alicedroni's reviews
68 reviews

We Go Where They Go: The Story of Anti-Racist Action by Kristin Schwartz, Michael Staudenmaier, Shannon Clay, Lady

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4.25

Fun read to compare tactics from then and now. A lot of the things happening then are still happening now and it's cool to see exactly how tactics have shifted over the years especially during an era of right wing resurgence.
Abolish the Family: A Manifesto for Care and Liberation by Sophie Lewis

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4.5

Love the concepts and the overall arguments. My one complaint is that there are so many references and footnotes talking about other essays and books i feel like either I should've done homework to prepare for this book or I have a hell of a lot of reading to do now that I'm done.

The author has a pretty academic tone through the whole thing, which can make some of the points feel quite distant in some parts but for the most part I related to everything she was saying. 
Pageboy by Elliot Page

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3.25

I want to rate this higher because his story of coming out is important and all the stuff he's dealt with is heart wrenching, but it felt quite disjointed as a narrative.

He jumps around a lot making it hard to keep track of which events happened in what order. The tone shifts wildly between traumatized, then insanely horny, then good experience right after, all while Elliot reads in a somewhat dissociated tone. Also I heard at least 3 errors in the audio book where lines were repeated.
Polysecure: Attachment, Trauma and Consensual Nonmonogamy by Jessica Fern

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5.0

Made me think about my relationship with my mom a lot more than i wanted to while thinking about my dating life hahaha

I think this book brings up a lot of really great questions and self-reflection topics. Like all polyamory books I'd absolutely recommend this to my monogamous friends as well, i think it has a great view on dealing with attachment both within oneself and in a general sense of relations with others. i found a lot of my secure attachments lie within platonic friendships and it's nice to decouple this from a mono-normative lens.
Set Fear on Fire: The Feminist Call that Set South America Ablaze by LasTesis

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4.5

Love a good angry manifesto, hate how relatable it all is.
Mating in Captivity: Unlocking Erotic Intelligence by Esther Perel

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2.0

This book was for someone, and that someone was not me. 

Its not like she has bad observations, they're just incredibly normative. If you're queer, poly, aromantic, childfree, anti-marriage, or any combination of those, you wont find anyone you relate to in this book. At the beginning of the book she mentions asking for help representing queer folks, and though there are technically two queer couples mentioned, both are extremely upper middle class, typical married couples and are essentially indistinguishable from a regular heterosexual married couple.

Her main hypothesis about desire and intimacy being separate feelings seems like an extremely simplified and hetero-normative version of the split attraction model many queer theory and aro/ace books talk about (and I think generally do a better job of explaining).
Bullshit Jobs: A Theory by David Graeber

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4.75

I put off reading this book for a while since I was struggling through burnout at my job and finally picked it up when i finally decided to quit and it was the perfect read. 

Even if you don't work a specifically "bullshit job" yourself, there are a lot of great observations about work culture as a whole that can benefit most readers. It also has a ton of personal stories that are both eye opening, entertaining, and relatable.