| 12/29/17 |
Jen Wilde
Queens of Geek |
Didn't like this as much as I wanted to, considering it was about geeky people doing two things I relate to: fangirling, and growing an audience with YouTube. Too many of the situations felt written to force forward movement of the story and a lot of it felt inauthentic or detached from reality or predictable. |
| 12/26/17 |
Rebecca Sugar & Angie Wang
Fusion for Beginners and Experts |
Excellent relationship guide based on Steven Universe characters' lessons learned through fusion. |
| 12/22/17 |
Christopher Hastings
Gwenpool Volume 1 |
Some of the comic was funny and it had its moments, but overall I wasn't really the audience for this--don't have enough familiarity with the Marvel Universe. |
| 12/15/17 |
Lev Grossman
The Magicians |
Had a lot of trouble with this one because I found the main character insufferable. He was a tiresome entitled jerk who objectified every woman who crossed his path, and the plot just didn't grab me. |
| 11/26/17 |
Talya Perper, Queenie Chan, & Jenna Ayoub
Steven Universe: Anti-Gravity |
Wow, this was way better than I expected. Great touching story, lots of callbacks, valuable content, and fun! |
| 11/24/17 |
Jerry Spinelli
Knots in My Yo-yo String |
It's the author's childhood stories lumped together and mostly entertainingly told. I didn't relate much but it was worth a read! |
| 11/17/17 |
Angie Thomas
The Hate U Give |
Really good book about a teenage black girl who's witness to her friend getting murdered by a white cop. How she deals with her personal life and the fallout of the incident is nuanced and special, and I hope it can wake some people up if they're in denial about how this works in our country. |
| 11/9/17 |
Joseph Fink and Jeffrey Cranor
It Devours! |
The second Welcome to Night Vale book was pretty great! I liked it more than the previous one. It was the perfect mix of creepy, funny, and touching. |
| 10/24/17 |
Melanie Gillman & Katy Farina
Steven Universe: Warp Tour |
This was the first trade paperback for the ongoing comic series for Steven Universe. I read the individual issues as they came out but I like to have the collection (with the variant covers) too. Love these stories. |
| 10/13/17 |
Dav Pilkey
Captain Underpants #11 |
This one was silly as usual, though I didn't like a couple things the author threw in there that aren't really funny to joke about. I get that it's a gross-out book and I like that, but traumatizing someone and having them sent to "the goof house" as a punchline kinda grossed me out in a different way. |
| 10/5/17 |
Carl Hiaasen
Stormy Weather |
Wacky story about some Florida weirdness happening surrounding a hurricane and its aftermath. Weirdly, I read this partially while having an actual hurricane in my city. |
| 9/26/17 |
Molly Reisner
Lion, Mane of Mystery |
A kids' activity book about Lion for Steven Universe fans. Fun! |
| 8/25/17 |
Kelly Thompson & Sophie Campbell
Jem and the Holograms Volume 1 |
This was a cute reboot. I enjoyed the increased, more authentic diversity and some of the characters' interplay. |
| 8/21/17 |
Marieke Nijkamp
This Is Where It Ends |
A school shooting story following four individuals all related to the shooter in different ways. I liked a lot of things about it, though it wasn't quite as emotional as I was hoping for considering the subject. |
| 8/8/17 |
Jaclyn Moriarty
The Cracks in the Kingdom |
Awesome book 2 in the "Colors of Madeleine" series, with more info about Elliot Baranski helping Princess Ko find her family and developing a really interesting relationship with Madeleine. I just love the author's fresh take on a fantasy mythology. |
| 7/29/17 |
Richard Dawkins
The Ancestor's Tale |
Took me a while to get through this thick book, but it was worth it. Good journey through evolutionary history and little anecdotes about each creature with whom we share a common ancestor. With funny stories sometimes. |
| 7/11/17 |
Chris McDonnell
Steven Universe: Art and Origins |
Incredible art book with information on the creation and development of my favorite cartoon. So many fun pictures and so much great inside information, especially about who did what to make it happen at the beginning! |
| 6/13/17 |
Michael Dante DiMartino & Bryan Konietzko
The Rift: Volume 1 |
Great first volume in a trilogy about old meets new, past meets future. Wow, we're going to have some baggage for Toph and Aang, aren't we? |
| 6/9/17 |
Paul Zindel
Pardon Me, You're Stepping on My Eyeball! |
What did I just read? I didn't get this at all. Everything was disconnected and nobody acted like a real person, and it was full of weird racist, sexist, and fat-shaming narration. Plus of course the good old fun story of a girl who gets treated terribly by a boy and she falls for him in the end. Gross. Wish I hadn't read this. |
| 5/26/17 |
Peter S. Beagle
The Last Unicorn |
Saw the film as a kid and really wanted to read the book--so I finally did. Very close to the film and I loved the simple but evocative language and the concepts of human nature when viewed through the eyes of a unicorn. |
| 5/18/17 |
Riichiro Inagaki & Yusuke Murata
Eyeshield 21: Volume 27 |
The Oujou game is over! Wow, what a finale on that game. Monta is adorable and Sena and Shin's rivalry is wonderful. |
| 5/12/17 |
Paul Krugman
The Conscience of a Liberal |
Learned a lot about income inequality, the role of racism in shaping conservative messages, and the fight for universal health care. Not a particularly entertaining book, but a well-written one. |
| 4/28/17 |
Orson Scott Card
Ender's Game |
Finally read this classic. I actually expected it to blow me away way more given what I have heard about it, but still really enjoyed it despite not having much emotional connection to it. It kinda reminded me why I usually prefer softer science fiction though. |
| 4/23/17 |
Faith Erin Hicks
The Stone Heart |
Really enjoyed this second volume of the Nameless City series. The art and the characters are both really well thought out. I read it so I could talk about it on a podcast with my friends. |
| 4/20/17 |
Roxane Gay
Bad Feminist |
Pretty dang good collection of essays. I didn't learn much from it but I nodded along in agreement more times than I can count. |
| 4/19/17 |
Matt Burnett & Ben Levin
Keep Beach City Weird |
Just Ronaldo being Ronaldo. Mostly conspiracy theories that go nowhere, with the occasional shred of unexpected truth. |
| 4/7/17 |
Jaclyn Moriarty
A Corner of White |
This author's books are always great! Love the Kingdom of Cello and the way the princesses are portrayed and the concept of Colors and the way Elliot and Madeleine communicate. Really interesting stuff all the time. She always manages to surprise me. |
| 3/31/17 |
Meg Rosoff
Picture Me Gone |
I liked How I Live Now so I wanted to read this, and I appreciated that the people ARE the mysteries. It's sort of a missing person search but more about uncomfortable relationships. |
| 3/25/17 |
Andrew Smith
Winger |
I don't know man, I really didn't like the protagonist because he was kind of a horny jerk whose interactions with other people felt more misogynistic, mean-spirited, or underhanded than I think they were meant, but he was also pretty realistic in some senses, and the book was funny. Hate the protagonist most of the time, but enjoyed reading the book for some reason. |
| 3/17/17 |
Carl Hiaasen
Scat |
Another story surrounding a missing person mystery and an endangered species. The usual Hiaasen stuff, for kids! It was a good read. |
| 3/8/17 |
Michael Dante DiMartino & Bryan Konietzko
Avatar: The Search, Part 3 |
And they've wrapped up what happened to Zuko's mom! I'm satisfied honestly, and really there was quite a lot of nuance here. Art is great as usual. I'm so happy with this one. |
| 3/4/17 |
Natalka Burian
Welcome to the Slipstream |
One of my Pitch Wars mentees wrote a book and I got a mention in the acknowledgments and my own advance reader copy! It was an excellent book about a teenage girl with a mentally ill mom she has to try to protect while also trying to live her life and play her guitar. With lots of weirdness at the end. Whee! |
| 3/2/17 |
Alison Bechdel
Dykes to Watch Out For |
Great graphic novel compilation of this long-running script featuring a large cast of (mostly) lesbian friends and lovers. |
| 2/5/17 |
Christopher Moore
Fluke |
As usual, Moore's absurdist work is a delight. A guy studies whale songs and ends up stumbling into information those connected with the whales don't want him to know. . . . |
| 1/19/17 |
Ann Brashares
The Here and Now |
I really loved this one--even though I wouldn't say I'm a romance fan or a time travel fan. I love Brashares's very specific, sometimes contradictory way of writing characters' feelings. |