kathryn_a_million's reviews
27 reviews

Patternmaster by Octavia E. Butler

adventurous challenging dark fast-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

3.75

First of this series I’ve read and it doesn’t seem like the order matters which is good bc i think this one is somewhere in the middle. She really never misses. This one could have been three times as long, and the ending is a bit unsatisfying, but still felt like an earned victory. Love that the healer Amber was bisexual also.

A Natural History of Transition by Callum Angus

adventurous emotional mysterious medium-paced

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

4.25

Consider me charmed. Short story format made so much sense here, using magical realism to complicate and shade more generic or otherwise human forms of transformation. I’ll be thinking about Rock Jenny for a while, wish I could go visit her shoulder, take a hike on her hip. Winter of Men and Rock Jenny were my standouts.

I Who Have Never Known Men by Jacqueline Harpman

adventurous dark reflective tense fast-paced

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

3.75

Quietly devastating, I held out hope until the very last page but inevitably it was a very French ending to an incredibly constructed predicament. Hope and curiosity are not only valuable survival tools, but mental health tools for the prevention of madness and despair. “Because I want to know! Sometimes, you can use what you know, but that's not what counts most. I want to know everything there is to know. Not because it's any use, but for the pleasure of knowing, and now I demand that you teach me everything you know, even if I will never be able to use it.”

The Wolves by Sarah DeLappe

adventurous funny lighthearted fast-paced

4.0

All Fours by Miranda July

reflective medium-paced

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

3.0

The Days of Abandonment by Elena Ferrante

dark emotional sad slow-paced

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

2.25

So many people recommend this book and Ferrante in general and it couldn’t have been more unpleasant for me to read. I get why people like it if they love languishing women type stuff, like Rachel Cusk. Not my thing 

Our Town by Thornton Wilder

emotional lighthearted reflective fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.5

Reread to make sure I still loved it.  Finished it in total and complete solitude and stillness, when I was still  without power or phone service at my house. A time I didn’t particularly need the reminder of how precious and fragile this life is, but delivered on forced gratitude regardless. I love plays! Fuck! 

The Word for World is Forest by Ursula K. Le Guin

adventurous dark tense fast-paced

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

3.75

I finished this book right before falling asleep in a Portuguese hostel and I woke up on my birthday to my sister telling me Trump was shot in the ear. I was glad I had just read this book offering me a bit of extraterrestrial perspective on humankind’s  most violent tendencies. 

Motherhood by Sheila Heti

challenging emotional tense slow-paced

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

3.0

A well written but ultimately tormenting read. Maybe it caught me at a bad time but I felt a little depresso with all the indecisiveness and pessimism. I know she’s probably right about everything though. 

John by Annie Baker

dark funny mysterious tense medium-paced

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

3.75

Loved the setting, use of clock, music, humor. Awesome to imagine it on the stage. The characters were hard to like, and that just makes it a lil tough to connect with.