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readingpicnic's reviews
487 reviews
One Hundred Demons by Lynda Barry
4.5
I picked this up after seeing the multimedia artforms on the cover and the chapter introductions, which I fell in love with. I would just stare at these chapter introduction pages for about five minutes each time I came to one to really soak them in. This was such a feral girlhood book, which I LIVE for. I also really appreciated how the topic of CSA was handled in such a thoughtful and honest way, as I almost never see it talked about in depth in books due to the shame that we associate with it. I had to write down the quote associated with her lack of memories (and avoidance/refusal to remember these memories) of it because it hit so close to home: "Especially because you don't remember that time, you can't forget it but you do remember never to remember it, the time when the shattering into pieces became a way of life."
Content Warnings
Graphic: Child abuse
Moderate: Bullying, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Pedophilia, Sexual assault, Suicide, Toxic relationship
Minor Detail by Adania Shibli
4.5
I've had to sit with this book for a few days after finishing it so that I could try to do it justice in a review. The first half of the book centers around the subject of interest in the latter half of the book, the Palestinian girl who was gang-r*ped by Israeli soldiers and then murdered. The main character in the latter half of the book, a journalist, becomes interested in the girl's story after realizing that her death date was exactly 25 years before the MC's birth date, which caught her eye and generated a need to know more about this girl. The two parts of the book connect in pieces that the MC doesn't even realize because she doesn't have access to the information from the first half of the book, and it's essentially lost knowledge/history. She wishes to feel some connection to the girl who died while not realizing that some of her actions and sensory experiences are replicating what the girl went through, and this strong desire for connection coupled with the not knowing the connections do exist really devastated me. Some examples I wrote down were the dog howling/barking haunting the MC, and the dog also seemed to be a ghost at one point on page 94? There's also a scene on page 92 where the MC spills gasoline on herself after saying that she wishes she could stay in the area longer to get a clue as to what the girl endured, even though her reeking of gasoline for the remainder of the book is part of what the girl endured at the hands of the soldiers. In the first half of the book, the parts where the main soldier in charge was frantically crushing every bug in his room every night and was losing his mind a bit also fucked me up a lot. The imagery of barriers, both physical and metaphorical was very powerful in this book, especially with the way the MC worried over them in every interaction. One quote that really stuck out to me was "By the way, I hope I didn't cause any awkwardness when I mentioned the incident with the soldier, or the checkpoint, or when I reveal that we are living under occupation here" (56). I saw a TikTok explaining greenwashing before reading this book, and I'm really glad that I went into it with that context since I saw it come up again and again with mentions of Canada Park and Israeli soldiers saying that they were going to revitalize the land because Palestinians didn't know/didn't care to take care of it (not fucking true btw).
The last few pages of the book felt so aimless and wandering as the MC realizes that she truly cannot find the lost history of the girl and that her journey cannot have a satisfying ending because of all the barriers that prevent her from this knowledge. The ending of the book was shocking, but also not shocking due to the violence of this book and the almost expected violence by Israeli soldiers. The only part of this book that I wasn't a huge fan of was how it's written with every single action spelled out if that makes sense. Like, if a character got out of a vehicle, then every single part of that action was detailed from start to finish. I'm sure there's a reason for this method of storytelling, but maybe I can't see what it is in relation to the overarching themes of the book right now. Overall, this is such a necessary read.
Also, side note, I saw that someone added this to the Autistic Reads Challenge, and I agree that I was contemplating while reading this whether the main character of the second half was autistic and/or neurodivergent due to her thought processes, but I wasn't sure whether that was intentional on the author's part. I hesitate because she may process the world in these ways and think in these ways due to trauma and the circumstances in which she lives under occupation and has to be on high alert and think through interactions carefully, but acquired neurodivergence and disabilities due to trauma are valid, so I'm on the edge with this.
The last few pages of the book felt so aimless and wandering as the MC realizes that she truly cannot find the lost history of the girl and that her journey cannot have a satisfying ending because of all the barriers that prevent her from this knowledge. The ending of the book was shocking, but also not shocking due to the violence of this book and the almost expected violence by Israeli soldiers. The only part of this book that I wasn't a huge fan of was how it's written with every single action spelled out if that makes sense. Like, if a character got out of a vehicle, then every single part of that action was detailed from start to finish. I'm sure there's a reason for this method of storytelling, but maybe I can't see what it is in relation to the overarching themes of the book right now. Overall, this is such a necessary read.
Also, side note, I saw that someone added this to the Autistic Reads Challenge, and I agree that I was contemplating while reading this whether the main character of the second half was autistic and/or neurodivergent due to her thought processes, but I wasn't sure whether that was intentional on the author's part. I hesitate because she may process the world in these ways and think in these ways due to trauma and the circumstances in which she lives under occupation and has to be on high alert and think through interactions carefully, but acquired neurodivergence and disabilities due to trauma are valid, so I'm on the edge with this.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Animal cruelty, Genocide, Gun violence, Hate crime, Physical abuse, Racism, Rape, Sexual assault, Torture, Violence, Police brutality, Kidnapping, Murder, War
Anya's Ghost by Vera Brosgol
4.0
Maybe I’m silly, but I didn’t see the plot twist coming at all, and I didn’t expect this to get quite so creepy (pleasant surprise). This art style is so scrumptious; I adore the thick, clean lines. Emily was getting up to so many creepy kid antics, I loved it (like Rhoda from The Bad Seed vibes). The character growth with Anya was sweet. Hope her mom’s okay lol.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Fire/Fire injury, Sexual harassment
Moderate: Body shaming, Bullying, Eating disorder, Toxic friendship
Mallory in Full Color by Elisa Stone Leahy
4.5
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher Quill Tree Books for a free digital ARC in exchange for an honest review.
Honestly, this was just a good book. I don’t know if it was the writing or the sweet story, but it was never far from my mind. I liked the representation of a queer kid trying to figure out their identity in an environment where it’s safe for them to do so; where they have queer and trans friends to turn to and family members who they know will support them. However, that’s not to say there isn’t transphobia and homophobia surrounding her, as most of the book centers on her local drag queen storytime becoming national news due to controversy and subsequently being canceled.
The way that the comic pages and art in the story show Mal exploring her identities as a queer Korean American child was really well done, and I love how the cover of the book connects back to this with her self-portrait in the story. Mal spends the majority of the story trying to be who everyone wants her to be to the point where she loses track of herself and feels a disconnect from how everyone perceives her. Mal screws up a lot, lies to a lot of people, and says the wrong stuff sometimes, but she does genuinely act like a middle schooler, and I feel like these are middle schooler things to do. This book was so middle school in a way that didn’t make me cringe, but was moreso funny and nostalgic to me. Her brothers were also so feral and funny. I feel like this author just understands children and tweens in a way that I don’t get from a lot of middle grade books, and I can’t really put my finger on why. I think it would be excellent for queer middle school kids read this book, and it makes me happy that this will surely happen.
I think the main part that took me out of the story was the mom’s monologue in the end ending with her saying a line about Mallory being in “full color,” which struck me as a last ditch effort to include the title of the book in the book in a way that didn’t feel organic or natural. I do also think that the tag on NetGalley of this being a graphic novel threw me off because there are only graphic novel pages in between each chapter, so it’s basically a novel with illustrations, which is still cool.There was also a friendship in the book (with Fiona maybe?) that never felt resolved other than Mal recognizing that she didn’t like how she acted around her and then I don’t think she really showed up again, which felt like a loose end, but wasn't too big of a deal. I adored the book overall.
Honestly, this was just a good book. I don’t know if it was the writing or the sweet story, but it was never far from my mind. I liked the representation of a queer kid trying to figure out their identity in an environment where it’s safe for them to do so; where they have queer and trans friends to turn to and family members who they know will support them. However, that’s not to say there isn’t transphobia and homophobia surrounding her, as most of the book centers on her local drag queen storytime becoming national news due to controversy and subsequently being canceled.
The way that the comic pages and art in the story show Mal exploring her identities as a queer Korean American child was really well done, and I love how the cover of the book connects back to this with her self-portrait in the story. Mal spends the majority of the story trying to be who everyone wants her to be to the point where she loses track of herself and feels a disconnect from how everyone perceives her. Mal screws up a lot, lies to a lot of people, and says the wrong stuff sometimes, but she does genuinely act like a middle schooler, and I feel like these are middle schooler things to do. This book was so middle school in a way that didn’t make me cringe, but was moreso funny and nostalgic to me. Her brothers were also so feral and funny. I feel like this author just understands children and tweens in a way that I don’t get from a lot of middle grade books, and I can’t really put my finger on why. I think it would be excellent for queer middle school kids read this book, and it makes me happy that this will surely happen.
I think the main part that took me out of the story was the mom’s monologue in the end ending with her saying a line about Mallory being in “full color,” which struck me as a last ditch effort to include the title of the book in the book in a way that didn’t feel organic or natural. I do also think that the tag on NetGalley of this being a graphic novel threw me off because there are only graphic novel pages in between each chapter, so it’s basically a novel with illustrations, which is still cool.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Racism, Transphobia, Xenophobia
Neighborhood Story, Vol. 1 by Ai Yazawa
Did not finish book. Stopped at 34%.
Did not finish book. Stopped at 34%.
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher VIZ Media for a free digital ARC of the book in exchange for an honest review.
I ended up DNFing this manga at 34% through because although the art was lovely, the story was really falling flat for me. It centered around a very basic love triangle where the guy was childhood best friends with the main character and they maybe harbor "secret" feelings for each other and the popular gyaru girl that everyone calls "Body-Ko" to objectify her. The will-they-won't-they slow burn that I think this story was trying to achieve between the guy and the girl was so repetitive and I didn't care at all for their friendship or relationship. I think their characters and relationship wasn't developed enough for me to be invested in them, and they just were bad friends to each other in general. I did like the fashion school setting because Ai Yazawa is great at drawing outfits, so that was a plus.
The misogyny and objectification of women in this book was just too icky for me, from like every single character. The way the women changed themselves physically to appeal to the guy weirded me out, and him acting like being a "nice guy" who doesn't like girls wearing makeup makes him the ideal man. Also, just weird comments about how "boys shouldn't have piercings anyway!," like okay...
Ai Yazawa also isn't beating the cultural appropriation allegations with depictions of TWO non-Black characters in this manga wearing Black hairstyles (Mariko's brother wearing locs and Mikako wearing an afro in the color pages in the back of the book). Past iffy behaviors include, but surely aren't limited to, Hachi's sister in Nana and occasionally depicting Junko's design in racist caricatured ways in the anime and manga.
Overall, the attitudes and depictions of sexuality and gender feel so cisheteronormative, and I just expected more. I was not the audience for this.
I ended up DNFing this manga at 34% through because although the art was lovely, the story was really falling flat for me. It centered around a very basic love triangle where the guy was childhood best friends with the main character and they maybe harbor "secret" feelings for each other and the popular gyaru girl that everyone calls "Body-Ko" to objectify her. The will-they-won't-they slow burn that I think this story was trying to achieve between the guy and the girl was so repetitive and I didn't care at all for their friendship or relationship. I think their characters and relationship wasn't developed enough for me to be invested in them, and they just were bad friends to each other in general. I did like the fashion school setting because Ai Yazawa is great at drawing outfits, so that was a plus.
The misogyny and objectification of women in this book was just too icky for me, from like every single character. The way the women changed themselves physically to appeal to the guy weirded me out, and him acting like being a "nice guy" who doesn't like girls wearing makeup makes him the ideal man. Also, just weird comments about how "boys shouldn't have piercings anyway!," like okay...
Ai Yazawa also isn't beating the cultural appropriation allegations with depictions of TWO non-Black characters in this manga wearing Black hairstyles (Mariko's brother wearing locs and Mikako wearing an afro in the color pages in the back of the book). Past iffy behaviors include, but surely aren't limited to, Hachi's sister in Nana and occasionally depicting Junko's design in racist caricatured ways in the anime and manga.
Overall, the attitudes and depictions of sexuality and gender feel so cisheteronormative, and I just expected more. I was not the audience for this.
Please Stop Trying to Leave Me by Alana Saab
4.5
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher Vintage for a free digital ARC of the book in exchange for an honest review.
This story is meandering in a good way. Reminiscent of Interesting Facts About Space by Emily Austin with its unabashed look into the mind of a mentally ill, neurodivergent queer woman who shares her most shameful thoughts with the reader and her therapist, similarly to I Want to Die But I Want to Eat Tteokbokki or Mr. Robot. As someone who was once diagnosed with depersonalization disorder myself, this was an intensely relatable look at dissociation and how it impacts one’s relationships. I haven’t seen dissociation and depersonalization disorder represented this well in a piece of media ever…except maybe playing the game Night in the Woods? The descriptions of what it feels like to not be present in your body, such as the feeling of being coated in saran wrap, were perfect. The humor is also deeply and darkly funny as the narrator obsesses over minute things that bother her, and I found myself laughing out loud often. The formatting of the story worried me at first with it being prose-like and absent of quotation marks, but I quickly got used to it and it wasn’t confusing. The storytelling method of switching between the author’s real life and her memoir-esque fictional short stories was very effective with the blending of these realities featuring magical realism and horror within the short stories being compared with the horrors and traumas of reality. I would suggest looking through the trigger warnings before reading this if you or someone you know has a history with mental illness and childhood trauma especially. One part towards the end that really hit me hard was this:
“What Norma meant to say with each metaphor was that her writing was doing what her mind had done for twenty-seven years. Her writing kept her pain at a distance from her. It kept her memories dissociated from her body. It kept her emotions trapped somewhere away from her heart. Writing was her attempt at transplanting her trauma into a character so she didn’t have to hold it. And when she transplanted it, she could edit the trauma the way she so badly wanted to edit her memories. Sometimes the pain was so difficult, she had to write a character who was writing another character.”
Just…damn. A lot of my experiences with trauma and mental illness and weird family dynamics were strikingly similar to Norma’s, so this book really hit me hard and I had to take my time with it. Will this book be what finally makes me go to therapy?
This story is meandering in a good way. Reminiscent of Interesting Facts About Space by Emily Austin with its unabashed look into the mind of a mentally ill, neurodivergent queer woman who shares her most shameful thoughts with the reader and her therapist, similarly to I Want to Die But I Want to Eat Tteokbokki or Mr. Robot. As someone who was once diagnosed with depersonalization disorder myself, this was an intensely relatable look at dissociation and how it impacts one’s relationships. I haven’t seen dissociation and depersonalization disorder represented this well in a piece of media ever…except maybe playing the game Night in the Woods? The descriptions of what it feels like to not be present in your body, such as the feeling of being coated in saran wrap, were perfect. The humor is also deeply and darkly funny as the narrator obsesses over minute things that bother her, and I found myself laughing out loud often. The formatting of the story worried me at first with it being prose-like and absent of quotation marks, but I quickly got used to it and it wasn’t confusing. The storytelling method of switching between the author’s real life and her memoir-esque fictional short stories was very effective with the blending of these realities featuring magical realism and horror within the short stories being compared with the horrors and traumas of reality. I would suggest looking through the trigger warnings before reading this if you or someone you know has a history with mental illness and childhood trauma especially. One part towards the end that really hit me hard was this:
“What Norma meant to say with each metaphor was that her writing was doing what her mind had done for twenty-seven years. Her writing kept her pain at a distance from her. It kept her memories dissociated from her body. It kept her emotions trapped somewhere away from her heart. Writing was her attempt at transplanting her trauma into a character so she didn’t have to hold it. And when she transplanted it, she could edit the trauma the way she so badly wanted to edit her memories. Sometimes the pain was so difficult, she had to write a character who was writing another character.”
Just…damn. A lot of my experiences with trauma and mental illness and weird family dynamics were strikingly similar to Norma’s, so this book really hit me hard and I had to take my time with it. Will this book be what finally makes me go to therapy?
Content Warnings
Graphic: Body horror, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Pedophilia, Sexual assault, Suicidal thoughts, Toxic relationship, Blood, Medical content, Medical trauma, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Cancer, Self harm
How the Boogeyman Became a Poet by Tony Keith Jr.
5.0
This audiobook was incredible! Stellar performance with added sound effects that kept my attention the whole time. I’m always super interested in stories where young queer people find queer community and friendship online before ever seeking out these communities irl, especially for QTBIPOC people living in predominantly white cisnormative heteronormative spaces. I also loved the love that he had for the women in his life and the emphasis on female, sisterly, and motherly friendships—very sweet.
Another Appalachia: Coming Up Queer and Indian in a Mountain Place by Neema Avashia
3.75
I appreciated the overarching dichotomy between having love for your rural small town and its people while also acknowledging the racism and harmful beliefs held by the majority of people in your small town; that you can only be acceptable to them if you "don't get political," while their Facebooks are filled with harmful rhetoric about minoritized communities. I haven't gotten to the point where I'm proud to come from a rural small town (Midwest not Appalachia), but I suppose me constantly reading rural queer books shows some fondness on my part? I do love a short book, but this didn't feel like it had quite enough time to round itself out. Although I enjoyed the book for the most part, I didn't love the narrator of the audiobook. Speaking of, crazy thought, but what if non-Black audiobook narrators didn't read the full n-word out loud even if the non-Black author of the book wrote it in full...
Content Warnings
Graphic: Racial slurs, Racism, Xenophobia
Moderate: Bullying, Gun violence, Homophobia, Mass/school shootings, Religious bigotry, Lesbophobia
My Favorite Thing is Monsters Vol. 2 by Emil Ferris
dark
4.0
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher Fantagraphics Books, Inc. for a free digital ARC of the book in exchange for an honest review.
Since the ARC I received is only the first 200 pages of the book, I want to preface by saying that my review only reflects half of the book, but I am eagerly awaiting an opportunity to finish the book because the suspense is really getting to me! Emil Ferris is a master of the cliffhanger. I read the first book five months ago, so I was a little disoriented going back into Anka’s story in particular since I didn’t remember where we left off with it, but that’s my bad for not refreshing myself on the story. I did like how the book started off with Victor, since it was such a major cliffhanger for the end of the first book.
This book follows Karen and Deeze’s relationship a lot more closely, which was interesting to see since Deeze is such a complex character with so many sides to him, which complicates the suspicion surrounding him with Anka’s death. Their relationship is strained due to a lot of factors, including him now being her primary caregiver, but they have some very heartfelt moments that I enjoyed, such as visiting the art museum together and Deeze showing Karen his cover for the monster magazine. I do think Karen is getting a new love interest, which makes me happy for her since she’s going through a lot…
The art is incredible as always, and the lined journal set-up for the pages really lends itself to the feeling that Karen is writing and drawing the book. I love how art is woven throughout the story, with paintings that Karen visits with Deeze in art museums, as well as the cover art from the monster magazines. This series inexplicably reminds me of the game What Remains of Edith Finch, mostly the chapter focusing on the girl who starred in a monster film as a child. Karen is such an interesting and loveable character, and I adore her point of view of the world–her curiosity, her weirdness, her imagination as it pertains to monsters and her own monstrosity, etc. This story has a lot of triggering and explicit Holocaust portrayals, as well as lesbophobia, racism, and racial slurs, so be warned of that going into the book. I’ll be sure to update my review once I get my monstrous little hands on a copy of the full book, but until then, this was a very satisfying sneak peek into book two.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Child death, Death, Genocide, Homophobia, Racial slurs, Racism, Sexual violence, Torture, Violence, Antisemitism, Murder, Lesbophobia
Moderate: Trafficking, Death of parent
Slow Noodles: A Cambodian Memoir of Love, Loss, and Family Recipes by Chantha Nguon
5.0
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher Algonquin Books for a free digital ARC (or I guess a late reader copy since I requested this and was approved after it was already published) in exchange for an honest review. The recipes were tied into the story so well before they were reintroduced in recipe format, and it was such a wonderful enmeshing of genres that felt so natural. The ways that the recipes were altered in creative ways, such as with instructions to noisily prepare food to make the eater feel unwelcome eating it–so creative. The food descriptions were incredible and so meticulous, and you can tell the author’s passion for the food knowledge that she wrote this to preserve, keeping both her mother and culture’s recipes alive. The mission of this book and the execution were fairly flawless in my opinion, and even though readers should check the trigger warnings due to the traumas of the Cambodian genocide and living in communist North Vietnam with extremely rationed food, living in extreme poverty, as well as losing so many family members to illness, it is still definitely worth the read. The family dynamics were very interesting to read about, especially in the ways some of her siblings just stopped interacting with them after moving away from Cambodia and the normalcy of that (could just be my western perspective). I am truly not very educated on Cambodia’s history, so even though I learned some of that history from this book, this really emphasized for me how much more I have to learn (I think I’ll read Ma and Me by Putsata Reang soon). I think that ending the book with an epilogue from her daughter was a great way to round out the story and really emphasized the generations of women that are so prevalent in this story. The relationships between Chantha and her mom, her sister (who also took on a mothering role), and then between her and her daughter were the true through line of this book, and it just all came together so nicely and in such a lovely way. Anyways, 5 stars, and I’m glad I took my time reading this slowly.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Cancer, Child death, Confinement, Death, Genocide, Mental illness, Racism, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, Death of parent, Murder, War, Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Misogyny, Sexual violence, Trafficking, Sexual harassment