Tag: Sports

ARC, Books

Book 658: The Children of Harvey Milk – Andrew Reynolds

Geoff W

I’m not sure how I stumbled across this one, but when I did back in May I requested a copy from the publisher and they kindly obliged.* I was interested because of the subject matter, but also because Reynolds is based at UNC Chapel Hill (my undergrad) and his name rang a bell because he’d chaired the Sexuality Studies program there at some point in the recent past. And then with my master’s degree focusing on the Civil Partnership Act (2014) in the UK, of course I was going to want to read this book and see what he had to say.

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Books

Book 648: Honestly Ben – Bill Konigsberg

Geoff W

This one was pretty forgettable for me, which is sad because it’s actually a good book. I think the problem is that I read Openly Straight, basically the first half of this book/story a little over five years ago. If I would’ve read these back to back I would’ve probably had much stronger feelings about this one.

Let’s start with what didn’t work: the swimming analogy. The book opens with Ben, the protagonist, going to swimming lessons for the first time and sinking to the bottom of the pool. Konigsberg uses this as a very clunky metaphor for Ben’s life and thoughts at the start of the book. I was honestly hoping it wouldn’t resurface at the end of the book—which isn’t totally fair because I would’ve been more pissed if he didn’t complete the metaphor—but it did and it just made me sigh and shake my head.

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Books

Book 642: Evvie Drake Starts Over – Linda Holmes

Geoff W

I discovered Linda Holmes years ago when I started listening to NPR’s Pop Culture Happy Hour and reading what used to be called Monkey See but was re-branded recently to match the podcast. I’ve always appreciated her views and the people she brings to the discussion, so when she started to drop hints that she was working on a novel I was SUPER excited.

I was also psyched to see the public radio shout out so early in the book, “She took down one of two public-radio fundraising mugs from the cabinet, leaving behind the one with the thin coat of dust on its upturned bottom.” (10). There’s another scene when Evvie is trying to decide what to do with some money and the list of charities she wants to support is just perfect.

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Books

Book 599: Fence Vol. 2 (Fence #2) – C.S. Pacat, Johanna the Mad, and Joana LaFuente

Geoff W

Still not quite doing it for me. It’s interesting and a fun quick read, but it’s just not as good as the Bob’s Burgers comics I’ve been reading or even the wonderful Check, Please!

For me, this series will be 100 times more powerful once it’s all released and it can be put into one compendium. The amount of time between my reading of Fence Vol. 1 and this one, and the time until Fence Vol. 3 is released will be too far.

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Books

Book 590: #Hockey (Check, Please! #1) – Ngozi Ukazu

Geoff W

(Check out my updated 2020 response.)

My heart is glowing after reading this. Seriously—I will probably read it at least 2-3 more times before I surrender it to the library. There’s just something so sweet and innocent about this and I cannot wait to read volume two: Sticks and Scones.

I found this after Sarah over at Sarah Reads to Much released the list of the Morris Award finalists (which she helped select). The blurb and the cover pulled me in so I added it to my list to check out at some point and then it appeared on someone else’s blog and I was like alright I’m in.

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