Tag: Books
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365 Books in 365 Days – Episode 110 by Annie Walton Doyle
New Animal by Ella Baxter “‘I think you might be trying to get away from those things, because of your sadness, which is so uncomfortable that it’s almost unbearable—but I promise you, running away from that sadness is like trying to run from your own shadow.’” When New Animal was published, it was salaciously (and,…
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Liebestrasse: A Review by T.S. McNeil
There is a notion, particularly among reactionary conservatives, that LGBTQ folk, though that is not the term the likes of Gavin McInnes use, have only existed since the 1960s. A blinkered opinion based on ignorance and queer as a three-dollar bill that utterly ignores landmark works of queer culture like The Boys In The Band,…
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And Then The Gray Heaven: A Review by T.S. McNeil
In a culture of increasing representation, which can only be a good thing, one of the aspects of humanity rarely noticed are the truly odd. Not the those who are different because of how they vote or what they like to wear or listen to, but the organic oddballs, who are different in the most…
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365 Books in 365 Days – Episode 102 by Annie Walton Doyle
Patricia Wants to Cuddle by Samantha Allen At first, Amanda registers it as a dog or a bear, but it looks almost human, its contours twisting into an expression that is equal parts hunger and despair – a deep, almost prehistoric longing. The critique of books as “lightweight” or “women’s fiction” tends to be veiled…
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Storyteller: A Review by T.S. McNeil
The first stories, at least in the Western tradition, were sung. Going back to ancient Greece, long before the written tradition, foundational narrative works such as The Iliad and The Odyssey recited in poem form, often with the accompaniment of a lyre. A bardic tradition carried on well into the 14th century by the troubadour…
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365 Books in 365 Days – Episode 75 by Annie Walton Doyle
Chrysalis by Anna Metcalfe “She has a power over the people who find her; once you’ve known her, it’s hard to go back to a time before.” While there is always an attraction to a manic, frantic, crisis-led novel, Chrysalis instead unfolds in a still, calm, and even slow manner. This works to maintain an…
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365 Books in 365 Days: Episode 72 by Annie Walton Doyle
Nightbitch by Rachel Yoder “To what identities do women turn when those available to them fail? How do women expand their identities to encompass all parts of their beings?” Explorations of female rage always make for an interesting read, to me – but Nightbitch managed to pique my interest further. What if rage became so…
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365 Books in 365 Days: Episode 56 by Annie Walton Doyle
The Pisces by Melissa Broder I, like many others before me, first came to The Pisces by Melissa Broder because of the promise of sex scenes with a merman. And if you, too, are intrigued by that simple premise, then you won’t be disappointed in this engaging and exciting novel. But the truth is, The…
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“First as Tragedy, Then as Tragedy: on Christian Petzold’s ‘Transit’” by Oscar Mardell
They say about this land that the projectiles of the last war unearthed the projectiles of the one before. – Anna Seghers, The Seventh Cross (trans. Margot Bettauer Dembo) But war, of course, consists not only of projectiles but of peripatetics: every legion of soldiers produces another of refugees. And few have been more sensitive…