Xcaret Books

Here are the books that I finished on my trip - fewer than usual, because my friends and I were doing a "pass and play" board game on the flights! 

And the Category is…Inside New York's Vogue, House, and Ballroom Community (by Ricky Tucker) 

For the Read Harder Challenge category "a nonfiction book about BIPOC and/or queer history."  This is the history of the ballroom community, as you can probably guess from the title. I enjoyed this, although I found it structurally disjointed.  I would have loved this as, for instance, an oral history in chronological order. Maybe with a glossary of terms. Instead it's kind of a mishmash. But a lot of good information about an important political movement. 

It’s Been a Pleasure, Noni Blake (by Claire Christian) 

Another RHC book, this time "a romance with bisexual representation." Noni goes through a bad breakup and decides to take a sabbatical for work and go back to sleep with the ones that got away. It's very sex-positive and body positive, pretty light, but has interesting things to say about deciding what you want in life and going for it.  Enjoyable. 

Friday I’m in Love (by Camryn Garrett) 

My favorite Garrett YA novel so far. I enjoyed how it's essentially a Sapphic romance about Black joy, but also deals in a real way with issues of class and generational trauma that don't have easy answers. Loved our main character and the crackling chemistry with her love interest. Really an excellent YA.

The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida (by Shehan Karunatilaka) 

This is a Tournament of Books selection but also qualifies as "a historical fiction book set in an Eastern country" since it is set in the late '80s in Sri Lanka. I learned a lot about the history of this country and the civil war.  The narrator is a ghost who is in the "in between" and trying to solve his own murder. Beautifully written, as you might expect from something that won the Booker Prize last year. I wouldn't be surprised to see this win the ToB (I mean you never know, it could be out in the first round, but nonetheless it would be a deserving winner.) Really fabulous.