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Palahniuk, Chuck. Choke.
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finished: date
Pretty good. Palahniuk can really write a line. I think this can work for readers who want a straightforward story because it has enough going on to be entertaining, but it's even better if you enjoy analysis because there's a lot to work with. Actually, there were several moments in which something that could be picked up on was explicitly pointed out later---it wasn't constant, which would have ruined it. Twice that I can remember, in fact. So if you're interested in a deeper, closer reading, this would be a good one to do that with because there's plenty to work with. I'd like to read more from him. No, I haven't read Fight Club yet, but I suppose that should be the next one I pick up.
Howarth, Chloe Michelle. Heap Earth Upon It.
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finished: 2026-05-18
This was frustrating to get through for me. Maybe it's the autism, but I was incredibly irritated with the ricocheting between was that too direct? should I be more direct? I should ask this question so they don't think I'm uninterested. was that too nosy for me to ask? I do plenty of that in my day-to-day life and it's not a game I was willing to play for this book, which invited a new narrator every (incredibly short) chapter to speak to an unknown person in exactly the same voice. The first half was treading water. Stakes appeared in the back half, and maybe I would have seen things forming before that point, but I just couldn't stay engaged. I picked this one up because I wanted to read it before watching frankiesshelf's video about it (I'm reading King's A Good Person next before watching that video, too) but I almost didn't make it through. I knew he'd like it---short chapters, monomaniac narrator, second-person--and when I did watch the video, I realized something: the slow pace made me read this too fast and I missed out on what would have been a good overall story otherwise. I also didn't read the summary of the book whatsoever, so I didn't know what I was in for, and that probably would have helped. A note for next time.
King, Kirstin. A Good Person.
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finished: 2026-05-21
For this one, I made sure to read the summary before jumping right in, but I don't know if it even made that much of a difference here! This one was fun, and I think that I would have thought so going in blind, too. There's not a lot of need for me to expand on it because Frankie said everything I would say about this book... one or two pop culture references or millennial jokes were funny while most pulled me out of the story and a few were downright cringey, but it was entertaining and I think the pieces came together very well... with the exception of Lillian's sudden revelation, which disappointed me. On Storygraph, I've got this rated at 3.75 which is a rating I feel confident in, but I'll go ahead and go with 4 here because I won't read it again, but I'm glad I did and I'd recommend it.
Folk, Kate. Sky Daddy.
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finished: 2026-05-23
This one was a Mother's Day gift: one I loved. I've been wanting to read this for a while, and it was absolutely worth it. Of course I'd heard good things, but that doesn't necessarily guarantee I'll like it (for example, see below). This one I loved. It matters a lot to me that the narrator is someone I'm comfortable with... the voice means everything. Just as importantly, Folk nailed the ending. Go read this, especially if you appreciated Convenience Store Woman by Sayaka Murata.
Machado, Carmen Maria. Her Body and Other Parties.
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finished: 2026-05-27
I'd started a translation of The Odyssey but that's on pause (I haven't read The Illiad since college but I read the Fagles translation then, but my teen daughter said she'd read it with me if we had the Lombardo, so I've never ordered a book faster). Instead, I picked this one up that I'd had on my TBR and found at a used bookstore a few weeks ago. I had high expectations but I forgot something very important: it's rare that I like a short story collection. There are few short stories that I really like and, as far as I can remember, only two or three short story collections I've actually enjoyed. One was from Mary South... and then Ted Chiang's Exhalation... this might be the end of the list, at least off the top of my head. Since this was recommended highly, I gave it a shot, and while it wasn't bad, I did end up having to push myself to pick it up. When I did, I had to stop myself from skimming, and not in the I-can't-wait-to-find-out-what-happens kind of way. Now, that doesn't mean it was a bad read; I just wasn't immersed. I wasn't the target audience. It made me think of the time I read a Raymond Chandler short story (something about a yard sale) many years ago in an English class and felt strongly that, if I really thought about it, there would be something insightful and beautiful in it, but I couldn't find the motivation to do that. Given the choice between a short story and a novel, I'll choose a novel. Given the choice between a novel and a series, I'll choose a series. The longer I can spend with a character, the more interested I am, and most short stories feel like underdeveloped ideas to me. I don't necessarily like that about myself all the time, but that's how it is.
Anyway, when it comes to this collection, if you like short stories at all, you'll love it.
I was out in my study reading and when I came in the back door, my partner and three kids were sitting in the living room silently reading. took me a second to notice that all of their books were upside down. i burst into laughter and they simultaneously said, "SHHH!"
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After a six-month hiatus, I'm returning to my handwritten daybooks. When the school year started to get the best of me, I fell back on journaling only in Obsidian, but summer means a chance to reset, so my tasks and notes will still be with Obsidian, but the end-of-day reflections I've been writing since January of 2015 will go back into notebooks.
19 may 2026
It's been quiet here for a couple of weeks. I was absent first because I was busy for 10-12 hours a day working with students during finals week and catching up the last of the grading, but then when the semester officially ended, it was because I've been indulging in the things I've been wanting to do without paying attention to a task list or a ticking clock: reading books that have been stacking up next to my armchair, finishing some crochet projects, watching movies I've been meaning to see with the family. Now that the kids are about to be done with school for the summer, though, the quiet's ending and it's about time to get back to work.
I wanted to read heap earth upon it before watching Frankie's video about it but it's such slow read π I feel like I've been a third of the way through it for a month
stop. analyse that text through the lens of its author's intentions and original historical context. okay now take the author out back and kill them dead and analyse that text as though it were published by your mutual yesterday and is in direct conversation the contemporary discourse that's most relevant to your life. okay now pick your favorite angle of interpretation and come up with the strongest possible argument against it. now imagine that the text is your best friend and that it means you well and that you naturally give it every benefit of the doubt because you're on its side and you want the best for it. now imagine that the text wants you dead and it'll eat you if you don't eat it first. now pretend that you found this text locked away in a cave with no evidence of when or where it came from and you have to divine its meaning solely through its internal coherence and nothing else. okay now address the elephant in the room aspect of the text you've been ignoring because you find it boring or confusing or uncomfortable and become the number one expert on it. now spend forty minutes assigning all the characters dnd classes with at least three sentences of reasoning each. okay now do the cha cha slide.
why, at the end of the semester, does everyone suddenly have a sister with an English degree who has definitely been the one helping them with their final paper and definitely not chatgpt?
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4 may 2026. locked in my study all day with the exception of a trip to town for lunch with my partner. the rest of the day has been about grading, and the pile's getting shorter. more tomorrow!
as soon as grades are in, i have a journal ecosystem to revisit. i've been using obsidian for many months now but i miss my leuchtturm 1917. i picked up the vogue diary at the end of 2025, too (i'm not usually one to follow trends but journals and diaries are my weakness). my partner also gifted me a louise carmen recently so now i don't know what to do. but none of this is really new. this is just something i do from time to time: completely break down under the desire to use multiple forms of documentation, planning, and journaling.
03 may 2026. sunday means visiting grandparents, where we talked about collecting coins and I worked on crocheting a yellow blanket I'll put away until it's cold again. came home and graded the rest of the journal entries except the ones due in a few days. watched some episodes of Little Mosque on the Prairie, which I hadn't seen in so long!
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02 may 2026. nothing but grading, dawn to dusk! I got quite a lot done. I have entered the state in which my brain has been absorbed by the computer. I have become one with the software.
I've been having a bit of a mental breakdown over the fact that I'm the oldest person in every room now. Well, the most millennial person in the room, anyway, because I've aged out of the study communities that got me through university, even though they've always been a great help to me. While everyone else is studying, I'm grading papers, and I feel like an interloper.
If there are communities, sites, apps that would be an appropriate fit for me, please let me know!