The most important thing about the month of April (aside from my sister’s birthday—happy birthday, Maleah; don’t read past the “read more” unless you want your birthday present spoiled lol—and her very high-quality production of Cinderella)—is that Darcy gets her picture taken in the bluebonnets. It is very precious.
Here’s what I read…
Fence Vol. 6: Redemption by C.S. Pacat and Johanna the Mad
As anticipated, the latest volume of Fence creeps the story forward only incrementally. At this point, I know to expect that and I’m only marginally disappointed by it. The truth of the matter is that I’m not much of a graphic novel reader—I don’t process visual information as well as written, and I’m frustrated by the length of each volume and the release between—but I love this series. Redemption reads like a part two to Rise (although, for what it’s worth, I’m not entirely sure who is being redeemed in it, or even who needs to be redeemed). I really enjoyed the increased focus on Harvard this issue, Seiji starting to respect and even value Aiden was delightful, and I was overjoyed to finally get some real quality pagetime with the long-promised Jesse. By the end, this volume ramps up the romance; this series has always had romantic undertones, but this is the first time the romances get actively pulled to the fore (unless you count the YA novels, which I also love but which are not strictly canonical post volume five). I’m excited to dig more into Aiden and Harvard’s relationship in subsequent issues because they’re dynamic is adorable. I’m more skeptical about Nicholas/Seiji since I had originally thought they were both aroace and still can’t convince myself to totally let that idea go, but I’m willing to be convinced. On the whole, Redemption isn’t my favorite volume—volumes four and five are the best—because it feels a bit more like setup for what is to come (Harvard has a boyfriend who isn’t Aiden! Seiji takes Nicholas seriously now!) As always, I read this as soon as I was aware of its existence, speeding through it in twenty minutes. I’m more than ready for volume seven, but I guess I’m just going to have to hang onto that enthusiasm for another two years.
Previous volume reviews here and here
The Familiar by Leigh Bardugo
Leigh Bardugo is a phenomenal writer. She has yet to go wrong, and her newest novel fits very well within her existing canon as well as being a standout for its historical setting and the fact that it stands alone. As in her previous novels, The Familiar focuses on balances of power (specifically imbalances of power), the double edged sword that is religion, and the experience of life lived on the peripheries of society. It is an excellent novel and while my personal taste is more skewed to the more exciting and character-driven Grishaverse, I feel certain that The Familiar will bring Bardugo to new audiences. It’s a fascinating stand-alone fantasy novel—there are never enough of those—that deftly handles nuanced power dynamics alongside genuinely interesting characters and a high-stakes story. Unsurprisingly, I enjoyed this novel very much.
Full review here
Most Ardently by Gabe Cole Novoa
As a longtime lover of Pride and Prejudice, I was very satisfied by this retelling. It’s a quick read and while it sticks pretty closely to the original storyline and characters (with the major change being that Elizabeth Bennet is swapped for Oliver Bennet, a closeted trans boy), there are enough changes to keep the reader interested and to make a case for its own existence. While I do think that Most Ardently misses a couple of the marks as a retelling—Wickham never charms anyone, and neither lead is particularly proud or prejudiced, leading to most of the obstacles between them being external rather than internal—I found that the historical queerness and likable protagonists made up for that and turned Most Ardently into a charming romance that is likely to please Austen fans and new fans alike (although… if you’re a new fan, please read the original).
Every Gift a Curse by Caroline O’Donoghue
I really liked the first book of this series, and I was really excited to see how it all ended up. Every Gift a Curse isn’t bad and I certainly didn’t hate it, but it did not live up to my hopes for it. I was just disappointed that all the parts of the previous books that I really liked were all but erased in favor of the bits I liked least. I liked the resolution with the Housekeeper, but pivoting from a human villain to a vaguely evil placeholder was a huge mistake. Focusing less on the social realities of queer people in the face of a violently conservative and religious backlash in favor of an organization that wants power for power’s sake was a mistake. Expanding the cast instead of focusing on the core characters was a mistake. Forgetting about or fast-tracking major emotional storylines (Aaron’s reformation, Roe’s gender journey, Fiona’s self-harm, Lily’s depression, Maeve’s inferiority complex) to focus on more rituals and magic was a mistake. Perhaps saying these were mistakes is disingenuous. It’s not what I wanted, and if All Our Hidden Gifts had had this energy I would’t have continued the series. It’s… fine. But there was so much to recommend this series at the start that to see it fail to follow up on any of the things that drew me to it is a major bummer.
Full review to come
After Annie by Anna Quindlen (audiobook read by Gilli Messer)
The start of this novel was intriguing, but by the end I was rolling my eyes at just about everything, I hated all the characters, and I was relieved to finish. It simply included a few too many things that I personally dislike and can’t look past, like
-a surprise pregnancy solving all a woman’s problems
-two victims of child sex abuse are used to hammer home the theme that some things can’t be fixed and to assuage the main character’s guilt and confusion, but neither victim is given any interiority or narrative space
-a man starts dating a woman who had previously been his children’s counselor, and with whom he had had at least one counseling session
-a man passively forces his young daughter to take over 99% of the domestic responsibilities and only notices once she’s functionally lost what was left of her childhood
None of the things I was excited about in this book (namely, a nuanced depiction of the way that grief can be alienating to a platonic best friend or anyone who doesn’t fit cleanly into the usual nuclear family/the way that domestic work often falls to young girls because grown men don’t do it and don’t make the effort to divvy it up equitably) were actually explored. Instead, we just got the same few points over and over again. It’s repetitive and uninspiring. But hey, at least it’s short.
Full review to come
The Sun and the Star by Rick Riordan and Mark Oshiro (audiobook read by A.J. Beckles)
At long last, I have finished my PJO reread. The Sun and the Star was actually in large part why I decided to do it (well, that and the TV show). I initially read this when it was first released, and while I enjoyed it very much it had been long enough since I read the material that proceeded it that my memory was, at best, foggy. I was particularly excited to get back to it considering that in the reread Nico actually became my favorite PJO character.
Unfortunately, I liked The Sun and the Star far less in close proximity to the rest of the series. Part of that is likely burnout. This is the sixteenth PJO book I’ve read since January, and that’s a lot of books to read back-to-back by the same author. However, it wasn’t just burnout. Tonally, The Sun and the Star sticks out from the rest of the books. I sort of noticed that the first time, but it’s far more apparent when you’ve just come from those other books. Part of it is intentional, but it’s not all intentional, and there are still lots of moments that are clearly meant to be humorous, but it’s a different brand of humor that neither matches the quick-witted wiseassery of Riordan’s usual heroes or the dark dry humor Nico has employed previously. It’s a little bit cringey and a lot of it is rooted in romantic tropes (half of it is just Will and Nico calling each other “my little [xyz]”). (The trogs are still A+; Hiss-Majesty is a vibe). The darkness isn’t quite as dark as I’d remembered. It doesn’t dive quite as deeply into the existing trauma as I’d remembered—a lot of it is just Nico remembering things that we already know about him, and while there’s a lot of focus on that time that Nico let Octavius die, it entirely ignores Bryce Lawrence, a far darker and far more direct death at Nico’s hands—and the metaphorical storyline of Nico choosing life a the end is undercut by the fact that he never truly considered self-sacrifice as an option. I’d remembered Nico being suicidal (or, if not suicidal in a direct sense, suicidal in a ‘I’ll gladly sacrifice myself to save my friends’ way) and growing to value his own life, and it’s not that.
I think a lot of the problems I had with the book this time around, though, come from the audiobook. It is narrated by A.J. Beckles and—much as I hate to say this—I don’t think he did a particularly good job. He reads everything in a sort of half-whispered, melodramatic way; it almost sounds like dramatic slam poetry. There’s never any comedic cadence, and I suspect a lot of the reasons the humor didn’t hit me this time because Beckles read even the joke lines as if they were deadly serious. The comic moments were read as if someone was dying. The screams were read as dramatic whispers. The romantic moments came across like Will and Nico are campaigning for an Oscar. I truly think that it was recorded the first time Beckles read it, and not just because of the occasional awkward pauses and failure to anticipate a joke. At one climactic moment, Nico announces that Bianca is his mother. I know nothing can be without errors, but… maybe someone should have caught that one? It also doesn’t help that the audio doesn’t make it obvious where Gorgyra’s out-of-sequence segments occur, which could cause confusion for first-time readers of the book.
I still enjoyed the book, but I definitely enjoyed it less this time around, which is a little disappointing. Oh, well! I’d still recommend it… but maybe not right after reading the rest of them, and absolutely not in audio format. It’s still a fun read with delightful queer rep, a solid fantasy adventure, and some good laughs.
Alice by Heart by Steven Sater
One of the hardest things about being an obsessive musical theatre fan is how often one falls in love with a show that is functionally impossible to see. If you don’t have the money or don’t live in the right city or only found the show after it closed and there’s no widely available version, it’s highly possible to be deeply obsessed with the music of a show that you know basically nothing about. Occasionally, though, there’s a novelization. Alice by Heart is a novelization of the off-Broadway musical of the same name; it is written by the musical’s lyricist and book co-writer (alongside co-book writer Jessie Nelson and composer Duncan Sheik). Alice by Heart strikes me as having been written by an excellent writer stepping outside his medium. Steven Sater’s lyrics are gorgeous. His prose is a little muddled and unnecessarily difficult to follow. It’s lyrical. It’s evocative. It’s confusing. My impression of this novel is that it is a Sater taking the ideas from the original Alice by Heart and taking them in a different direction. I’m still not certain I know exactly what happens in Alice by Heart but hey, the music is gorgeous.
Full review to come
- Total Books: 7
- Novels: 6
- Nonfiction: 0
- Graphic novels: 1
- YA books: 3
- Adult books: 3
- JF books: 1
- Fantasy: 2
- Historical fiction: 3
- Contemporary books: 1
- Romances: 3
- Mysteries: 0
- New-to-me books by new-to-me authors: 3
- Rereads: 1
- New-to-me books by authors I’ve read before: 3
- Debuts: 1
- Books by female authors: 4
- Books by male authors: 3
- Books by trans, genderqueer, or nonbinary authors: 3
- Books by POC authors: 2
- Books with significant LGBTQ+ content: 4
- Audiobooks: 2
A Blog of Books and Musicals 