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book thoughts - will include spoilers!!!!!!!
- omniscient reader's viewpoint (not yet finished reading it but process on-going) by sing shong
- crying for 10 million years
- gideon the ninth by tamsyn muir
- gay. note added in 2026: i truly will never get over harrow being calm when she thought gideon was going to drown her and thrashing in panic when she realized it was a hug.
- harrow the ninth
- gay. also the soup scene makes me feel like i am dying. note added in 2026: i love the part where ortus hugs harrow and says essentially that she deserved to be actually taken care of as a child and she thinks that it means more coming from him even than from god, because ortus was actually there when things were happening and knew what her childhood was like. i also love the line "she was nine, and she'd made a mistake. she was seventeen, and she'd made a mistake." also harrow is so funny, wishing a cold death on anybody who looks at her in pity, a heat death on anybody who looks at her in amusement, a quick death on anybody who looks at her in fear. mayor freak of freak city and yet also a classic and perfect example of a 17 y/o girl.
- nona the ninth
- gay. also the way that nona describes beauty and talks about the things she finds interesting and beautiful and fascinating about people makes me very emotional. it feels like how i talk about things, feels very specifically ace and autistic in alignment with my experiences as an ace/autistic person. note added in 2026: something i love about locked tomb is that the series depicts so many complicated and nuanced relationships, including many that don't fit into obvious categories of "romantic" and "platonic," and romantic relationships are never depicted as the be-all-end-all, closest type of connection. there are so many people who messily and deeply love each other.
- this is how you lose the time war by amal el-mohtar and max gladstone
- recommended by a friend. gay. god i love reading about freaks. note added in 2026, having reread the book somewhat recently: the methods of letter writing and delivery are so fascinating in this book. the idea of figuring out, together, what they can be, and wanting to be a context for each other, is beautiful. a very moving depth of knowing each other and each other's pasts.
- station eleven by emily st. john mandel
- i read this after watching the show. it was interesting how different it was in some ways to the show. i think, while i really enjoyed some moments in the book, that i enjoyed the story the show told more, and appreciated the changes they made. the way the stories weave in and out and connect, the way everybody has an impact on everybody else even from the other side of the world, even after death, and the way art was transformed to fit a new need and to connect with people where they were in the present was really moving. the conflict and friction between needs/memories/traumas/healing of the past/people born before things ended and needs/curiosities/realities/frustrations of the future/people born after were difficult and interesting to watch. kirsten waving goodbye multiple times at the end of the show made me cry.
- the host by stephenie meyer (reread for the first time since middle or high school)
- loved this book in middle school. stephenie meyer have a normal age diff and be normal about gender roles/ages of partners in a relationship challenge, difficulty level apparently impossible. however, humiliatingly... i did have some fun reading it. there are still things i find compelling. everything compelling in this book is compelling very much in spite of s meyer's best efforts. how is there not a huge queer following for this book, honestly.
- exhalation by ted chiang (started a year or two ago, returned to it and finished this year)
- the story about the predictor box has been buzzing around in my brain since i first started the book maybe 2 years ago, and i think about the motif of harmful sensation a lot. the audiobook includes notes from the author after every story.
- the hunger games by suzanne collins (reread)
- interesting to return to this one after so long. don't think i've read it since it first came out. hadn't heard the story before that the premise was in part inspired by the disorientation of flipping back and forth between news broadcasts about war and the super bowl or some similar big sporting event.
- sea of tranquility by emily st. john mandel
- the circles of storytelling were interesting. the author insert character and covid trauma elements i had complicated feelings about, largely in that it reminded me quite a bit of a very specific brand of early pandemic panic, which is strange for me to read and feel again now as i see more and more people and institutions and organizations pretend that the pandemic is over. there's a corner of the city where, every time i pass it, i think about the book, because i was listening to it there while waiting for the bus.
- harrow by joy williams
- the lightest object in the universe by kimi eisele
- honestly, i found the characters in this a little annoying, tbh - especially beatrix at points.
- gwen & art are not in love by lex croucher
- my fav of lex croucher's books.
- ace by angela chen
- recomnended by a friend. while it didn't really touch on much that i didn't already know, i'm glad i read it and would recommend it as a resource.
- catching fire by suzanne collins (reread)
- i always found the clock ticking arena so fascinating. i also remember, as a kid, being so frustrated with everybody giving katniss such a hard time about romance. like, jesus christ, leave her alone, she's going through something. maybe that says something about me then?
- the santaroga barrier by frank herbert
- recommended by a relative. hm. some parts didn't age well. it was interesting, though.
- earth abides by george r. stewart
- recommended by a relative. again, some parts def didn't age well, but it was interesting. the main character was in moments insufferable, and i truly don't know if he was intended to be read as such or not. i think it's interesting to read him as intentionally insufferable - like, as the author knowing he's insufferable and presenting him as an imperfect person after an apocalyptic event. also interesting reading another book set around here (santaroga barrier is set around here-ish as well). the way time moves in this book is so fascinating, as is the evolution of language near the end. i found the last sections of the book really emotional.
- mockingjay by suzanne collins (reread)
- am i misremembering, or did people have an issue with katniss deciding to have kids in the end? i don't really understand why that would be an issue.
- cemetery boys by aiden thomas
- recommended by several friends. very sweet.
- catch-22 by joseph heller
- i know this book is quite old so this isn't headline news but this was prob one of the best books i've read in this big list of books. obviously some parts haven't aged well, but so many parts strikingly have. i watched the movie after, and talked everybody's ear off about how i think the way they depicted some things was interesting but i ultimately think the book is still much better, and don't like some of the changes they made in the movie. i read about the miniseries online and will never watch it but jesus christ some of those changes they apparently made are so bonkers. why does the miniseries end with him deciding to keep bombing even as doing so breaks him? what's the point of that change? i tried to think, "ok, is there a reason they decided to do that, some change in the years that made that seem more poignant?" but honestly, coming from a big celebrity as a director and being made/put out on a big platform, i don't really put much stock in their creative vision, and think any argument they might make for such a wild change would probably ring hollow.
- timequake by kurt vonnegut
- some parts obv haven't aged well. interesting to hear some quotes i've heard a million times in context.
- the hundred year's war on palestine by rashid khalidi
- took a long time to get this one off hold from the library, which seems good, like lots of people are reading it. i've always been bad at keeping dates in my head and that remains true but this gave some valuable context i hadn't had.
- out there screaming, edited by jordan peele and john joseph adams
- recommended by a friend. really loved this anthology. some very heavy stories. i think my favorite was invasion of the baby snatchers - really sent some chills up my spine i think.
- the future is disabled by leah lakshmi piepzna-samarasinha
- really loved this book. i talked about it so much in therapy that my therapist wrote it down to read. coincidentally i was reading it during one of my many weeks where i suddenly remember "oh, right, i'm disabled, huh?" because i still spend so much time ignoring my own needs. also coincidentally read it during a period of time where i've been thinking about interdependence and indepedence and community and how those things look different in different places, with different people, how they feel different in my life depending on context. i loved the sections on how mutual aid, outside of the more recent buzz around the term, often is quiet, or small, or one-on-one, or in a small group, and can look like so many different things. i loved the parts describing beautiful moments of disabled solidarity. i loved the section filled with questions about what internal things you've figured out this week, what your needs are, what needs even are in the first place, acknowledging the ways that forcing yourself to have no needs and to make do can be/maybe has been necessary to survival, and the parts about what you have to offer, build, create, share. i'd been thinking again about the idea of creating a radical community space in my hometown. i've talked to friends from there about it. several think the city council would try to shut it down. but just imagining a free community fridge and pantry in that space, or a single openly queer space in town, gives me so much energy sometimes. maybe i'll write more about this sometime. i tend not to share certain things but, actually, maybe saying things out loud can be good - needs and hopes and wants and wishes.
- the vanished birds by simon jimenez
- recommended by a friend. another one where time moves very interestingly, though not apocalyptic this time.
- refusing compulsory sexuality by sherronda j. brown
- recommended by a friend. some heavy sections, certainly, but really valuable resource. definitely recommend.
- the daughter of doctor moreau by silvia moreno-garcia
- despite not being especially short, it felt quite short. maybe it was the sort of fable/fairy tale air of the story.
- my heart is a chainsaw by stephen graham jones
- recommended by a friend. jesus christ. this book had some incredibly beautiful moments. i'm reading the second book soon, and have the third on hold, though since i believe it just recently came out the waitlist is quite long. i haven't entirely collected my thoughts around this book yet. there were some lines and moments i found so meaningful. it's so painful and emotional and meaningful to watch a well-written teenager struggle with internalized shame around their trauma. on top of that, it's a really well-done slasher.
- parable of the sower by octavia e. butler
- also set at points around here, also an interesting sense of time, though less constantly shifting than other apocalyptic/post-apocalyptic books on this list. i wonder if they walked through my hometown. i have the second book on hold. this one's got some very heavy moments. i started in a while ago and then had to pause it, returned to it only now.
i think the above notes were all written around 2023. the below are being written now, in 2026.
- beyond survival, edited by ejeris dixon and leah lakshmi piepzna-samarasinha
- writing my thoughts now, years later, i still think about this book often. i want to read it again, and annotate a copy this time. highly recommend. it has helped me think about nuanced and complicated accountability processes, who they might serve and what they might mean, what we owe to each other and what we are allowed to ask of each other, in a way that i've found incredibly meaningful. there are so many insightful pieces in this book, but one of the reasons i still so often think about it is that, i think, prior to reading this book, it had genuinely never occurred to me that i actually could ask for accountability from certain people in my own life, in a way that is focused on what i need, and not a predefined version of "justice" that serves a system i do not want to uphold. it gave me some of the language and tools to be able to ask, "what kind of accountability would *i* want from and in my community? what would actually help me?" (not just what i've been told i should want/not just what i've been told is the only set of options available to me).
- model home by rivers solomon
- some moments that really got to me: really chilling depiction of the desperation not to remember/not to have someone else know what happened to you. the ways the brain will rewrite and obfuscate what happened, repress it in ways you aren't conscious of. the realization that someone else knew, and they were trying to help you. (eve knowing, even as a child, and trying to help in what limited ways a child could, and the solidarity of eve never saying it directly and out loud to ezri, referring to it in more vague terms the way ezri would refer to it, but also perhaps not knowing the extent to which ezri had repressed it all - a complicated and sad and compassionate response of a child.) the deeply held shame and self-blame for something that wasn't your fault. the ways the trauma manifests as seeking risk and degradation. a very different story from the indian lake trilogy, but there are some significant connections in the ways that traumatized children sometimes need to mythologize and repress the horrific things that have been done to them, and in ways that the people around them do and don't notice and understand before they do. children are smart, and they know what's happening, and they also cannot know what's happening and need to do whatever they need to do to survive. also some clear connections between the two stories in the ways that these predominantly white neighborhoods failed these children and harmed them so spectacularly, and adultified them, and blamed them for the ways in which they were struggling, and "missed" the obvious signs of trauma. really hard to read at points. really painful. particularly the points where you can see ezri failing their own child; i was sad for ezri and empathetic to them, and also angry at them; that's mirrored by the story itself near the end. being responsible for someone else while you're barely functional yourself is a complicated topic. the last chapter made me cry, ezri and elijah moving in with eve. "what a relief. what a relief that i am no longer here. i am not where i once was."
- some more thoughts: i recently tried to read tomb sweeping by alexandra chang, and had to stop. the collection of stories was described, in the blurb, if i remember correctly, as "deeply playful," but i found it quite upsetting. to be clear, i'm not saying it was a bad book; i just personally could not keep reading. it was a little disorienting that many of the stories i got through before needing to stop reading were set in places i've lived or lived near, but the grocery store story in particular was really hard for me to read. i'm going to seriously summarize it and i'm sure i'm leaving much of it out, but the plot of that story is ultimately not the point of why i'm discussing it just now. anyways, in it, the narrator is working at a fancy grocery store, taking classes, trying to leave. he's in his 20's, and works with a young girl, a teenager, and there is a misunderstanding that makes it seem to others like he tried to or did pursue her. his boss indicates he's going to report him, and he freaks out, meets with the girl, angrily tells her to correct the misunderstanding. a woman passing nearby sees this, and approaches to make sure the girl is okay. she says she is, says she will tell the manager that nothing happened, and leaves. years later, the guy is working at a different grocery store, and she walks in, like the rich customers from their old job, and they have a brief interaction. while he did not, actually, pursue her when she was young, he did think about it at one point. i think he is likely supposed to be a complicated character, and we're not supposed to think he's "the good guy," exactly, but i found the story incredibly upsetting and could not continue reading. i am trying to figure out why i could read model home, and the indian lake trilogy, but could not stomach continuing tomb sweeping, even though model home and indian lake are overall far more visceral in many ways. the most obvious difference is that the story in tomb sweeping is told from the perspective of the perpetrator, or "potential" perpetrator, and model home and indian lake are told from the perspectives of survivors. i'm a survivor of csa, myself, and so perhaps it's as simple as that: i often cannot stomach hearing from the perspective of perpetrators, and my emotional reaction to those stories is different from the moments where i have an emotional reaction to stories told from the perspective of survivors.
- i am also thinking about a q&a i only partially remember, with jonny sims of the magnus archives. i just went back and found the transcripts:
- ALEX: "What are our most hated horror tropes and do we find it hard to avoid them?"
- . . .
- JONNY: "Mine is using sexual violence as a source of horror. Certain stories I, I have heard generally, generally by survivors do actually use horror very effectively as a means of exploring and coming to terms with that sort of thing but, crucially, they never, it’s never the horror. Like, it really leaves us horrid… like, a really nasty taste in my mouth when that sort of thing is equated to ghosts and, you know, ghosts and mummies and all this sort of stuff and–"
- ALEX: "Well, it’s the difference between trauma and horror."
- i do think it's an interesting thing to think about. i think that horror written by survivors about their experiences does tend to be different, and perhaps often does tend to be about the processing of the trauma and the aftermath rather than presenting the event(s) as The Horror or making a spectacle of the event(s) in the way someone who hadn't experienced these kinds of traumas might be inclined to do.