Like, seriously. I will never look at a secondary world fantasy the same way again. Jade City, the third book overall and first adult novel from author Fonda Lee, does such a phenomenal job of creating the country of Kekon and its religion and politics and economy and international relations, that it will be very difficult for other books to measure up. So Jade City is set in a fictional East Asian country called Kekon whose primary resource is a magical version of jade. Green Bones are warriors who are trained to use jade to make use of magical powers,…
15 CommentsCategory: 4 Stars
Is everyone here familiar with the NPR Book Concierge? The most magical and glorious of end-of-year book lists? And I say that as someone who loves end-of-year book lists and never, ever tires of reading through them. The NPR Book Concierge is the The Millions Book Preview of end-of-year book lists. I get so many book recs from it that it is a Problem. Among them this past year was Gengoroh Tagame’s My Brother’s Husband. It’s about a guy called Yaichi who lives in Tokyo with his daughter, Kana. But their lives change when a large, bearded, lumberjacklike Canadian called…
26 CommentsOne of the beloved talking points of people who are currently Nazis is that there was a time in Europe when everyone was white. Mostly, they think this because they are crap people in search of crap beliefs that will support their continued quest to be terrible. In part, though, historians and teachers have contributed to this belief by beginning the stories of black Britain with the advent of slavery. But as Miranda Kaufmann’s new book Black Tudors shows, the reality is that people of African descent did live in early modern Britain, plying their trades alongside white residents. (For…
12 CommentsIt’s Monday and we all probably all need some romance novels in our lives. Here are two new ones that you might want to pick up if you need something to get you through the holiday season. I received electronic copies of both of them from the publishers for review consideration, which did not influence my review because my good opinion is more costly than ebooks. Wrong to Need You, Alisha Rai (Goodreads link!) Sadia Ahmad owns a cafe, tends a bar, and raises her son. When her dead husband’s brother comes back to town after years of radio silence,…
5 CommentsHappy very belated Wednesday, pals! After many travails and difficulties, Whiskey Jenny and I have walked ten miles in the snow uphill both ways to bring you a very overdue podcast. This time around, we’re updating you on professional boundaries in our Serial Box Book Club, chatting about fictional friendships we love, and reviewing Laia Jufresa’s wondrous and underappreciated book Umami.
You can listen to the podcast using the embedded player below, or download the file directly to take with you on the go!
Here are the time signatures if you want to skip around!
1:03 – What We’re Reading
4:15 – Serial Box Book Club: Episodes 3 and 4 of Geek Actually
11:58 – Fictional friendships!
28:02 – Umami, Laia Jufresa, translated by Sophie Hughes
38:45 – What We’re Reading for Next Time!
39:26 – HOLIDAY GIFT GUIDE
Seriously, please get at us in the holiday gift guide submission form and help us help you buy gifts for your loved ones.
Get at me on Twitter, email the podcast, and friend me (Gin Jenny) and Whiskey Jenny on Goodreads. Or if you wish, you can find us on iTunes (and if you enjoy the podcast, give us a good rating! We appreciate it very very much).
Credits
Producer: Captain Hammer
Photo credit: The Illustrious Annalee
Theme song by: Jessie Barbour
Our transcript is below the cut!
Leave a CommentDoes anyone else here have a habit of mentally constructing syllabuses to replace the syllabuses you had as a kid? Where you’ll be like, “Instead of A Separate Peace, I decree that all the youths will now read Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe,” or whatever. I haven’t exactly decided what specific book on youthful summer reading lists The Girl with the Red Balloon should replace, but I’d love for it to be on those lists. Ellie Baum thinks her grandfather’s stories about being saved from the Holocaust by a magic red balloon are just that —…
7 CommentsFINALLY. Not that anyone cares,1, but my struggles to get my hands on my library’s copy of Lower Ed have spanned almost six months. If I wanted to wait six months to read a book I put on hold at the library, I’d have stayed in New York and only had a NYPL library card because BPL actually processes holds at a reasonable speed but what I’m saying is that NYPL is terrible at processing holds. And six months was too long to wait for Lower Ed. I’d have lost interest if I hadn’t been so darn interested. Lower Ed…
4 Comments