Happy New Year Readers!
Sorry to have been so MIA lately, honestly I'd love to say that I was holed up somewhere reading all the books, planning out reviews and read-a-longs, but I wasn't. I was dealing with grief, depression, holiday feels realness, and emotional stagnation. Thankfully, I'm coming out of that.
January has been a very bookish month for me. I've gotten through 12 reads, only one wasn't the best, and I'm 23% through my Goodreads challenge. Yes, this year I've only challenged myself to read 52 books, just one a week for 2019. Something I've noticed while reading my way through grief is that I will read a LOT, and listen to a LOT of audiobooks and podcasts as a way to avoid my emotions. For the past few years I've set myself up for these reading challenges, to successfully complete them, and while I have finished everything I wasn't fully enjoying the stories. I was reading to fill in the time that freed up in my life because taking care of my dying parents was no longer on my plate. I was reading to fill the hole in my chest that grief created. Yes I loved some of the books I read last year, I still can't shut up about Sadie, but I put all of this immense pressure on myself to be the book girl that I lost the fire that made me a reader in the first place. So 2019 is the year of the story for me. I'm reading books, I will always be reading books, but I'm reading them solely for the stories they contain. I'm not trying to fill bingo cards, check off challenges, or hit triple digits like I have in years past. This year, I'm just reading for the sole enjoyment of reading.
So, without further ado.....
Here are the first 12 books of 2019!
1. Essentialism by Greg McKeown
2. Empress of the East by Leslie Peirce
3. Nixonland by Rick Perlstein
4. Impeachment by Jeffrey Engel, Jon Meacham, Timothy Naftali, and Peter Baker
5. Playing With Fire by Lawrence O'Donnell
6. An Anonymous Girl by Greer Hendricks and Sarah Pekkanen
7. Verity by Colleen Hoover
8. Throne of Glass by Sarah J. Mass
9. Crown of Midnight by Sarah J. Mass
10. Heir of Fire by Sarah J. Maas
11. White Lies by Lucy Dawson
12. Two Can Keep a Secret by Karen McManus
What I'm currently reading:
Queen of Shadow by Sarah J. Maas
The Dreamers by Karen Thompson Walker
Bad Blood by John Carreyrou
Stay tuned for my RBG special, my hot take on Bad Blood, and much more this year.
XoXo
BrainyHeroine
Showing posts with label LitGoals. Show all posts
Showing posts with label LitGoals. Show all posts
Saturday, January 26, 2019
Sunday, March 5, 2017
Viva La Geek Girl Revolution!
Morning All,
Today we're discussing The Geek Feminist Revolution by Kameron Hurley, a self dubbed Intellectual Badass who has truly earned the title. Known for her incredible Sci-Fi and Fantasy novels this collection of essays is something else and more and a wonderful stand alone to her other work.
I am a bad feminist, not in the same vein as Roxanne Gay, but still I don't find myself to be a good feminist. I believe in women having every single opportunity, I believe in women making equal wages, and I think that having a vagina doesn't mean you have to be separated from a person with a penis unless literally it is for a porno casting. Women are every bit as smart, as strong, as capable as our male counterparts. Yet we're valued as less because somehow, somewhere, that became okay; and women have spent centuries trying to stop that bullshit.
Kameron Hurley's collection of geekish essay's lets me be okay calling myself a feminist. She doesn't blame men for the current plight of the females of our species, and she doesn't rally females into violent assault either. What she does is spend plenty of time building the reader up, and reminding them that regardless of gender we have a world we need to create, a world we need to support and embrace, a world that we need to be held responsible for and for what we put into it. As writers, consumers, citizens we have the immense responsibility for what we pour out of ourselves and into this world.
My copy of The Geek Feminist Revolution is now struck through and looks as though it is bleeding with the portions I have underlined, the notes I have added, the questions I have asked it knowing I won't get the answers from the pages; but rather from what I do after I read this book. TGFR contains real world advice on writing, the importance of ownership, and the surprising look into how much of geek culture is made up of women who aren't accepted into it. Hurley also spends a portion of the book explaining the culture of geekdom, how mainstream media dissects and perpetuates certain tropes and archetypes, and what makes her brand of geeky feminism so personal to her.
I can't explain what it is exactly that makes me love this book, and honestly I don't think I loved it for any specific reason. Finding something that helps you explore and understand a part of your identity as a woman and a geek in 2017 isn't easy, and I wasn't really looking for it. When I decided to read this book I needed to fulfill my Litsy A to Z "G" challenge, and find something that wasn't fiction. A collection of non-fiction essays certainly fit that bill, but gave me something more. I'm more fueled now to keep reading everything, to pick books that I normally wouldn't, to accept the fact that I love to read books that make most people think I'm a psychopath. I found utter acceptance in Hurley's essays, and I can't be the only one who did.
Challenge Met:
#LitsyAtoZ
Publishing Info:
287 pages (including notes and annotations!)
Originally Published on 5/31/2016 by Tor Books in English
ISBN 13: 9780765386243
Amazon Link: https://www.amazon.com/Geek-Feminist-Revolution-Kameron-Hurley/dp/0765386240/
Author Page: http://www.kameronhurley.com/
TBR because of this book:
Geek Girls Unite: How Fangirls, Bookworms, Indie Chicks, and Other Misfits Are Taking Over the World by Leslie Simon
I am a bad feminist, not in the same vein as Roxanne Gay, but still I don't find myself to be a good feminist. I believe in women having every single opportunity, I believe in women making equal wages, and I think that having a vagina doesn't mean you have to be separated from a person with a penis unless literally it is for a porno casting. Women are every bit as smart, as strong, as capable as our male counterparts. Yet we're valued as less because somehow, somewhere, that became okay; and women have spent centuries trying to stop that bullshit.
Kameron Hurley's collection of geekish essay's lets me be okay calling myself a feminist. She doesn't blame men for the current plight of the females of our species, and she doesn't rally females into violent assault either. What she does is spend plenty of time building the reader up, and reminding them that regardless of gender we have a world we need to create, a world we need to support and embrace, a world that we need to be held responsible for and for what we put into it. As writers, consumers, citizens we have the immense responsibility for what we pour out of ourselves and into this world.
My copy of The Geek Feminist Revolution is now struck through and looks as though it is bleeding with the portions I have underlined, the notes I have added, the questions I have asked it knowing I won't get the answers from the pages; but rather from what I do after I read this book. TGFR contains real world advice on writing, the importance of ownership, and the surprising look into how much of geek culture is made up of women who aren't accepted into it. Hurley also spends a portion of the book explaining the culture of geekdom, how mainstream media dissects and perpetuates certain tropes and archetypes, and what makes her brand of geeky feminism so personal to her.
I can't explain what it is exactly that makes me love this book, and honestly I don't think I loved it for any specific reason. Finding something that helps you explore and understand a part of your identity as a woman and a geek in 2017 isn't easy, and I wasn't really looking for it. When I decided to read this book I needed to fulfill my Litsy A to Z "G" challenge, and find something that wasn't fiction. A collection of non-fiction essays certainly fit that bill, but gave me something more. I'm more fueled now to keep reading everything, to pick books that I normally wouldn't, to accept the fact that I love to read books that make most people think I'm a psychopath. I found utter acceptance in Hurley's essays, and I can't be the only one who did.
Challenge Met:
#LitsyAtoZ
Publishing Info:
287 pages (including notes and annotations!)
Originally Published on 5/31/2016 by Tor Books in English
ISBN 13: 9780765386243
Amazon Link: https://www.amazon.com/Geek-Feminist-Revolution-Kameron-Hurley/dp/0765386240/
Author Page: http://www.kameronhurley.com/
TBR because of this book:
Geek Girls Unite: How Fangirls, Bookworms, Indie Chicks, and Other Misfits Are Taking Over the World by Leslie Simon
Wednesday, December 28, 2016
Decisions, Decisions
Happy New Year All!
To kick off this new year I am doing a book reading blitz. Between today and tomorrow I plan to read as many challenge books as I can! There are about 10 on my master list that are nice and short, unintentionally, yet this is making my blitz that much more doable.
The blitz had been planned for awhile, but the books kept bouncing around. Actually deciding what to read sometimes is hard! I am one of those who can simultaneously want to read any and everything, while still not being able find anything to read.
For the blitz I have chosen the shorter books on my list which will let me start off with a bang. Over the next couple of days I'm aiming to get through about 8 books; each meeting a different challenge requirement.
Am I insane? Yes. But this will also be great practice for the 24in48 January Read-a-thon later this month. (Check it out and sign up!)
Happy Reading!
-BrainyHeroine
-BrainyHeroine
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