June Reading Wrap-Up

I fear I may have overcommitted, a bit, in how much I wanted to read, post, and create this month, and that's okay! I just got a lot of things that make me happy, and that means we will always overcommit to the bit. Anywho, I have recently been reading a lot of Substack articles about physical media, and most of what I read this month was therefore physical media, because by god, I actually want to keep and care for my things. The article I read referenced this video: You Will Own Nothing on technofeudalism and how subscription services and digital media are not truly "ours" and then immediately after reading that article, I saw this post on insta: Can You Love What You Rent about the same topic! So I have been in a philosophical mood about ownership, identity, and physical media recently. 

I read 8 books this month, which is pretty solid, and I have been on a huge fantasy kick recently, but there's just so much stuff! to read! always! 

• The Red Palace by June Hur
• A Darker Shade of Magic by V.E. Schwab
• Gradmaster of Demonic Cultivation (Vols 1, 2, & 3) by Mo Xiang Tong Xiu
• Soma by Fernando Llor & Carles Dalmau
• The Spellshop by Sarah Beth Durst
• Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka 

I think I am going to change up my posting layout, as I just cannot keep up with the amount of books I read and my want to review them all and post them, which means I am generally a month or two behind on posting my reviews for books so! instead, I will be posting about my faves of each month and leaving the rest of them in my monthly recaps, like right now. 

Starting with my favorite of the month: The Red Palace by June Hur 

    - ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

    - rented via Libby 

    Genuinely in love with the way June Hur writes her novels, her characters are beautiful, the plot is heartbreaking and gripping, and the setting is so lush and haunting. I so dearly want physical copies of both A Crane Among Wolves and The Red Palace, and I cannot wait for her next book, Behind Five Willows, to come out. The murder mystery with political intrigue and palace setting made the story so captivating, the plot twist was twistingggg. Hur expertly explores the complexity in her characters' desires, which in this case are justice, survival, love, and wanting to be loved, yet also ensures that these desires change and grow with them as they go through the (quite traumatic, honestly) events in this novel. Hyeon, a palace nurse, experiences the misogyny and danger in being a woman (period.) and working in a palace that has danger and blood around every corner, yet strives to find the real murderer who killed her classmates to prove her mentor's innocence. Her family is broken, yet Hyeon still yearns for her mother's love and her father's approval, and through this murder mystery, finds confidence and love in herself and in others around her. Eojin (my poor boy) just wanted to prove himself to the world and also find love and bless up! he did! slightly traumatically, but still was successful. I will be on the hunt for physical copies of this book. 

Favorite quotes of the book: 

• "I would not love, unless I was loved first and loved the most. I would be nothing at all, if I could not be first." 
• "We are women," she continued, "and nothing short of death stops us from doing precisely what we wish to do." 
• "There is only you." His words caressed me, winding themselves around my soul. "There will only ever be you. I promise, Hyeon-ah." (˚ ˃̣̣̥⌓˂̣̣̥ )づ♡ 

A Darker Shade of Magic by V.E. Schwab 

    - ⭐⭐⭐⭐.5

    - physical copy 

    Okay, with this book, I actually found a fully annotated copy at a little free library, and it was gorgeous, had little sticky tabs and highlights and underlines, just in love with the physical copy. I had found it a while back and finally decided to tackle it this month, and I am glad I did! The magic system was incredible, and it did (unfortunately) take me a little while to get truly invested in it, but that happens sometimes, especially with well-known, well-loved books. The last 100 pages of the book though?? absolutely wild, which I feel like is on par with most fantasy novels. All four (well, technically 3 that we saw) of the Londons were beautiful (in my mind), and even though they each had the same layout, the feel and mood of each one was so totally different that it was easy to tell the difference between them all. Kell and Lila, my stupid chaotic idiots, I am so glad that y'all are not dead because I was VERY SCARED for a second towards the end. Schwab did an excellent job of exploring both of the MC's identity crises throughout the book, with Lilas want to escape her life and not be known as a woman, and Kell's life of, not slavery, but definitely servitude to the crown that he both loves and despises. I did not fall in love with the story, though, and so I will be reading the second novel eventually because it was a good story, but probably not soon (I have other! things! i want to read). 

Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation by Mo Xiang Tong Xiu

    - ⭐⭐⭐⭐

    - vol. 1: physical copy rented from public library 

    - vols. 2 & 3: rented via Libby 

Honestly, this was a nice little re-read! I read the manhwa a long time ago, and recently, one of my public libraries got copies of vols 1-5! So decided to indulge and read some sad gay stories. This was definitely a chiller read than my usuals, and I have no thoughts tbh. My review for all three of these novels on Goodreads was: GAYYYYY 🫵. Aaaand that's my thought on the entire series. 

Soma by Fernando Llor & Carles Dolmau 

    - ⭐⭐⭐⭐

    - physical own

    

    I got a copy of this book from a friend who is on a graphic novels committee and needed to free up some shelf space, and the art in this novel just caught my attention so fast, plus, little space friend! my fav! I love the burnt-out comic book artist MC and the weird little alien that crash-landed in her living room. The story of the hero and the sacrifice is an oldie but a goodie, and it was cool to see the story mirrored into the actual plot compared to the stories that Maya designs in her comics. Once again, the art was so cool, I loved the color palette and the designs on each character; they were so animated yet still serious in the literal world-ending catastrophe. Maybe I am just enjoying the identity crisis stories because that was another theme we saw in this book, as Maya tries to figure out what she wants to do with her life and Soma, weird ass little guy, genuinely is just here to save the world, he doesn't have time for an identity crisis. He has his BEFORE he crash landed on Earth, and now he's determined that he will do what is not only right to him, but right for all. Soma proving to be a model for Maya was so cute, and also fucking heartbreaking at the end (╥_╥) 

The Spellshop by Sarah Beth Durst

    - ⭐⭐⭐

    - own on kindle 

    Honestly. I did not care for The Spellshop (what!), did not care for The Spellshop. This book was genuinely insufferable to read for about the first half of the book, Keila was annoying and fucking rude, which I can usually get behind when someone is traumatized, but it was not written well. There were some moments were I could see her reasoning behind being an actual bitch to everyone, but it felt shallow and uncessary and made me dislike her enourmously. Now, this does lend into a huge character growth arc later in the book, and she's cool when she's not rude asf, but I realllllly had to push through the first half to actually care about this story. This felt like someone wanted to be validated in their antisocial tendencies and magnified them when writing Keila's character, which I can vibe with a good antisocial character, but this felt stereotypical and not good. This victim complex that she had in the beginning does fade out over time, and we get to see the real her, but I feel like we could have seen her from the beginning, and then see even more character development from there. Okay, done with my complaining because I did actually like some things, such as the atmosphere and setting of this book; it was ethereal and gorgeous, the descriptions of the forest and the village were breathtaking, and you can see how Keila and everyone else loved the island. Caz was cool as fuck, and so was Meep, plus her magic?? pretty sick tbh, and the scenes with the merhorses were so cool. Larran was so sweet and generous and kind, I loved him from the very start, had me crying when he did something sweet. The forest spirits?? creepy but very cool, so all in all, the FMC killed the story for me, but everything else was cool. 

Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka 

    - ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

    - physical copy rented from school library 

    Also a re-read!! I loved this novella when I first read it in my undergrad, so I wanted to revisit my sad little bug man. I forgot how quickly you are thrown into this situation, and how quickly it devolves, but I think that reflects well on Gregory's perspective as well, because he also had no idea what was happening and only wished for it to end. Gregory's family did not deserve him!! He spent his whole life providing for them, only for them to imprison him in his room and act like he was never a person before. There are so many ways for this metaphor to span across, but in all honesty, we just need to imagine him not as a bug, but as a man who is treated disproportionately and unjustly by his family and by society. My poor bug man did not deserve his sad, crushing death (╥﹏╥;)

My goal this month is to post at least once a week and include both book content and also just some regular chatting content, but this is what I read this month!! sorely lacking in queer representaiton consideirng it was pride month, but we read queer books year round so it'll be alright