In my head I'm starting to just refer to Ender as Mary Sue.

I am struggling, after reading this masterful and prescient tale with my book club, to justify to myself the trauma of reading it. It took me to dark places but didn't provide me, a reader who is already subscribed to the belief that we are in a fight for our rights, with a way forward beyond "don't let this happen." So what I learned from this is that what I need from any misogynistic dystopian fiction right now is a rubric for moving forward.

The emotional work that went into reading this story was valuable to me, but the flaws of the storytelling make it hard to recommend it to anyone not specifically looking for near-future dystopian views of immigration policies in the US. I'm inclined to believe that the most unlikeable aspects of the story are commentary and not trope, but it requires giving the author a benefit of the doubt that the narrative does not always earn.

About Santiago but giving me so many thoughts and feelings about my own maritime-yet-surrounded-by-mountain-ranges city of Seattle. Is this where the mythic Seattle Freeze comes from? The dynamic tension between accommodating and wary, accessible and remote?

Admittedly, my first read through was pretty slow and confused in the first half but once I got my feet under me it was buoyed by unforgettable images in the second. I think about Strange's description of feeling like people's faces were lantern masks with candles behind their eyes regularly, tbh. The second read through, post BBC adaptation-watching, really let me savor the vivid writing and painfully (charming) English governance.

Irresponsible! I can't believe this book is still being marketed with reviews from the 1930s. It is deeply upsetting to think what someone who really did know nothing about Chinese culture and history would walk away from this book with. Imo, it only deserves to be presented as a classic with an accompanying essay explaining the historical context of the book and its author, a la Tom Sawyer or Uncle Tom's Cabin.

"...it seemed appealing to try writing a journal that would reflect two contradictory convictions. First, that we end up experiencing a particular world in every place we visit. Second, that through the media we spend more time in other places (or in several places simultaneously, or nowhere at all) than where we are physically. But if this is the case, then why does travel continue to transform and teach us so much?"

Three myths in and so far I'm enjoying this collection enormously. Related to the picture: I am not a dog person per se but this Argos myth made me cry; it is so tragic and beautiful and brave.

**"Dios mio, you're such a prude Ted. We're just body parts, that's all we are, body parts and souls." ** I am really looking forward to talking about this one tonight at book club. It's not often I come across a character arc that makes me truly conflicted, but Mariana Blades, RN has done the job admirably and I need to talk it out.

Mercury: the only characters in this novel are white men. Everyone else is othered out of humanity and into crass props for an incredibly mediocre sci-fi tale. The casual sexism and racism make it jaw dropping that this book was published in 2006. Seriously, Ray Bradbury's Martian Chronicles contains female characters with more depth and believable motivations. It is not the first Ben Bova story I have read but it will likely be the last.

I dashed through Powell's on a quick trip to Portland today and this is what stuck to me. After falling hard for The Song of Achilles, I am really looking forward to see what Madeline Miller does with "Galatea and Pygmalion." Though honestly the synopsis of pretty much every one of the myths in the table of contents has me ready to tear through this. Mr Duchovny's book might need to come first though for book clubbing reasons.

I couldn't choose which of these prompts best relates my disdain. The "tell" of the book wants to suggest it's women are Empowered People but the "show" makes it abundantly clear that women are really only valuable to as sexual objects (all we know about most of them is their desirability to the male protagonists). It's only respect for my friend who chose this for our sci-fi book club that will get me to finish it. Commencing with the hate-read.

Happy #NationalBookLoversDay! Somewhere in here is Beatrix Potter's journal, which is excellent time travel reading for upper middle class life in the late 1800s. From ages 15 to 30 she wrote it in a code of her own devising, as recording her thoughts on her life, art and politics was a transgressive act in her day.

A historical dispatch from the hometown. It brought to mind how little I know about the Japanese internment. I went to a school on Beacon Hill (a neighborhood adjacent to the book's setting) in the 80s and I can't recall it ever being covered. Was it really omitted? Was I not paying attention? While I am appreciative to have individual voices to set to an under-represented part of local history, I really wish it had been crafted by a defter hand.

I don't have a copy of The Cursed Child to read yet, but seeing as it's Harry's birthday today it seems right to be in a coffee shop with my current HP read. I'm still impressed by how much there is in the early books for the latter ones to call back to. Today's point of awe: the Vanishing Cabinet and Malfoy together in Borgin & Burkes at the beginning of book two.

Chapter 11 on TED talks and how much white people love public assembly was probably my favorite section. There's a lot to choose from in the menu of intersectional politics here, and thus a lot to love/like/admire/be entertained by/be reminded you have some ally work to do around/bookmark to use in future internet discourse.

Maybe starting HTMWPL at a *Silent* Book Club was not the best strategy? No, actually it was great. And while, as advertised, it is making me laugh, there is also a lot of vigorous smiling, subtle head nodding and the internalization of the 🙌👏👍👌emojis. As many before me have noted, ever page seems to pack a punch. I particularly like this line.

Stumbled across in a stack of @Ironmaus books. You can judge this one by its cover. It's an adorable, straight forward explanation of bad arguments. For memory purposes, I really appreciate the organizational taxonomy and that each one is accompanied by an illustration of use.

Seeing the tragedy unfold through the eyes of the Californian's crew was, for me - a veteran consumer of Titanic-themed drama, a new and compelling perspective on the event. Original characters help make it a light(ish) summer read on a darkly fascinating subject.

Necesitaba tres meses para leer el primer libro. ¿Quizás sólo necesito dos meses para de este?

"So this, I thought, is what happens when you put the best of New York society onto a boat and run it into an iceberg." ? 28 pages in, Dyers is fighting a losing battle to make me believe his protagonist isn't just a modern man dumped in a historical setting, but I am really enjoying the book.

I'm about to celebrate the loss of a considerable amount of free time during the coming year by planning to really enjoy what I've already set aside and preserved in my schedule.

It reads more like a long-form investigative journalism piece than memoir, which is no surprise given the author bio. I came away with a richer understanding of Montana's history, and got more than I bargained for in an expose of elder abuse and compromised medical ethics. Light yet heavy reading.

When your Friday night reading inadvertently makes you feel better about your student loan rates

I read from east to west. Thankfully I only found 9 essays as off-putting as the editors' preface and intro. Sadly, I only found 4 that I would revisit or recommend. In between I found themes that personally resonated (gentrification) pretty evenly mixed with those that did not (hipster irony).

It's pretty delightful. I particularly liked playing the side quest as Nurse. It doesn't usurp To Be or Not To Be as my favorite of the choosable-path adventures, but it's still a fun book to play around with (and an absolute killer for Bring Your Own Book games).

The book shows us the ways it could all go wrong. Without support and love, if shame is allowed to make their emotional pain match their physical trials, here are the ways the boys will break. But instead, a modern fairytale emerges and immigrant parents, so often portrayed as obstacles, are heroes.

I'm 6 essays in and at a solid 50/50 between like and loathe. I really wasn't prepared to enjoy John Hodgman's take on Massachusetts but damn if his views on Bostonian sportism aren't winning me over.

It is love at first read. I'll return to this one when I'm lonely because the characters feel like friends. And I will likely search out its fanfiction because Beck Chambers' clever, inclusive universe-building is the stuff that sparks great imagination and transformative works.

The introduction to this book just brings to mind the saying "Lord give me the confidence of a mediocre white man." As this intro is written by one of the co-editors, I am not hopeful that they will deliver on their promise to provide fresh voices to illustrate the American landscape.

It's been awhile since I fell in love at first read, but I think Dr. Chef might be The One. Maybe also Kizzy. And Sissix. Uh...the whole book? Is it too early to say the whole book?

"Columbus never set foot there but only named it in passing...He could not have known that he would have so many things to name and I imagined how hard he had to rack his brain after he ran out of names honoring his benefactors..." An excellent example of Lucy's gift of sizing up and cutting down.

Yesssss! New Ryan North Book = hours of bite-sized reading entertainment.

For the past 16 months I've been walking 4-6 miles per day, mostly in a radius around home and work. I've come across a fair number of curiosities, like the surprisingly frequency of heart-shaped graffiti and sidewalk art in my neighborhood, but I'm excited to learn to see more, filter less.

I've been carrying this one in my bag everywhere for months now. My Spanish language skills are such that it takes me quite awhile to read an entire page, and it's been fun and thought-provoking to revisit this book by paying such careful attention all the words and phrases.