Bookish Thoughts

When I really love a book, you can tell not just by how many times I've read it, but by how many copies I've bought. Space Opera was just elevated to a book I've bought more than once, simply because I needed both a physical and a digital copy of it. The thing that makes this one of my favorite books it the simple, recurring line: Life is beautiful and life is stupid. It resonates with me, especially since my husband was diagnosed with cancer while I was pregnant with twins. 2019 was a fantastic, terrible year, and 2020 even more so. My husband's death is the worst thing that's ever happened to me, but my kids are the best thing that's ever happened to me, and to have them both happening at the same time has resulted in an extreme roller coaster. This book reminds me that it's okay to be happy, to feel joy. Not just in that main theme, but because it's a hilarious book with a whole lot of heart. I keep coming back to it, as I do with most of Cat Valente...

It was a long wait for Allie Brosh's second book, but it was worth it. A lot happened to her in the years between books - a divorce, the sudden death of her sister - and the really informs her new stories. While her earlier work was hilarious and relatable, it also tended to stay on the surface. She started digging deeper at the end of her last book, and that same depth is present in nearly every story here. I'll be honest: I wanted a bit more of the surface hilarity. These stories hit hard, and I wasn't always ready for the raw grief that showed up. I also got unreasonably upset at the fact that her new husband was named Kevin, like she'd stolen him from me somehow. But I'm sure I'll keep revisiting these stories in the future, and I'll keep getting more out of them in the coming years.

I regard the Discworld the way other people regard the bible. That might be blasphemous, but there it is. When I need comfort, when I need to laugh, when I need to think deeply, when I need to be reminded of all the beauty of humanity, I turn to the Discworld. These books soothe me. They empower me. They provide surety that it will all be okay, but that I have to do my part to make it okay. Reaper Man is about Death. It has some incredible quotes that, in the wake of my husband's death, I needed to come back to. And in coming back to them I ended up re-reading the entire book.  Anyway, here are a few of my favorite bits of this particular book: Alone of all the creatures in the world, trolls believe that all living things go through Time backward. If the past is visible and the future is hidden, they say, then it means that you must be facing the wrong way. People get exactly the wrong idea about belief. They think it works back to front. They think the sequence is, first object, t...

It's been a while since I read or enjoyed The Oatmeal. I stopped finding it amusing fairly early on. But there's no denying that there was a time when it was everywhere. And when I saw this collection of his comics at the library book sale, I threw it in my bag without thinking. This collection is a bit of a throwback, containing a lot of his earlier work. As such, there was a certain nostalgia factor for me. These were comics I remember reading and enjoying back in the day when they all got passed around and linked. So I did enjoy this book. And I'm glad I picked it up for relatively cheap.

The first time I read this book, I liked it a lot. The second time I read it, I loved it. But that's been my experience with nearly all of Catherynne Valente's work, so I should be surprised. Her books get better every time you revisit them, because the more you know about them the more they reveal themselves. Once you know where the story is going, you have a much greater appreciation for how Valente gets there. It's all about the journey with her. But that journey becomes so much richer when the destination is known. The central theme of this book pops up early: Life is beautiful and life is stupid. It has seemed particularly relevant to my life lately. Recently my husband was diagnosed with leukemia. Though he achieved remission in just a few months, the doctors are still recommending a bone marrow transplant as our best option for beating the disease. I recently gave birth to twins and was initially disappointed when it became clear that I would have to have a c-sec...

This was a cute collection of the online webcomic of the same name. I picked it up cheap at a used book sale and read it pretty quickly. The comics are all, of course, available online for free, but sometimes having a physical, curated collection is easier for me to read. The comics are vaguely organized by theme and interspersed with short stories and essays. They were, frankly, a bit weird, but in keeping with the overall tone of the book.

At this point it's probably time to admit that I'm a Terry Pratchett completionist. He might not ever be releasing any new work, but there are still a handful of books that I haven't gotten around to yet. It'll be a while before I don't have any new Pratchett to read. And considering that I'm in the midst of an epic and constant Discworld  re-read, I may not ever be done reading him entirely. I'll just keep picking up his books and discovering new things in them and laughing at old jokes and wrapping them around me like a favorite sweater. The point is that this collection of short stories is really only for people who want more Terry Pratchett no matter what. It's not for casual fans. Pratchett isn't great at short stories (he admits as much in the intro for one of them). And most of these were written before he started writing novels. It's rough and unformed, but you can see the writer he eventually became. That said, there are a couple of ...

Thud!  isn't my favorite Discworld book. I'm not even sure if it would crack the top ten. But it is Pratchett at the top of his game, firing on all cylinders and weaving together a bunch of threads to create a dense, elaborate story that's so much more than the sum of it's parts. This book focuses on the contentious relationship between Dwarves and Trolls. As the anniversary of a famous battle between the two nears, tensions are running high throughout the city. Then a dwarf is murdered, the dwarves immediately blame a troll, and it's up to Vimes to get to the truth and keep war from breaking out in the streets of Ankh-Morpork. Pratchett dives into the interplay between history and myth, and the way they can inform actions in the present. He examines stereotypes and grudges and shows how they can take over and become larger than life. But this book is really about change. The way some people are so resistant to it that they'll do anything, and the small ways...

My main thought upon finishing this book was that I need to read it again. Which is what happens nearly every time I finish a Cat Valente novel and is the main reason I love her as much as I do. Unlike Radiance  and Palimpsest , the plot of this novel is obvious pretty early on. Aliens have become aware of the existence of humanity, and they're giving us a chance to prove our sentience and join the intergalactic community. There's a musical contest, based heavily on Eurovision (the book was initially conceived as "Eurovision in space"), and all we humans have to do is not come in last. They've gone through our musical archives and put together a list of possible contestants. Most of whom have died. The only one left standing is Decibel Jones, who was an international sensation before one member of his band died, resulting in an estrangement between him and the remaining band member. He's spent the last twenty years trying to recapture the glory of his yout...

I haven't actually listened to much (any?) of Jim Gaffigan's stand up. I mostly know him from his stint on My Boys , which I really liked when it was airing and re-watched several times when we first got Netflix. His mostly this cultural presence whose existence I've absorbed through osmosis. I always recognize him, and I see him more than I expect to, but I never really seek him out. And so his memoir, sitting on the shelf at the library used book sale, was just a spur of the moment grab. I recognized his face, and I enjoy his humor more often than not, and it looked like a quick read, so I figured I'd give it a shot. I basically got exactly what I was expecting. Gaffigan is a father of five, and his book (co-written with his wife) is basically about that. He complains about being a dad. Finds humor in the weird things kids do. Complains about being tired all the time. Finds the humor in his exhaustion. It wasn't anything I was terribly unfamiliar with (though ...

Going Postal  may not be Terry Pratchett at the top of his game, but it's pretty close. This book introduces Moist (who is entertaining in the beginning but, much like Rincewind, quickly wears out his welcome) and focuses on an ever more modern Ankh-Morpork. The clacks have been around for several books now, allowing messages to pass quickly both within the city and between the city and the outlying regions. Communication with Sto Lat is near instantaneous and it's even possible to keep up to date with far-flung Genua. But it's all starting to fail. The system was privatized, maintenance was dropped in the name of profit, and now the clacks is down more often than not, while the fat cats who own it grow ever fatter. So Vetinari enlists Moist von Lipwig, notorious conman, to resurrect the failing postal service. What follows is a rollicking adventure, touching on everything from public service to redemption to freedom. The references to Tump Tower feel even more on the n...

Good Omens  was my favorite book for a very long time. I've re-read it more times than I can count. I once gave a copy to my mom for Christmas and then immediately stole it back. It's sitting on my book shelf right now. This book never failed to make me laugh or to make me think about what it means to be a good and moral person (or a god worth worshiping). I've read it so many times that I practically have it memorized. But I think I might be outgrowing it. Or maybe it's just that it isn't aging well. I still like a lot of what it says about humanity and morality and taking responsibility. But this time through I found myself cringing at as many of the jokes as I laughed at. Shadwell as a character no longer makes much sense to me. Or maybe it's the way people react to him. I can certainly imagine an angry, conservative, little man who hates everyone indiscriminately and insults anyone he interacts with. I can't imagine all these people finding it charmi...

Sense and Sensibility  is not my favorite Austen. It might even be my least favorite Austen. But that's at least partly because I bring a whole lot of emotional baggage to this book. I first read it at the end of college, when I was visiting Europe on my own. I took an overnight train from Madrid to London. I was in a compartment with three other girls my age. I don't think they knew each other, but they all spoke French and Spanish and none of them spoke English. They had a lively conversation and I read this book and felt an incredible mix of emotions that are, I think, unique to that specific time and place in my life. On the brink of adulthood with no plan for the future off on an adventure and surrounded by people I couldn't communicate with. A mere $150 in my bank account to see me through three days in London. The other part of my baggage is that the Dashwoods - Elinor and Marianne's half-brother and his wife - remind me strongly of my father and his second w...

On re-read, I enjoyed The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents  much more than when I initially read it. I'm not sure why exactly this is. Whether I'm better acquainted with children's literature in general now or with Pratchett's children's literature in particular and have a better understanding of what it tries to and can accomplish. Or whether it's because I read it along with Mark Oshiro, who loved it and pointed out all the wonderful nuance that I wasn't as attuned to my first time through. Regardless, I really enjoyed this book this time around. So much so that I'm seriously considering using it to introduce Gavin to the Discworld in a few years. (Let's be real, it was either going to be this or Tiffany Aching, and this one is geared towards slightly younger children than that sub-series). But it pulls of the neat trick of dealing with really big questions and refusing to provide easy answers. And in a kid's book, too. The rats in ...

The real draw of The Last Hero  is the artwork. The story itself is fun and interesting. It's probably the best of all the stories that involve Rincewind and Cohen, because those two are best in small doses. But it also does a good job of incorporating all the other characters, from Lord Vetinari and Captain Carrot, to the wizards, the gods, and, of course, Death. And it half seems like that was just so Paul Kidby would have an excuse to draw all of these characters. The story is simple and straight forward, with a classic Pratchett twist. Having read some of his earlier work I have a much greater appreciation for this story. It's still lacking in some ways, and there were a number of characters I wish had been woven into the story (like literally any female character at all who resides on the Discworld). But the artwork is stunning, and that's really what this book is about. The fantastic illustration of the characters, the gods, and the Great A'Tuin.

Mindy Kaling's second book of essays is just as light and smart and quick and fun as her first book. This one focuses more on her adult life, and particularly on her time working on The Mindy Project . Kaling talks about work and her attitude towards working hard (which I deeply disagree with, but I'm also not as successful or driven as she is). She talks about dating and fashion and not being traditionally thin, especially by Hollywood standards. And she does it all with her trademark humor. I'm not sure I would ever want to be friends with Kaling. She's a very intense person, and it would be a lot for me to handle in person. But she's exactly the kind of person whose work I enjoy, and who I'm confident will continue to produce funny things.

This was a fun collection of short stories for kids, from the very beginning of Terry Pratchett's career. He was still a teen-aged journalist when he wrote these stories for the paper he was working for. The collection was something of a mixed bag. I really liked some of the stories. Others never quite came together for me. Part of that is because I can't help but judge Pratchett's work against his later stuff. Comparing where he was in the beginning of his career to the heights to which he would eventually soar isn't fair, but I can't quite help it. On it's own, this is a wonderful collection of stories that I'll be thrilled to read to my kid in a few years. You can see the seeds of ideas and themes that Pratchett would go on to wrestle with later in life. The stories are cute and funny and often manage to subvert expectations. It'd be nice if there were more girls, but that's something Pratchett eventually got a lot better about.

In Modern Romance , comedian Aziz Ansari teams up with sociologist Eric Klinenberg to investigate the ways dating has changed in modern times, with shifting social mores and advancing technology. We have more choices than ever before and more time before we're expected to settle down, which means that our goals have changed, as well as how we pursue those goals. All in all, this book made me glad that I'm happily married. Ansari's life sounds exhausting, and not just the dating aspect of it. He's so determined to have the best of everything that he invests most of his energy into researching options. If it takes him most of a day to decide where to go get lunch (only to discover that his restaurant of choice is closed) you can only imagine how frustrating and unsatisfying his dating life must be. There was some interesting information in this book, and Ansari definitely has a gift for presenting it in an interesting way. Reading this book was a lot of fun. But mostl...

Thief of Time  is a lot sillier than I remember it being. It's not exactly a bad thing. But I remember loving this book, and this time around I only liked it. It was fun and funny. But the past few books have had a depth that this one lacked. So I ended up feeling a bit let down. The thing this book is missing is the biting social commentary that I remember as such a hallmark of the Discworld  series. Of course, it took years for the books to evolve from the silly adventures of Rincewind to the much more hard-hitting advancement in Ankh-Morpork. They're all satire, but some of them are a whole lot lighter than others. The past few books have been heavy, though. Pratchett was tackling more complicated issues, holding that distorted mirror back up to our world and demanding that readers take a good look around. And so Thief of Time  feels like a bit of a regression. It's a good, solid book. But by Discworld standards, it is merely okay. There's a lot to like here. Su...

Jasper Fforde's The Last Dragonslayer  is a lot more accessible than his other books. I liked The Eyre Affair , though I get the feeling that that series requires a PhD in English to be truly appreciated. And Shades of Grey  is one of the most difficult books I've ever succeeded in reading. By comparison  The Last Dragonslayer  is positively straightforward. Which makes sense, as it was written for children. The world he creates is still absurd, a mishmash of high fantasy and modern technology that is a little too unrecognizable to really qualify as urban fantasy. But I felt like I understood most of the references this time around. It's not that his plot require that much brainpower. This is a pretty simple chosen one story about an orphan who finds out that she's the last in a long line of dragon slayers and it's been prophesied that she will slay the final living dragon. There are twists and turns, but nothing too outlandish. No, the absurdity is in the details...