cyborgforty's reviews
192 reviews

The School for Good Mothers by Jessamine Chan

fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

This was a gripping read. The writing style felt notably impersonal, distant in a way that I thought was done very well. It's a dystopian plotline that you can imagine happening IRL. But now I'm just curious whether the author borrowed any ideas from Little Fires Everywhere.

Frida pulled a Bebe and I knew what was coming as soon as it started happening.

This Weightless World by Adam Soto

emotional reflective slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

I didn't expect to really enjoy this book (what's up with the cover design?!) but I didn't expect to dislike it either. Good prose and compelling character study. An alternate universe - what if aliens made contact in 2012 - yet very much the same as our universe today. The fact that it's science fiction set during the Obama era makes it so conceptually interesting.

Maybe it's because I know this book was published in 2021, and maybe it's because I was 9 years old and unaware of the world in 2012, but I feel like it's a book about 2012 that feels like 2021? Was Uber really commonplace in 2012? Etc. etc.

I didn't really dig the Babichev / Takka passages embedded between the chapters. I feel like those were there to make it feel more like science fiction - and we get some references to the story's characters and a bit of clarification on who Babichev is by the end - but while reading it, I just didn't understand why they were relevant to the story and found myself skimming over them.

Horse Barbie by Geena Rocero

funny hopeful inspiring reflective medium-paced

4.0

I enjoyed this memoir! I wasn't even familiar with Geena Rocero when I first read it but am now very curious about her documentary "Caretakers."

Split by Cathy Linh Che

5.0

read it all in one train ride... wow

Negative Money by Lillian-Yvonne Bertram

5.0

i loved the graphical/visual format!

The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh Nguyen

4.0

I picked up this book because it has long been on my TBR (required reading as a Vietnamese American, right?) and plus, the show was coming out so now's a better time than ever. I'm really glad I waited to read it now rather than read it while I was in high school. The prose is dense but gripping. AP English Lit type shit. It gave me Invisible Man vibes right off the bat, and then I remembered what VTN named his son. I will say the war scenes made my eyes glaze over, which is the only reason I'm docking a star. The Sympathizer's style is better suited for character and reflection than for physical action, and while the war scenes were certainly necessary considering the context of the story, I was slow both to get into and finish the book because of it.

Bullshit Jobs: A Theory by David Graeber

4.0

I was very struck by the original essay, so decided to read the book in full. Some chapters felt like they were saying the same things as the introduction did over and over again but I think it was the right read at the right time for me. I appreciated the overview of sociological/economic theory that I got from this book being not-very-well-read in that subject matter.

Water I Won't Touch by Kayleb Rae Candrilli

5.0

Poetry collections are very hard for me to rate because I think it depends on my headspace at the time I read them and this one had me in a wreck... I think my comfort poems are in here

The Twenty-Ninth Year by Hala Alyan

4.0

I'm just starting my twenties and I feel like I will never be as cool as Hala Alyan...

What We Fed to the Manticore by Talia Lakshmi Kolluri

4.0

I haven't read a lot of animal-oriented stories that I've really enjoyed, especially told in a legend/anthropomorphic style like this, but I enjoyed this collection. The thing with short story collections are that some stories always seem stronger/more memorable with others but what drives it home is a strong start and end, which this book had.