jayisreading's reviews
516 reviews

I am so grateful that Akbar published such a heartfelt and beautiful book to explore the importance of being earnest (not to steal Oscar Wilde’s title here), in spite of everything that has happened, in spite of the world being the way it is. I am thankful that Akbar created a protagonist like Cyrus, who wears his heart on his sleeve and relentlessly feels the blistering pain of hope. Martyr! is, in many ways, a messy novel. It’s messy in how Cyrus navigates the world and feels everything, the way it oscillates between the past and present, how it plays with different perspectives, and more. I know this novel won’t be for everyone because of its structure and lyrical prose (after all, Akbar is a poet), but I personally thought it all came together really well to show how earnestness means dealing with life’s wonderful and horrible messiness.

I do think it’s worth picking this novel up—regardless of what your reading preference is—to contend with what life and death might mean to you, and what it means to sincerely look for meaning in your aliveness. With that said, I do recommend checking the content warnings, as Akbar dives deep into these themes to get his points across.

How does one describe this poetry collection, in which words don’t take their usual form? Jjjjjerome Ellis crafts their poems in a manner that asks the reader to feel the way they navigate the world as a Black stutterer. Ellis tenderly approaches music and language through homages, benedictions, and more. I was particularly taken to “Benediction, Movement 2 (Octave),” which I think exemplifies how Ellis gently yet firmly pushes the reader to dwell in the same time and space as them, showing how they are not in-sync with normative expectations.

I know this won’t work for every reader, but I really appreciated how Ellis cited a number of people throughout this book to acknowledge the influence they had on the poems. It reminds me a fair bit of the importance of citational practices and the importance of honoring shared knowledge, especially among Black thinkers.

This was a great debut novel from Jenny Tinghui Zhang, who takes the reader to the time when the Chinese Exclusion Act was passed in the late 1800s and draws attention to a Chinese girl’s arduous journey from being kidnapped in China then smuggled into the United States (first landing in San Francisco then ending up in Idaho). A lot of careful research clearly went into this novel, and I found that it was as informative as it was imaginative; I thought that Zhang found a great balance between providing historical facts while also taking creative liberties to tell a compelling story (particularly in her handling of incorporating Chinese folklore). Furthermore, this novel was by no means an easy read, and the protagonist, Daiyu, suffers quite a bit. I’d highly recommend checking the content warnings for this novel before picking it up, especially considering that Zhang doesn’t shy away from sharing the grim realities of Chinese people during this time period (especially towards the end).

I enjoyed the author’s writing style, which was lyrical but also not to the point that she was dipping into purple prose. (In some ways, the writing style read as more “grounded,” for lack of a better word, than C Pam Zhang’s How Much of These Hills Is Gold, which had a similar setting and was apparently an influence for Jenny Tinghui Zhang.) I did feel that the limited narrative (told from Daiyu’s perspective) made some parts of the novel feel repetitive (especially as Daiyu’s thoughts circle around the same topic), but at the same time, there was something authentic about her perspective as she tried to make sense of the world around her and survive as best as she can.

I don’t think this novel will be for everyone, and I would stay away if you’re not interested in anything heavy and traumatic, but I think it’s worth picking up if you want a close-up of a subject that isn’t as talked about when United States history is brought up.

Based on the real story of the Dozier School for Boys in Florida during the Jim Crow era, The Nickel Boys was heartbreaking to read, considering the horrors that Black boys faced. Something I really appreciate about Whitehead’s writings is how he shows the lasting reverberations of anti-Blackness in the United States by focusing closely on a specific aspect of the country’s history. Despite the horrors that exist in these pages (and in United States history), I was surprised by the amount of love and resilience that came through. It really made the ending all the more gut-wrenching, especially as you grow a particular fondness for Elwood.

Not that there’s ever a really good headspace to be in when reading such a devastating novel, but I think I could have appreciated this novel more if I had less on my plate while reading it. I felt that I read this in a rush and didn’t get the chance to fully appreciate Whitehead’s efforts. Considering this, I really would like to revisit this novel when I can really put more care into what’s happening.

It took me a little under a year to finish reading The Count of Monte Cristo, which I think is somewhat understandable, given that it’s a pretty damn long novel. It was fascinating to see Dumas’s mind at work as he spun together a complex plot that had themes ranging from vengeance to forgiveness. I know there were a fair number of details that flew over my head, and this is absolutely one of those novels which, if you’re familiar with the historical events of when this novel took place, the reading experience will be significantly richer. Unfortunately for me, this was just outside of the period I’m more familiar with, so I greatly appreciated the footnotes that were in my translated edition.

The Count of Monte Cristo was a challenging novel for me to read, in part because it was long, but mostly because there were so many moving parts, so much that I seriously considered taking notes to remind myself who certain characters were, their motives, etc. The pacing did slow a fair bit towards the middle, with Dumas taking up hundreds of pages to lay the intricate groundwork for Edmond Dantès to exact his revenge on the three men who ruined his life. I admit that there were numerous occasions when I wondered why I needed to know a particular detail—and to be frank, I think there were a lot of details that weren’t necessary but were included anyway because Dumas was likely paid by the word—but patience paid off when I reached the ending and saw how everything unfolded.

I can see why some people may not enjoy how consumed Dantès was in seeking vengeance (especially when he was introduced as a just and good-natured man), but I quite liked how Dumas contemplated the nuances of revenge through his protagonist’s merits and flaws (but I also like a good Byronic hero, so there’s that).

Would I ever revisit this novel? Honestly, I don’t know if I would, mainly because it’s so long, but I’m glad to have finally gotten around to reading a sprawling and highly regarded classic. 

I really wanted to like this one, but the storytelling and characters were just too flat for me.

The writing style isn't for me.

I'm not in the right headspace to read this right now. I'll have to revisit this one sometime in the future.

I enjoyed Vértiz’s intimate approach to the body, both in the sensual and fleshy sense, as well as the mechanical. The personal touch of having been raised and near auto body shops make her poems stand out for their unique connections between automobiles and humans. There was a particular tenderness to these poems that I didn’t expect, but I think this was strengthened by the beautiful and unapologetic incorporation of Spanish into many of these poems.

On a more personal note, I didn’t particularly love or hate these poems when it came to style and structure, which is definitely a matter of personal taste.

This collection was definitely a mixed bag, with either me enjoying the short story or caring very little about it (if at all). Without a doubt, though, Chiang really knows how to craft a world and situation; even for the short stories I struggled with due to disinterest, I was still impressed with the way he wove everything together. Furthermore, each story posed such interesting questions and challenges to reflect on, whether it be the unreliability of mathematics as we know it, reckoning with the undeniable presence of God and His angels, or reconfiguring one’s reality through language. Perhaps not surprisingly, the gem of this collection is “Story of Your Life,” which may have been one of the best short stories I have read in a long while. (It has certainly incentivized me to finally get around to watching Arrival.) I now understand why it has received as much praise as it has.

To me, the short stories that are worth reading are: “Story of Your Life” (this one is a must, I’d say), “Tower of Babylon,” “Understand,” and possibly “Hell Is the Absence of God.”