Books of September ’24
A whopping 20 books this month, including the start of a spontaneous re-read of Jane Austen. (Oops!) A few other re-reads for September too, comfort and otherwise. The unintended theme of the month is a bit political, from Austen to de Sade, from housing rights to reproductive rights.
Jane Austen, The Secret Radical — Helena Kelly (2016) ⚭
Superb and long-overdue reevaluation of Jane Austen and the context in which she wrote her beloved novels. For many people, I imagine “radical” is the word in the title that lifts eyebrows; for me, it’s the word “secret.” Austen’s politics have always felt clear on the page, and this is how I’ve read her, even lacking some of the well-researched context Helena Kelly provides here.
I understand romance readers, myself included, who get tetchy at the suggestion that the romance genre is inferior, and a book must earn in its way into the canon by being Serious and Important. But I also stand by my conviction that Jane Austen wrote only one romance—Pride and Prejudice—and had to warp all societal conventions to do it, and it’s important to understand why. She is first and foremost a political writer to me, and however you read her endings, the domestic is political, who we’re permitted or forbidden to love is political. When Kelly agrees that Austen deserves to be in the same conversation as Mary Wollstonecraft or Thomas Paine, I cheer.
You Made a Fool of Death with Your Beauty — Akwaeke Emezi (2022) ⚭
Re-read. The widowed Feyi hooks up with a stranger, then dates his best friend Nasir, then falls in love with Nasir’s father, and none of that sentence captures the raw transcendence of this novel. It makes me not just cry, but weep, multiple times—not (only) because of the grief but because of the way it vibrates with life, with pain, with joy, with every raw emotion. The friendship matters, the bisexuality matters. It’s so tender and haunting and vibrant and unlike any other romance I’ve read, grounded wholly in the genre yet wholly its own thing. (And not in the pretentious litfic way that purports to do genre better than genre.)
I’m glad I started the god-tier shelf back when I read The Saint of Bright Doors, because Emezi storms in to that category too.
Sense and Sensibility — Jane Austen (1811) ⚭
Re-read, because (see above). I’m reminded again how compulsively readable Jane Austen is every time I pick up her books. It’s “can’t put down” levels of engagement—I was hauling around the complete novels so I could mark up the margins with my notes (1300 pages!), and I still read this in the bath, in bed, in the doctor’s office, in the car. The verdict: Helena Kelly severely undersold the claim that happy endings in Sense and Sensibility are in short supply. It’s basically a dystopia, a psychological horror. No one is what they seem, not just Willoughby. Every single person, not just Willoughby, has a nearly manic commitment to deception, not least deceiving themselves. Wollstonecraft is a necessary touchstone here; more on that in my longer review, but jeez, what a book full of delight (the writing) and despair (everything else).
Confounding Oaths — Alexis Hall (2024) ⚭
I was exactly in the mood for this. Cynical fairies and curses from the gods and a family in shambles. The romance is there, and quite lovely, but it’s off to one side, and that suits my mood too. The Caesar sisters and the Irregulars of the militia take up space on page, which makes me happy. In the throes of re-reading Jane Austen, I want that communal voice, that cacophony of perspectives filtered through our wry and caustic narrator. The precarious ending suits me too, lovely in its way of sincere commitment but also real-life uncertainty. And my kingdom for Miss Bickle, forever and always the best.
Goddess — Cheryl Tan (2024) ⚭
Chapbooks and zines are an art form, the ideal container for poetry. I wanted more of this one, which is the indication of a good chapbook indeed.
Abolish Rent: How Tenants Can End the Housing Crisis — Tracy Rosenthal, Leonardo Vilchis (2024) ⚭
An enthusiastic and persuasive manifesto on housing rights as human rights. It’s encouraging to see such robust organizing among tenants across the country, and the practical template for how to expand it. The authors rightly quote Ursula Le Guin: our housing system is a human power—produced by people, not God or nature. And any human power, she wrote, can be changed by human beings.
Griso — Roger Mello (2024) ⚭
A very brief tale of a unicorn searching for other unicorns, with each spread rendered in a different historical style—Tang dynasty murals, medieval illustrations, cave paintings, African art, surrealist art, and more. The color palette and visual cues make it more cohesive than you’d think. I’d happily have it on my own shelves or gift it to nieces and nephews, both for art and story alike. Gorgeous work.
Slippery Creatures — KJ Charles (2020) ⚭
Re-read. After the recent spate of lackluster histroms that were trying to do various spy and mystery related things, I was pining for Will Darling. Enter Chirp audiobooks with a well-timed deal on the series bundle, and before you could say Lord Arthur Aloysius Kimberly de Brabazon Secretan, I had the dulcet tones of Cornell Collins narrating my favorite KJ Charles competence porn. The fun of re-reading this for the umpteenth time is spotting all the signs of when Kim is being an utter shit, and all the signs of when he’s not. With the knowledge from the later books, it’s like getting Kim’s point of view embedded within Will’s point of view, learning to read Kim as Will does, which is a feat to pull off. A masterwork of plot and character that ticks like a Swiss watch, and has no right to be as fun and moving as it is.
In Perpetuity — Johannes T. Evans (2020) ⚭
Melancholy little novella about vampires stuck out of time in our modern world, besieged by the violent noises and smells as civilization encroaches upon them. The author has written other autistic characters; it seems like he has first hand experience of the nerve-wracking world of sensory overload to render it so accurately. Moreover, the language is a feast—mannered, formal, elegant dialogue about Airplane Mode and bicycle helmets, all dislocated in time. It seems as if everything has been everything, at least once, and all these fast-moving, fast-dying people forget it.
For Real — Alexis Hall (2015) ⚭
Re-read, for the new annotated print edition. And let me tell you, just when I thought one of my favorite romances could not get better, the annotations add a new layer. Dare I say, much as I enjoyed them, the annotations in Glitterland felt… superfluous? In Waiting for the Flood and Chasing the Light, they were a welcome addition to help stitch the old half of the story with the new. In For Real, it feels like they’re essential text. I’ve committed much of the book to heart, so this time my quotes were mostly copied from the footnotes. Highlights include discussions of kink and trauma, Jane Eyre, deconstructing the BDSM genre without betraying the genre, the emotional nadir vs. the third-act break-up… it’s Hall at his overthinking and articulate best.
As for the book itself, it still floors me. The best of the best. The lemon meringue pie scene is infamous for obvious reasons, but may I suggest my actual favorite scene: Laurie showing up to the caff to help Toby through his meltdown, waiting tables and whipping the place into shape. Who am I to argue that competence kink isn’t the best kink of all?
Tarot for Change — Jessica Dore (2021) ⚭
I’d prefer a bit less Joseph Campbell and Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, but overall, the best book on tarot I’ve encountered so far. Or, rather than a definitive superlative, it’s the book that most resonates with me so far. It’s how I engage with tarot, not for divination, but therapeutically, creatively, narratively, for introspection and storytelling. I took gobs of notes, and I have a feeling that I’ll thumb through its pages often in the future.
This Will Be Fun — E.B. Asher (2024) ⚭
Lex Croucher, this is not. This landed on the wrong side of cheesy for me, and whoever compared it to The Princess Bride should have to answer for themselves. It’s a second-chance romance twice over, with two different couples who seem better off apart (although the lesbian couple was marginally better, but I may be biased for obvious reasons). The writing is clunky in a way that I hope gets improved before the final publication. I often like to read new authors unawares, but had I looked up the three authors behind the pen name I would have known ahead of time that this wasn’t for me.
The Good Life — Gordon Merrick (1997) ⚭
Man takes The Great Gatsby as a how-to manual, right down to the narcissism and body count, just with more explicit gay sex. (As in, Gatsby the way the good lord intended.) It’s unpleasant to read in the way obscene wealth always is, but it’s beautifully structured and compellingly written, an interesting artifact of both the era in which it’s set and when it’s written. And also, the era in which it’s printed, given it was edited and published posthumously by Merrick’s longtime partner, Charles G. Hulse.
(Note: I consulted my copy of A History of Gay Literature to see if Merrick was mentioned, and he was not. Wild that someone who wrote gay romances in the 1970’s that topped the NYT charts didn’t merit a mention… why is he obscure now?)
The Worst Duke in London — Amalie Howard (2024) ⚭
I’m not averse to anachronisms in my historicals (the aforementioned Lex Croucher, Alexis Hall, et al. can get away with ahistorical murder), but there is anachronistic, and then there is untethered from reality. This was the latter, and not in a fun way. The info-dumping, the choppy writing, the shallow girlboss feminism, the hypersexual internal monologues, the plentiful (and destitute) dukes, the chaotic plot and even more chaotic characters, all of it made me bail earlier than usual. I think Howard and I just may not vibe in our tastes or sense of humor.
Country Queers: A Love Letter — Rae Garringer (2024) ⚭
A book after my little southern queer heart. Garringer crisscrosses the Bible Belt, collecting a scrapbook and oral history of various LGBTQ+ people living in the rural margins. The older interviewees—the elders who survived the AIDS crisis and more—are the best and most emotional part. It’s easy to get miffed when people act like the Brooklyn or San Francisco subcultures are the only ones that matter, or like gay and trans people don’t exist in the south except to be persecuted. Yes, the political climate is often dire, and there is a wealth of queer culture, community, and joy in the smallest and southernest of places. This documents the lived reality of the former with a celebration of the latter.
Gothic Tales — Marquis de Sade (2024) ⚭
Turns out I’ve read most of these stories before, but it makes sense to repackage them here for their gothic themes and add a pleasing cover. My hope springs eternal, with each new edition, that Sade gets placed in his rightful political context, his radical philosophy that’s more dangerous than any pornography.
For example, in “Eugénie de Franval,” you get people who bail at “ugh, incest” (which: fair) without ever making the connection that for dozens and dozens of pages Sade is setting up the parallels of a god that would supposedly create in his image and then confine his creation to an infantile, subservient existence, call it love, and give free reign to a government that exploits that theology to oppress its citizens. If incest sickens us, then why are we not disturbed by that? And so on, using individual cruelty to illustrate the cruelty of church and state, ripping at the seams of civility and rattling the chains.
I relish Sade for his boldness; I’m disturbed by Sade for the same. If Justine or Juliette is too daunting, then his short stories are an adequate aperitif. (Although Philosophy in the Bedroom is still the best introduction to Sade’s themes, IMO.)
Pride and Prejudice — Jane Austen (1813) ⚭
Speaking of radical politics… yes, Austen is so compulsively readable that I’ve already accomplished my re-read of Pride and Prejudice too. And no, don’t worry, I’m not about to be the killjoy that strips the romance from it this time. This novel is romantic, a true meeting of minds with the happiest ending Jane Austen has on offer.A fairy tale through and through, it’s just that it’s a political fairy-tale as much as a romantic one, and benefits from a much closer reading, noting the larger class themes at work and the transgressive choices Austen makes. For example, it’s easy to see Collins as the definitive buffoon, Lady Catherine as a belligerent absurdity. It’s harder to see, through the layers of time and distance, the larger (and utterly blistering) critique against the Church of England and the aristocracy. Or the lengths to which Darcy and Elizabeth transgress propriety. That context makes the relationship and character growth all the more meaningful, and all the more relevant in any age. Overturning our prejudices indeed, not just individually and romantically for a pair of fine eyes, but socially, culturally, at large. (Many many more notes and quotes here.)
I Cross-Dressed for the IRL Meetup #1 — Kurano (2024) ⚭
I love seeing what Japanese manga does with gender. Ada Palmer’s essay on anime and manga has some of the historical context for it, but you don’t need a history lesson to enjoy this fun volume. I particularly liked the seamless inclusion of a trans girl alongside the cross-dressing boys, highlighting the differences and similarities among the two, and the lack of moral panic surrounding cross-dressing and gender in general. When their identities get revealed, it’s not seen as betrayal or deception, but a shared way to bond. Makes me realize how engrained our expectation is for that betrayal part of the story—why? It’s not necessary. Imagine that, a world where gender isn’t so feared, policed, and politicized. How refreshing. It was great.
I’m Sorry for My Loss: An Urgent Examination of Reproductive Care in America — Rebecca Little, Colleen Long (2024) ⚭
I know a book is going to be good when it starts off with the way language limits or distorts our understanding of a subject. Recommended to absolutely anyone, with or without a uterus, with or without the intention to procreate. It’s ostensibly about pregnancy loss and miscarriage/stillbirth awareness, but that overlaps with many things—abortion, grief, medical misogyny, racial injustice, human rights. The authors treat a sensitive topic with care and respect, and fury when called for.
U.S. laws around women’s bodies, pregnancy, miscarriage, or abortions are rooted in a lack of understanding of how it all works, and it’s no coincidence that the women I know who are anti-abortion were raised with abstinence-only education. As the authors bluntly put it: “if you don’t even really understand how the fetus gets in there, you don’t sweat the details of how it gets out. Birth, miscarriage, abortion—it’s all a mystery.” Books like this go a long way toward rectifying that lack of understanding, and if we’re gonna stop the spiraling reproductive care crisis, it’s not a moment too soon.
I Ching, The Oracle — Benebell Wen (2023) ⚭
I now understand the I Ching a fraction more than I did before! It’s a great and thorough introduction. I can’t attest to how well it stacks up against others of its ilk, but it suited my needs and rewarded my curiosity. Beautifully designed too, which counts for a lot.
Previously: Books of August ’24