2020 Books

Posting quickly so I can update the list for 2021. 

001. The Stars and the Blackness Between Them, Junauda Petrus

002. So You Want to Talk About Race, Ijeoma Oluo

003. Little Weirds, Jenny Slate

004. Winterwood, Shea Ernshaw

005. The Body in Question, Jill Ciment

006. Gingerbread, Helen Oyeyemi

007. How We Fight for Our Lives, Saeed Jones

008. The Beautiful, Renee Ahdieh

009. The Night Country, Melissa Albert

010. Before and After: The Incredible Stories of Orphans Who Survived the Tennessee Children's Home Society, Judy Christie and Lisa Wingate

011. The Last True Poets of the Sea, Julia Drake

012. Burn It Down: Women Writing About Anger, Lucy Dancyger, ed.

013. Perfect Little Children, Sophie Hannah

014. Old Bones, Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child

015. Made for Love, Alissa Nutting

016. Vita Nostra, Marina and Sergey Dyachenko, translated by Julia Meitov Hersey

017. Good Girls Lie, J.T. Ellison

018. Station Eleven, Emily St. John Mandel

019. The Truth About Animals: Stoned Sloths, Lovelorn Hippos, and Other Tales from the Wild Side of Wildlife, Lucy Cooke

020. Strung Out: One Last Hit and Other Lies That Nearly Killed Me, Erin Khar

021. On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous, Ocean Vuong

022. Nine Pints: A Journey Through the Money, Medicine, and Mysteries of Blood, Rose George

023. No Ashes in the Fire: Coming of Age Black and Free in America, Darnell L. Moore

024. The Secret Lives of Color, Kassia St. Clair

025. Sparrow Hill Road, Seanan McGuire

026. Death's Acre: Inside the Legendary Forensic Lab the Body Farm Where the Dead Do Tell Tales, Dr. Bill Bass and Jon Jefferson

027. Deep Creek: Finding Hope in the High Country, Pam Houston

028. Middlegame, Seanan McGuire

029. Little, Edward Carey

030. The City in the Middle of the Night, Charlie Jane Anders

031. Daisy Jones & The Six, Taylor Jenkins Reid

032. The Gilded Wolves, Roshani Chokshi

033. All Over the Place: Adventures in Travel, True Love, and Petty Theft, Geraldine DeRuiter

034. The Book Charmer, Karen Hawkins

035. Wordslut: A Feminist Guide to Taking Back the English Language, Amanda Montell

036. Day Zero, Kelly DeVos

037. Unashamed: Musings of a Fat, Black Muslim, Leah Vernon

038. The Secret Diary of Hendrik Groen, 83 1/4 Years Old, translated by Hester Velmans

039. There Will Be No Miracles Here, Casey Gerald

040. No Country for Old Gnomes, Delilah S. Dawson and Kevin Hearne

041. The Red Pencil, Andrea Davis Pinkney

042. Upright Women Wanted, Sarah Gailey

043. Late Migrations: A Natural History of Love and Loss, Margaret Renkl

044. Gold Rush Girl, Avi

045. Long Live the Tribe of Fatherless Girls, T. Kira Madden

046. The View From Flyover Country: Dispatches From the Forgotten America, Sarah Kendzior

047. Such a Fun Age, Kiley Reid

048. Why I'm No Longer Talking to White People About Race, Reni Eddo-Lodge

049. A Thousand Fires, Shannon Price

050. A Crown of Wishes, Roshani Chokshi

051. Emmy in the Key of Code, Aimee Lucido

052. The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle, Avi

053. The Beekeeper of Aleppo, Christy Lefteri

054. House of Salt and Sorrows, Erin A. Craig

055. Docile, K.M. Szpara

056. Buzz Sting Bite: Why We Need Insects, Anne Sverdrup-Thygeson, translated by Lucy Moffatt

057. The Black God's Drums, P. Djèlí Clark

058. Crying Laughing, Lance Rubin

059. The Editor, Steven Rowley

060. Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe, Benjamin Alire Sáenz

061. Everywhere You Don't Belong, Gabriel Bump

062. The Pinks: The First Women Detectives, Operatives, and Spies with the Pinkerton National Detective Agency, Chris Enss

063. Three Women, Lisa Taddeo

064. The Empress of Salt and Fortune, Nghi Vo

065. Riot Baby, Tochi Onyebuchi

066. Real Men Knit, Kwana Jackson

067. I'm Not Dying with You Tonight, Kimberly Jones and Gilly Segal

068. The Valedictorian of Being Dead: The True Story of Dying Ten Times to Live, Heather B. Armstrong

069. A World Without Bees, Allison Benjamin and Brian McCallum

070. Orphan Eleven, Gennifer Choldenko

071. The Lost Book of Adana Moreau, Michael Zapata

072. The Princess Beard, Delilah S. Dawson and Kevin Hearne

073. A River of Royal Blood, Amanda Joy

074. The Hidden Half of Nature: The Microbial Roots of Life and Health, David R. Montgomery and Anne Biklé

075. Forest of a Thousand Lanterns, Julie C. Dao

076. The Deep, Rivers Solomon with Daveed Diggs, William Hutson, and Jonathan Snipes

077. Afterlife, Julia Alvarez

078. Friday Black, Nana Kwame Adjeh-Brenyah

079. Saving Ruby King, Catherine Adel West

080. Real Life, Brandon Taylor

081. In the Dream House, Carmen Maria Machado

082. Meaty, Samantha Irby

083. Luster, Raven Leilani

084. Weather, Jenny Offill

085. Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, and You, Jason Reynolds and Ibram X. Kendi

086. Her Body and Other Parties, Carmen Maria Machado

087. Conjure Women, Afia Atakora

088. Minor Feelings: An Asian American Reckoning, Cathy Park Hong

089. Crooked Hallelujah, Kelli Jo Ford

090. Out Stealing Horses, Per Petterson

091. A Blade So Black, L.L. McKinney

092. The Mermaid, the Witch, and the Sea, Maggie Tokuda-Hall

093. A Song Below Water, Bethany C. Morrow

094. Tooth and Claw, Jo Walton

095. A Map Is Only One Story: Twenty Writers on Immigration, Family, and the Meaning of Home, Nicole Chung and Mensah Demary, eds.

096. The Dreamers, Karen Thompson Walker

097. Of Poetry and Protest: From Emmett Till to Trayvon Martin, Philip Cushway and Michael Warr, eds

098. Make Russia Great Again, Christopher Buckley

099. I Wanna Be Where You Are, Kristina Forest

100. Octavia's Brood: Science Fiction Stories from Social Justice Movements, adrienne maree brown and Walidah Imarisha, eds.

101. More Than Maybe, Erin Hahn

102. Verge, Lidia Yuknavitch

103. When We Were Magic, Sarah Gailey

104. Light From Other Stars, Erika Swyler

105. The Pull of the Stars, Emma Donoghue

106. Postcolonial Love Poem, Natalie Diaz

107. Home Baked: My Mom, Marijuana, and the Stoning of San Francisco, Alia Volz

108. A Madness of Angels, Or, The Resurrection of Matthew Swift, Kate Griffin

109. Love Yourself Like Your Life Depends On It, Kamal Ravikant

110. The Color of Air, Gail Tsukiyama

111. Pale Rider: The Spanish Flu of 1918 and How It Changed the World, Laura Spinney

122. The Midnight Library, Matt Haig

123. The Seven Necessary Sins for Women and Girls, Mona Eltahawy

124. The War That Saved My Life, Kimberly Brubaker Bradley

125. The War I Finally Won, Kimberly Brubaker Bradley

126. Find Layla, Meg Elison

127. African Samurai: The True Story of Yasuke, A Legendary Black Warrior in Feudal Japan, Thomas Lockley and Geoffrey Girard.

128. Anxious People, Fredrik Backman

129. Early Departures, Justin A. Reynolds

130. Legendborn, Tracy Deonn

131. Let's Never Talk About This Again, Sara Faith Alterman

132. His Only Wife, Peace Adzo Medie

133. Ties That Tether, Jane Igharo

134. New Suns: Original Speculative Fiction by People of Color, Nisi Shawl, ed.

135. Cinderella Is Dead, Kalynn Bayron

136. The Order of the Pure Moon Reflected in Water, Zen Cho

137. The Age of Phillis, Honorée Fanonne Jeffers

138. The Sleepwalker's Guide to Dancing, Mira Jacob

139. Hench, Natalie Zina Walschots

140. The Expats, Chris Pavone

141. The Paris Diversion, Chris Pavone

142. The Story of More: How We Got to Climate Change and Where to Go From Here, Hope Jahren

143. A Million Aunties, Alecia McKenzie

144. Felix Ever After, Kacen Callender

145. All Your Twisted Secrets, Diana Urban

146. The Office of Historical Corrections, Danielle Evans

147. Trust Exercise, Susan Choi

148. Particulate Matter, Felicia Luna Lemus

149. Ring Shout, P. Djèlí Clark

150. The Secret Lives of Church Ladies, Deesha Philyaw

151. This Is Kind of an Epic Love Story, Kacen Callender

152. He Started It, Samantha Downing

153. Survival of the Friendliest: Understanding Our Origins and Rediscovering Our Common Humanity, Brian Hare and Vanessa Woods

154. Gods of the Upper Air: How a Circle of Renegade Anthropologists Reinvented Race, Sex, and Gender in the Twentieth Century, Charles King

155. Beasts Made of Night, Tochi Onyebuchi

156. Crown of Thunder, Tochi Onyebuchi

157. Mean, Myriam Gurba

158. The Freezer Door, Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore

159. Trouble the Saints, Alaya Dawn Johnson

160. Lay Me Down Among the Words: A Collection of Poetry by a Trauma Survivor Whose Inner Voice Saved Her Life, Deborah Hallal Bradt, R.Y.T.

It's soup, not brain surgery

It's officially fall. I should be in Rhinebeck for NY Sheep and Wool, but since too many people think that being considerate of others is too much of a sacrifice, the festival was cancelled. 

Anyway, we're doing our part and staying home as much as possible. The weather has turned cooler, so my soup-loving husband has started demanding soup. Because I am a monster who twists his words in order to make his life miserable, I made broccoli soup. (We also had a gorgeous head of broccoli from our CSA. This thing was so massive and beautiful that I felt guilty about chopping it up. I am planning to make a casserole with cauliflower and kale tonight, because I love forcing him to eat foods that he hates. Also CSA.) 

Sharing this recipe because it actually was quite tasty. I feel guilty about making ya'll scroll through three paragraphs to get to the recipe, but hey, at least you won't be forced to close an intrusive video or a pop-up asking you to join my email list. Source recipe is at this link, with all sorts of shit to scroll through before you get to the recipe: broccoli cheese soup. This is what I did:

INGREDIENTS (amounts approximate; it's soup):

1 tablespoon + 4 tablespoons unsalted butter, divided

1 onion, diced 

3 cloves garlic, pressed

1/2 cup all-purpose flour

4 cups stock (I used water + mushroom bouillon)

4 cups milk (she used half and half, I prefer keeping that for my coffee)

1 giant head of broccoli, diced into bite-size pieces

6 small carrots, trimmed, peeled, and sliced into very thin rounds, about 1/16th-inch

smoked paprika 

dry mustard powder

chili powder 

Big chunk of sharp cheddar cheese, grated (half a Costco-sized package)

DIRECTIONS:

Saute the onion in a little bit of butter until it makes you happy.

Add the garlic and cook a bit longer.

Add another whack of butter, and after it melts toss in the spices: dry mustard, smoked paprika, and chili powder. 

Let them bloom just a bit, then stir in the flour. 

Disclosure: I see no point in dirtying another pan in order to make a roux.

Add carrots now if you like them best when cooked into oblivion, like I do.

Slowly add the vegetable stock, whisking constantly. (I used a spoon rather than a whisk.)

Slowly add the milk, whisking constantly.

Allow mixture to simmer over low heat, stirring occasionally.

While mixture is simmering, chop the broccoli. 

When the giant head of broccoli is in small pieces, dump that in.

Simmer until the texture of the broccoli makes you happy. 

While the soup is cooking, grate the cheese if you aren't using the pre-grated stuff. 

Dump in the cheese, stir until it's melted and integrated.

Eat.

I was just told that if I ever have to "get rid of" more broccoli, this soup is an acceptable way to do it, but it needs a sandwich as a side. Or maybe the soup is the side. Whatever. I ate the leftovers, so I don't care what he thinks. (Yes, I am pissy. I was watching a livestream on my tablet and he walked upstairs to tell me he was thinking of buying a projection tv thing so I could watch livestreams on a 100" thing. I don't think he even realized he was interrupting something. So he's getting cauliflower and kale for dinner.)

And hey, it's the end, let me share an ugly picture of the soup: 

Realization! And random nostalgia shit.

Tonight was a fundraiser for the Cuyahoga County Public Library. I signed up to attend as soon as I saw the announcement. CCPL is the best, and a fundraiser where I stay home? I'm all in. 

When I added the event to our calendar, I told my husband that we were going to the event and by going I meant that I would pick up ingredients and we would watch the presentation and cook at home. He was on board as soon as he reached the second part of the sentence. Neither of us is a big fan of gala dinners, and you would have to pay us a LOT of money to convince us to attend one during a pandemic. (They showed a few clips of groups and that made me nervous. For all I know the groups may be quaranteams/pods, but that wasn't clear and I don't trust anyone.)

Anyway, I picked up our box of ingredients today. Since I've been vegetarian forever, I saw no point in taking the included chicken home. I stopped by a friend's house and we had a lovely socially distant visit in her front yard. She's one of the kindest people I know, and I need to make an effort to see her more often. 

She laughed at me when I told her that I don't enjoy dinners with people I don't know. She doesn't quite believe me that I don't enjoy making small talk with strangers. Somehow she doesn't see how awkward I feel in situations like that. She asked how we became friends if I don't like talking to people.

Realization: The people I love most are all open about their passions. You don't have to spend much time with them before they tell you about the things they love - their pets, their partners, their hobbies, their studies - whatever it is they enjoy most. I've known for a long time that I don't like people who can't say anything nice about their family, chosen or otherwise, but hadn't made the connection that I love those who are loving. (And I should have - the other day I watched LeVar Burton tell Jacqueline Woodson that he loved her at the start of an interview, and then I told my husband that I love LeVar Burton. But who doesn't love LeVar Burton?)  Duh. 

She LOVES her cats (and books, and her family), and we met when she was looking for a home for a cat that I ended up fostering for a few days before taking him to his new people. He was a loving little boy, but feline ladies did NOT love him. Her girlcats hated him, and Zoey hissed at me after I snuggled with him when he was staying with us. He's happy and loved where he is, but I kinda wish I had forced Zoey to accept him. He's a lumpa lump of purring love, with the softest paws ever, and I miss him.

Life here is mostly the same, current events are stressful because we should know better than to elect toddlers and far too many people don't, but today I picked up books and last night's Quarantine Book Club started with the author saying, "Penises all the way down." Oh! I learned that CCPL will now be using Zoom rather than facebook for their author events. Which makes me VERY happy, because I have Feelings about facebook and avoid it as much as possible. Zoom has its own set of problems, but I'm not forced to witness my father's kool-aid consumption there. 

This morning I left the house (!) to pick up the food at the library, drop off the unwanted chicken, and stop by a bookstore to collect the books I'd ordered. Since recent news has been making me cry, I listened to music that makes me cry instead. Hence the random nostalgia shit part of the title.

My new car (did I tell everyone that I bought a new car last October? Trevor needed a new clutch, and after being held hostage at a local dealership I bought a 2017 Honda Fit from a dealership in Indiana. I called them from the Ohio dealership's office because I do not reward hardball tactics and if you leave me alone me long enough for me to call another vendor I will. I am a knitter, not a doormat.) has a USB port, and I use it. Duh. 

Anyway, I have a weakness for angsty late-90s dudes. (And maybe just angsty singers in general. Hmm.) I won't admit how many times I listened to this song today, but it was a lot. (Hint: I lost count.) I've gone into my personal history before (albeit not recently), so if you care to wander through my ramblings you'll find that my husband and I had a hiatus of a few years before deciding that yeah, we could possibly maybe might actually be compatible or something. This song was released when we weren't together and I was heartbroken, and it evokes all those memories. 

Anyway, I guess I'd rather be sad for personal reasons that I know were resolved than sad about things that I can do very little about. I will still do what I can, but I can't de-program those who have been brainwashed. Facts and reason and logic can't overcome fear, and critical thinking and empathy have become foreign concepts. 

And on that note, I should try to get some sleep. Tomorrow is a brew day, and I should make sure that some of the Special Brewing Underwear has made the journey from the dryer to the underwear drawer. The things we do for the people we love!

September and I'm trying to avoid work

At least a few of us missed that it was suddenly September. (Isn't that a song by the Motels? No? Suddenly Last Summer? Hey, google tells me that it's a Tennessee Williams play/film. Learn something new every day!)

Anyway, it's September. I'm still trying to do 12 things at once. Costco orders via instacart and standard delivery, work, finishing a book, copying down a recipe I want to make that I can't seem to find the tab for, thinking about another recipe I want to make but need to look up because we've ended up with a ridiculous amount of sweet corn in the fridge, drafting this post, trying to avoid twitter because the randomness that it provides is the sole thing that can hold my attention oh hi there you are again tweeps, scowling at a dude I occasionally have to deal with whom I seriously dislike because he changed something he probably should have changed but I feel like I'm being blamed for not having the information that is inside his head, listening to new albums by Oceanator and Girl Friday, time to read another chapter because this book is far too prescient and I'd like to return it to the library today, scowling some more because simpering dude is simpering and I hate it, and oh, I really ought to drink more because I can feel that I'm dehydrated, and maybe I should delete the commas because they make this run-on sentence slightly more coherent and stream-of-consciousness leads to beautiful things like there is a ceramic cow smiling at me except the cow isn't here it was somewhere I was babysitting decades ago and now I don't think anything is smiling at me, I should probably eat something because it's after lunchtime and where's my calendar, wondering if nextdoor has been taken over by bots because all of the "hi I'm xxx and it's nice to meet you" messages are baffling and slightly unsettling, fuck you dickhead, I hate that people with food blogs think I want to hear all about their kids before I look at the recipe that caused me to click their link, and my email inbox is overflowing and I know my voice mail is full but I can't bring myself to clean it out, I should probably do something productive like clean the bathroom or empty some of the boxes that have accumulated by the front door and dear Bob my workspace is a disaster but decision paralysis is a thing and I am overwhelmed with everything that needs done and maybe I'm not actually doing as well as I thought I was.

Anyway, Zoey is very serious about high fives, at least when treats are involved.  

Books and things

We're still here, having ridiculous arguments about how he'd rather me chop up peppers and make burritos than stuff peppers because he'd rather have me do the work of cutting peppers for him but he draws the line at me pre-chewing his food because he's not a Ferengi. Also whether fruit, yogurt, and granola should be consumed for lunch or dinner. And that store-bought tortillas shouldn't be stacked because that causes them to stick together. As if they aren't already stacked in the stores. Oh, apparently I should chop vegetables so he can use them to make lunch because he's incapable of using a knife or something. Except he doesn't trust me when I have a knife in my hand because I am clumsy and might stab him. Whatever.

Anyway, apparently the way to encourage me to read is to give me a new stack of library books. Back in March, I checked out all of the books being held for me right before everything shut down. And then my reading rate decreased. When the library opened for returns/drive-thru pickup at the beginning of June, I only had 18 books to return and should have had at least 25. (Tangent: I caused traffic jams at two different library branches while returning and picking up books.)

Since then, I've been voraciously reading, partly as an attempt to stay below my allowed limit of checkouts. It hasn't really been working, but most of the library employees have been kind enough to give me however many books are on the shelf waiting for me. 

And since returns are being quarantined for at least three days, I have been obsessively refreshing my library account on the day books are due to be scanned back in, because apparently it's reassuring to watch the number of my checkouts decrease. I should do that now, brb. Nope, they're not scanned in yet.

Anyway, I should have been posting some flash book reviews but haven't. Y'all should read these books:

 

Such a Fun Age, Kiley Reid

Docile, K.M. Szpara

Everywhere You Don't Belong, Gabriel Bump

Three Women, Lisa Taddeo

The Lost Book of Adana Moreau, Michael Zapata

The Deep, Rivers Solomon with Daveed Diggs, William Hutson and Jonathan Snipes

Friday Black, Nana Kwame Adjeh-Brenyah

Saving Ruby King, Catherine Adel West

Real Life, Brandon Taylor

In the Dream House, Carmen Maria Machado

I do not suggest reading Station Eleven right before the world descends into a global pandemic. It's an excellent book, but reading about a deadly global flu was not reassuring during the early days of COVID-19. 

...And suddenly it's midafternoon, which means I should start on dinner. Later!

It's July, and we're still mostly at home

Pandemic update! We are staying home most of the time, and that's fine with me. I will acknowledge that I spent a little bit of time knitting in my car in the library parking lot this week, but mostly I wanted to finish my row. Side note, I was thrilled when the library opened for drive-thru service. Apparently all I needed to get my reading mojo back was an infusion of new library books. 

I wanted to share that my primary issue with being married in the time of quarantine has been resolved: my husband now has his own coffee maker. The other day he said that he expected me to tell him that sharing my coffee really wasn't so bad. No. 

We still have to work on interruptions, as today I was spinning through a poetry class. 60 minutes, 55 of which I was being talked at, 5 in a breakout session when participation was required. He spent 57 minutes of the hour in the basement, but came upstairs and started talking to me during the small group bit. Thankfully I'd muted myself because spinning wheels are not silent, but his timing is still bad. Speaking of which, I need to grab a tiara because one of the eight things I am doing at this very moment is working. He'd asked for some sort of visible signal of when I was working, so I'm taking a cue from Mary Robinette Kowal. Also, she looks a lot like my sister in-law in that photo. 

What else? Since we don't leave the house, there's not much laundry other than underwear and pajamas, and we seem to run out around the same time. So that issue is mostly resolved. I can't say that we've given up on cleaning entirely, but we've found other distractions. Like spinning. Even though the Tour de France has been postponed, the Tour de Fleece is still happening, and I am spinning lots and lots of yarn. This is from the first week:

It's several hours after I started this, and I should probably get back to a book.  

Next day update: A laundry issue! Apparently he's brewing today and has particular underwear he likes to wear while brewing, and it's not clean. Shame on me. 

Marital difficulties in the days of working from home...

...aren't all that different from pre-COVID times.

1. Coffee: I don't like sharing my coffee. My coffeepot makes the amount of coffee that I want to drink every day, and I don't like that my husband insists on drinking a cup every day. (It was bad enough when he only demanded coffee on Fridays and weekends.) Clearly this means that he should give up caffeine and leave it all for me, not that I should get over myself and just make more coffee. Duh.

2. Distraction: He has terrible timing. My focus isn't the greatest at the best of times, and it seems like every time I can concentrate for more than 30 seconds he comes upstairs and distracts me. Doesn't he know that I'm trying to do about eight different work tasks while also making a grocery list, deleting/filing personal emails, browsing Ravelry forums, and doing something else that's slipped my mind due to my lack of focus? Oh, yeah, swearing at the local idiots on nextdoor. Keep your cats inside, people!

3. Laundry: Inevitably, the day after I've done laundry, he will announce that something, often the shirt he is currently wearing, needs washed. It's not like we're going much of anywhere, so it's not usually as urgent as in the days before social distancing, but since I'm whining I might as well whine, right? Pass me the cheese, please.

4. Cleaning: Since we've been stuck at home, he's been cleaning and organizing the basement. This sounds like a good thing, right? No. Why? Because he found boxes of my stuff, and is forcing me to go through the piles of WTF from high school. So far I've found a bunch of random notes written during classes, many reminders of our inexplicable love for Mötley Crüe, two suicide notes from the same person (one ending with the statement that her decision was final but we'd talk about it during lunch; facebook informs me that she's still alive and well and hopefully less of a drama queen), and this beautiful piece of found art:

Perhaps someone will recognize this and tell me what it was in reference to.

So yeah. Waaaah. All in all, things aren't so bad. They could be a lot worse. I feel like I've made at least a few good life choices.

In other news, various music is bringing on ALL OF THE FEELS lately. I don't know if anyone cares, but I might ramble on about that in another post.