wetherspoonsgf's reviews
59 reviews

Kindred by Octavia E. Butler

4.0

The Driver's Seat by Muriel Spark

fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No

3.5

Fantasia: An Algerian Cavalcade by Assia Djebar

adventurous challenging dark emotional informative reflective slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated

5.0

This is some of the most beautiful prose ever written, which feels especially important given how much time Djebar spends thinking about the act of writing and of writing in French throughout the book. 
Part 1 and 2 have something of the feel of documentary filmmaking as Djebar narrates her (our) encounter with the archive as much as the events of France's colonisation of Algeria itself, interwoven with her autofiction, before Part 3 starts on this iterative, looping, contemplative three part structure of recovery and feminist re-narration of anti-colonial work and different decolonisations. I adore this book, I think the epigraph to the Finale alone is one of the cleverest pages in all of literature.
If this book was only as intelligent and reflective on language as it is I'd love it, but the fact that it's so deeply interested in language while being so transcendently well written is once-in-a-lifetime sort of stuff. Get this back into print!

The Beautyful Ones Are Not Yet Born by Ayi Kwei Armah

emotional hopeful reflective sad medium-paced

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

4.5

Beautifully, beautifully bitter reflection on the failures of decolonisation and the broken promises of socialist revolution in Ghana. Some slightly wonky gender politics, but wonky in a way that means I think I'm going to write an essay about them.

The Yield by Tara June Winch

emotional reflective fast-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

4.0

Much preferred this to My Place, though I was expecting it to commit to a trans/lesbian angle by the end and it did neither. Love the way Winch dives into aborginal language and uses it to drive characterisation and plot.

I didn't expect it to end as hopeful as it did, and I'm not sure how I feel about it doing so. Really dislike the Yuval Noah Harari citation in the author's note at the very very end but what can you do.

Gender/Fucking: the Pleasures and Politics of Living in a Gendered Body by Florence Ashley

emotional reflective fast-paced

4.25

This book is great, if slightly less theory heavy than I hoped. I'm almost regretful that I read it from the library rather than bought the book because certain passages stick in my mind in a way I know I'd like to be able to return to. Florence can make hot stuff hot, thoughtful stuff thoughtful, and both funny, but they aren't a poet and are a millenial.

[in case I come back to this: Shabot's crticisms of cyborgs; libidinal vertigo, Lacan, and not topping; palliative activism against mind-body dualism]

My Place by Sally Morgan

emotional reflective medium-paced

3.0

not a huge fan of how this executed its main premise, though interestingly i think it deliberately tries to frustrate you as a reader, which i like.

it feels a little too willing to let 1987-present australia wipe its hands of a lot of racism, and readings where it doesn't do that rely on an amount of faith in the narrative & construction that i can't quite find.

that said, i don't want to place unfair expectations on the book as an object of postcolonial literature, it's not as cut and dry as 'i didn't like it', but also, i didn't hugely like it. justice for nan.

This is How You Lose the Time War by Max Gladstone, Amal El-Mohtar

emotional mysterious reflective fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes

4.0

these space lesbians write like trans girls on twitter.

Clear Light of Day by Anita Desai

emotional reflective medium-paced

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

3.5

on the one hand, this book deals with disability about as well as you'd expect in 1980. on the other hand, it has one of the best passages about alcoholism ever written. 

any book with a 'the girls put on trousers and realise the patriarchy exists' scene is automatically capped at 4 stars and it bungles the ending a bit but it's very well written.

X by Davey Davis

challenging dark emotional mysterious fast-paced

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

4.25

This is slightly less of the noir/thriller it bills itself as on the blurb, but I can't think of a better montage of hazy and violently taboo snapshots and memories.

Every now and then the prose gets so purple (in a good way) that it almost feels perverse to use to describe this kind of sex and violence. Shoutout to the world building which balances alt history dystopia and satire very well without ever feeling overbearing.