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Congratulations to all of us for making it through the recent sticky heatwave, during which even my most summer-loving friends cancelled plans. It was nice to have everyone live on Vampire Standard Time with me, during which I avoid the sun and only go outside before dawn and after dusk.
The heat does something to me, and that something is that it makes me stupid. It makes my reading sloppy and my writing sloppier, as I get so busy clanking my hydroflask defeatedly around town while mosquitoes eat me alive that I don't notice day-old groceries going moldy from humidity or anything beyond my autonomic nervous system at work. Despite reading some good stuff recently, my thoughts are stripped and frayed from overwarmth. I am missing metaphors and craving pineapple. I am reading whatever requires the least amount of effort, and I am sweating. I am hoping to click my heels together and appear on a beach sometime soon, where the sun is a friend rather than foe. But until then, I am going to read light while outside and save deep thought for in front of the air conditioner.
The Books
I have ordered the below reads by the heaviness of book contents. The lighter texts have risen to the top, while the denser, heavier subjects are further down. In fact, it was so burdensome to physically hold a book during recent particularly warm days that all of the below were read through my phone, either as e-books or audiobooks. The weight of humidity is physical weight enough for me.
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I ate up books four, five, and six of the Wayward Children series, which I raved about last time. The even-numbered books tend to be deep dives into particular characters and the magical worlds they've immersed in, so I'm preferring those volumes over the quest-driven odd-numbered books. Reading this series is an easy, cozy epitome.
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I listened to the audiobook of Taste by Stanley Tucci, the exceedingly fizzy and friendly memoir you'd expect from a guy who got paid by CNN to bounce around Italy after helping bring The Devil Wears Prada and The Hunger Games to life. The memoir focuses on Tucci's lifelong passion for food, with particular emphasis on his Italian-American upbringing in the 60s and 70s, and has lots of anecdotes and recipes to try. It reminded me of hanging out with my parents in the nicest way.
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I finished an advanced copy of Bliss Montage by Ling Ma, which publishes next month. This collection of short stories feels more like a series of snapshots from strange lives of different women, thematically linked through loneliness and voyeurism and magical realism. Though I found myself invested in reading each tale, I couldn’t help but feel frustrated by each story’s lack of conclusion. Since Ma’s writing is a weird treat, I’d recommend this if you’re looking for something eerie and odd and inconclusive. One of my favorite stories, "Peking Duck," was published and discussed in The New Yorker if you’d like a taste.
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I also listened to the audiobook of Belly of the Beast: The Politics of Anti-Fatness as Anti-Blackness by Da'Shaun Harrison. This brief account of intersectional experiences traces how fatphobia, transphobia, and anti-Black racism coalesce into upholding systems of desirability politics and white supremacy. I replayed certain sections to ensure I heard every word, particularly since the book includes several interviews that tie back to the author’s thesis. I wish it had been a little longer to develop some of its ideas more fully, but found it informative and accessible.
Coming Up Next
August is Women in Translation month, during which I will celebrate international women writers by reading more of them. The above stack predominantly fits the bill with a focus on works translated from Japanese and Korean, but I might finally dig into my Elena Ferrante collection as well. Her work is a big gap for me, and it might be time to address. If you’re looking to read some fabulous translated fiction yourself, Revenge by Yoko Ogawa (odd and intense short stories, translated from Japanese) and The Wandering by Intan Paramaditha (choose-your-own adventure novel following a sexy deal with the devil, translated from Indonesian) are two of my favorites.
Since I am suceptible to peer pressure (looking at you, Ash and JB), I'll also be participating in a month-long fantasy-fueled readathon that is part-RPG, part reading challenge run by the BookTuber Book Roast. It really just means I have a few prompts to structure my August reading, but it comes with a fun little fantasy world to play in as well. I love to play!
Beyond the Bookshelf
The good news: I was delighted to find out that Books Are Magic will be opening a second location and contributing to the Montague Street renaissance this fall, my favorite of all the seasons. My near-daily walks to Brooklyn Heights—which I have taken to calling my Promenade promenades—are about to be even more fun.
The bad news: Everyone’s selling shares of every little thing, including themselves, these days. I was going to write about this enraging Esquire article, which discusses disrupting the publishing industry using crypto to let readers “invest” in authors or something, but Book Notes already said everything I was going to say. Too much crypto talk always ruins a dinner party, even if Book Token sounds like a deceptively cute book-buying currency. It is, devastatingly, not cute. So I’ll leave you with that.
That’s all I have for now. If you’re looking for other books of interest, Mohsin Hamid was profiled in the NYT’s Beyond The Book, since he has a novel coming out this Tuesday (one of my most anticipated of 2022, might I add); the hilarious Samantha Irby has several recommendations for you at Elle’s Shelf Life column; and Blackbird Spyplane is dubbing it a very P.G. Wodehouse summer (“the Seinfeld of books”), if that tickles your fancy. Toodles!