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sunfishcakes's reviews
246 reviews
Woodworking by Emily St. James
4.0
Might bump this up to 4.5 later. This might sound quaint, but I really had a wonderful time reading this. I'm delighted that a critic whose writing I've (on and off) followed for over a decade didn't disappoint.
The Icon and the Idealist: Margaret Sanger, Mary Ware Dennett, and the Rivalry That Brought Birth Control to America by Stephanie Gorton
4.5
Really great. What I most appreciated was the contextualizing of the birth control movement in American history as a fundamentally feminist movement concerned with the welfare and agency of women*, especially working class women, but also undeniably enmeshed with the then popular and explicit movement of eugenics. Neither aspects cancel each other out but provide complexity to the historical moment that's still entrenched in current cultural attitudes and debates around birth control (and abortion).
Also, while the topics are handled with the necessary care, thought, and severity, there's a strain of gossip and petty intrigue (on the part of the figures involved, not the author) that I found compelling and humanizing
*By this I mainly mean cisgender women, but as Gorton points out (citing Donna Drucker), this is more to do with the historical category of women which conflates the ability to birth children with gender.
Also, while the topics are handled with the necessary care, thought, and severity, there's a strain of gossip and petty intrigue (on the part of the figures involved, not the author) that I found compelling and humanizing
*By this I mainly mean cisgender women, but as Gorton points out (citing Donna Drucker), this is more to do with the historical category of women which conflates the ability to birth children with gender.
The Claiming of Sleeping Beauty by A.N. Roquelaure, Anne Rice
2.0
Oddly readable but it gets boring pretty quickly. I was kind of curious as to how a whole novel-length story of erotica would go, and turns out you really need some buffer periods in between or else it all kind of blurs together into sludge. This is especially true when the kinks boil down to sexual torture to forcefully break in a submissive masochist. And that isn't even touching the elements I found more repulsive and unpleasant (spent most of the book pretending that the protagonist wasn't an underage teenager).
This isn't really my set of kinks. I read the Wikipedia summaries as a teen out of morbid curiosity, and then realized as an adult I could read them myself. Unfortunately, I think the Wikipedia summaries basically suffice. (The introduction from 2012 was honestly quite interesting and nice though. Better than the whole book.) But I feel even with the fetishes in mind as the goal, it just felt like it dragged a lot once we hit the castle and while parts were more dramatically intriguing, at some point just straightforward eroticism of the same themes and fixations can only sustain itself for so long. It just feels repetitive after a while, especially when you hit the slog of Alexi's gnarly backstory. Not to ask for political intrigue in the BDSM sex slave world fairytale, but some of that sprinkled in might've genuinely helped some things. (Yeah, I'm thinking of Captive Prince here, and I definitely think Pacat read some of these books.) Like, despite everything I was kind of curious to what happens later in terms of plot and worldbuilding (especially with the 4th book that's apparently aboutBeauty becoming the new BDSM dom queen? ), but I would not be able get through three (3!!!) more books. So I just read the summaries of those on Wikipedia and lol.
I like Rice's writing style okay enough though (though almost exclusively using "sex" to refer to genitalia got tiring pretty fast), and I get the feeling I would better appreciate a book with not only a real plot, but with a narrative by her that has some dramatic and tonal variety. But if you like some taboo BDSM sex slave stuff with a gratuitous amount of spanking, maybe this is for you.
This isn't really my set of kinks. I read the Wikipedia summaries as a teen out of morbid curiosity, and then realized as an adult I could read them myself. Unfortunately, I think the Wikipedia summaries basically suffice. (The introduction from 2012 was honestly quite interesting and nice though. Better than the whole book.) But I feel even with the fetishes in mind as the goal, it just felt like it dragged a lot once we hit the castle and while parts were more dramatically intriguing, at some point just straightforward eroticism of the same themes and fixations can only sustain itself for so long. It just feels repetitive after a while, especially when you hit the slog of Alexi's gnarly backstory. Not to ask for political intrigue in the BDSM sex slave world fairytale, but some of that sprinkled in might've genuinely helped some things. (Yeah, I'm thinking of Captive Prince here, and I definitely think Pacat read some of these books.) Like, despite everything I was kind of curious to what happens later in terms of plot and worldbuilding (especially with the 4th book that's apparently about
I like Rice's writing style okay enough though (though almost exclusively using "sex" to refer to genitalia got tiring pretty fast), and I get the feeling I would better appreciate a book with not only a real plot, but with a narrative by her that has some dramatic and tonal variety. But if you like some taboo BDSM sex slave stuff with a gratuitous amount of spanking, maybe this is for you.
A Magical Girl Retires by Park Seolyeon
3.5
Felt similar to reading an enjoyable oneshot manga. Fun and snappy, but inherently kind of slight and flimsy.
Pure Innocent Fun: Essays by Ira Madison III
3.0
I think calling it a series of essays is a bit of a misnomer because it's more like a loose, non-linear memoir told through vaguely thematic, self-reflective chapters. It was quaintly fun and funny, but I don't have much more to say than that.
The Ministry of Time by Kaliane Bradley
4.0
I always love a book that's both fun and hurts a good bit.
All Our Ordinary Stories: A Multigenerational Family Odyssey by Teresa Wong
4.5
Even though this was a recommendation from a top books of 2024 list, I was so surprised by how much of a gut punch I found this comic to be. I know some people's eyes may glaze over at another "child of immigrants" memoir, but the level of emotional self-awareness, the genealogy and history entwined, and the layered structure Wong brings to these stories makes this a real standout.
Abortion in the Age of Unreason by Warren M. Hern
4.0
A powerful and moving book.
This probably falls under memoir but structurally and stylistically, I would call this a scrapbook of Hern's life, knowledge, writing, and philosophy regarding abortion in the USA. While he outlines important political and cultural changes throughout his career, you won't get the kind of analysis or broad picture that you would from a historian or social sciences academic writing on the topic. The introduction explicitly lays out that this book will jump back and forth in time, and it does. It also repeats itself quite a bit, but I didn't mind it much. Some may find it kind of sloppy and gratuitous though.
I think his perspective as a doctor is one you don't often hear, even as pro-choice rhetoric often emphasizes abortion as healthcare, it's rare to actually hear someone go into the weeds of what that means and how vital it is for people. It is one of the few arguments for medicalization and pathology that I've read that doesn't focus on pity or helplessness, but on uplifting people's agency in getting the healthcare they need.
The parts I found especially valuable were his analysis of pregnancy as pathology and the testimonies from former patients. He's really quite articulate and rigorous in reframing abortion as a procedure to be normalized and appreciated, not just an unfortunate medical incident some may go through.
There is an almost exclusive emphasis on framing abortion (and OB/GYN care) as women's healthcare, but I'm willing to let it slide, as I think the work he's done and demonstrated is so major. He's otherwise someone who writes with deep expertise, thought, compassion, and experience.
Occasionally there are stray typos and formatting errors, which aren't too distracting, but are unfortunate in a book that I fins so interesting and informative.
This probably falls under memoir but structurally and stylistically, I would call this a scrapbook of Hern's life, knowledge, writing, and philosophy regarding abortion in the USA. While he outlines important political and cultural changes throughout his career, you won't get the kind of analysis or broad picture that you would from a historian or social sciences academic writing on the topic. The introduction explicitly lays out that this book will jump back and forth in time, and it does. It also repeats itself quite a bit, but I didn't mind it much. Some may find it kind of sloppy and gratuitous though.
I think his perspective as a doctor is one you don't often hear, even as pro-choice rhetoric often emphasizes abortion as healthcare, it's rare to actually hear someone go into the weeds of what that means and how vital it is for people. It is one of the few arguments for medicalization and pathology that I've read that doesn't focus on pity or helplessness, but on uplifting people's agency in getting the healthcare they need.
The parts I found especially valuable were his analysis of pregnancy as pathology and the testimonies from former patients. He's really quite articulate and rigorous in reframing abortion as a procedure to be normalized and appreciated, not just an unfortunate medical incident some may go through.
There is an almost exclusive emphasis on framing abortion (and OB/GYN care) as women's healthcare, but I'm willing to let it slide, as I think the work he's done and demonstrated is so major. He's otherwise someone who writes with deep expertise, thought, compassion, and experience.
Occasionally there are stray typos and formatting errors, which aren't too distracting, but are unfortunate in a book that I fins so interesting and informative.