It's Monday, What Are You Reading is hosted by Sheila at Book Journey!
It's been a pretty relaxed week, not a lot going on. I did a lot of reading. I also got invited to do a poetry reading! So that's exciting. It's not my first, but normally I can talk the host into letting me read...anything that isn't poetry. Not this time.
So this week also marked the 11 year anniversary of my dad's death. I've officially been living without him for half of my life, which is weird to think about. I was sad that day, but not for the entirety of it. I saw some old friends and it was overall a good day. But anyway, the point of mentioning that was that I started writing a poem about him that I'm going to perform. It's kind of hard to work through, but I think it's important.
This week I read:
- The Hall of Small Mammals by Thomas Pierce - Loved these weird short stories! They brought me back to life after The Deep by Nick Cutter beat my spirit down.
- Gilead by Marilynne Robinson - Aaaaand this one beat me back down again. I really wanted to like this one. Lila sounds so good, so I wanted to try this trilogy. I tried, I really did. The writing was pretty, yes, but that wasn't enough to make up for the lack of plot. And normally I'm super good with lack of plot. Perhaps some of the prettiness was lost on me, because I don't know a lot about Christianity and it doesn't resonate with me at all. The last thirty pages were great, don't get me wrong, but the rest of it was a slog.
- The First Bad Man by Miranda July - Just finished this today and oh my god. Miranda July has done it again. Loved it. So funny. So smart.
Currently Reading:
I read like 10 pages into Sweetland by Michael Crummey a couple weeks ago, but put it down for other things. Now it's due back at the library in a two days, it's time to get back into it! I've heard it'll punch me in the feelings, so I'm excited.
Ok I'm ACTUALLY going to read Soil by Jamie Kornegay this week. I read an excellent review of it over at Malcolm Avenue Review and now I'm really pumped for it. I was kind of nervous about some of the things I heard about this "darkly comic debut novel", but I'm back to just feeling into it.