shorshewitch's reviews
281 reviews

The narration is so beautiful. The points are all for the way it's narrated. 

That climate change activism is interconnected with all other left activisms is not a very novel thing to know. At least I know this for folks in my circle. But at times, it's very encouraging to read things that validate and build on your worldview, give you a more robust vocabulary to review your own understanding, and study specific cases that broaden your mind. This slim book of essays by various writers serves this very purpose for me. The book rests on the philosophy of Edward Said, Palestinian-American political activist and literary critic. Various writers from different geographical and socio-political regions flesh it out further from their respective contexts. 

Marginalized will always be the first to bear the consequences of the changing climate, a phenomenon for which theirs will be the least contribution. I found the book hopeful in its despair. The call to action is clearly to visualize and work towards a society radically different than the one we are living in, and to stop acting like idealism is a bad thing. #climatechange #booksaboutclimatechange #leftwordbooks #essays #climatechangeessays

Where the Wild Ladies are by Aoko Matsuda, translated by Polly Barton

Book 22/100 

🍁 quick read 
🍁 was a recommendation by amazing folks on #translatedgemsbookclub
🍁 inspired by and reinvents a lot of Japanese folktales
🍁 now I want to read more Japanese folktales. Sarath tells me we have a huge collection of them. So yay for me. 
🍁 the stories are interconnected but not chronological, so a certain level of suspension of the concept of conventional time is required. 
🍁 Stories deal with pretty heavy issues and yet are kept light and fun. 
🍁 some stories end abruptly but since you will find some connection at a later point it does not feel cliffhanger-y.

A decent collection of short stories. This is my first by Ambai. Some of the stories are beautiful while I felt some others were trying way too much. In a few stories, I found stuff crammed without having a lot of relevance to the story. In a few others, I found confusing narration like someone else spoke here. I am not exactly sure if that's supposed to be language barrier. I am not sure how it reads in the original Thamizh, but there is a big chance I lost some nuance in translation. There are descriptions of food, places, music, movies, science, and the stories touch a wide variety of themes. It was an interesting read except for a few of them. I am curious enough to pick more by the author. 

I mean, I didn't understand a lot of things but I couldn't stop reading. I will have to mostly read it again, and yet this was so absolutely fascinating. I am going to look up more by the author. 

Jollof Rice and Other Revolutions by Omolola Ijeoma Ogunyemi

I bought this pre-loved book from a known bookseller because of its title. It has food. And Jollof is such a tasty word. No, I can't explain! 

This is my first time with this format of a novel with interlocking short stories based on characters - in POVs both first person and third person. And I absolutely loved it. The story(s) has 4 Nigerian friends who have grown up together and have stayed in touch. I love reading about friends who stay with each other through everything. 

This is a debut of the author and it totally does not seem like it. The author seems like a veteran and knows exactly what she wants to convey and how.

The span during which the stories occur covers one and a half century - from 1897 to 2050. There is a high level chronology followed when a story opens and at a granular level, each story takes up the burden of filling in the details of the gaps in between. 

Despite the challenging format, the author does exceptionally well in making each story connect with the others, building up a fabulous single thread, all along superbly tackling themes ranging from churches, religions, to romantic relationships, generational traumas, conservative politics, immigration, belonging, alienation, bullying, police brutality, racism, rape and sexual abuse, parental neglect, childhood traumas, friendships, medical complexities, grief, misogyny and patriarchy. It has some fiesty women and tonnes of good men, some stories witty in their humor, and many rich in their descriptions of Nigerian culture, customs and food. The final wrap up in which we get to see all the characters again in one story is emotional and cathartic. 

I would totally recommend this book if you like short stories and want to explore a related format. The pace is pretty fast. 
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//And so here is Ife, my only grandchild, engaged to a moron at sixteen and dressed like a nun from the 1980s, except her habit is royal blue instead of black. At a time when the Catholic Church has agreed that priests can marry and women can be ordained, my granddaughter is asserting her right to be a throwback.//

Pet by Akwaeke Emezi 

Revolution came to Lucille long back and the angels all drove the monsters out. The people of Lucille are absolutely sure there are no monsters any more. They all respect each other, treat their kids with dignity and maturity, refrain from using violence of any kind, are queer friendly and believe in reformative justice. But like we read in Utopias of all kinds, there is no Utopia that doesn't have some level of Dystopia. Not yet, at least. Utopias can truly be maintained only if we decide to collectively look far, far away the other direction. 

Jam is a citizen of Lucille and lives with her parents Aloe and Bitter. Redemption, her best friend, and his brother, Moss, live with their parents - Malachite, Whisper and Beloved - just a short distance away. One day, Jam accidentally summons an entity from another realm, through one of Bitter's paintings. Why is the entity here? Are they angel or monster? What are they hunting? All these questions form the rest of the story.

I have been a fan of Akwaeke Emezi since I read their The Death of Vivek Oji. That book made me bawl. Pet moved me as well. 

Pet implores us to think of a world not completely devoid of crime and criminals, but with a better understanding of justice and rehabilitation of both the perpetrators and the survivor in a manner that neither diminishes the injustice done to the survivor nor denies the humanity of the perpetrator. 

The conversations between Jam and everyone else around her are super comforting. It is a quick read. The climax is neatly and cleanly folded. 

We have for far too long resisted even imagining a world without police and prison industrial complex. Of course it will require a lot of organizing and imagination. But like Angela Davis, in her phenomenal "Are Prisons Obsolete?" tells us, it was hard for us to imagine a world without slavery as well, and yet here we are. There is no need to have all answers immediately. There is a need to start conversations though. We need to have more stories put together by creative brains because how else do we build a society that reflects its literature. 

Pet is therefore an important book. A significant initial tiny step towards a world full of radical kindness. This is a great pick for the Trans Readathon, or any other readathon for the prompt where the protagonist is a trans person.

Dutch colonization of Indonesia started somewhere in the 15th century and they went on "civilizing" the "primitive" natives right until the 19th century. Of course, they also made laws to take over control of the trade of all the fur, cloves, nutmegs,  etc just like colonialists "have" to. Laws were also further made to exploit the natives rendering them extremely poor and with no respect. As goes in most stories of oppression, it's the native women who suffered more than the men (the language of queerness is not even uttered). 

This Earth of Mankind, is the first book of the Buru Quartet, an epic work of literature by Pramoedya Ananta Toer, an Indonesian communist writer, who was imprisoned for 2 years by Dutch and then 10 years by authoritarian Indonesian president, Suharto. The book was first an oral narrative, because Pramoedya did not have access to pen and paper in the jail. It was later turned into a written book in Bahasa Indonesian, with the help of his fellow inmates. All his works including the Quartet were banned for his scathing criticism of the colonial and authoritarian policies. While the ban has been lifted in 2010, despite being a prominent figure in the history of Indonesia, the schools do not have his books in their curriculum till this very day. It becomes an even bigger obligation then, upon us as readers who are not based in Indonesia, to read and speak about the book, the first chance we get. 

This first book follows the story of Minke, a descendant of Native Javanese royalty, who studies at the the elite H. B. S., alongside the Dutch students. It begins with Minke's meeting with Nyai Ontosorah, concubine of a white man called Herman Mellema, and their "Indo" (Mixed blood) child, Annelies Mellema, in their estate, Boerderij Buitenzorg, of the Buitenzorg Agricultural Company. The estate and the family is guarded by a Madurese fighter, Darsam. The story then follows Annelies and Minke's love, Nyai Ontosorah's exceptional skills and education despite no formal degree and low status, Minke's family, his growth as a person, his political views and influences, his conversations with his peers and subordinates, and political controversies.

The writing style takes a bit of a getting used to. My guess is it is because of the language and culture related nuance. Max Lane, the translator, has done a good job of retaining the essential aspects of the culture and the language. The narrative style is journalistic. It reads as Minke's narration of the events as they occurred. There is an exchange of several letters in the narration during which it assumes a temporary epistolary form. 

The characters are fascinating in their attitudes, ideas, lives and personalities. The book is rich in its vivid descriptions of contemporary Indonesia at the turn of the 19th century, its history, and its growing unrest. 

I am definitely reading the Quartet through the rest of the year, along with Max Lane's "Indonesia Out of Exile: How Pramoedya’s Buru Quartet Killed a Dictatorship".

I read the book for #translatedgemsbookclub 's March reading and now we plan to read the Quartet though the year together.