God Loves Sex by Dan B. Allender and Tremper Longman III

By Tori

155 pages
Started 07/10/2019; Finished 07/18/2019

My interest in this book came from reading another one by Dan B. Allender earlier this year. I have a lot of respect for his biblical approach to sensitive topics that require compassion and wisdom. When Lifeway gave me a coupon for their website, his name was the first I searched.

Though the entire book is about God’s perspective on sex, Allender and Longman unpack it with two approaches. In half the chapters, they give a careful commentary and history lesson on Song of Songs; in between each of those chapters, we read a fictional diary of a new Christian who’s studying the book in a varied group from all different stages of life. At first, I cringed at the idea of unwrapping this topic in a fictional way (though I adore fiction, clearly), as it seemed like a cheap tactic, but I found myself unwillingly compelled by the character.

Sex is complicated, and the church’s response has been prudish, historically speaking. There’s a church tradition that Song of Songs is not about sex but is instead an allegory about God’s love for the church. This book addresses how and why that idea came about and subsequently shows its error. It’s a pervasive idea. I even heard it as a kid. This idea robs us of a much needed celebration of sex as God intended it, and it assigns physical or sensual things to a place below spiritual, as though they should and could be separated.

So, in a world that either idolizes sex or trivializes it and never speaks of it or speaks of it too openly, it was instructive to read an open discussion on the topic and even see a biblical model for finding that balance.

Before I got married, I sat down with Song of Songs, a big commentary, and a journal. I highly recommend any engaged person do the same. The commentary I used argued that the entire book was telling one story, but Allender and Longman believe it’s a series of individual poems, related only in topic and some repeated themes. From my inexperienced exegesis, I think both have valid arguments, and neither approach needs to harm the point of the book.

The authors do not force any aspects of sex into Song of Songs that aren’t there. They unpack what the Bible says without trying to drag it into any modern debates. They do, thankfully, spend some time on desire, beauty, sexual play, and rest, and then they use some of the struggles within Song of Songs to unpack the way our cultures and our families can make intimacy a struggle.

I would recommend this book to any person wanting a healthy, biblical approach to sex, but I would caution those not ready to have sex to wait until an appropriate time. As the Beloved says to the daughters of Jerusalem:

Do not arouse or awaken love until it so desires.
Song of Songs 8:4

Cheaper by the Half-Dozen

In the last month, I have read six books. I didn’t realize that until I checked to see which book I’d write about in my new review. Well, what a good summer so far!

Since I’m that behind, I’m gonna do a review dump again. It’s probably unfair to most of these books, especially the brilliance of Severance and the trash of Shades of Milk and Honey, but I’ll try to be more consistent with the next book I read.

So, here they are in the order I read them:

Oathbringer by Brandon Sanderson
This third installment of Sanderson’s Stormlight Archive is the longest book I read this year. Whereas Moby Dick was 206,052, this chunky boy was 454,440. I only attempted it because I knew I’d be sitting on a beach for a week, and I could knock it out without setting back my reading challenge. I’m glad I did. Even after reading enough to worry about eye strain, I wanted more. Sanderson’s worlds are always compelling and his endings so satisfying. I will admit that I doubted him at one point. The obstacles and debacles seemed hopeless, and I worried I’d wasted days for a book that end with a promise of fixing it all in the next book. The ending blew my mind. Sanderson, after all this time consuming your novels, I’m so sorry I doubted you.

Shades of Milk and Honey by Mary Robinette Kowal
I hated this book, but I really didn’t want to. A friend had recommended as “Jane Austen but with fantasy.” Since the same friend also strongly recommended Oathbringer, I still trust her taste. A lot of the Goodreads reviews had warned that this was nothing like Jane Austen. Well, I don’t expect anyone to be as good as Austen except the mastermind herself. The problem, however, is when an author herself is trying to model her writing after Austen. In both style and plot, Kowal’s writing felt like a fanfiction crossover of all Austen’s novels and a vague magic system that served more as an excuse for writing the novel than anything worthwhile. Where as Sense & Sensibility‘s Elinor Dashwood is an example of a big heart ruled by wisdom and restraint, this novel’s character (whose name is Jane, because of course it is) is ruled by self-pity and occasionally petty envy of her prettier younger sister. I did not want her have her happy ending.

The Signal and the Noise by Nate Silver
In Logan’s list of books that shaped who he is, this non-fiction work is in the top five. So, I started reading it last year to understand why it was so important. It took me six months to finish, and even then, I decided not to read the last two chapters when I found out he didn’t read them either. Don’t let this take away from the 4 out of 5 stars I’d give it. He just suffers from the John Piper Syndrome of making your point too many times. The first half of the book analyzes our modern problem of Big Data, how all the noise sometimes drowns out the signal, and the tendency of some industries (looking at you, housing bubbles) to abuse the system. Halfway through the book, he introduces a philosophy of educated guesses. The second half of the book, then, is observing a variety of forecasters that already incorporate (knowingly or not) this philosophy.

Homesickness by Jesse Donaldson
Part-memoir and part prose-poems, this memoir is a meditation on Kentucky and nostalgia. Donaldson uses an entry for each of Kentucky’s 120 counties to tell a story of his love for this state but also the love for his wife which compels him to stay in Washington. I enjoyed reading of a relationship with my home that resonated in surprising ways. Does everyone miss their home state like this when they leave it? I grew up feeling restrained by these bluegrass hills, but after calling another state home for a brief time, I came home to Kentucky with the same affection and fondness Donaldson describes as a lifelong state of being. I recommend this to anyone with a connection to Kentucky.

Bad Therapist by Evan Wright
So many trigger warnings should precede this book. Wright’s exposé of Chris Bathum will haunt me for a long time, as well it should. Bathum’s crimes, including insurance fraud in the millions and licentious, evil treatment of the patients who idolized him, were made possible by loopholes in our system that still exist. The bravery of Rose Stahl, his patient and employee, in exposing him and cracking open the case will also serve as a shining example of doing the right thing even if it puts your life at risk. I listened to it slowly as an audiobook, and I’d recommend the same for anyone who might need to take a break from this dark story of wickedness and villainy.

Severance by Ling Ma
Of all these books, Ma’s debut novel is most deserving of its own post, especially as it’s hard to describe succinctly. The journey of Candace Chen, an average millennial and child of immigrants, is told in chapters alternating between her arrival to New York after college and also in a future time after the end of the world. The apocalypse comes as a zombie-esque virus, but these zombies aren’t the brain-eating type. They are merely stuck in routines, performing the same rites and duties and jobs without sleeping, flinching, seeing, or speaking. As Candace herself is prone to routines and reliving the past, the line between the “fevered” and the narrator is blurred. Ma’s prose is perfectly paced so that it never felt rushed and never dragged, never too heart-racing and yet hard to put down. She critiques capitalism and American industry without verging getting political. As a girl who works in an office and lives in a city, I found this narrative to be more terrifying than any other post-apocalyptic story I’ve read. It’s the new The Road.

The Broken Earth Trilogy by N. K. Jemisin

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I needed this series, and you might, too.

A little less than a month ago, Logan and I went book shopping on our anniversary. He’s already written a blog on the book he picked (and a few others since then), but I’ve been taking my sweet time working through 1424 pages of character-drive science fantasy. I had walked into our local bookstore looking for a series, a trilogy, a world that didn’t kick me out after one book. I found this boxed set, and though it won three consecutive Hugo Awards (the first in the genre to do so), a Nebula Award, and a Goodreads award, it was this quote on the side that convinced me to buy it, “If you read one sci-fi series this year, it should be The Broken Earth.”

I have to say, I agree. You’ve never read anything like this, because there’s no fantasy novel like this. So many of the narrative choices, the characters, and the world itself all come from a voice that I have yet to experience in this genre: a black woman. I mention this not because being a minority alone is a merit, but because in a genre where we want to explore new worlds and new ideas, we’ve been pretty limited to those ideas coming from one demographic.

On top of which, Jemisin’s background influences the vivid world-building in her novels. She uses themes of oppression and racism in a way that’s simply skillful if that’s all you want and yet deeply relevant if you’re looking for it. She also has powerful female lead characters, with rich three-dimensions (no four-dimensions (no, five!)).

And that’s really what I want to spend the most of this piece talking about. What I loved about this series and what will truly stay with me for a long time are the characters, especially Essun. The narration of the Essun is given in second-person, a perspective I was strictly told never to use in my creative writing courses. Yet Jemisin uses second-person masterfully in a way that never feels gimmicky and allows us to explore the character on new levels (I can’t say much more than that without spoilers).

Jemisin expects her readers to be smart, as well, which I appreciate. Often characters will put something together, and though we are told about their jolt of surprise in understanding, we are not always hand-fed what they’ve figured out. The world-building is done in much the same way, but that made for a complicated reading experience for me.

See, though I have a lot to say about the series, it’s hard to talk about for a few reasons. Firstly, because of how she wrote it. The best way to explain it is to compare the experience with reading a Brandon Sanderson novel. For most Sanderson novels, we’re given a clear, concrete world. You understand what’s going on, and you love every second. The big twist at the end is when you’re given just a little bit of information to unlock a whole new layer that was there the whole time. For Jemisin, it’s more like holding the author’s hand while walking child-like through her world, and the twist at the end is finally feeling like maybe you know what’s going on (but probably not). This wasn’t un-enjoyable, but it did lead to my second complication.

I didn’t know how I felt about the series the whole time I was reading it. Actually, I didn’t know until right up to an hour ago. I would have moments of feeling deeply moved or surprised, but I kept wondering if I was missing something. I kept asking, “Is she a clever author, or is she over-reaching?” The real question should’ve been, “Am I reading a bad book, or am I failing to understand what she’s giving me?” It took me trying to explaining the ending to a friend who likes spoilers to realize just exactly how the whole system and world work together.

So, it took me a few days after finishing the series (which I did enjoy the whole time I was reading it) to definitively say: This series and author are brilliant and deserve very acclaim received.

In 2017, Jemisin was in talks to make it a TV series. Let’s hope that happens soon.

These Last Five Books

Due to a recent, personal setback, I have neglected to blog about the last couple of books I’ve read. According to GoodReads, I’m still on track to read 52 books by the end of the year if I read a book a week. Since I’m trying to read at that pace, I don’t want to back-track to write blogs for the last five books I’ve read on top of the ones I’m currently reading. So, here’s my thoughts on the last five books at a speed-dating pace.

Refresh by Shona and David Murray
While on a weekend retreat with my Bible Fellowship Group from church, Logan and I won a set of books by Shona and David Murray. ‘Refresh’ is for women; ‘Reset’ is for men. These books sprung from the Murray’s personal experiences with burn-out and function as prescriptive advice for others to both avoid and recover from our own burn-out. Though Shona shares her own experience with burn-out, I do wish the book was clearer about its purpose. She says this book is for anyone on the spectrum from anxious to suicidal, but in reality, it’s for those on that spectrum as a result of burn-out. Many with depression or suicidal desires have a different cause than burn-out and may need different kinds of help or therapy. For those who have felt stressed out, worn down, run ragged, or any other two-worded way of saying “exhausted,” this book offers help strategies grounded in both Scripture and science.

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Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim by David Sedaris
In my undergrad studying creative writing, Sedaris’ name was spoken reverently, and the excerpts I read stuck to my mind more than most memoir pieces. The audio format for this book is the first time I’ve heard of an audiobook being nominated for a Grammy. I know I’m more describing the reception of Sedaris’ work than I am the work itself, but that’s mostly because it’s hard to describe his stories. I prefer to let him do it. He’s labelled as an “American humorist,” and much like a Bo Burnham sketch, I’d do it a grand disservice to try to summarize the whole thing or even repeat a bit. Each chapter in this collection details another angle of his odd family life. I had Logan listen to a few chapters, as it was too funny to listen to alone. I highly recommend the audiobook (read by the author) if you can get your hands on it.

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Holding Up the Universe by Jennifer Niven
One of the most interesting things about this book wasn’t in the synopsis on the back and yet was introduced on the first page: a main character with prosopagnosia (face blindness). I’d never considered the implications of such a disorder before, but Niven did her research before giving Jack Masselin the character trait and letting us see the world through his eyes. The other first-person perspective in this YA novel is Libby Strout, a high-schooler who has overcome childhood obesity getting cut out of her own home years before. Though she’s lost hundreds of pounds, she’s still one of the biggest girls in the school when she re-enters for her junior year. This book was honestly perfect for a YA novel. The well-written characters change in inspiring ways, and though the end of the book changes their lives permanently, it doesn’t change much of the world around them. I was pleasantly surprised by how grounded this book was while also letting me believe in something wonderful.

Unashamed by Lecrae
Lecrae’s memoir was ChristianAudio.com’s free book of the month. I’ve been following his career for a while, but as I listened to the first few chapters dig into his early childhood, I realized I didn’t know his story at all. Yet the picture of all that he went through was not as poignant to me as the story after his conversion. We often hear of sinners converted and leaving the past behind for a new life. We don’t hear about converts relapsing, reverting, or returning to the same way of life they thought God had freed them from. Lecrae’s story is important in a culture that often idolizes spiritual highs, leaving those in spiritual lows alone in the dark. The last third of his book also explains his approach to making music as a Christian, as opposed to making Christian music. The dilemma of using art to engage culture as a Christian is a topic handled by many Christians, but I’ve never heard it discussed by someone actually applying what they believe. It’s a tricky topic, but I appreciated his approach. The prose to this book is simplistic, but I think that’s intentional and doesn’t detract from the five stars I gave it on GoodReads.

When Michael Met Mina by Randa Abdel-Fattah
This one’s hard to read, but not due to bad writing. Michael’s from a family that’s created a political movement to oppose refugees from coming to Australia; Mina’s an Afghani refugee standing on the other side of the picket line. It felt like a take on Romeo and Juliet, and honestly, it worked. It was hard to read about Michael’s family, however. To sit in that home and hear the things they say, even without hatred, took some patience. Though the political movement they represent is fictional, I’ve heard their ideas actually stated by those in my own country. I felt my ire rise. So, naturally, I empathized with Mina’s pain (though we don’t have the same background) and honestly teared up with her near the end when she found some hope and relief. For a YA novel that covers serious issues, I’d recommend picking this one up.

The Rithmatist by Brandon Sanderson

by Tori

Begun 3/7/2019, Finished 3/19/2019
375 pages

You’re either a Sanderson fan, or you’ve never read him.

Everyone I know who’s read his stuff has turned around and recommended it to me instantly. In the case of this book, a friend literally put it in my hands, knowing I’d want to borrow it. I’ve also never gotten as many comments from strangers in public about what I’m reading as I do when I’ve got a Sanderson novel in my hands.

While he typically writes high-fantasy fiction, he has a lot of side-projects from his main series (series here is plural as he has quite a few “main” ones). The Rithmatist is a YA novel with one of the most intriguing setup I’ve ever heard: a Hogwarts-esque school for magic and non-magic folk in a steampunk culture set in the United States, if the U.S. was spread across a collection of islands.

The magic in this world consists of two-dimensional chalk drawings that can come to life. Sanderson’s strong suit is always his magic systems. He has a very specific philosophy for writing magic.

Sanderson’s First Law of Magics: An author’s ability to solve conflict with magic is DIRECTLY PROPORTIONAL to how well the reader understands said magic.

Unlike Rowling’s approach to magic (long live the queen), Sanderson’s magic has clear limitations and established abilities. That’s not to say that the entire system is laid bare for either the characters or the reader; even in this book, the characters are still exploring this “new” magic and acknowledge they don’t know everything.

A difficulty in a lot of fantasy or sci-fi is revealing the world to the reader. My sister just read Dune and said the book does little to explain itself, so it takes a while to understand what’s going on. Most authors have a character who’s teaching the protagonist about the world, like Hermione in Harry Potter. In The Rithmatist, Sanderson has the main character, Joel, actually play this role with a twist. He’s a non-magic user in a magic school. He’s obsessed with the system and sneaks into magic classes to learn more.

I have to admit that quite a bit of this system was lost on me, no matter how often Joel fanboys over it. There’s a math-y visual element that I struggled to hold in mind when reading about the duels. Thankfully, the book is full of visuals and illustrations, to the point that the illustrator’s name is on the cover. Inserts between chapters cover various defensive maneuvers and any chalk creatures are shown within the text.

The book’s pacing hit that sweet spot between building momentum without rushing through scenes and plot. A serial killer (or kidnapper) has been taking children, and the plot is essentially a fantasy “whodunnit.” Once I got to about 2/3 of the way through, I felt too hooked to put it down and finished it within a day. I didn’t feel hungover after I finished either, as can often happen. I just felt satisfied and ready for the sequel (which is not written yet).

As usual, the characters were well-developed. Joel’s know-it-all attitude could’ve been a problem, but it’s gently and effectively rebuked by a caring teacher. I found his friend, Melody, relatable to an uncomfortable degree, though descriptions of her personality weren’t always flattering. Every character felt three-dimensional enough so that the big reveal at the end genuinely took me by surprise. For someone who can rarely turn off analyzing while reading, it’s always pleasant when an author can hide the answer in plain sight.

Of course, I recommend this novel, but if you know me or Logan, you didn’t have to read to the end of this blog to guess that.

Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? (And Other Concerns) by Mindy Kaling (Tori)

By Tori

222 Pages
Begun 02/15/2019, Finished 02/17/2019

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I tricked my husband into reading this book. I say “reading,”but I mean listening. When I described the book as an option for an audiobook on our trip to visit his parents recently, he said it didn’t sound like his kind of book. A memoir about a girl who wonders if everyone is hanging out without her and some meditations on boys and body? Yeah, I suppose the dust jacket would deter most guys. Yet as I played it on the drive as “background noise,” it didn’t take him long to put his book on Nixon away and pay attention to Mindy’s friendly tone. Of all the books I’ve read by female comedians, I think this was the best one for him to share with me. (“Bossypants” is obviously the exception. Everyone should read/listen to Bossypants. It’s untouchable in its solid first place, and even Mindy knows that.)

I think everyone who reads this book will want to be Mindy’s friend. That’s exactly what you want to say about a celebrity – right? They’re “one of us.” Though Mindy often alludes to a casually upper class way of living – like throwing away a jacket from Forever 21 in order to leave a party early or when she expresses exasperation with everyone who hasn’t bitten the bullet on Lasisk yet. The relatability comes more in what I assume anyone reading this book would have in common with her – a love of comedy, a love of Mindy, and a love of gossip. She manages to reference both Tennessee Williams and Twilight in the span of five minutes.

Some of her remarks about the future are amusingly correct, and some, like her mention of Amy Poehler’s marriage were embarrassingly off. Yet she did totally cameo in a movie with a shorter number than 11 -and an all-female Ghostbusters, both of which she mentioned wanting to see done sometime.

She has a false sense of confidence, but she’s far more aware of it than, say, Lena Dunham in her book And she’s an experienced, and intentional writer, unlike Amy Poehler. By the time she got to landing her job at The Office, I was so hooked and invested in her story, that I literally cheered while driving. I was disappointed to be at the end of our 2.5 hour trip and have to wait to hear more.
I believe she’s written another book since then, and I’m hoping to pick it up, along with checking out every other movie she’s been a part of. I feel way more into her career now. It’s not because she’s some over-comer who’s had an uphill battle in all this. There’s nothing particularly inspiring about her. I just, like most readers I think, like her.

(Click here to see what Logan thought of her.)

The Wounded Heart by Dr. Dan B. Allender

by Tori

271 pages
Begun 08/02/2017, Finished 02/14/2019

Yes, those dates are correct. It took me a year and a half to finish this one.

When talking about my most “influential” books, nothing comes close in the category to touching this one. I’ve spent a year and a half slowly trekking through its chapters, and only eight years of therapy can compare with this book in being instrumental to God’s healing in my life. Dr. Allender addresses sexual abuse from a Christian perspective in how we define abuse, how we understand it, and how we heal from it. The journey of healing (even the journey of reading this whole book) is difficult, but he calls readers and victims to the task of healing and wholeness for the sake of the gospel.

To live significantly less than what one was made to be is as severe a betrayal of the soul as the original abuse.

The book is divided into three equally-powerful sections. The first is “The Dynamics of Abuse.” Though everyone’s experience is unique, he draws from his experiences with others and statistics to paint a picture of the problem. To repeat the claim on the book cover: “Someone you know has been sexually abused.” Unfortunately, sexual abuse is “one of the few crimes where the victim feels more shunned and rejected than the criminal.” He exposes the definition of abuse and the accusations of shame that have too long kept victims quiet.

Actually, the first section was the hardest for me to get through. He explains how abuse happens, especially to children. I had never thought to ask that question. The grooming process was only a sinister mystery, especially heinous in its hidden nature. Yet reading his explanation and detailed stages of the grooming process was so accurate and horrifying that it probably took six months to fully get through that chapter. Even now, my cheeks flush to remember seeing something so privately nightmarish written out step-by-step like a doctor telling a terminal cancer patient exactly how the disease will ravish her body from start to finish.

Before describing the grooming process, however, he sets the stage by answering the question – why are some children susceptible? The answer, often, lies in the home. Though there are exceptions to everything he says, most children who fall prey to sexual abuse were raised in “an atmosphere in which a child is vulnerable to abuse and/or had no one to whom to turn after abuse.”

Understanding the dynamics of abuse is harrowing, and I caution anyone who picks up this book to read it slowly. Give yourself time and grace. It’s a lot to swallow, whether you’ve lived it or not.

The second section, “The Damage of Abuse,” can be equally difficult. Whether your heart twists to learn of the lifelong, pernicious struggles of victims or you’re reading your own personal trials identified for the first time then laid bare, these chapters require as much patience and determination.

With chapters on powerlessness, betrayal, ambivalence, and more, Dr. Allender is careful to use a gentle voice when sharing the disastrous effects of abuse while also keeping a Christian worldview. The ways in which some victims cope or protect themselves can lead to lifestyles that deaden, harden, or further cripple the victim, and Dr. Allender both validates why this happens while also calling victims to a healthy, rich life in Christ.

He does not shy away from the topic of sin and the ways in which different profiles of relational styles can keep us from fully loving those around us.
The damages of abuse primarily drive wedges between victims and themselves, others, and God. Though in all this, his intent is never to shame but to demonstrate that this is not the life that God wants for us.

I hoped the last section, “Prerequisites for Growth,” would be easier to read, especially as the first chapter is called “The Unlikely Route to Joy.” Like the rest of the book however, I was both surprised and moved by the content far beyond what I expected.

Yet throughout this section and also throughout the whole book, Dr. Allender is full of hope. Though I and most readers must take it slowly, no one is trapped under the current without sight of land. The point of the book is to lead brokenness through the exercise of healing without skipping a step or giving our pain any foothold with denial.

Our God is also one who suffered and the only one who can answer the questions: “Where was God when I was abused? Why doesn’t He take away, the pain, struggle, memories? Why didn’t He intervene before I made destructive decisions?” Dr. Allender shares this quote by John Stott:

I could never myself believe in God, if it were not for the cross. The only God I believe in is the One Nietzsche ridiculed as “God on the cross.” In the real world of pain, how could one worship a God who was immune to it? … There is still a question mark against human suffering, but over it we boldly stamp another mark, the cross which symbolizes divine suffering. “The cross of Christ… is God’s only self-justification in such a world” as ours.

If your story includes any of the elements covered in this book, I hope you read it. If you can’t buy it for yourself, message me. I’ll get it to you. I think it’s important.

And I do think everyone should read this book. I started it a few months before #MeToo began, and I appreciated the awareness that the campaign caused. Awareness, however, should not be enough. We have to know about this epidemic, and we have to see it with clear eyes and God-given hope. I encourage you to read this book with an excerpt from the author:

Words To a Friend
You are the friend of someone who has been abused, and you are untrained, inexperienced, and scared. If I am accurate so far, then you have also seriously thought about backing out of the relationship with your abused friend. Not that you are going to treat her like a leper or avoid all contact, but the issue of abuse, the current struggles and fears, are off-limits.
My counsel to you is simple: Don’t back off from the frightening terrain of a wounded heart. You may say the wrong things and even cause more harm, but the worst harm is to turn your back. Accept your limitations, but also acknowledge the fact that you are on the front lines of the battle. You may not like to hear it but the fact is, you are a foot soldier, an infantryman who is often the first to take the fire of the enemy.
As a therapist, I see your friend once, or maybe twice a week. You see her every day. I deal with significant issues in her soul, but you talk about the same issue, and even more. I may be necessary to the process, but you are even more so. Let me say it again: You are very important as a friend who will pray, talk, laugh, cry, read, embrace, shout, bake cookies, drive to Little League, and live life in intimate proximity. Don’t allow you inexperience or your own personal past to keep you from loving well.

Boxers & Saints by Gene Luen Yang

by Tori

Boxers: 325 pages
Begun and finished: 02/04/2019
Saints: 170 pages
Begun and finished: 02/05/2019

(Logan, don’t read this blog post. You should read this, too, and write your own review without my influnece!)

I often judge a book by how much I worry about the characters when I put the book down. Gene Luen Yang’s two-volume story about the Boxer Rebellion is so masterfully done that I was worried about the characters to the point of finishing each volume on the day I started them.

Yang is best known for American Born Chinese and Avatar: The Last Airbender. He brings the same story-telling skills we love from those tales to the intertwined lives of Bao and Vibiana. Both live on either side of the bloody Boxer Rebellion.

Prior to this, all I knew about the Boxer Rebellion was just that – the name. I wasn’t able to bring any bias into the reading, and Yang doesn’t let you take any with you afterward either. As in any war or rebellion, all the lives involved are as real and compelling as our own. To enter into both Bao’s Vibiana’s stories is to the compassion, sacrifice, and motivations of two sides both dedicated to protecting China.

The Boxer Rebellion was an attempt of Chinese nationalists to rid the land of “foreign devils,” the white Christians who’d come into their land. Bao follows this rebellion from start to tragic finish; Vibiana is a Christian convert.

Even though the Boxers volume gives the entire life of the rebellion, the Saints volume doesn’t feel repetitive by going over the history from Vibiana’s perspective. Actually, as much as I was impacted by the first volume, the second volume left me audibly gasping, “Wow,” as I shut the cover and basked in Yang’s twists and punches.

I recommend this boxed-set if you haven’t read a graphic novel before, like historical fiction, want a shorter read, or are just interested in human stories. So, if you think you might read it,
don’t read below this line to avoid spoilers.

Supernatural elements are assumed and accepted by the characters with ease, as though the spiritual realm were often intruding into common life. This is a version of the story that clearly incorporates the mythology as fact. Bao is only able to lead the rebellion once he’s learned how to assume a god-form and teach others to do the same. Vibiana receives all of her direction in life from a vision of Joan of Arc. Joan was famed for her own visions, but they were the exceptions not so much the rule like they are in this world.

An interesting difference between the volumes’ art styles is color palettes. The Boxers volume is full color, typically bright and primary. The god-forms are notably more colorful, but only because the men are wearing drab, light-brown clothes before they transform. However, the Saints volume only uses shades of brown. This only changes in scenes with the visions of Joan.

The color change becomes more noticeable at the end of Saints. Vibiana teaches Bao how to pray before he kills her, and after her death, the novel switches back to his perspective. We see him he pray as Vibiana taught him, all with the same brown, muted colors in her story.

In Boxers, Bao and Vibiana are both motivated to protect and unify China. In Saints, they both fail to protect China, and yet it’s only Vibiana’s Christianity that manages to save one of them.

Moby Dick by Herman Melville

By Tori

610 pages
Begun 01/06/2019, Finished 02/03/2019

Call me a sucker. I like big books.

Reading this one has been a personal challenge for a long time. I’ve read enough of Brandon Sanderson’s novels which more than double the length of Herman Melville’s great work, so the size was not as intimidating as it was when my friends were reading it in high school. So, when I found this cheap, small copy at Half-Price Books, I decided it was time.

It would be either naïve or cocky (or both) to offer much criticism of this novel; it’s fullest depths are beyond me. I enjoyed the experience, and I’m fairly confident I’ll need to read it again in a few years to catch the layers I’m sure I missed in this first read-through.

Still – why did this take me a month to get through? Though the first and last quarters of the book are somewhat regularly paced, the middle presents the challenge. Almost half of the book is a biology lesson on whales. A friend pointed out that the chapters on cetology function much like Leviticus does to the New Testament: “Here are the details of the glories you’re about to witness.” The middle certainly prepares us for the end, but they weren’t necessarily page turners.

The book is also riddled with nuggets of poetry. Ishmael dedicates a chapter to the whale’s head, skin, forehead, oils, mating habits, color, and more, each with a couple of pages of more information than you thought you’d need. Yet in the midst of a chapter on tails, we have this gem:

Real strength never impairs beauty or harmony, but it often bestows it; and in everything imposingly beautiful, strength has much to do with the magic.

The effect of spending hours knee-deep in cetology while keeping a vigilant eye out for such poetic lines left me feeling much like the men aboard the Pequod must have. After they leave Nantucket, they spend a year on the sea, never touching land again within the novel. How do they spend the weeks and months that pass between the chapters of this whale sighting or that ship passing? Much like the reader, meditating on life at sea while keeping watch for the prize.

The narrator, too, is endearing in his fanaticism. We all know someone a little too into their niche interest and a little too elevating of its superiority to all other interests. Should Perseus, St. George, and Vishnoo belong to the elite membership of whaleman as Ishmael claims in the chapter “The Honor and Glory of Whaling”? Perhaps not, but I appreciated his arguments for the case.

Also, I related to a character who could read gravestones and subsequently muse:

Yes, Ishmael, the same fate may be thine. But somehow I grew merry again. Delightful inducements to embark, fine chance for promotion, it seems – aye, a stove boat will make me an immortal by brevet. Yes, there is death in this business of whaling–a speechlessly quick chaotic bundling of man into Eternity. But what then? Methinks that what they call my shadow here on earth is my true substance. Methinks that in looking at things spiritual, we are too much like oysters observing the sun through the water, and thinking that thick water the thinnest of air. Methinks my body is but the lees of my better being. In fact take my body who will, take it I say, it is not me.

His character is young, perhaps my age, though we’re given little information about him. Ahab slowly enters the scene, but once he’s on deck, his looming presence overshadows all other characters so that you hardly notice the absence of Ishmael’s perspective at the end.

I joked, a month ago, that reading Moby Dick had inspired me to chase my goals, yet after I finished, the joke became real. If I can read this task of a book that has taunted me from my bucket list for years, then reading 52 books this year is far less intimidating than before.

Juliet Naked by Nick Hornby

By Tori

Audio: 9 hours.
Narrated by Bill Irwin, Ben Miles, and Jennifer Wiltsie.

The first audiobook I ever finished by myself was Funny Girl by Nick Hornby. I was captivated by the simple style yet fleshed-out characters. Surprised by how entertaining I found an audiobook for the first time, I rooted for the characters and felt satisfied by the end. So, as Logan and I have started challenging ourselves to read more this year, I felt that a good Nick Hornby audiobook would be the best start.

The premise for this novel starts with a fanboy. Duncan lives in a small English town and writes obsessively on a fansite about has-been rock star, Tucker Crowe. His girlfriend Annie enjoys Crowe’s music as well but nowhere close to Duncan’s obsessed level. Though Crowe has been absent for decades, a new CD comes out with an unedited version of his last album, Juliet. This “undressed” version of the album is called Juliet, Naked. Annie and Duncan disagree on the quality of this raw material; Duncan writes a glowing article on his site naming it the best Crowe album yet, and Annie writes her first post on the site to call the album evidence that art is a process and first drafts need editing. Later, she receives an email from Tucker Crowe himself, thanking her for the article, and…. well, you’ve seen the movie trailer, right? This is a romance.

And romances with celebrities are far-fetched, but I trusted Nick Hornby to deliver the same grounded characters he has before. Yet, these characters were so down-to-earth that we could’ve been six-feet-under. Tucker Crowe is a jobless, feckless, ex-alcoholic father of five children who’s womanizing ways faded with his stardom. Sure, he reads Dickens and has cleaned up his appearance to look “like an accountant,” but he seems to navigate relationships too listlessly and reluctantly to inspire admiration for the character. Relationships, however, are the primary context in which we experience him.

Annie, too, is not spared this lackluster realism. She dislikes her job, dislikes the small town where she lives, and dislikes her boyfriend of over-a-decade. She regrets her childlessness and blames Duncan for a lot of her state of being. When they break-up, she belittles him as a person so thoroughly and calmly that I grew unsympathetic towards her character. Duncan had cheated her on her, yes, but her dismissal was passionless and almost relieved. Without giving spoilers, I will say that her ending was, to me, lacking any satisfaction, for either of us. She does not seem to change, only become further dismissive of her life.

The movie (which I watched immediately after finishing the book) attempts to fix her character. She’s slightly more charming and actually acts on her desires at the end. She changes her life. But this isn’t faithful to the book. We don’t see Book Annie make any progress in her life except for firing her therapist, one she’s been trying to fire for years.

I grew up in a small town next to small towns. I know what it looks like to look around and see nothing changing, including yourself. Hornby portrays that suffocating stillness as the antagonist to both of these characters, but at the end of the novel, we are left in the same place. The antagonist defeats them. If this is meant to be a lesson on the dangers of fanboys and the public’s unrealistic fantasies concerning celebrities, good job. If he wanted to warn readers that you can’t change someone who won’t change themselves, got it.

I, like the characters, just wanted more.