julis's reviews
502 reviews

Wounds Into Wisdom: Healing Intergenerational Jewish Trauma by Tirzah Firestone

challenging emotional medium-paced

5.0

Well this was timely.

I actually had it on hold from the library for a bit, but Recent Bullshit makes it super pertinent.

Very, very good look at specifically Jewish trauma and how to approach it from a Jewish lens–there’s a little bit in the beginning that’s SUPER Jungian bullshit but it moves past that and can be easily ignored.

This is a book for us, about us, about our collective historical trauma, both directly inherited and radiated throughout diaspora & Israeli culture, and how we can grow through it, not let it dictate our fears. And–again, extremely pertinent–how to keep from perpetuating the cycle of trauma and oppression. 

The Unbroken by C.L. Clark

challenging dark tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

This came from one of those tumblr posts on what to read when GtN has just occupied your brain and yeah.

Anti-colonialism fantasy about French North Africa and how it only takes a handful of genuinely bad actors to completely destabilize a good faith attempt at peace. Also, as might be guessed, queer women.

Has a few moments that made me go “yeah this is a first novel” mostly in some of the transitions, but exceptional work otherwise. 

The Queen of Attolia by Megan Whalen Turner

adventurous tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

Literally every potential flaw in this book (sometimes the writing is clunky, the pacing can be odd, the style is occasionally jarring) I am ignoring in favor of the ship, which is incredibly toxic and balls-to-the-wall insane and 100% my jam. God. She terrifies him and he wants to climb her like a tree. I love it.

I am though Hmm at like. This is not a work of historical fiction it is Greek-inspired but not about Greece and yet the Medes are just straight out of an Ancient Greek text on Persia like. A little deconstruction would’ve killed you? I get it’s YA published in 2000 but come on. 

Ninth House by Leigh Bardugo

challenging dark tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

GOD. This one’s gonna be rattling around my brain for a while.

I absolutely see how you go from Six of Crows to this; I still have no idea what went wrong to produce the Grisha trilogy but as long as I don’t need to read it again I don’t care.

Bardugo posits an Ivy League filled with secret societies, each with their own variety of horrible rituals, running America–wait, that’s just reality.

Part of the fun is that NH’s Yale is so real, it’s so palpably close to truth that the side characters feel like guys you know or friends of friends, you know, that frat that got kicked off campus for a hazing ritual involving sheep?

Which in turn leads to some of the most repellent characters, BECAUSE they are so true to life.

Plotting is aces, pacing phenomenal, etc. 

Strike the Zither by Joan He

medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

I do not remember why this wound up on my to-read list. I was underimpressed. The biggest problem through the whole book is I needed slightly more context and explanations for just about everything. I don’t know if this is He’s fault (general pacing problem, slow it down and let everything breathe a bit!) or editor’s fault (YA has to be under X,000 words) but jesus christ.

It’s not an inability of mine to read into implications either, it’s that He outright does not even imply what’s going on with the government: She gives a couple of broad statements and then cruises onwards. Nor do I know why I should give a damn about anyone in this book, Xin Ren included. Which is a bit of a problem, because her loyalty to Xin Ren is Zephyr’s primary motivator and it is completely inexplicable.

The SECOND problem is that if you are going to go “hah! the gods are real!” midway through, there has to be some setup on the way there. You cannot just pull that out of your ass 50% in. And I’m not talking “oh but Zephyr would’ve dismissed things because she’s a skeptic” I’m saying there is ZERO mention of magic or gods before that point. The most we get are a couple conversations about stars and the Empress. That’s it. Then the plot hinges on the reality of the gods and I’m going. What. Come back here and give me just like 2-3 rumors, Zephyr dismissing them as peasant superstitions and it would’ve been FINE I would’ve been COOL but NO– 

Piranesi by Susanna Clarke

adventurous emotional tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

I liked this better than JS&MN, the pacing was much better. Obviously in conversation with Plato, Borges, etc, does anyone else think it’s also in conversation with The Secret History?

Characters suitably deranged, setting nuts, etc. Both this and JS&MN are thinking a lot about giving information to/keeping it from the reader: JS&MN has the infamous footnotes, which I loved, and this is from the POV of someone who at first knows nothing at all. For periods of the book the reader knows more than he does. 

Puppy Socialization: What It Is and How to Do It by Marge Rogers, Eileen Anderson

informative fast-paced

5.0

This is it, my favorite puppy socialization book. It balances “but I want my adult dog to be people/dog neutral” with “also I’d like her not to want to eat the delivery person” and “what if dogsports!!!!”. It’s slightly overwhelming but so is owning a puppy, and it is EXTREMELY straight forward. They do not give options, they give directions, which is exactly what puppy owners need. 

Social, Civil, and Savvy: Training & Socializing Puppies to Become the Best Possible Dogs by Laura VanArendonk Baugh

informative fast-paced

4.0

Guess What I Just Got A Puppy.

This is a lovely and very approachable book on puppy socialization for most people. For me it’s a hair short and cursory. I bookmarked a couple of exercises I’ll be using with puppy, and it is going on my recommendations list, but it’s not the BEST for ME. 

Oedipus Rex by Sophocles

dark fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

Another Dover Thrift Edition with 0 commentary, although this one was originally sold for $1.50 and also apparently it’s been on my bookcase for thirteen years. Anyway.

I do have thoughts on the play but they’re messy and disorganized, I think primarily I’m struck by just the. slow series of revelations, the catastrophic dramatic irony of knowing who Oedipus is the whole time, watching everything fall down around his ears, that he’s initially TRYING to save his city but promptly loses his temper in the worst way–yowch.

Hurricane Lizards and Plastic Squid: The Fraught and Fascinating Biology of Climate Change by Thor Hanson

challenging hopeful informative medium-paced

5.0

VERY nice. Realistic attitude towards the current situation (published 2021) without being pessimistic or defeatist. Wide-ranging, honest about our impact on the world, but also full of reminders that life will survive. That doesn’t excuse our current behavior: What’s coming is decades of incredible suffering for humans largely in the Global South and non-human animals. But we can also dial back the fatalism just a smidge.