april reading + watched wrapped.
a lot of mid books and three stunning movies.
April was a weird month in terms of reading. I went in with high hopes and a wide selection, and came out mostly empty-handed. I didn’t care for most of what I read, but what I did like, I loved. This is the low part of being widely read, I guess; there will be some months when nothing interests me, months where I’m bored and underwhelmed, just as there will be months where I every book I put my hand to will change me fundamentally.
I only missed on book off my TBR—Those Bones are Not My Child by Toni Cade Bambara—but I won’t beat myself up because that’s a huge book and I was reading a lot of different things in April. There also won’t be any scans this month, sorry! My reading journal was decidedly un-aesthetically pleasing, and I really don’t think you guys would find it appealing. I am thinking about pulling out my family’s scanner and scanning some pages from my older reading journals, though, if you all would be interested!
Oh! Also, I technically finished my reading goal for this year! I set a low goal of 36 books, and I finished my 37th today. I’ll boost the number up to 90, just to keep challenging myself.
Anyways, onto the books!
READING WRAPPED
GOD THEMSELVES by Jae Nichelle: I’m not a huge poetry person, though I really am trying to be. Poetry requires a patience and a tenderness that I think I lack, and it takes a lot to tap into it. Still, I really do enjoy a good poetry collection, especially one by a Black person. I’m keeping my copy so I can revisit it; I liked the psalms poem the absolute best!
SUCH COLOR: NEW AND SELECTED POEMS by Tracy K. Smith: I’ve seen Smith’s poetry around a lot, in a lot of web weavings and collage posts and sort of dissected as different quotes, so reading it first hand and experiencing it for myself was transcendent! Gosh! There are so many good poems in this collection. Reading this made me realize that I may actually really love poetry. I thought I didn’t get it, but it turns out I just needed to read poetry written by Black people, and even the poems I wasn’t super crazy about, the notes and context at the end of the book enlightened and fascinated me. So, now I’m a poem fae! Yay! My cousin’s impact!
BRUTES by Dizz Tate: The kickoff of disappointing reads. I think I was expecting something much more from this, which may not have been fair. Still, when a book compares itself to The Virgin Suicides you expect something transgressive and fascinating and gripping, not something half-hearted and dull. In truth, I think this is the perfect sort of book for fans of Taylor Swift and Phoebe Bridgers. Ethel Cain would be a little too intense for this reader, and they’d flinch from a book that wanted more of them, but it does what it’s meant to do. It has a very sort of “girls are pink and sharp” energy that I find boring. Great for a very specific sort of 24-29 year old who’s still horny for Kristen Stewart. I don’t know! Maybe Tate’s next book won’t be so cowardly?
THE NURSERY by Szilvia Molnar: Another book that I felt was reaching for something just out of its reach. And it feels so disappointing because I feel if authors just let themselves have time, if they let themselves scrap things and start from the ground up, we’d get much better books. It isn’t a crime to be mediocre, but it is disappointing, you know?
THINGS HAVE GOTTEN WORSE SINCE WE LAST SPOKE AND OTHER MISFORTUNES by Eric LaRocca: Thank God for Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke because the other misfortunes were unfortunate for sure. The other two pieces in this collection The Enchantment and People are Like That All Over were such nothing which is really more offensive to me than it being just plain bad. If they were in different collections or if they were stood on their own, I think they’d be so interesting, but as it stands, they’re just two mediocre short stories next to a hard-hitter. Oh well!
LIGHTHOUSEKEEPING by Jeanette Winterson: Thank God for the first five star of the month! I’ve heard a lot about Lighthousekeeping; again, lots of quotes on Tumblr, lots of web weaving and swooning from other authors, so I was excited to get into it. I’ve also read Oranges Aren’t the Only Fruit when I was in my teens, so I had an idea of Winterson’s style and was eager to read another one. Oh my God! What a book! I have such a soft spot in my heart for books like these, books that are about stories and storytelling, books that radiate with love. I came away wanting to read it over and over, and also to have a copy of my own, and also to cry for a million years for how much I love love and I love telling stories and I love how nothing is true and everything is true.
THE TALENTED MR. RIPLEY by Patricia Highsmith: So, we’re all watching Ripley on Netflix, right? I’ve read The Talented Mr. Ripley back in 2019 and I really enjoyed it then, but coming at it now with a slighter bigger brain, my mind was absolutely blown. This book eats. It’s thrilling, it’s exciting, it’s about performances and costumes and disguises and the roles we play, especially when we’re closeted and a little ashamed. Stunning book. Not quite a five-star experience, but a good experience nonetheless. I believe my Storygraph review was something like, “Damn. He did it. Good for him.” And honestly? Good for him. I believe in the rights of toxic gay men!
THE DISPOSSESSED by Ursula K. Le Guin: Last book of the month, and my God, did it earn it’s five-star rating! And how timely! As we watch as the United States funds and stages several genocides, as we watch as militarized police brutalize the brave students that are protesting the genocide in Palestine, it feels just right to read this book by Miss Le Guin. A book about governments, a book about the complicity of academia in fascism, a book about control and freedom. We do come to each other as the Anarresti Beggarman, empty-handed, owning nothing, and it is our privilege as human beings to be able to look at one another and give what we can and do what we can. Yeah. Exactly.
WATCHED WRAPPED
MONKEY MAN (2024): Which I saw twice in theaters, once on my birthday and once on the 20th, and both times were literally transcendent. I loved absolutely everything about it! The costuming, the soundtrack, the story, the way it merged the story of Hanuman with the journey of Kid, the inclusion and power of the trans women! And the violence! God, more films need to be truly and deliciously violent, everything is so bloody, but nothing is gory like this is, nothing is giving us wild-eyed violence and teeth and drool and sweat, and we need more of it! Ugh! I only wish that Peele and Co. didn’t dilute the BJP storyline/didn’t kowtow to hinduvista nonsense/hindu nationalism. Still, you could feel the emptiness at the heart of it, that missing thread, and if you know what was taken out, you definitely felt it. Very meta, in that sense. (
CHALLENGERS (2024): Which I saw Monday, and I’m truly so thrilled that I did. Thank God for tennis and polyamory and bisexuality. Thank God for Tashi Duncan pushing her two little white boys, thank God for the mischievous glint in Peter Svieg’s eye, thank God for the kicked-puppy act that Art Donaldson puts on even as he schemes. Fabulous movie. Five stars, can’t wait to see it again. Also…We need more films where a woman is getting her neck sucked on by two men and where those two men then kiss each other. Also, Tashi should’ve pegged them both on screen.
ALL OF US STRANGERS (2023): I watched this on Monday too, when I came home from the theater. Several friends have been screaming and crying and throwing up about it, and I do love anything with Andrew Scott involved. It was lovely; thoughtful and slow and careful, and when I realized what was happening, the twist at the end, I was truly breathless. God, what tenderness! What love!