Another journal

This year I’m trying some things around my reading habits. Chase and I are listening to non-fiction audio books (often ones that one of us have read in text previously) while hanging out in the same room. I have a little bit (a lot bit) of trouble hearing and following audio so it’s partly to help me build that muscle, but it’s also the only way for us to read a book at the same pace, as I read at an unfair speed. Also, Chase’s mom sent me a lovely stack of barely-read mid century mass market paperbacks that I am doling out to myself at the pace of one a month. They’re so pleasant to hold! What a perfect object they are.

Let’s look at what the top-level stats were for me in January.

Here are my Storygraph reviews for my top rated books:

Legendary Children: The First Decade of RuPaul’s Drag Race and the Last Century of Queer Life by Lorenzo Marquez, Tom Fitzgerald

I started watching RuPaul’s Drag Race right when it came out, trying to get this new streaming thing working on my laptop. This book is such a deftly handled thing, weaving queer history with the show and adding context to all the things that have made Drag Race what it is. Sure, I knew a lot of it but there were bits of queer history new to me, new movies to seek out and people to learn about. And every time T&L touched on a subject or era and I thought “oh, they better mention [x],” they did. Like any history spanning a wide range of time, it can’t go into full depth on any one thing, but the depth they manage to go into is very good. It’s made to read while pausing to look up and learn or watch more, a brilliant jumping-off point for anyone, no matter how much or little they know.

We’re now listening to the audio book of this, which Tom and Lorenzo read, and the east coast “a” of Tom’s light accent delights me constantly. A delight. I made a Letterboxed list of the movies they mention in the book, even in passing. Most are available on Kanopy!

A Scent of New-Mown Hay by John Blackburn

A tense cold-war thriller that also offers up the science-fictional monstrous. Non-stop pacing with a well done written version of not showing the monster to make it scarier, it’s a neat and tidy book that is like a bit of eldritch horror in a spy novel coating.

This is a snappy, spooky little book that does some very deft things. It has a good aftertaste, if that makes sense, not like you’re thinking of it often after so much as it has a nice little shiver in your memory.

Burnt Offerings by Robert Marasco

Ooh, a good and creepy hungry house story.

Lol, not a lot in that review. But that’s what this book is! It’s one of those books of an era that feels hinged around a specific family dynamic that isn’t as much the norm today. That said, a person having a deep and unexamined hole in her life and self that makes them vulnerable to devil’s bargain trickery is eternal.

Here’s your pretty gradient of all the covers from this month.

Another title of note this month was Non-Stop, which I picked up because the cover I saw in a 70’s Sci Fi Art newsletter intrigued me. It has a banger of a twist. And The Light Eaters, have you heard the good word of Light Eaters? I will get everyone I know to read it at some point. I think it adds a really beautiful dimension to looking at the world and the wealth of growing things in it.