hermionesviolin: Tina Modotti photograph: Mexican sombrero with hammer and sickle, 1927 (Tina Modotti)
mid-March, O. asked, "could we read something by a Palestinian author, or about Palestine, at some point?" Conveniently, April is Arab American Heritage Month.

A.D. came through as usual. I've copied their posts in the Slack, adding in Bookshop links, publication dates, info about the authors, etc. Love to have 10 books to rank choice vote on 😂 Feel free to weigh in if you have any thoughts.
Here are some suggestions for books about Palestine/written by Palestinians:
  • Wild Thorns by Sahar Khalifeh [fiction; first published in 1976 -- author was born in Nablus in 1941; she divides her time between Amman, Jordan and Nablus, Palestine]
  • The Drone Eats with Me: A Gaza Diary by Atef Abu Saif [nonfiction, 2016; war diary of Israel’s 2014 invasion of Gaza -- author was born in Jabalia Refugee Camp in the Gaza Strip in 1973]
  • Evil Eye by Etaf Rum [fiction, 2024 -- author was born and raised in Brooklyn, New York, by Palestinian immigrants]
  • On Palestine by Noam Chomsky and Ilan PappĂ© [nonfiction, 2015 -- Chomsky was born to Ashkenazi Jewish immigrants in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; PappĂ© is an Israeli historian, political scientist, and former politician]
  • I Saw Ramallah by Mourid Barghouti [memoir, 2003 -- author was born in the West Bank in 1944]
  • Freedom is a Constant Struggle: Ferguson, Palestine, and the Foundations of a Movement by Angela Y. Davis [nonfiction, 2016 -- author is African American, not Palestinian]
  • Against the Loveless World by Susan Abulhawa [fiction, 2021 -- author is a Palestinian-American writer and political activist]
I read ten books Palestinian books last year, so here are a few that I really enjoyed/would recommend as well:
hermionesviolin: fan art of Tessa Thompson's Valkyrie in bisexual Pride colors, wearing sunglasses and flipping off the viewer, wearing a t-shirt that says "Die Mad About It" (bisexual Valkyrie die mad)
So, last May or so, someone we'll call A. started a DEI bookclub at my work.

It has recently dwindled down to a Core Four of us showing up for discussion meetings (though there's about a dozen people in the Slack channel).  But about a week after the inauguration, A. posted a notice in the social channel on work Slack about our February (Black History Month) book and invited folks to come to the meeting, join the low-pressure Slack channel, whatever, if interested (since it felt like people might have more appetite for this sort of thing in This Current Climate). 

2 people joined the Slack channel, including someone we'll call O.

Two days later, Jan 31, I posted in the bookclub channel:
It's very me that now that we've picked what we're doing for February I'm thinking ahead to what we're gonna do for March. Back in December [when I had posted about month themes through June] I had said:
March: Women's History Month -- we could overlap this with letting [R.] nominate a slate of graphic novels, or with picking an Indigenous memoir (something [A]. would like at some point)
Do people have preferences?
Another option (given recent aggressive attacks on trans people) is to do a book by a trans woman (could be fiction or non-fiction) in March.
Based on the ensuing responses, on Feb 5, A. posted a poll:
What type of text/author do we want to focus on in March?
  1. Memoior written by an indigenous woman
  2. Text written by a trans woman
  3. Include both options in the reading selection/ poll
Feb 11 (today), A. posted in the bookclub channel:
Okay, based on the poll, I'll include options representing both types of texts/ authors! Does anyone have any recommendations for books by a trans woman?
O replied:
I have two: either She's Not There by Jennifer Finney Boyle or Whipping Girl by Julia Serano
I have read the first one and found it very poignant
My partner then got a flurry of messages from me as I spent time on Goodreads:
I have now learned that JFB also wrote a book called Good Boy: My Life in Seven Dogs and honestly I would be more interested to read that [than her famous transition memoir] and I don't even like dogs.  (Ob Jupiter Ascending caveat applies, obvs.)

Good Boy is a universal account of a remarkable story: showing how a young boy became a middle-aged woman—accompanied at seven crucial moments of growth and transformation by seven memorable dogs. “Everything I know about love,” she writes, “I learned from dogs.” Their love enables us to pull off what seem like impossible feats: to find our way home when we are lost, to live our lives with humor and courage, and above all, to best become our true selves.
I had not realized she was such a prolific author.

From her GR bio:
> Her 2008 memoir, I'm Looking Through You, is about growing up in a haunted house. While trans issues form part of the exposition of the book, the primary focus of I'm Looking Through You is on what it means to be "haunted," and how we all seek to find peace with our various ghosts, both the supernatural and the all-too-human.

Again, ALSO MORE INTERESTING!
I also have opinions about how JFB's famous memoir is from 2003 -- so it's over 20 years old at this point. (The haunting book is 2008, as noted above, and the dog one is 2020.) There is value in classics, to be sure, but given how much Discourse has changed over the years, I would overall prefer to read more recent works. I am also just not interested in a standard Transition Memoir. (Not to be confused with what Casey Plett calls Gender Novels.) I recognize I am not a typical cis audience in this way. I'm on gender Tumblr way less than my genderqueer best friend is, and I get all my Gender Reveal podcast filtered through my trans partner, and yet -- I feel like I should make some sort of riff on the xkcd "average familiarity" comic here or something, but I am running out of steam for thinking/writing.
hermionesviolin: Gwen Stacy from Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, her arms folded, her blonde hair shaved on one side (Spider-Gwen)
I almost didn't vote in the TFR [The Transfeminine Review] Choice Awards this year, since I felt like I hadn't read enough (and hadn't loved some of what I had read).  But Bethany was encouraging folks to vote on short stories, since it was pretty tied-up and she hadn't read enough to feel like she could break the tie herself.  So I read a few short stories, felt a couple of them were really good, and voted. (You could vote for up to 3 works in most categories.)

I'd forgotten [until I went to vote] just how many categories there were -- see this post for the list of all 34 award categories, but they included Best Character of 2024 & Best Transfeminine Representation by a Non-Transfeminine Author 2024, for example.

On-brand, the category I was most interested in the longlist for was Outstanding Children’s/Young Adult 2024.  I honestly wasn't sure I'd seen ANY trans picturebooks come out in 2024 -- other than Marley's Pride (about a they/them autistic Black kid and their they/them elder, by a they/them author).  And alas, the closest to a picturebook on the full nominations spreadsheet [relevant tab] was A Kids Book About Being Transgender by Gia Parr. I'm hoping some good trans picturebooks come out in 2025.

Bethany's post about the 2024 winners is here.

Looking through the nomination masterlists especially, I was struck by the fact that I had "book-length work" in my head unless the category explicitly specified otherwise -- like, it didn't occur to me that short stories or essays would be options (not that I necessarily would have nominated "The V*mpire" for Horror or whatever, but it literally didn't occur to me).

I'm definitely gonna be intentionally reading more trans-fem stuff in 2025 in prep for the next Reader's Choice Awards, as well as reading more stuff from the 2024 list.

+

2024-published transfem-authored stuff I had read:

Adult fiction:
  • The Sunforge by Sascha Stronach -- sff, a sequel which I didn't like as much as I did the first book, though I'm still interested to read the third book in the trilogy when it comes out

Nonfiction:
  • A Short History of Trans Misogyny by Jules Gill-Peterson
  • It Gets Better... Except When It Gets Worse: And Other Unsolicited Truths I Wish Someone Had Told Me by Nicole Maines -- I nommed this for Memoir, despite it being the only trans-fem memoir I'd read this year (though not the only trans memoir); Bethany had some criticisms of it (e.g., you can read the thread that's quote-posted here), some of which I very appreciate and some of which are more a matter of taste and with which I disagree

YA:
  • Lucy, Uncensored by Mel & Teghan Hammond (authors are sisters; Mel is cis and Teghan is trans) -- I voted for this
  • Girlmode written by Magdalene Visaggio (trans) & illustrated by Paulina Ganucheau (cis?) -- I didn't like this as much as Bethany did, but it won graphic novel
  • Just Happy to Be Here by Naomi Kanakia -- there are things I struggled with about the book, many of which are intentional (it's tonally very different from Lucy, Uncensored), and I don't necessarily begrudge it winning Children's/YA

eligible short stories I read before the voting deadline:
hermionesviolin: Margo Hayes climbing La Rambla, with text "Climb like a girl" (climb like a girl)
A whole bunch of books by trans-fems came in for me at the library around the same time, so in addition to my perpetual book club books, also on my to-read-soon list are:
  • The Sunforge by Sascha Stronach -- sequel to The Dawnhounds (which I recently read for feminist sff bookclub, yay)

  • It Gets Better... Except When It Gets Worse: And Other Unsolicited Truths I Wish Someone Had Told Me by Nicole Maines -- which I'm interested to read in conversation with Elliot Page's Pageboy, which had a lot more trauma in it than I was expecting, and of which Abby said, "It's what The Trans Memoirℱ is supposed to be, which is a story of trauma and triumph and omg it's so hard to be trans because the transphobia." (Abby admittedly DNFed the book, but...)

    I had put a library hold on the Nicole Maines book approximately for the title alone (before Abby and I even started reading Pageboy, just when I saw it on a BookRiot Our Queerest Shelves "The 10 Biggest and Buzziest New Queer Books Out in Fall 2024" on Sept 10, 2024), in large part because I feel like queer (esp trans) memoirs are dictated to have to be So Inspiring.

  • Lucy, Uncensored by Mel Hammond and Teghan Hammond

    04/04/2024 I had posted in a Discord:
    BookRiot Our Queerest Shelves a little late to TDoV with this link, but one of the upcoming YA books is a trans girl applying to a historically women's college.
    Hi, it me, a graduate of a historically women's college, dating a trans woman.

***

Also, speaking of literature by trans-fem folks, if you haven't heard of The Transfeminine Review [website, Bluesky, Tumblr, etc.], you should check it out.

Bethany's taste only somewhat overlaps with mine, but her booklists are incredibly comprehensive (I can't believe she's only 22!), and I appreciate her literary criticism.  She's also doing "A Brief History of Trans Literature" -- which has turned into a huge historical deep dive (see the Every Post Ever list), which I haven't started trying to read yet, but which definitely makes me think of Jules Gill-Peterson's A Short History of Trans Misogyny.

I read her Start Here post and commented, "I feel like it tracks that I recognize almost all (11/12) of Tier One, much (9/22) of Tier Two, and almost nothing (1/22) from Tier Three. (It me, a cis book nerd with a transfemme partner.)"

She also has my kind of thoroughness. A recent post is 15 Black Transfeminine Novelists You Should Read (10/9/24) â€“ "Looking at the position of black transfeminine novelists within the industry and their major works."  Like, she literally found all the Black transfeminine novelists she could and read them (often only one work by each one, but still).

She recently skeeted, "one of my plans for this winter is to go on a high fantasy/hard sci-fi kick, it’s really a blind spot for me atm (fantasy especially)."

***

And while I'm highlighting trans-fem art: Black Trans Women at the Center: a New Play Festival: November 18 – 21, 2024

"The festival will premiere on Nov. 18 and be available to stream for free for three days." [source]

***

(Subject line is from a Discord conversation today about the forthcoming trans women tennis indoor volleyball book -- which the Boston NWSL's abandoned marketing campaign makes me think of.)
hermionesviolin: image of Matilda sitting contentedly on a stack of books, a book open on her lap and another stack of books next to her (Matilda)
Last Thursday, the local library Fall Newsletter came out, including the schedule/titles for the year for the LGBTQ+ Book Group.

I think I'll probably go to most of them this year (as opposed to this past year, when I skipped most of them).

October 17
Pageboy: a memoir by Elliot Page (2023)
white trans man actor

November 14
You Exist Too Much by Zaina Arafat (2020)
novel about a Palestinian-American girl. not on the list of Palestine books I'd suggested to the facilitator (since I wasn't all that interested in this one), but it has probably gotten more buzz than any of the ones I'd suggested -- and I don't think I checked to make sure all the books I suggested are available in our library network.

December 12
Angels in America: a Gay Fantasia by Tony Kushner (1991)
I assume this is our classic. I don't think we've ever read a play before. I went to see this play (both parts) last year, so I will maybe only skim-read this?

January 9
Camp Damascus by Chick Chuck Tingle (2023)
lol at the typo in the newsletter
a ~ horror novel about gay conversion camp. (I guess this is the closest we're getting to sci-fi/fantasy this season? It's also our lighter book for January.)

February 13
Homebodies by Tembe Denton-Hurst (2023)
the blurb says, "debut novel about a young Black writer whose world is turned upside down when she loses her coveted job in media and pens a searing manifesto about racism in the industry."
It's gotten a lot of low reviews on GR, so we'll see.

March 13
The House of Impossible Beauties by Joseph Cassara (2018)
I don't think I'd heard of this one before.
1980s NYC, House of Xtravaganza, Paris Is Burning fanfic? (one of the main characters is a trans woman but the author is a cis man -- who I assume is gay?)

April 17
A Minor Chorus by Billy-Ray Belcourt (2022)
I don't think I've read fiction by queer Cree poet Billy-Ray Belcourt before, so I'm bummed I'll miss this one (this book club meeting is on Maundy Thursday!). I'll probably read the book anyway.

May 8
Fun Home: a Family Tragicomic by Alison Bechdel (2006)
memoir of a queer white woman. our annual graphic novel. I think I read this around the time it came out? I don't remember being blown away by it (yeah, I know), so I'll maybe only skim-read it?

June 12
Everything I Learned, I Learned in a Chinese Restaurant: a memoir by Curtis Chin (2023)
I've been interested in this book for a while.
"This memoir tells the story of Curtis Chin’s time growing up as a gay Chinese American kid in 1980’s Detroit."
hermionesviolin: animated icon of a book open on a desk, with text magically appearing on it, with text "tell me a story" framing it (tell me a story [lizzieb])
Lammy finalists are out. I forwarded the email to Abby and said:
We have read zero of the Trans Fiction Lammy finalists -- but 3/5 of the Trans Nonfiction are on our TBRs to some degree.

We have 1 Lesbian Memoir/Biography on our TBR (Hijab Butch Blues).

You've read 1 LGBTQ+ Anthology (congrats to Tuck for 2 Trans 2 Furious!)

We've read 3/5 of the LGBTQ+ Children’s Books (though I've flipped through a 4th one).

Aww, Fat Ham made LGBTQ+ Drama!

I've read 1 LGBTQ+ Middle Grade (and 1 other one is on my TBR, and I've at least heard of most of them).

Edit: I'm now looking through the Transgender Fiction list, and I appreciate how non-US centric it is:
  • Bellies // Nicola Dinan (Hanover Square Press)
    • GR says the author "grew up in Hong Kong and Kuala Lumpur and now lives in London" and the book blurb says we follow the protagonists "From London to Kuala Lumpur, New York to Cologne"

  • Girlfriends // Emily Zhou (LittlePuss Press)

  • The Rage Letters // ValĂ©rie Bah; translator Kama La Mackerel (Metonymy Press)
    • translated from the French; GR says "set in Montreal and beyond" & "the intertwined lives of a group of Black queer and trans friends"

  • Trash // Sylvia Aguilar ZĂ©leny (Deep Vellum)
    • Mexican author, set in Mexico

  • Wild Geese // Soula Emmanuel (Feminist Press)
    • author is an Irish trans woman, protag is an Irish trans woman living in Scandinavia
hermionesviolin: Boston skyline at sunset with the word "Boston" at the top (Boston)
Someone I know from work started a climate change book group at the town library. I have been eyeroll/judgy about a bunch of the disorganization, but the discussions have generally been good.

For March, we read The Great Derangement: Climate Change and the Unthinkable by Amitav Ghosh (2016) -- a nonfiction book by a fiction writer. It was originally a series of lectures and covers a lot. It's relatively short (164 pages minus the endnotes), but once I started reading it I wished I had given myself more time because there's so much content and so much to think about.

I'm excited about the next 2 books:

April, fiction: How Beautiful We Were by Imbolo Mbue (2021). Set in a fictional African location, but at least partially inspired by real events. The GR blurb says, in part:
Told through the perspective of a generation of children and the family of a girl named Thula who grows up to become a revolutionary, How Beautiful We Were is a masterful exploration of what happens when the reckless drive for profit, coupled with the ghost of colonialism, comes up against one community’s determination to hold onto its ancestral land and a young woman’s willingness to sacrifice everything for the sake of her people’s freedom.

May, nonfiction: Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants by Robin Wall Kimmerer (2013) -- which has been recommended forever, so this will finally get me to read it. (Even though I may already have concert plans with Abby that night, oops.)
hermionesviolin: animated icon of a book open on a desk, with text magically appearing on it, with text "tell me a story" framing it (tell me a story [lizzieb])
So, the January 4, 2024, Our Queerest Shelves BookRiot email link list included 3 LGBTQ Reads links:
I opened all 3 tabs and got overwhelmed. But then the next day I started to go through them (in reverse order).

*

So much fantasy in these MG books.

Represented in these books (an incomplete list):

  • Tagalog folklore
  • trichotillomania
  • roller derby
  • autism
  • a magical connection to the sea
*

[Expletive deleted], the YA list is so long. Lots of murder. Lots of fantasy, though I think less than the MG list.

This list includes (but is not limited to):

  • "the first trans girl at an all-girls school" (who the cover indicates is a WoC)
  • a literal cupid
  • "She doesn’t expect her older sister, Elara, forming an unprecedented bond with an enemy dragon—or the gods claiming the only way to break that bond is to kill her sister." ("Jamaican-inspired")
  • a trans guy in 1812
  • a Jane/Bertha reimagining of Jane Eyre
  • a male dryad (a reimagining of The Secret Garden)
  • the absinthe fairy is a real live "Green Faerie, trapped in this world."
  • an autistic Latino
  • "a queer, feminist reimagining of the Fox Maiden legend from Korean mythology" (graphic novel)
  • a "fat, nerdy lesbian"
  • "a bone familiar"
  • "a fat, broke girl with anxiety" -- who catches feelings for a girl while playing a tabletop roleplaying game
  • "a YA fantasy graphic novel that’s the political drama of Nimona meets the heartfelt romance of The Princess and the Dressmaker, but this time in a sapphic romance surrounded by a mist of magic."
  • a girls only underground fight club (which reminded me I still haven't watched Bottoms)
  • a "Korean-inspired Alice in Wonderland retelling"
  • a trans guy who "accidentally becomes an animal shelter volunteer under an assumed name―and it’s there among the unconditional acceptance of dogs that he finally receives the affirmation he’s been longing for."
  • a queerceañera
  • a motorcycle girl and a car girl bond over the Fast & Furious films (paging [personal profile] escritoireazul) [the girls are humans, not literal vehicles/transformers, just to be clear]
There are also 2 books with drag plotlines -- one with a male character and one with a female one.

hermionesviolin: (hard at work)
books
    adult

  • the first 2 books in the Pies Before Guys mystery series by Misha Popp: Magic, Lies, and Deadly Pies and A Good Day to Pie

  • [December local library LGBTQ+ book club] Fine: A Comic About Gender by Rhea Ewing

  • Into the Riverlands by Nghi Vo -- the third novella in The Singing Hills Cycle -- after Abby read it [Abby: "I think it’s my favorite of the 3 I’ve read, which is saying something considering one story is about a sapphic tiger and her nerdy girlfriend."]

  • [January work book club] Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt (even though it is not How Far the Light Reaches: A Life in Ten Sea Creatures by Sabrina Imbler -- which I have not yet read, but which Abby is currently reading)

    easy reader

  • skim-read the first 5 Colt Lane "Monster and Me" early readers -- I don't super love them.  Expandlargely because they're set on a ~mystical mountain in Nepal but written by a white dude )

    Per Mombian, we do meet a new friend in Book 4 (Too Cool for School) who's casually trans (she discloses on page 49) and returns in Book 5 (The Impossible Imp -- where she mentions her transness on page 57).  I appreciate that moment in the 5th book for the part where she discloses to someone and says, "[So-and-so] didn't say anything to you?" and the other person says, "I'm sure [they] thought it was your story to tell."

  • I read the next 2 Jo Jo Makoons books (Fancy Pants and Snow Days) and still don't love them.  [Jo Jo is 7 years old, and Ojibwe, and somewhat Amelia Bedelia-ish.]

  • skim-read the Yasmin books (written by Saadia Faruqi & illustrated by Hatem Aly), which I continue to generally enjoy (I'd read Yasmin the Fashionista back in July, checking out books to maybe get for 5yo ~nibling J) -- Yasmin is a second-grader; her family is Muslim, Pakistani-American, and speaks Urdu and English.

  • the 3 Too Small Tola books (written by Atinuke & illustrated by Onyinye Iwu) -- young Tola lives in an apartment building in Lagos, Nigeria.

    picture books

  • read ~8 picturebooks myself -- and skim-read ~17 more (shout-out to Betsy Bird's 31 Days, 31 Lists for populating the bulk of that -- here's the 31st list, which has links to all the preceding 30 lists at the bottom)
    and read Abby ~10 picturebooks (7 of which were ones I'd read myself previously)

    highlights:

art
  • [Peabody Essex Museum] As We Rise: Photography from the Black Atlantic with Abby -- "On view June 17 through December 31, 2023" and we managed to get in the last weekend before her son's top surgery (at which point she'd be pretty housebound)
    & Bats! (On view September 9, 2023 to July 28, 2024, but I wanted to see it), which was more science/conservation education, but did also include some art


trailers
  • Furiosa (the Fury Road prequel) with Abby

YouTube video essays
  • Fri Dec 8th I finally watched the Dec 3rd (?) Plagiarism and You(Tube) by hbomberguy -- intending to just watch the first half about plagiarism generally, but ended up watching all of it (so including the James Somerton takedown)

    lol @ 39:21 "Creative people often have trouble recognizing their skills *as* skills because eventually they feel like second nature. And they don't feel real and practical like building a house or domming."

  • from the sidebar: A Man Plagiarised My Work: Women, Money, and the Nation by Philosophy Tube (Abigail Thorn) -- which is much more about the development of society such that a man took credit for work that Abigail did rather than about plagiarism per se
    "What is a woman? A scam invented by the Chrysler company to get free labour!"


    "What is a woman? A scam invented by white people to get free labour! Or to put it in technical philosophy language, sex/gender can be understood as an economic and sociopolitical construct that determines people's access to resources. It intersects with race, which does the same thing."

    "What is the family? A scam invented by rich people to get free labour!"

    about 35min in is where it got really interesting to me, about the appeal of fascism to (white) British women in the mid-20th century

    I later saw this Tumblr post, which talked about conservatives thinking of the Other as truly Different -- which feels related.

  • from H's recs in his video: TikTok Gave Me Autism: The Politics of Self Diagnosis by Alexander Avila -- which is far-ranging and I should maybe watch again when I'm less tired?

    In addition to the expected stuff about how the DSM criteria for stuff like autism is really subjective, Avila talks about how (in the West) "madness" and "reason" being opposites developed in the 17th century (in earlier centuries, "madness" was considered a kind of esoteric, spiritual knowledge ... not necessarily desirable, but still a form of knowledge) -- and gets all the way into, "What even is the self?"  

  • ToddInTheShadows' I Fact-Checked The Worst Video Essayist On YouTube (a fact-checking rebuttal of all of James Somerton's false claims)

  • About a week later I learned that Somerton had done a video on the Barbie movie, so I tracked down the archive of his videos to hatewatch it (it's #74 there).  I messaged a little bit of live commentary to Abby while I watched and at one point:

    me:
    Why so many digressions, James?
    Plagiarize yourself an editor!
    Reference: Abigail Thorn, re: a different clip: "I realise this is besides the point but this clip is also so overwritten? He should try plagiarising an editor"

    Abby:
    I watched like 20 seconds of the clip she’s responding to and god, babe, why do you hate yourself?

  • (I also watched JS' Dec 21 apology video.)

***

Currently reading: 

  • [feminist sff book club] The Bruising of Qilwa by Naseem Jamnia (shout-out to [personal profile] thedeadparrot for the recommendation) for this coming Sunday.

    Also, GR claims I'm still Currently Reading: When We Were Sisters by Fatimah Asghar (because Abby) & Sorry, Bro by Taleen Voskuni (sapphic Armenian-American romance), and I sort of am; they've just been kind of back-burner-ed.

    Reading next: 

    Local library now has a climate change book club, and the Jan 10 book is The Future We Choose: Surviving the Climate Crisis by Christiana Figueres & Tom Rivett-Carnac, so I will maybe read that.
  • hermionesviolin: photoshoot image of Michelle Trachtenberg (who plays Dawn in the tv show Buffy) looking seriously (angrily?) at the viewer, with bookshelves in the background (angry - books)
    Abby posted in a Discord we're in about The Witch King by H. E. Edgmon and said, while summarizing the premise/first chapter, "Like, it's unclear so far exactly how witch works in this world? It's maybe an ethic identity?"

    I DMed her to say she meant "ethnic identity."

    Which led to this:
    Abby:

    Thanks. I mean, it’s also maybe an ethic identity, but that’s definitely not what I was trying to say.

    me:

    Abby: "I'm probably an atheist, and Elizabeth isn't. But our more important ethic identities are witch and fae, respectively."

    Abby:

    Elizabeth, a fae: “There are RULES and they are very important and must be followed precisely. Except when they’re stupid and don’t matter. Also, the rules are secret.”

    Abalyn, a witch: “Be kind, do good, and burn shit.”
    ***

    For anyone who's interested in the book, here's all of what Abby said (with typos corrected):
    I just started audio reading The Witch King, by H. E. Edgmon (not to be confused with Witch King by Martha Wells), over the weekend, and for an allegedly YA novel, the first chapter is kinda smoking (and drops an f-bomb in the explicitly sexual meaning).

    Plot synopsis: the Prince of the Fae was/is engaged to a witch, but the witch did something awful (has not been revealed what, yet) and ran away. Then also transed. Prince of the Fae has come looking for him and demanding the engagement be honored, because Fae Politicsℱ.

    Protagonist is the (former?) witch. (Like, it's unclear so far exactly how witch works in this world? It's maybe an ethnic identity? Maybe a racial identity? It doesn't seem to be exclusively female but...maybe it is? Like, protagonist has/had a bio dad, who is/was maybe a witch? Unclear.)

    But trans dude protagonist is hella gay and there's a lot of smouldering sexual tension between him and the fae prince.

    (This is all Chapter 1, so not really a spoiler in any meaningful way.)
    hermionesviolin: animated icon of a book open on a desk, with text magically appearing on it, with text "tell me a story" framing it (tell me a story [lizzieb])
    The schedule is out for this year's round of my local library LGBTQ+ book club, and I'm mostly not super-hype about it?  :/  (This is maybe in part because it's more dude-heavy than I feel like I'm used to -- okay, 4/9 as opposed to last year's 3/9, so not necessarily a significant difference.)

    Oct 12: Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil: a Savannah Story by John Berendt (1994) true crime

    I read this in college (because a gay male friend loved it), and I have basically no memory of it.  I think I enjoyed it at the time, but I'm not sure I really wanna reread it?  One GR review says, in part:
    there is the slow but increasingly annoying realization that Berendt sees our anti-hero as a kind of social peer, which for some reason really bothered me. who knows, maybe i just automatically hate the rich & parasitic. Berendt writes about a whole gallery of characters, all characterized briefly but adroitly, and eventually i realized i was reading a classier version of a tourist-eye's view of Southern grotesques, a drive-by tour of weirdos. how aggravating! who knows, maybe i just automatically empathize with the weirdos and am annoyed by the normals. and then there is the sad fact of THE LACK OF BLACK PEOPLE WHO COME ACROSS AS REAL PEOPLE. yes, they are there (several) but for the most part they are part of the gallery of grotesquerie. this novel takes place in a part of the country that has a huge black community and i found the lack of this demographic - even ones who, i suppose, Berendt would consider non-grotesque - to be perplexing and troubling.
    But I was chatting with Maddi today and she's gotten really into the book and talked about how Chablis is referred to as a drag queen but really seems trans. And it would probably be interesting to revisit in 2023 a book I read probably around 2001 that was written in 1994 about events in 1981. I think partly I just don't trust the facilitator? :/

    Nov 9: Black Sun by Rebecca Roanhorse (2020) YA SFF, first in a trilogy

    I had initially been excited about Roanhorse's first series (back when the first book was coming out), but then I read various stuff on Debbie Reese's American Indians in Children's Literature blog (frustratingly, many of the links she posts don't work anymore, and I can't find them on the Wayback Machine) criticizing Roanhorse (who is not DinĂ©/Navajo, though her husband is) for having used in her books stuff from DinĂ©/Navajo culture that is not supposed to be shared with outsiders and secondarily for "mischaracteriz[ing] and misrepresent[ing] DinĂ© spiritual beliefs").  There's also counter-criticism that folks are just criticizing Roanhorse because she's part-Black -- and of course no community speaks with a single voice (the Vulture profile is a pretty good summary, and includes input from DinĂ© folk supporting Roanhorse's work -- including one who worked as a sensitivity reader on Race to the Sun, her stand-alone middle-grade book which received criticism similar to that of her first series). But I've definitely opted to err on the side of not consuming her books.

    Wiki says of this newest series, "Roanhorse researched Southeast Asian, Native American, and Mesoamerican civilizations while writing Black Sun." But I haven't seen much about Native reception of this book. (Or the reception of anyone whose cultures are drawn on in this book, tbf.)

    Dec 14: Fine: A Comic About Gender by Rhea Ewing (2022) our graphic novel selection, and our trans selection

    I thought it was gonna be Yet Another Memoir, but, "The graphic novel is comprised of 56 interviews Rhea Ewing conducted with a wide variety of people asking them what does gender mean to them." So that's potentially interesting?

    Jan 11: The Guncle by Stephen Rowley (2021)

    I know this book got a lot of buzz when it came out, but it just doesn't interest me.

    I know the facilitator wants to pick lighter books for January (because it's a dark time of year...).

    Feb 8: The Sweetness of Water by Nathan Harris (2021) our Black History Month choice, I suspect

    Reading about this on GR, it sounds a lot like The Prophets by Robert Jones Jr. (2021) -- which was a book club meeting I skipped because I was not interested in reading hundreds of pages about enslaved Black men who fall in love and then get in trouble for same-sex sexual intimacy. And in this book, the secret m/m lovers are two former Confederate soldiers, and I definitely have a bit of cringe about that -- though yes, it's not the same as like Nazi romances.

    I am kind of here for "In the aftermath of so much turmoil, it is Isabelle who emerges as an unlikely leader, proffering a healing vision for the land and for the newly free citizens of Old Ox." (from the blurb)

    Mar 14: Confidence: a novel by Rafael Frumkin (2023)

    I ... This is a book I hadn't previously heard of, and I don't even know what to think about this book whose blurb begins, "Two lifelong friends, occasional lovers, and constant conmen find themselves on top of the world after founding a company that promises instant enlightenment to its users in this thrilling, brainy caper about scams, schemes, and the absurdity of the American Dream." I don't think I particularly wanna read it, but that sure is a book.

    Apr 11: The Selected Works of Audre Lorde by Audre Lorde (2020)

    Sure, I'm up for an "essential reader" of Lorde's work.  (The blurb says, "This essential reader showcases her indelible contributions to intersectional feminism, queer theory, and critical race studies in twelve landmark essays and more than sixty poems" -- so I guess it sort of counts for April as National Poetry Month?)

    May 10: The Chosen and the Beautiful by Nghi Vo (2021)

    Okay, this queer Asian-American riff on The Great Gatsby has been on my TBR for a while.  I don't really care about The Great Gatsby, but I've heard good things about this book; and I've liked Vo's Singing Hills novellas (I've only read the first 2 -- no spoilers).

    June 13: Untamed by Glennon Doyle (2020) memoir

    Blah, Glennon Doyle.  I'm not sure I'm up for a whole-ass book of her talking.
    hermionesviolin: animated icon of a book open on a desk, with text magically appearing on it, with text "tell me a story" framing it (tell me a story [lizzieb])
    Medford Public Library LGBTQ+ Book Group's list of books for this season came out today. (In-person/Zoom hybrid from 7-8:30pm, 2nd Thursday of the month unless otherwise noted. hmu if you want in on any of them.)

    It feels more wide-ranging than previous years? Like 3/9 authors are male (and 1 is non-binary). Also a surprising amount of historical fiction. And 2 memoirs and 1 "partly autobiographical" novel.

    When I posted about this book club last year, I included publication dates, so I'm including that again.
    October 13, 2022
    Orlando by Virginia Woolf (classic/fiction) [first published October 11, 1928]
  • Orlando the character begins as a British nobleman during the reign of Elizabeth I (late 1500s), lives for centuries without aging, turns into a woman at one point, has romantic/sexual relationships with men and women... definitely has some uncomfy racial stuff in moments (also talks about "gipsies," which term is considered pejorative by many Romani people)
  • Virginia Woolf (a British woman) wrote this book for Vita Sackville-West, and one review says, "A high-spirited romp inspired by the tumultuous family history of Woolf's lover and close friend, the aristocratic poet and novelist Vita Sackville-West"

    November 3, 2022 (1st Thursday of the month)
    The Thirty Names of Night by Zeyn Joukhadar (fiction) [November 24, 2020]
  • protagonist is a Syrian American trans boy in NYC -- I think author is similar? (definitely trans-masc, and seems to be Arab at least -- and Wiki at least used to call him "Syrian American")

    December 8, 2022
    Butter Honey Pig Bread by Francesca Ekwuyasi (fiction) [November 3, 2020]
  • about 3 Nigerian women, by a Nigerian-Canadian woman

    January 19, 2023 (3rd Thursday of the month)
    ÂĄHola Papi! : how to come out in a Walmart parking lot and other life lessons by John Paul Brammer (biography/essays) [June 8, 2021]
  • biracial Chicano (Mexican American) man

    February 9, 2023
    Real Life by Brandon Taylor (fiction) [February 18, 2020]
  • Wikipedia says, "the partly autobiographical book tells of the experiences of a gay, Black doctoral student in a predominantly White, Midwestern PhD program." [protagonist and "scientist turned novelist" author are both from Alabama.]

    March 9, 2023
    Matrix by Lauren Groff (fiction) [September 7, 2021]
  • historical fiction by an American woman about Marie de France (a woman in late 12th-century England)

    April 20, 2023 (3rd Thursday of the month)
    How We Fight for Our Lives by Saeed Jones (memoir) [October 8, 2019]
  • black, gay man from the American South

    May 11, 2023
    Frog Music by Emma Donoghue (fiction) [April 1, 2014]
  • historical fiction about women in Summer of 1876 San Francisco by an Irish woman

    June 8, 2023
    Gender Queer by Maia Kobabe (memoir/graphic novel) [May 28, 2019]
  • e/em/eir-pronouns non-binary and asexual American
  • hermionesviolin: animated icon of a book open on a desk, with text magically appearing on it, with text "tell me a story" framing it (tell me a story [lizzieb])
    So, my local library's LGBTQ+ Book Group is meeting January-June next year, and I think my sending the convener Casey the Canadian Lesbrarian's 2017 blog posts Six Canadian Trans Women Writers You Should Know and Six More Canadian Trans Women Writers You Should Know blogposts really impacted her -- of the 6 books, 3 are by trans and/or Canadian woman authors 😂

    I annotated the email with GR links to the books, publication dates (I feel like this season has a lot more very-recent books than previous seasons, but maybe not?), and some comments of my own.
    January 13, 2022 -- For a classic feature this season we’re going to read, The Price of Salt AKA, Carol, by Patricia Highsmith and a recent biography (published January 2021) on Highsmith by Richard Bradford.

    The Price of Salt (fiction) by Patricia Highsmith [1952]
    Devils, Lusts and Strange Desires: The Life of Patricia Highsmith (nonfiction) by Richard Bradford [January 19, 2021]
  • I got this first book out from the library after I saw the 2015 film Carol but then didn't get around to reading it...
  • Highsmith sounds like a fascinating person, but I'm still mostly on a break from books by white dudes; dilemma...

    February 10, 2022 -- The Prophets (fiction) by Robert Jones Jr. [January 5, 2021]
  • GR blurb: "A novel about the forbidden union between two enslaved young men on a Deep South plantation, the refuge they find in each other, and a betrayal that threatens their existence." -- written by an American Black man (I had heard of this book before, but was today years old when I realized it was written by Son of Baldwin)

    March 10, 2022 -- The Subtweet (fiction) by Vivek Shraya [April 7, 2020]
  • 2 South Asian Canadian female protagonists (one is trans), author is same -- is about an intimate friendship

    April 7, 2022 -- Shadow Life (graphic novel) - Hiromi Goto, Author and An Xu, Illustrator [March 30, 2021]
  • Casey the Canadian Lesbrarian says (of the protagonist), "Kumiko is a bisexual Japanese Canadian woman in her 70s who is stubborn, quirky, funny, and independent." And the author seems to also be an Asian Canadian woman.

    May 7, 2022 -- Ordinary Girls (memoir) by Jaquira DĂ­az [October 29, 2019]
  • author is a Puerto Rican woman

    June 9, 2022 -- Detransition, Baby (fiction) by Torrey Peters [January 12, 2021]
  • author is an American trans woman
  • hermionesviolin: an image of Alyson Hannigan (who plays Willow Rosenberg) with animated text "you think you know / what you are / what's to come / you haven't even / BEGUN" (Default)
    August

    books

    • 5 picturebooks
    • Pole Dancing To Gospel Hymns by Andrea Gibson [(spoken word) poetry]
    • [Newton SFF book club] Babel-17/Empire Star by Samuel R. Delany
    live theatre
    • [Youthquake] The Tempest -- outdoors, only a little over an hour long but I didn't feel like anything was missing
    movies
    • [fannish movie night] F9 -- "F9 (Fast and Furious 9)! Cars... in space?" <-- That's how D. billed it to the movie night crew, and it's kind of a misnomer, since it takes like 3/4 of the movie until we get to space and it's not even the most interesting thing that happens?  But it does maybe stand in for just how Extra the movie is.  Secret Family Members! Faked Their Own Death! Magnets!  I'm not kidding -- this movie leans in hard with the magnets, and the ridiculousness is really delightful.
      There's some lampshading, but there's also technobabble and plot-physics.The movie starts out slow, but there's an extended section that is super-delightful.  And Charlize Theron is gr9 (her haircut is unfortunate, but she still manages to look amazing).  Also, Helen Mirren is back -- and learning that she's in this franchise is maybe what got my partner to wanna watch it? đŸ˜‚





    September

    books

    • [work book club] Sharks in the Time of Saviors by Kawai Strong Washburn

      The author recommends this review.  Excerpt:
      In this way, Sharks blooms into a tale about colonialism’s rippling effects and the pains of diaspora. When Washburn’s characters return to the beaches and valleys they left behind, they encounter reminders of a time when Native Hawaiians lived cooperatively and self-sufficiently on their land—before white settlers stole everything, before the plantations closed, before there were any plantations at all. In a vision, Nainoa sees “Waipi’o Valley, its rivers, then lo’i paddies of kalo stalks growing plump and green, swarming the valley bottom, and there my family is among it all, with many families
” Washburn contrasts this history of collectivism with the Western mandate of individualism that infects Americans today, many islanders included. As the kids’ mother, Malia, describes, that mandate was a catastrophic development. “[Ships] from far ports carried a new god in their bellies,” she reflects, “a god who blew a breath of weeping blisters and fevers that torched whole generations, a god whose fingers were shaped like rifles and voice sounded like treaties waiting to be broken.”

      Nimbly rotating between Nainoa’s, Kaui’s, Dean’s, and Malia’s stories, Washburn intertwines their perspectives like the strands of an intricate lei. In this way, he wraps us up in their personal struggles to figure out if they have what it takes to set themselves apart—from their family, from their underprivileged home, from their widely misunderstood ancestry. But right when you find yourself rooting for them the hardest, Washburn unravels what they’ve built, reminding us that setting oneself apart is inherently a selfish pursuit. At the end of Sharks, Washburn leaves readers to wonder if the Western values we bring to the reading experience—for example, an investment in personal growth and achievement, which the bildungsroman has taught us to expect—lead us to misunderstand who the protagonist has been the whole time. Through a subtle bait and switch and a fantastical portrayal of Native Hawaiian culture’s communal spirit, Washburn gracefully pushes us to rethink our understanding of what makes a character meaningful to a story. In doing so, he rethinks storytelling altogether. Ultimately, you may also ask yourself if you’ve misunderstood your own narrative all along—and if you’ve had the audacity to think you’re the savior when really you’re one small part of a much larger and longer story.

    • [Bi+ book club] Outlawed by Anna North -- though our protagonist is a cis het woman (she spends much of the book in a community of folks of various genders and sexualities)
    • [novella] Remote Control by Nnedi Okorafor (apparently in the same universe as all her other SFF)
    • 4 picturebooks about kids with incarcerated parents
    • 3 additional picturebooks (and one more that was read to me on a virtual reading/Q&A)
    • The Joy of Being Selfish: Why You Need Boundaries and How to Set Them by Michelle Elman -- recommended by my friend Holly
    • Trans-Forming Proclamation: A Transgender Theology of Daring Existence by Liam M. Hooper -- Thom likened this book's writing style to Untie the Strong Woman: Blessed Mother's Immaculate Love for the Wild Soul by Clarissa Pinkola EstĂ©s (author of the 1996 classic Women Who Run With the Wolves: Myths and Stories of the Wild Woman Archetype), which makes me not want to read anything by that author
    live music
    movies
    • [fannish movie night] The LEGO Batman Movie
    tv
    • Ted Lasso S2E9 "Beard After Hours"
      Thom live-blogged her experience of first watching this:
    ExpandRead more... )

    Okay, going to brush my teeth and head to bed. It feels wrong to say this is my favorite episode of Ted Lasso because it’s not even an episode of Ted Lasso. It’s like a random romp through weird shit in London feature a handful of bit characters from the series. And the feel of the episode is completely different. And I kind of loved it.

    I’m mildly tempted to show it to you, because it is an almost stand-alone piece of artistry. Like, I could give you all the background you need to understand it in like 2 minutes. And it’s just very wow.

    Hence, us watching it on a date night.

    hermionesviolin: photo shoot image of Summer Glau (who played River Tam) with text "we are all made of stars" (no one can stop us now)
    books
    • 3 picturebooks
    • A Safe Girl to Love by Casey Plett [trans girl short story collection]
    • Dear Senthuran: A Black Spirit Memoir by Akwaeke Emezi -- which makes more sense having read Freshwater first, and also adds a lot to one's understanding of Freshwater
    • [work book club] The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead
    • [for two different book clubs] The Space Between Worlds by Micaiah Johnson

      Someone suggested this book for my feminist sci-fi bookclub, but what sold me was seeing that the author Tweeted
      I don’t always retweet reviews of my book, but this one tackles trauma and healing so thoughtfully it warrants it. It’s also the first review of my work (that I’m aware of) to put abolitionist policies in conversation with my particular brand of optimism.
      RTing Virginia Eubanks:
      What an abolitionist restoration drama about trauma brings to the party that Kurt Vonnegut's anti-war satire doesn't: care, healing, hope. #PTSDBookclub considers @micaiah_johnson's extraordinary debut novel: The Space Between Worlds. https://virginia-eubanks.com/?p=1838

    theatre
    • [New Rep] Listen to Sipu -- about the history of the colonization of what is now Watertown

    movies
    • [fannish movie night] Gunpowder Milkshake

    world tour

    Jun. 23rd, 2021 08:03 pm
    hermionesviolin: (train)
    M (nibling #1) turned 5 today.

    My parents had been visiting and flew home last night, so we did a video chat yesterday afternoon so I could watch M open the presents I had sent her.

    The first one she opened was Monsoon Afternoon. My mom commented that it was reminiscent of the heavy rain they had had earlier in their visit.

    The next one she opened was A Is for Africa, and my mom said, "You're going on a world tour."

    Which, I hadn't thought of exactly, but which was kind of true.

    The next thing she opened was IndigiMatch: A Native American Matching Game -- which I think is all people in what we call the USA.

    She was really engrossed in that for a while -- "reading" the booklet of the various people (i.e., making up stories) and also finding the card to match the image in the booklet.

    She finally opened the other package: Just in Case: A Trickster Tale and Spanish Alphabet Book. Which is not explicitly set in Mexico, but is definitely Mexican inflected -- our protagonist is Señor Calvera, the skeleton from Day of the Dead celebrations; the objects he considers as gifts are given in Spanish and then glossed in English... [My mom struggled with a lot of the Spanish pronunciation, which had not occurred to me as a possible issue, since I took Spanish in high school, but I found a read-aloud video today and shared it in case my SiL wanted to practice.]

    My mom read her that one. Cute moment:
    Zelmiro the ghost, to Señor Calavera: "But I wonder, are they what Grandma Beetle would love the most? Why don't you look again, my friend? Just in case."

    M: "Why does she keep saying that?"

    my mom: "I guess because we're not done with the alphabet yet."
    hermionesviolin: (andro)
    My partner messaged me earlier this month: "I’m proofing a Transgender Day of Visibility doc for someone in [a Facebook group]. Do you have particular kid or adult books you’d recommend? (And how is it that I don’t actually have any?)"

    I made some preliminary recommendations based on my memory and then started digging through assorted tags ("shelves") on my GoodReads (and yes, I know, I should move to StoryGraph) to come up with more thorough recommendations.

    Here, have a post on my rarely-used wallet-name blog.
    hermionesviolin: Giles on a horse (Giles on a horse)
    My feminist sci-fi/fantasy book club read The Drowning Girl by CaitlĂ­n R. Kiernan -- which is a ghost story of sorts, and involves sirens and werewolves, but is arguably rather less fantastical than we were led to expect? (The narrator is schizophrenic, so there's a lot of Unreliable Narrator happening.)

    Anyway, at one point in the book, there's a wolf/woman sex scene, and so of course in the discussion I brought up the Governor General's Literary Award winning (1976) book Bear by Marian Engel (#ThanksCanada). [I also noted that a Globe and Mail review asserts that, "Bear unfolds (pretty self-consciously, I think) like a parody of Canadian literature."]

    Eve then reminded us about the dolphin sex book we had read a couple years ago in this book club -- Made for Love by Alissa Nutting, pitched to us as: "a woman flees a toxic marriage to the abusive CEO of Gogol Industries when he decides to connect them via brain chips for a literal mind meld; rave reviews say the book is very funny and that there are dolphins"

    My partner pulled up the book on GR and PMed me loling that the entirety of my review was, "Huh, this has a more satisfying ending than I was expecting."

    She then went on to joke:
         I mean, also, “That’s what she said!” 😘

    We r the most mature. 😂
    hermionesviolin: (like salt water)
    I have not read this book (yet), but Thom messaged me last night:
    Have you read _This Is How You Lose The Time War_?

    I am enjoying this a lot, and not just because it frequently makes me think of you.

    Mostly not in the specifics — just in the depth of the sentiment.
    They sent me some excerpts, most of which had sort of in-jokey connections to us, and said:
    We’ve been married for ~2 weeks, dating for ~7 months, not-dating for ~19 months, and friends for, what, ~2.5 years? And we have so many in-jokes that I can find you almost anywhere. ❀
    Reader, I melted.

    [Also, pedantically, it's been ~19 months since we started not-dating, but because we got to level up to actual-dating after 12 months, it's a little misleading to say "we've been not-dating for ~19 months."]

    ***

    Lunchtime today:
    Thom:

    God, this book is so romantic.

    And I’m going to stop sending you snippets, because I don’t want to spoil this any more than I might already have. (I don’t think I have, but I want to be extra careful from here to the end.)

    I’m likely to keep highlighting to share with you once you’ve read it.

    I’m low key tempted to ask you to read it on a day when we’re together, so I can talk about every chapter with you as you read.

    JFC, I’ve come close to crying at the end of, like, over half the last few chapters.  

    Highs and lows and such deep sentiment. 

    me:

    I mean, you're also under a lot of stress and your body might want an excuse to cry...

    (Which I do not say to minimize the intensity of the emotion of the book -- #BothAnd.)

    Thom:

    Oh, yeah. Definitely also a thought I had. It is impossible to separate our experience of art from our experience of reality. 

    My love for this book is a product of my stress, of my love for you and for Colleen, of my umbilical hernia, and of three episodes of _Ted Lasso_. (Thanks, mediocre and sentimental cishet white guy.) 

    But also, the book is objectively excellent.  

    As is likely any book that includes in the acknowledgments, “Warm thanks, too, to Felicity Maxwell, for her generous expertise on Bess of Hardwick.”
    hermionesviolin: young black woman(?) with curly hair and pink sunglasses, facing away from the viewer (every week is ibarw)
    Email I just got to send 14 HBS faculty:
    Thanks to everyone for your time this morning.

    I’ll clean up the notes from the meeting and work with [M.] on a Doodle poll for 45-minute tours of his online course.

    In the meantime, while we were settling in, [F.] had mentioned struggling to explain to her 7-year-old that the people who are supposed to protect us aren’t, and I had offered to share some picture book recommendations.

    In the chat, [A.] shared A Kids Book About Racism (https://akidsbookabout.com/products/a-kids-book-about-racism) and I shared Something Happened in Our Town: A Child's Story About Racial Injustice (https://www.apa.org/pubs/magination/441B228).

    A friend had recently posted to Facebook crowdsourcing for “useful, honest books about race in the United States for different age cohorts” and someone linked to this GoogleDoc of books for kids ages 0-12 in a bunch of topical categories (including “Police Brutality/Racist Attacks/Black Lives Matter/Incarceration”): https://docs.google.com/document/d/15H1nzEIbC53OojvsLnlxM2zGYktooOGlOFMZ9xO74zk/mobilebasic

    Profile

    hermionesviolin: an image of Alyson Hannigan (who plays Willow Rosenberg) with animated text "you think you know / what you are / what's to come / you haven't even / BEGUN" (Default)
    Elizabeth (the delinquent, ecumenical)

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