And now Chris Kraus's Where #Art Belongs has me in that spot of yearning for creative collectives that emerge out of the absolutely right coincidental conditions and bust out all the best stuff because they function outside of institutional bounds, qualifications, and ambitions. I'm going to find such a community one day, damn it...
“We cut down the trees out of fear,” he continued, “but cutting down the trees releases our worst nightmares back into the atmosphere. This is a far more terrifying situation than before because now there is nowhere to hide. There is no way to run. There’s no escape.” -- from Jennifer Croft's 'The Extinction of Irena Rey' #BookQuote#quote#reading@bookstodon
The #1 bestselling author of Cooking for Picasso and The Godmothers returns with The Girl from the Grand Hotel, a dazzling historical novel that brings readers into the glamorous world of the first (and doomed) Cannes Film Festival and the deadly atmosphere of Europe on the brink of war.
📚 Just finished reading: The Motorcycle Diaries by Ernesto Guevara (2021 edition)
The diary of Che Guevara's journey to discover the continent of Latin America while still a medical student, in 1952 on a vintage Norton motorcycle with his friend Alberto Granado, a biochemist. It captures the exuberance and joy of one person's youthful belief in the possibilities of humankind tending towards justice, peace and happiness.
Think I just found a new favorite; a morning spent #reading Ben Lerner's The Hatred of #Poetry didn't leave me with a better understanding of what makes for great (or sometimes even bad) poetry—but as I said on the book-cataloguing sites, it sure does result in feeling less alone about/in my conflicted relationship to it all.
This is why real print and paper books matter. Their materiality tells parallel stories about the people who owned and loved them, and how they related to the ideas in the books.
My second book for AANHPI Heritage Month is The Fortunes of Jaded Women by Carolyn Huynh.
Partial synopsis from the inside book jacket: “Everyone in Orange County’s Little Saigon knew that the Dương sisters were cursed.
It started with their ancestor Oanh, who dared to leave her marriage for true love. So a fearsome Vietnamese witch cursed Oanh and her descendants so that they would never know love or happiness, and the Dương women would give birth to daughters, never sons.
A multinarrative novel brimming with levity and candor, The Fortunes of Jaded Women is about mourning, meddling, celebrating, and healing together as a family. It shows how Vietnamese women emerge victorious, even if the world is against them.”
Artist compiles 1,984 copies of Orwell’s 1984 on the small island where he wrote it, commemorating 75 years of publication.
That this story is timeless tells us something about our world.
Via @guardian @bookstodon#bookstodon#books#reading#fascism
Just went to The Bookshop on the Heath, which was a location not once but twice for separate episodes of Spooks. Bought this, seeing it's all the rage... 😏📚📖 #books#bookstodon@bookstodon
I'm a big fan of Isabel Waidner and have read all of her #novels (which makes them the only contemporary writer I've read ALL the books ;). This is my take on their latest novel: Corey Fa Does Social Mobility.
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ #literature#queer#lgbtqia#reading@bookstodon
Full disclosure: I know Alex Cochran. But that’s not why I was so knocked out by this book. ‘The Pollutant Speaks’ is a beautifully written exploration of themes I’m already obsessive about: social justice, the philosophy of language, aliens, big spaceships…