AAPI Month | May 2021 Wrap-Up

Hey hi hello friends, and welcome back to my blog! 

What a whirlwind month May was. I'm still trying to process everything that happened to me and the world. It's a lot, that's for sure. 

As you know, May was Asian-American/Pacific Islander Heritage Month, and so I challenged myself to only read books by Asian, Asian-American, and Pacific Islander authors. It was so much fun. I read a ton of great books and found a few new favorites. In the month of May I read 10 novels, 2 nonfiction, and 3 manga volumes. So, without any further ado, let's get right on into it.

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Novels

1. The Poppy War by R.F. Kuang
Star rating: 4 out of 5 stars
Page count: 545 pages
Day(s) read: 05.01 - 05.05
Goodreads thoughts: I...wow.

That was horrifying and incredible. The writing fit the story so well—it wasn’t lyrical or pretty, but sharp and quick and to the point. The atrocities were nauseating to read about but were not out of place. And the forced growth of the characters, children caught up in a war, was brilliantly done.

I’m a little scared to read the sequel, not gonna lie, but you bet your ass I’m getting my hands on it as soon as I can.

2. Love From A to Z by S.K. Ali
Star rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars
Page count: 384 pages
Day(s) read: 05.05 - 05.06
Goodreads thoughts: I thought this was a fantastic story. It was a little instalovey but that didn’t bother me like it usually does, probably because I thought both characters were cinnamon rolls and I fell in love with them just as quickly. I also loved how all of the places they went were described, it made me feel like I was actually there with them in Doha. Also the depictions of MS were done very well.

3. Darius the Great is Not Okay by Adib Khorram (ONE DAY READ)
Star rating: 3 out of 5 stars
Page count: 320 pages
Day(s) read: 05.07
Goodreads thoughts: I really liked the depiction of depression in this. It felt very natural, in the way that it was just another part of Darius’s life, and not something to be treated as “other.” Also, this book made me SO hungry. I can’t eat a lot of what was mentioned but that didn’t stop me from dreaming about it.

As usual though, I found myself getting annoyed with the amount of references in the book. They made sense in the context of the story since Star Trek and Lord of the Rings were the two things that Darius was watching/reading at the time, but I couldn’t help but cringe every time he mentioned them in comparison to something else. And it happened at least once a page, so. But that’s a me problem, for sure.

4. Klara and the Sun by Kazuo Ishiguro
Star rating: 3 out of 5 stars
Page count: 304 pages
Day(s) read: 05.08 - 05.09
Goodreads thoughts: ** spoiler alert ** This was beautifully written but it left me with so many questions! What does being lifted mean? What were the Cootings Machines? What kind of place did Paul live in? Is this supposed to be futuristic? What about the AF backlash? I’m so confused and I want answers, dammit!

5. Darius the Great Deserves Better by Adib Khorram
Star rating: 4 out of 5 stars
Page count: 352 pages
Day(s) read: 05.09 - 05.13
Goodreads thoughts: I liked this better than the first one, I think. While I loved the setting of Yazd in the first book, I really liked the conversations in this one. Like the delicacy of friendship with someone who is also friends with your bully, and microaggressions in elementary school, and consent about sex. Also I REALLY enjoyed seeing an older queer couple. I don’t see much of that in books so I was very happy that was a part of this one. I wish we touched more on Sohrab and his situation, I think that would have been really important, but I understand that would have added maybe too much to an already bursting story.

6. Kafka on the Shore by Haruki Murakami
Star rating: 2.5 out of 5 stars
Page count: 467 pages
Day(s) read: 05.13 - 05.17
Goodreads thoughts: That was weird, and I’m not sure if I liked it or not. None of it really made sense and I’m not really the kind of reader that can overlook that and take the book at face value, unfortunately. The writing was good but the story just didn’t vibe with me.

7. Wicked As You Wish by Rin Chupeco
Star rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars
Page count: 432 pages
Day(s) read: 05.18 - 05.20
Goodreads thoughts: I didn’t enjoy the beginning very much because it was like we were picking up in the middle of a story, but it grew on me as I read. I’m interested to see how the next book plays out because I have some theories about who is a bad guy and who is a good guy.

8. Parachutes by Kelly Yang
Star rating: 5 out of 5 stars
Page count: 496 pages
Day(s) read: 05.20 - 05.21
Goodreads thoughts: This…was really hard to read. It is a very real story about very real things that happen to very real people, and I shed very real tears while reading, I can’t really think of anything other than the emotional turmoil I felt throughout the book but I can say that this was brilliantly written and definitely a much needed book.

9. To Hold Up the Sky by Liu Cixin
Star rating: 2 out of 5 stars
Page count: 336 pages
Day(s) read: 05.22 - 05.27
Goodreads thoughts: I feel like this solidified why I don’t lean toward sci-fi. Of the ten stories in this collection, I really only enjoyed three of them (Contraction, Ode to Joy, and The Thinker). The rest were meh, and I actually DNF’d two of them because they were so far from my taste. So yeah.

10. Shadow of the Fox by Julie Kagawa
Star rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars
Page count: 409 pages
Day(s) read: 05.27 - 05.30
Goodreads thoughts: THAT WAS SO GOOD why did it take me so long to read this??????

This was perfectly paced in my opinion, I was never bored or listing and I flew through it. I love Yumeko and her personality, and Tatsumi is incredible as well, all brooding and stoic but soft inside. Normally I don’t tend to gravitate toward characters like that but apparently there’s an exception to every rule.

And the lore!! So detailed, I can’t wait to see how the rest of the story plays out. I’m definitely picking the sequel up as soon as possible.

Nonfiction

1. Home Body by Rupi Kaur (ONE DAY READ)
Star rating: N/A
Page count: 192 pages
Day(s) read: 05.13
Goodreads thoughts: This is my favorite of her collections so far. It’s so raw and unapologetic, as is Rupi’s style. The two longer anecdotes were probably my favorite, just because there was more to help get the message across.

2. Crying in H Mart by Michelle Zauner
Star rating: N/A
Page count: 256 pages
Day(s) read: 05.21 - 05.25
Goodreads thoughts: I thought this was very well written, and conveyed a lot of emotion. It was difficult to read at some points because I watched my grandfather deteriorate from cancer the same way Michelle watched her mother, so I felt connected to the story in a very hard way.

The food!! Gah it makes me hungry just thinking about the AMAZING descriptions that she wrote about the food. I have to admit that I’m not really one who likes the sour, fermented flavors of Korean dishes like kimchi, and too much garlic gives me migraines, but oh man I was ready to eat (almost) everything she described.

Manga

1. Orange: The Complete Collection by Ichigo Takano
Star rating: 4 out of 5 stars
Total page count: 1,226 pages
Day(s) read: 05.05, 05.08, 05.13
Goodreads thoughts: Orange: Future - It was interesting seeing Suwa’s perspective but I don’t think I liked it as much as the original series.

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Total page count: 5,719 pages

Favorite book of May: Shadow of the Fox by Julie Kagawa

Least favorite book of May: To Hold Up the Sky by Liu Cixin

No DNF's this month

Unfinished books this month: Soul of the Sword by Julie Kagawa

Books bought this month: Bridge of Souls by Victoria Schwab
                                            Beneath the Sugar Sky by Seanan McGuire
                                            Across the Green Grass Fields by Seanan McGuire
                                            Mister Impossible by Maggie Stiefvater

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Alright, there you have it! For June I was planning on only reading queer books, but I have so many holds from my library coming in that aren't queer that I'm just not gonna bother setting that challenge for myself. Obviously I'll still read a decent number of queer books, they just won't all be queer. 

Until next time!