of Vesuvius
[X]  A play by an author of color and/or queer author: Yellow Face
[X]  A historical fiction novel not set in WWII:  The Mirror and the Light
[X]  An audiobook of poetry: Gmorning, Gnight
[X]  The LAST book in a series: Sleeping Murder
[X]  A book that takes place in a rural setting: Real Queer America
[X]  A debut novel by a queer author: London Calling
[X]  A memoir by someone from a religious tradition (or lack of religious tradition) that is not your own: Unorthodox
[X]  A food book about a cuisine you’ve never tried before: Meal
[X]  A romance starring a single parent: Midnight in Austenland
[X]  A book about climate change: New York 2140
[X]  A doorstopper (over 500 pages) published after 1950, written by a woman: Midnight Sun
[X]  A sci-fi/fantasy novella (under 120 pages): Story of Your Life
[X]  A picture book with a human main character from a marginalized community Parker Looks Up
[X]  A book by or about a refugee: On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous
[X]  A middle grade book that doesn’t take place in the U.S. or the UK: The Lacemaker and the Princess
[X]  A book with a main character or protagonist with a disability (fiction or non): Five Feet Apart
[X]  A horror book published by an indie press: Horrorstör
[X]  An edition of a literary magazine (digital or physical): Witness
[X]  A book in any genre by a Native, First Nations, or Indigenous author: Robopocalypse

Convenience Store Woman (Sayaka Murata)

What a delightful and strange little book. This book (translated from the Japanese) is about a woman who has worked for the same convenience store for 18 years, and feels that only within its world is she able to be a person that society understands. It is a commentary on social pressure, relationships, and mental differences. The details of the convenience store are rendered lovingly, and the narrator is delightfully unique. I stayed up too late finishing this one, a quick but absorbing read!

And with that, I've officially completed the 2019 Read Harder Challenge! You can scroll to the bottom of this entry to see the full list. Yay!

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks (by Rebecca Skloot)

I'm a bit behind the curve on this one, but I needed a book in the journalism category for the Read Harder Challenge, and that reminded me I hadn't read it yet! (Even though I was familiar with the broad outlines of the story and have donated to the Henrietta Lacks Foundation in the past.)

The story is compelling, and Skloot does an amazing service to Lacks's legacy. (As evidenced by all that has happened since the book's publication.) Parts of the story are so sad (the fate of Elsie, Henrietta's marriage and death) but the Lacks family comes to vibrant life and are portrayed in a thoughtful, not-at-all-condescending way, and their resilience and hope for the future is inspiring.

As compelling of a read as everyone promised it was!

Circe (by Madeline Miller)

Read on the strong recommendation of my book-loving colleagues, and also for the "book of mythology or folklore" category of the RHC.  I also have loved Greek mythology for many years, and often think fondly of my college seminar on the topic. (Shoutout to Hecate, goddess of crossroads, and the myth of Philomela.)

As you might guess, this has easily became one of my favorite reads of the year so far. Such a gorgeous and erudite retelling of the Circe myth, with an ending that is absolute perfection. It is a feminist retelling without being too on-the-nose about it, but damn it's great. I immediately reserved Song of Achilles from the library, because I want more mythology from her!

Cherry (by Nico Walker)

This Read Harder Challenge challenge was definitely a challenge.The category is "A book written in prison." Obviously I've read "A Letter from Birmingham Jail" (masterful) but I consider it more of an essay and I don't use re-reads for this category. So I started and abandoned De Profundis, Our Lady of the Flowers and (about halfway through) No Friend But the Mountains, before picking up Cherry. Despite the brisk writing style, this one took me a while too; to give you some context, while reading this I also re-read Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine and the last two Harry Potter books. But I pushed through.

This is an autobiographical novel by Nico Walker, an Iraq veteran and drug addict who is in prison (to this day) for robbing banks. His unnamed narrator has the same story arc. I found the war parts hard to get through for some reason, although you'd think knowing me that it would have been all the heroin injecting.  (Shoutout here to The Anxiety and Phobia Workbook, the reason I was able to read those parts at all.)

This book is darkly funny and a compelling read, but I wouldn't have finished it without the Challenge.

The Bees (by Laline Paull)

Found this via the Read Harder Challenge group on Goodreads, which recommended this for the category of "book in which an animal or inanimate object is a point-of-view character." In fact, the main character is Flora 717, a honeybee.

Paull draws from the science of bees, as I found out when I went looking up how bees reproduce and found that hive life is just as insane as it is portrayed here. But it's easy to sympathize with Flora, a sanitation bee who ends up with special talents that allow her to experience different aspects of life in the beehive.

I mentioned to my friend Miriam that the gender politics are interesting here, and indeed they are. Spoiler alert: I especially enjoyed the scene where all the lady bees decided the man bees were lazy and worthless and then bloodily massacred them all. #mood.

I'm gathering from friends' Goodreads reviews that this is a bit of a love-it-or-hate-it read, so your mileage may vary, but I loved it.

Vacation Reads: Hawaiian Cruise Edition

Here are the things I read on planes, ships, and beaches over the past week:


Evvie Drake Starts Over (by Linda Holmes) 

... saved especially so it could be my very first vacation book. So great and grounded and authentic and romantic and perfect. Absolutely loved it. 

Whisper Network (by Chandler Baker)

This novel is Big Little Lies x Lean In ÷ And Then We Came to the End

A bit unrealistic but rah rah feminist, very fun and ultimately satisfying. Loved the framing of the collective voice of women. (The author, Chandler Baker, is also a woman.) Reese will obviously be playing Sloane in the movie.

The Gifted School (by Bruce Holsinger) 

Also very Big Little Lies-esque! But like Whisper Network, adds in in the story of someone who is not white and not privileged. Seems that is a new part of the formula, which I like. Fun chewy interpersonal drama. Some characters (e.g. Kev) never quite crystallized but enjoyed it!

We Are Never Meeting In Real Life (by Samantha Irby)

A collection of humorous essays that fall under the humor category of the Read Harder Challenge. Hilarious but also super relatable. Essays don't tend to be my favorite, so there were a couple of false starts, but I'm glad I powered through and stuck with this one!

The Flatshare (by Beth O’Leary) 

A creampuff of a novel, fun but I doubt it will stick with me. Also do British people say "clock" all the time, drag queen style? Because both the main POV characters here do. (15 times, according to my app.) This is not a rhetorical question, please let me know.


Red, White & Royal Blue (by Casey McQuiston) 

A male-male romance between the son of the U.S. President and an English prince. Set in an alternate reality where a woman was elected president in 2016 (sob) and the world is not a garbage fire (sob, sob). Honestly impossible to fully escape into for that reason, but I loved the romance between these twentysomething characters. It was very reminiscent of Performance in a Leading Role, a rather famous piece of Sherlock fanfiction.

Whale Rider (by Witi Ihimaera)

For the category of "#ownvoices book set in Oceania," I finally read Whale Rider, a book about the Maori people of New Zealand by a Maori author.

I'd seen the movie, and enjoyed it, but not read the book.  My knowledge of Maori culture is limited to general Polynesian awareness and having once seen Whale Rider.  Plus this is a female empowerment film, about a young girl who is destined for greatness and craves her grandfather's approval, but he only thinks a boy can lead her generation. Moana owes a lot to this story as well. Plus, whales! So of course I enjoyed it!

A Disposition to Be Rich (by Geoffrey C. Ward)

The subtitle of this book is either "Ferdinand Ward, the Greatest Swindler of the Gilded Age" or "How a Small-Town Pastor’s Son Ruined an American President, Brought on a Wall Street Crash, and Made Himself the Best-Hated Man in the United States." Either way, it's a fascinating non-fiction book about a Bernie Madoff-style character during the Golden Age, written by his great-grandson, Pulitzer nominee Georfrey C. Ward.

I read this for the "non-violent true crime" category of the Read Harder Challenge. (I tried to read The Library Book, but got bored.) This is meticulously footnoted and researched, full of vivid detail about the entire Ward family, and all Ferd's victims (including Ulysses Grant).  The author steps in at the beginning and end to discuss the impact to his family -- his grandfather was Ferd's son, and was once kidnapped by Ferd in order to try and get his hands on family money.

Fascinating portrait of the "family sociopath" and a slice of life in Gilded Age America. Really enjoyed this.

Three Quick Reads

Going through books faster than I can blog about them, but to be fair, two of these were thrillers and those always go fast.

Binti (by Nnedi Okorafor)

Afrofuturistic space adventure featuring an amazing lead character, Binti! Won the Hugo and I think the Nebula award. Read for the category "A book by an AOC set in or about space." This is a novella and was a quick but super great read. Excited to continue with the series!

What the Dead Know (by Laura Lippman)

A fun thriller, albeit with an ending I saw coming about halfway through. I wanted more twists (I really enjoy being surprised) but enjoyed the read overall. 

The Silent Patient (by Alex Michaelides)

Now this is what I'm talking about! This one had a great twist and was a total page-turner! The ending makes no sense if you think about it, like, at all, but I don’t even care, I devoured this.

(Note: in both of these latter two books I highlighted some fatphobic content. Often mysteries introduce a lot of characters that have to be memorable, fast, and a lot of times "fat and grotesque" is a shorthand for these types of characters. Ugh, why.)

Frances and Bernard (by Carlene Bauer)

Read for the RHC category of Epistolary Novel, a genre that I really love. This is loosely based on the correspondence between Flannery O’Connor and Robert Lowell, and is about two writers named Frances and Bernard who meet at a writing colony, discover a mutual interest in Catholicism and writing, and become correspondents. They develop a complex and emotional relationship that unfolds beautifully over the course of the novel.




The writing itself is absolutely gorgeous, and I particularly fell in love with Frances, who has this beautifully drawn internal battle; she has to keep from setting herself on fire to keep Bernard warm. The ending is bittersweet and feels so honest and real. (I don't feel any closer to understanding Flannery O'Connor's Catholicism; I will confess that despite going to Catholic schools for 17 years and teaching O'Connor's fiction, I've never truly felt like I understood it.)

Definitely worth a read. 

Vacation Reads: PNW Road Trip Edition

Somehow a "vacation reads" post with only two books in it feels paltry, but I haven't finished my other two reads (Library Book and The Fifth Season) yet so here we are. Fortunately I'm the only person on earth who cares about the format of these book reviews.

Golden State (by Ben Winters)

I love the work of Ben Winters, even if his speculative fiction sometimes goes a bit off the rails, as it does here.  It's always interesting at the very least. This is about a near-future where truth is regulated and lying is punished by exile. A noirish detective story with a good twist and a strange ending. Didn't love it as much as Underground Airlines or the Last Policeman trilogy but I honestly will read whatever he writes.

An Extraordinary Union (by Alyssa Cole)

For the Read Harder Challenge category "historical romance by an author of color." This is about a free black woman posing as a slave to spy for the Union, and the man posing as a Confederate officer who becomes her ally. I'm not typically a romance reader but I really enjoyed this, found it well-researched and sexy. I loved the character of Elle and was thrilled to find she was loosely based on a real person. If you like historical romance you will probably enjoy this and bonus: it's the first book of a series!

The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie (by Alan Bradley)

I had this on my list because of the "cozy mystery" category of the Read Harder Challenge, and even though I already checked off that category, I'd heard enough about the Flavia de Luce novels to think I might enjoy them.

Narrated by a brilliant, Sherlockian 11-year-old, this mystery involved post-war traipsing around the English countryside, stamp collecting, and an intimate understanding of chemistry. Even the nicknames of her sisters -- Daffy and Feely -- are so freaking English. I suspended disbelief about Flavia being 11 and enjoyed the atmosphere and the unfolding of the mystery. 

I'm not sure how Flavia is going to get involved in more mysteries but I'll definitely add the next novel in this series to my library list.

There There (by Tommy Orange)

The last Tournament book I read before the competition got underway, and it was a good one! Would not be sad to see this one win, as opposed to, oh, all the other books except My Sister the Serial Killer. 

It's a multi-character narrative of American Indian characters in Oakland, leading up to the big powwow (the Big Oakland Powwow) at the end of the novel. The characters are interconnected in interesting ways, and Orange provides a glimpse of contemporary Indian life through many facets of these many characters.

It has my least favorite kind of ending (I won't spoil it but maybe you remember what it is) and yet in this case it feels more earned and more interesting than usual. Looking forward to the discussion about this one next week!

Vacation Reads: Truckee Edition

Spent the long weekend in the snow, giving me lots of time to read books! I'm about halfway through a giant one, but in the meantime, I finished some others:

Looker (by Laura Sims)

Absolutely loved it. This was marketed as a Gone Girl-style thriller but it’s not that. Instead, it’s a character study about a woman sinking into obsession with her actress neighbor. The protagonist is an unreliable narrator (my favorite, always) who reminded me of none other than Charles Kinbote, King of Zembla. The author isn't afraid to go dark and I loved the ending. Top book of the year so far!

When I Grow Up I Want to Be a List of Further Possibilities (by Chen Chen)

Such a great poetry collection, read for the Read Harder Challenge, by a gay Chinese man who writes about his identity, among other things. Here's a snippet I highlighted:

I’m envious of the clouds who can from time to time fall completely apart
& everyone just says, It's raining,
& someone might even bring cats & dogs into it,

no one says, Stop being so dramatic or You should see
a professional. 

Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald (by J.K. Rowling) 

I'm not into watching Johnny Depp do his weird Grindelwald thing, so I read the screenplay instead. Obviously a fast read, ended on a cliffhanger. The "fantastic beasts" part feels like such an afterthought to the overarching plot. Mostly I wish these were novels instead of movies and screenplays! 

Maid (by Stephanie Land) 

A compelling memoir about a single mother in poverty, albeit problematic in terms of white privilege. (She barely acknowledges it.)  Overall I feel like I would like a memoir of poverty from a woman of color, but given the world of blogs, it would be much harder for this hypothetical other woman to start a blog, and land a book deal. At any rate, Land's observations about the cycle of poverty and abuse make this worth a read regardless.

My Lesbian Experience with Loneliness (by Nagata Kabi)

My first time reading manga, which I guess is the point of the Read Harder Challenge! Overall I really enjoyed this; it's super honest and charming, very raw and real as the author talks about her experiences with self-harm, feelings of worthlessness, and sexual confusion.

The only thing I didn't like was the artwork convention where the lead character's face looks like it's melting off or she's sweating or crying. Sometimes it's clear which it is but sometimes not. The idea is "she's in distress" and I get that, but it was distracting to me because I always interpreted it as "it's hot and her face is melting like a candle." That is a real nitpick though.

I found the manga style pretty easy to get used to once I got the hang of it, and I can see why this one has won so many awards. I will pass this copy along to a loved friend and definitely try to find the sequel!  

George (by Alex Gino)

A book about a girl who at birth was assigned male and named George. She wants nothing more than to play Charlotte in her middle school's production of Charlotte's Web, and to be seen as she truly is: a girl.

This is a deeply moving read. It's impossible not to fall in love with Melissa (Melissa is the main character's preferred name) and sympathize or empathize with her struggles.  The use of the female pronoun throughout really emphasizes Melissa's identity. And the cruelty of some of the children in her class is a microcosm of what trans people face in the world today and how frankly ridiculous it is not to let people just be themselves.

Highly recommended for middle grade readers and beyond!

The Kiss Quotient (by Helen Hoang)

The last book I read was one that I thought was part of the Read Harder Challenge, but wasn't. In contrast, this one I didn't realize qualified for the Read Harder Challenge, but it does, in the category of "book by or about someone that identifies as neurodiverse."

This is a romance novel, which is not usually my genre, but it popped up in my library list so I must have heard about it somewhere. It's about a woman who has autism and written by a woman who also has autism.  It's a sort of reverse Pretty Woman storyline: a wealthy Silicon Valley engineer assumes she's bad in bed, and hires a male escort to help her learn how to have sex. He is escorting to pay his mother's medical bills. Romance ensues!

This book is kind of wall-to-wall sex, framed by a cute story. The lead character, Stella, is delightful and you really root for her. If you're into romance, I definitely recommend it.

Book Wrapup: L.A.

I took a bit of an unexpected trip to Los Angeles last week because my father had to have triple heart bypass surgery. My reading was a bit desultory, as in times of great worry I could focus mostly on random online games and not literature. But I did finish a few books during the trip. And, best of all, dad is on the mend and doing well!

The Parking Lot Attendant (by Nafkote Tamirat)

My notes say: Kind of enjoyable, but ultimately annoying and not grounded in reality. Maybe I'm missing The Metaphor or maybe don't have the patience for it right now. Another ToB disappointment. WHERE ARE THE GOOD BOOKS? 

I would characterize this as an okay read, though I didn't fully buy the characters, and didn't enjoy the ending. Also aych and I just chatted about the Tournament and I now think my main issue this year is that the library wait list is the longest for the top seeds with the most buzz, particularly There There and Washington Black. I should get The Mars Room and Warlight fairly soon. I may end up -- gasp -- actually purchasing a book because I am currently either 99th or 694th on the There There waitlist depending on which library you ask. 

True Porn Clerk Stories (by Ali Davis)

This came up in a thread on Ask Metafilter, I believe. This was a 2002-era online journal that I remembered highly enjoying at the time, and enjoyed revisiting as a time capsule of the video store and VHS porn era at the turn of the century.  It looks like Ali Davis has more recently become a playwright, and I hope to see more of her in the future. (Also this was self-published, so it ticks off a box in the Read Harder Challenge as well. Kismet!)

Born A Crime (by Trevor Noah)

The drive to and from Los Angeles was a good twelve hours, and the Extra Hot Great podcast can only get you so far! Friends had recommended this on audiobook, plus the South Africa aspect would give me and my mom something to chat about during our time together, since she grew up in South Africa (obviously, in a white township).  Well-structured, well-told, and gave me an appreciation of Trevor Noah that I hadn't previously had.

The Xenofeminist Manifesto (by Laboria Cuboniks)

Laboria Cuboniks is not a person but a "xenofeminist collective." I got this little book for Christmas and kicked off the Read Harder Challenge with it when I saw it had fewer than 100 Goodreads reviews (one of the categories).

Coming out of this reading experience, I think I would like xenofeminism if I fully understood it. I felt like I was back in grad school reading the words of passionate people with great ideas and inflated ways of conveying them.

What I got out of it in terms of principles: technology has the potential to create an egalitarian world but it needs to be created and maintained by someone other than a group of white men. Everyone has the right to speak without markers of race, sex, class until those markers are abolished.  Yay to both of those points and I would love to know how to personally work towards that! The book is written like this though:  

This non-absolute, generic universality must guard against the facile tendency of conflation with bloated, unmarked particulars -- namely Eurocentric universalism -- whereby the male is mistaken for the sexless, the white for raceless, the cis for the real, and so on. Absent such a universal, the abolition of race will remain a tacit white supremacism, and the absolution of gender will remain a thinly veiled misogyny, even -- especially -- when prosecuted by avowed feminists themselves.

This is one of the clearer passages but it gives you the idea. I would like to learn more about this movement in more actionable terms, but I'm not sure I can read a full book about the"autophagic orgy of indignity," "embedded velocities," or the "insurgent memeplex."