This was a decent reading month! Not many 5-star reads, but a nice mix of genres and topics and nothing too terrible.
Black Sun by Rebecca Roanhorse: Despite the abrupt cliffhanger, I liked this book that defies an easy good/bad binary among its characters. Roanhorse doesn't give the reader an easy place to perch, which makes the story challenging and engaging, not to mention the beauty of rooting it in a world based on diverse indigenous cultures.
Amelia, If Only by Becky Albertalli: I love everything Albertalli writes, and I especially enjoyed being back in the world of Imogen, Obviously with a well-crafted commentary on parasocial relationships. Although I saw the major plot developments coming from a mile away, I still greatly enjoyed the journey getting there.
The Resilience Myth: New Thinking on Grit, Strength, and Growth After Trauma by Soraya Chemaly: I appreciated what I think is Chemaly's main point in this book, that what actually helps people survive and thrive in difficult times is not individual toughness but tangible support, and I think a better-organized, better-edited version of this book could have been something I recommended widely. Unfortunately, I found this to be scattered and hard to follow much of the time.
The Psychopath Test: A Journey Through the Madness Industry by Jon Ronson: I kept waiting for this to coalesce into something that would bring all the different pieces together, but it never really did, but that doesn't mean that the pieces themselves weren't worth reading. I'd recommend this if you're interested specifically in the topic of what the subtitle calls "the madness industry" — essentially, how money is made on categorizing and diagnosing and treating individuals — but it's not one I'd go out of my way to recommend otherwise.
Jamie by L.D. Lapinski: This was exactly what I was looking for, a sweet middle grade read about kids making a difference. It can be a bit heavily didactic at times, but if the book itself is aimed at raising awareness about non-binary identities (much as Jamie and their friends try to do within the story), then I can forgive a bit of monologuing.
The Listeners by Maggie Stiefvater: Maggie Stiefvater is very good at atmosphere, and she's very good at sentence-level writing, and yet she puts so much energy into immersing the reader in this West Virginia hotel in 1942 that the story is ultimately secondary to the atmosphere. No matter how well constructed the story is and how believable the characters are and how clever the little plot twists are, it lacked a driving force to propel me through the story.
Looking back:
One year ago I was reading: Jessica, Loving Someone with Borderline Personality Disorder, The Sound of a Wild Snail Eating, and Crooked House
Five years ago I was reading: The New Jim Crow and Killers of the Flower Moon
Ten years ago I was reading: Jesus Calling, Clockwork Angel, The Woman in White, and From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler
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