Show Us Your Books: September 2021

Do you remember?
The second Tuesday of September?
Don’t even need to be a member!
To show us your books todayyyyyyyyy!

BAAAAAADEEEEYAAAA! The plotlines we dismember!
BAAAAAADEEEEYAAAA! Reading always sparks an ember!
BAAAAAADEEEEEYAAA! We’re blogging about books todaaaaaaaayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy!

It was only a three-book month for me. I’m studying between 9 and 12 hours a week for the CAE exam (obviously one of the worst ideas I’ve ever had), so pleasure reading has taken a backseat until December. I’m 1 book short for the Goodreads goal, but I can talk your off about the difference between a 501(c)3, a 501(c)4, and a 501(c)6 organization. So there is that.

Onto the books! I use the Goodreads rating system, which is:

• One star: did not like it
• Two stars: it was ok
• Three stars: liked it
• Four stars: really liked it
• Five stars: it was amazing

Such a Fun Age – Kiley Reid
This was a firecracker of a book. A young Black woman, Emira, is the babysitter for a white toddler. The family has a small emergency, so late one evening they call Emira to take the little girl out of the house for a while. Emira takes her to their favorite grocery store. This leads to her almost being arrested for kidnapping. This happens in the very first chapter, and the rest of the book deals with the ramifications from that incident. I spend a little time on Tiktok before bed these days, and one of the very popular background sounds for videos is woman singing “oh no, oh no… oh no no no no no” on repeat. Almost every decision that every adult character other than Emira makes elicited an “oh no” from me, even though everybody thought they were acting in Emira’s best interest. Four stars!

The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet – Becky Chambers
This was an easy, fun scifi book about a young woman trying to escape her past by taking a clerk job on a spaceship that creates tunnels in space for others to use for trade and travel. I cried a bit at the end, but it’s one of those books where, in a few months, I won’t even be able to tell you the plot and in a year or so I won’t even remember that I read it. Two stars, it was ok.

World of Wonders: In Praise of Fireflies, Whale Sharks, and Other Astonishments – Aimee Nezhukumatathil
I saw this featured in the books section of a few magazines and asked for it for my birthday. It’s a short book. Each chapter features an animal or plant, and Nezhukumatathil ties that being’s behaviors back to different periods of her life. She’s a poet, so she writes an almost lyrical, fantastical prose that will either make you furious or make you fall in love. I don’t think there’s a middle ground there. I thought some of the stories sounded a little bit familiar, and it turns out Nezhukumatathil contributed to The Toast years ago. Four stars, with a little content warning for the axolotl chapter, because it touches on animal testing.

Currently reading:
Feeling Good by David Burns – Needed.
Membership Essentials, CAE Study Guide 2020 – Also needed.

All of my book lists and reviews are on Goodreads.

This a part of the Show us Your Books linkup from Jana Says and Life According to Steph. If you want to read more bloggers gush about the books they’ve read this month, click the button below and have fun!

Other SUYB posts:

2022:
April | May

2021:
January | February | March | April | May | June | July | August | September | October
2020:
February | March | Spring/Summer | September | October | November | Year-end review
2019
January | February | March |April | June | July | August | December
2018
January | February | March | April | May | June | July | August | September | October | November | December

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