We discussed Rebecca F. Kuang’s Yellowface on January 11, 2024. This 2023 novel centers around authors June Hayward and Athena Liu. While June struggles to get her writing career going, Athena becomes a literary success story. When Athena dies in a freak accident, June acts on impulse: she steals not […]
Category: Review
26 posts
We discussed Kiersten White’s Mister Magic on December 14, 2023. This 2023 novel follows the Circle of Friends, five former cast members of the 90s children’s programme “Mister Magic”, who survived a tragic accident that ended the show’s production. They have spent their lives looking for the special sense of […]
We discussed Edgar Allan Poe’s The Fall of the House of Usher and T. Kingfisher’s What Moves the Dead on November 9, 2023. The 1839/1840 tale by Poe makes us witnesses to the mysterious decline of a house and the horrifying demise of its inhabitants. The 2022 retelling by Kingfisher […]
We discussed Bonnie Garmus’s Lessons in Chemistry on September 21, 2023. Garmus’s 2022 best-selling novel centres on intellectually gifted chemist Elizabeth Zott and her struggles to work in scientific research as a woman in the 1950s and 1960s. And because chemistry and cooking are quite closely related, a culinary tweak […]
We discussed Sherman Alexie’s Indian Killer on July 13, 2023. Alexie’s 1996 “feel-good novel about interracial murder” (according to the author) intertwines the personal life-story of John Smith, born native and adopted by white parents (evidently oblivious to Pocahontas), with the murder-mystery of a serial killer dubbed the “indian killer” […]
We discussed Maia Kobabe’s Gender Queer: A Memoir on June 15, 2023 as part of our Pride Month Special. Kobabe’s 2019 graphic novel shows the author’s own journey to eir non-binary gender identity and has been at the heart of the ongoing U.S. censorship debate. We talked about the text […]
We discussed Aiden Thomas’s Cemetery Boys on June 15, 2023 as part of our Pride Month Special. Thomas’s 2020 YA novel follows latinx trans boy Yadriel on his journey to acceptance—by himself, his brujx community, and Lady Death—and love—with Julian who kick-starts the plot as an accidentally summoned spirit and […]
We discussed Dana Schwartz’s Anatomy: A Love Story on May 11, 2023. Schwartz’s 2022 novel, set in 1817 Edinburgh, tells Hazel’s and Jack’s romance that enfolds over corpses and mystery: “Hazel Sinnett is a lady who wants to be a surgeon more than she wants to marry. Jack Currer is […]