Book Review: The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas

Powerful and timely, The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas well deserves its long-held spot at the top of the New York Times Young Adult Bestseller list. If you read only one book this year, it ought to be this one. Thomas masterfully combines social justice and talented story-telling in this novel about teenage Starr Carter who witnesses her best friend being shot to death by the police. Not only does the novel examine major problems that affect people of color like police brutality, but it also explores smaller, more insidious ones like microaggressions and cultural appropriation. Every character is so multi-faceted and believable, you will find yourself caring deeply about them and what they are going through.

Book Review: Dear Ijeawele, or a Feminist Manifesto in Fifteen Suggestions

If you are a feminist and haven’t been reading Adichie, it’s time to head to the library. Between her writings, TED Talks, and being featured in a Beyoncé song, Nigerian author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie is steadily becoming a household name in the international feminist scene. After reading her novel Americanah for book club, I decided to check out some of her works that deal more directly with her ideas on feminism. Today I will review her most recent publication: the epistolary essay Dear Ijeawele, or a Feminist Manifesto in Fifteen Suggestions, originally written as a letter to her friend with advice on how to raise a feminist daughter.

Book Review: Labyrinth Lost–a Story of Latina Magic

Sometimes, as a teenager, you wish your family would just disappear. But what happens when you have the magic to actually make that happen? Sixteen-year-old Alejandra Mortiz finds out in Zoraida Córdova’s Labyrinth Lost, Book #1 of the Brooklyn Brujas series. Alex dreads the Deathday ceremony that will awaken her powers, but when she tries to banish her magic, she banishes her family instead. Drawing from Latin American myth and culture and blending them with common tropes of the genre, Córdova creates a unique fantasy world for Alex to explore as she explores her own heritage. And despite what the back cover would have you believe, this isn’t your typical boy-girl romance. This is a book primarily about women and the relationships between them, be they familial, antagonistic, or romantic.

Interactive Fiction: Asylum for Wayward Victorian Girls Ebook Review

Treasure hunting. Code breaking. Doodles and audio clips. If your reading experience doesn’t include these elements, then I guess you haven’t picked up Emilie Autumn’s new ebook edition of The Asylum for Wayward Victorian Girls. While the detective skills may seem more fitting for a mystery novel, TAFWVG is actually part-autobiography, part-historical fantasy about being institutionalized for mental illness in the Victorian era and today. Emilie Autumn continues her dedication to a personalized relationship with her fans by developing this new level of interactive fiction.

Book Review: Cuckoo’s Calling by Robert Galbraith A.K.A. J.K. Rowling

I’m a little late to the game but finally got around to reading The Cuckoo’s Calling, the first installment of J.K. Rowling’s detective mystery series published under her pseudonym, Robert Galbraith. The novel follows detective Cormoran Strike and his temp secretary Robin Ellacott as they investigate the suspicious suicide of supermodel Lula Landry. One of the major themes of the book is exploring different experiences of being black in England, engaging in race relations with a nuance often lacking in the Harry Potter universe. Rowling also steps up her disability representation by featuring a protagonist with a prosthetic leg but at the same time seems to make backward progress in her portrayal of women.

Book Review: Philip Pullman’s The Ruby in the Smoke

The Ruby in the Smoke, Book One of Philip Pullman’s Sally Lockhart series, never gained the same fame as The Golden Compass and the rest of Pullman’s His Dark Materials trilogy, perhaps for good reason. It’s a cute story but doesn’t have quite the magical draw of epic world-building that bolsters his other works. From a feminist perspective, I appreciated the feisty female protagonist who demonstrates math skills and business acumen, but on an intersectional level, the book fails. The novel is meant to be a treatise against opium and the role England played in encouraging the opium industry, but it is rife with simplistic or downright racist depictions of Asians and the East.

The Fortress at the End of Time: An interview with Joe M. McDermott.

Does space travel and the possibility of discovering new worlds interest you? What about the unending ethical dilemmas of cloning? If you also appreciate Science Fiction when it focuses on personal  inner conflict and  the day-to-day aspect of life in at the lonely edge of the galaxy, then Joe M. McDermott‘s The Fortress at the End of Time might be right up your alley.

Cover art by Jaime Jones.

Bedtime for Batman: A Review

Normally, Daily Geekette does not review children’s picture books.  Normally, children’s books are not this awesome and catered to our specific audience.  Bedtime for Batman is a picture book by Michael Dahl.  The book tells the story of a little boy going to bed on one page.  On the opposite page, it parallels the boy’s life to Batman’s life of crime fighting.

A Court of Thorns and Roses Review

Source: Goodreads.com

Sarah J. Maas’s novel, A Court of Thorns and Roses, is a fantasy retelling of Beauty and the Beast. The world is divided by an ancient treaty into two sections: human and fae.  There is a magic wall that divides the realms.  Feyre and her family live along that wall.  They lost all their wealth, and rely solely on Feyre for survival.  Feyre is out hunting when she kills what turns out to be a high fae, disguised as a wolf.  That night a fae in beast form, Tamlin, comes to her house and demands her life for his friend’s.  Feyre finds herself living in the luxurious fae Spring Court where she will have to live out her days, but all is not as it seems.  Everyone at the estate has a masquerade mask on, which Feyre learns is a symptom of a much more serious problem, that she might be the answer to.

Book Review: Empire in Black and Gold (Shadows of the Apt #1) by Adrian Tchaikovsky

Continuing with the theme of Sci-fi Summer, I thought I would tell you all a bit about the second book I completed for my reading challenge. Empire in Black and Gold, the first installment of the Shadows of the Apt series by Adrian Tchaikovsky, is really more of a high-fantasy work with sci-fi elements, including steampunk and military sci-fi. Instead of elves and orcs, you have various Peoples with insect-inspired traits, powers, and strengths. The Wasps, for example, can fly and produce stinging fire from their hands, and are an aggressive and military people. They are poised to take over the Lowlands, and only the old Beetle Stenwald Maker and his young protégés see the threat. Can they open the eyes of the Lowland leaders and stop the invasion before it’s too late? You’ll have to read the series and see.