Reading for fun, threads over the years of scifi, history, social movements and justice, farming, philosophy. I actively work to balance out the white male default in what I read, but have a long way to go.
He/they for the praxis.
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When pioneering marine biologist Dr. Ha Nguyen is offered the chance to travel to the …
Solid near-future sci-fi on intelligence and environment. Moves easily between gripping techno-action-violence, challenging witness of human and ecological oppression, and a shimmering wonder at science, consciousness, and marine biology.
Beautiful and varied collection of essays, interviews, photography and poetry on African American agricultural experience - some generational, some newly engaged in community building through the land, some reengaging with interrupted family legacies.
The Wretched of the Earth (French: Les Damnés de la Terre) is a 1961 book …
On the violence in colonizing and decolonizing; on nationalist and authoritarian dangers in bourgeoisie decolonization that is not decentralized nor built on building power of the state from within the oppressed classes; on the psychological harms to all sides in fighting and repression. An understandable classic.
Use of Weapons is a science fiction novel by Scottish writer Iain M. Banks, first …
So good to return to these deeply considered illuminations of human problem space.
Use of Weapons is a science fiction novel by Scottish writer Iain M. Banks, first …
Revisiting some Culture, thanks for the reminder @sam@books.theunseen.city
A science fiction retelling of the Count of Monte Cristo.
Revenge across all time and reason, swashbuckling adventure and escape, twisted double-crossing. And good literary feel in many borrowed and emphasized lines and themes, a fantastic sci-fi homage to The Count Of Monte Cristo.
The Sirens of Titan is an outrageous romp through space, time, and morality. The richest, …
Despite the entertainment of fully immiserating an Elon-esque failson, along with wealth and war and human timescales of happiness, the misogyny is heavy and the plot is pointlessly dulled along the way. Can't all be winners.
The only life Tress has known on her island home in an emerald-green ocean has …
Entertaining YA-adjacent fantasy adventure, enjoyable magic and plot twists at a steady pace, and an earnest girl lead acting thoroughly considerately and boldly.
What's the harm in a pseudonym? New York Times bestselling sensation Juniper Song is not …
Wonderfully contrived to make you care about what horror the dislikable narrator will justify next, in a savage and very online swipe at publishing, representation, and authorship.
When your parents die, you find out who they really were.
Griffon Keming’s second parents …
Lit novel of chosen family support for self-determination, in trans and in revolt, with a tinge of speculative fic background and an arms-length from the action, taking place as much in the kitchen and studio as the streets. I loved this for the care and openhearted family dynamics, even though everything in the story is triggering trauma and violence, it is a warm story.
Accounts and reflection, mostly personally connected to the author's global Buddhist peacemaking journey, of deeply lived altruism, empathy, integrity, respect, and engagement (her organizing terms) that are central to ethical life but risk becoming all-consuming and counter-destructive at the extremes. Care and freedom for all is inseparable from care for oneself.
From Booker Prize winner Salman Rushdie, a searing, deeply personal account of enduring—and surviving—an attempt …
Good parts are Rushdie's imaginings, mental literary meanderings, and gallows humor. Would have been fine as a long-form article, a love letter to his new wife and to aging's difficulties healing, touches only briefly on the regret of still being better known for his tragedies than for his books.
Absolute riotous satire at the expense of the irrationality of men, art, war, and violence.
Generations ago, humans fled to the cosmic anomaly known as Grass. But before humanity arrived, …
Religion, aristocracy and patriarchy, environmental hubris, loss of tradition, loss of control, loss of mind - unsettling uncanny angles pile up to a dramatic peak here, unsurprisingly not exactly satisfying but inventive and powerful.
An approachable focused survey on receiving and living the precepts in the American Soto Zen lineage, interconnecting the refuges and precepts with commentary.