Looks like I did a post on stuff I liked reading in the Summer, so here’s another one. Books? They’re good! I’m not listing everything I read because I decided to log even the chapter books I read to my kids on Storygraph, and it would be incredibly tedious for people to look at that. I don’t have amazing taste in books by any means but maybe you’ll find a new book or two to check out from your local library. This list is not ranked by any means, just the order I read them last year and the links generally go to Bookshop.org or another place where you can buy it.

Everything I Learned, I Learned in a Chinese Restaurant – This memoir by Curtis Chin is about growing up as a gay man in a family that owned a Chinese restaurant in Detroit during the 80’s, a very difficult time for the city. On a related note, it was nice to hear that Detroit is now hitting historically low crime rates.

Hardcore Gaming 101 Digest Vol. 8: The Bride of Retro Horror – Hardcore Gaming 101 has put out a lot of good books on retro games. This one was a follow up to a previous digest on horror games, which I would also recommend if that’s your thing. The link goes to Itch.io but I think there’s print versions of all their books on Amazon.

Peter & Ernesto: The Lost Sloths – Graham Annable, who I know from the Puzzle Agent games but has done lots of animation and won an Oscar, has put out a few Peter & Ernesto books. They’re comics about two sloths, very cute and I like reading them with my kids. The link goes to his site where you can buy a signed copy.

The KLF: Chaos, Magic and the Band Who Burned a Million Pounds – A book about the band KLF. Can’t recommend it enough if you’re a fan and maybe even if you don’t listen to them but are a big music history nerd. I think this was recommended to me by Ste Pickford on Bluesky, which I would suppose would make sense because I don’t know if there’s many Americans recommending me books about the KLF. That said, I actually did listen to the audiobook for this through my local library using the Hoopla app, so there’s dozens of us in the US that like KLF.

Vagabond: A Memoir – Tim Curry wrote a memoir! And it’s good! I listened to the audiobook for this one. I cannot imagine how difficult it was for him to read this after becoming disabled from a stroke, but it was nice to hear his voice. I also actually thought it was fun that he wouldn’t talk about any relationships he has been in other than Miss Piggy during Muppet Treasure Island. I was also very surprised that he briefly mentions video game work. Mostly just to say that he doesn’t understand them but thought acting in front of a green screen was fun. But still, didn’t expect to hear him say the words “Red Alert 3”

Spread Me – I read a bunch of books by Sarah Gailey and this novella was another good one. Basically The Thing but more horny.

More Bugs – Em Reed of DOMINO CLUB fame (idk man, had to work in a Domino Club reference in this post) also has a book. I think I referred to it as erotic body horror on social media along with Spread me, which is not entirely accurate, but there’s still body stuff. Very surreal but I think it also captures the weirdness of living in a small town in the midwest. This review sucks but the book is very good! It’s not actually like Gregg Araki’s Nowhere (a film I love) and I think there’s way more empathy for the characters, but it did remind me of it. I got the ebook for this one but a print version is available.

Anyway, books are good! Make a goal to read at least a couple this year.

I guess I should post on here more. I’ve been pretty busy pretty busy this summer but here’s what I read this last month. You can always follow me on Storygraph

Ariol – A Beautiful Cow: This was a collection of comics that one of my kids picked from the library. It was fine! I never heard of it before

Dragonflight: My first Anne McCaffrey book! I thought it was ok but suffered from some very boring stretches but it has some neat concepts and I liked the ending. I will read more by her at some point in the future.

Exhibit by R.O. Kwon: Big fan of this writer. Didn’t enjoy it as much as The Incendiaries but still thought it was very good. The marketing for the book was very odd to me because it felt like it was hyping it up as an erotic and fun novel and that’s really not what the focus was. Not a criticism of the book at all, just weird that the marketing chose to go with that.

Kindred: My first Octavia E. Butler book! Nothing really insightful to say about this one. Yep, it’s a great book and I’ll need to read more by her. By knowing what the book was about in advance, I sorta expected it to be kind of a slog but nope. It felt like a quick read to me.

The Long Game: My first Ann Leckie story. This is another one of the short sci-fi stories that is available as part of Amazon Prime so I read it. I don’t really remember anything about it and my storygraph says I gave it 3 stars so I guess I thought it was just fine. I’ll read more by Ann because I know this isn’t really representative of her writing and to be honest, I’ve kinda felt “it’s fine” has been the case with all of the stories in this Kindle series.

The Stars Too Fondly: Really fun sci-fi, gay romance novel by Emily Hamilton. I don’t really know if I had seen people discussing it on Bluesky (where I now follow a ton of writers) before grabbing it from my library, but I’m glad I did.

Servant Mage: Meh. Fantasy novella that still felt kinda boring in the middle and I didn’t really find the characters to be too interesting.

Yours Cruelly, Elvira: My Wild Life as the Mistress of the Dark: This is the autobiography by Cassandra Peterson, the actress who plays Elvira. I would have a hard time recommending it to people who don’t know who she is, but I really liked it. Went with the audiobook for this one, which I think was the right choice. I think it’s neat my library had it.

In the House of Aryaman, a Lonely Signal Burns: My first Elizabeth Bear book. To be honest, I have already sorta forgotten what it was about and had given it 3/5 on Storygraph, which usually means I thought it was fine but not memorable. I had checked it out just because it was something I could listen to for free as part of my Audible trial. I’ll read more by her though. I thought it was neat that the main character wasn’t white, it was a perfectly fine detective story, and I was kind of in a weird mood when I listened to it anyway.

The Y in Life: This was a self-published novel by a local author that I checked out from the library because I enjoyed the author’s blog posts about local bookstores and soccer team. It’s a weird one that’s kind of a mess and way too long but I still enjoyed it? Maybe I like when an author knows they are probably just writing one book and just put everything in there. Maybe I should read more self-published books even if they’re messy?

When the Tiger Came Down the Mountain: I really liked the previous book in this world, The Empress of Salt and Fortune, but didn’t click as much with this. But it’s short, everyone else seemed to like it more than me, and I still didn’t even think it was bad, just not great like the first book. Still might read more in the series though since they’re standalone novellas set in the same world.

Started doing a lot more reading in April so I thought I should start documenting what I’ve read. Not that I ever stopped but it’s picked up a lot as I’ve started doing more ebooks and audiobooks in addition to all the physical books I check out from the library or buy. If you live in the US, consider using the Libby app. Generally I prefer checking out physical books over digital copies since book publishers like to screw over libraries through ebook/audiobook fees, but sometimes this is the only way they’re available to me. I also document all of this on my Storygraph but this feels more permanent to me.

Elder Race by Adrian Tchaikovsky: Pretty cool shorter book that works both as a sci-fi and a fantasy story based on the viewpoints of the two characters. This is the first book I read by Adrian and plan to read more. Did this one as an ebook.

Every Heart a Doorway by Seanan McGuire: Bought this one a while ago and finally got to it in my backlog. I know this one won a bunch of awards so maybe it’s just me but I didn’t care for it. A lot of good ideas but I thought some of the characters were really poorly written and the book could have probably actually been longer to give some of those ideas more time to develop. Oh well. It’s short so you could probably check it out from the library and see for yourself.

Ducks: Two Years in the Oil Sands by Kate Beaton: This is a graphic novel memoir by the author of King Baby and The Princes and the Pony, two picture books I love reading to my kids. This is definitely not a kids book but I do think it’s Kate’s best work yet. The book is about Kate’s two years working in Alberta’s oil sands to pay off her college loans. I cannot recommend the book enough if you have an interest in graphic novels or memoirs. Just be sure to read the content warnings first since it has some heavy subjects in it. Did this one as an ebook from my library but will probably buy a physical copy at some point.

Kitchen by Banana Yoshimoto: This is another short book that has been sitting in my backlog years after I bought it. Wish I didn’t wait so long to read it because I also loved this one. The book is actually two stories but the main one, Kitchen, is about a young woman who is taken in by another family after her grandmother, her caretaker, has passed away. I guess this book was a big hit when it came out and won a lot of acclaim so it’s not a hidden gem but I don’t see it come up so consider checking it out!

Tea and Murder: Stories of the Xuya Universe: The Citadel of Weeping Pearls & The Tea Master and the Detective by Aliette de Bodard: This is an audiobook I checked out from my library containing two stories, The Citadel of Weeping Pearls & The Tea Master and the Detective. Both stories are set in Aliette’s Xuya universe, a timeline where Asia became dominant in space, but you don’t have to read one to understand the other. I had a hard time following along with Citadel of Weeping Pearls, mostly because it was an audiobook and sometimes that happens with me and sci-fi, but I really enjoyed The Tea Master and the Detective. It’s just a Sherlock Holmes-inspired story but I thought it was a fun read. This was the first story I read by Aliette and also want to read more by them.

The Aquanaut by Dan Santat: I’ve read some of Dan’s picture books before but this is the first graphic novel that I’ve read by him to my kids. Really enjoyed this one as well and thought the art was great.

Selected Poems of Langston Hughes: A Classic Collection of Poems by a Master of American Verse: Another book that had been sitting in my library a long time. It turns out that the universally celebrated poet is very good at writing poetry!

The Salt Grows Heavy by Cassandra Khaw: A short horror fantasy audiobook I checked out about a mermaid and plague doctor. Really liked this one with my only gripe being that I thought the gore descriptions went on too long, to the point of it getting tedious. But I still really liked the book! My first by Cassandra but I’ll read more by them.

All about Me: My Remarkable Life in Show Business by Mel Brooks: While his movies can be hit or miss to me, I also really enjoyed this autobiography by Mel. He intentionally doesn’t go into his personal life in this book, choosing to mostly talk about his works and things that went well and what didn’t. I listened to the audiobook version from my library, which seems like the way to go for this book. I’m just a big comedy history nerd and like stuff like this.

Detriot: A Biography by Scott Martelle: This is a book about the history of Detroit and everything that led to where it’s at today. It’s probably the one I’d recommend if people wanted to know how a city ends up this way. It does a very good job explaining how racist policies, corporations, and other things led to its downfall and the author clearly loves the city and wants to to succeed. My only complaint about it, which isn’t its fault, is that it came out in 2012, at the lowest point of the city when it was bankrupt, and I wonder how things would be different if it were published today. Not that the city is completely fixed, but things have been improving and I would have really liked to have seen the author’s take on it since he has a better understanding of it all than I do.

Doctor Who audio dramas: I also listened to two Doctor Who audio dramas from Big Finish. The Flames of Cadiz and The Age of Endurance. Both are solid 1st Doctor stories and feature the living members of the original cast.