Hi, lovelies. Here’s my month in books, movies, and television.
Books
In Nothing But the Rain by Naomi Salman, a small town is isolated from the rest of the world after it’s discovered that coming into contact with water begins to erase a person’s memories. By keeping a journal and tracking her actions, Laverne struggles to hold onto herself and survive in a world in which overexposure to water can wash away a person’s ability to even function and feed themselves.
This is a melancholy read, focusing on solitude in the wake of a quiet apocalypse, questioning whether it’s better to sit back and accept the fate or struggle forward into a new future (and what that might cost).
Melanie Gillman’s Other Ever Afters: New Queer Fairy Tales is a lovely collection of graphic stories, in which mermaids, princesses, knights, barmaids, and old women take center stage. These tales come from a place of kindness and compassion, showing alternative means of ways to get to a happily every after.
In addition, the stories are presented with pastel infused artwork that brings an extra layer of beauty and softness to the tales. I really enjoyed this collection.
The opening of Kealan Patrick Burke’s Sour Candy happened in a supermarket. Our main character, Phil Pendleton, goes to the supermarket and witnesses a bizarre and unsettling event involving a women and her child — one of the most uncomfortable scenes that I’ve ever had the pleasure to read. When he leaves this moment behind, Phil finds his entire world has shifted sideways, reality rewritten. The horror that follows grows increasingly terrible in the best of ways. As a novella, this is a short, quick read, but it’s one that leaves a satisfying punch. 
Trail of Lightning is a fantastic urban fantasy novel by Rebecca Roanhorse. Set after flooding and natural disasters caused by climate change, Dinétah (formerly the Navajo reservation) is surrounded by a massive wall that protects it from the outside world. However, the survivors face not only the aftereffects of natural disaster, but also the reawakening of witches, monsters, and old gods. Fighting these monsters is Maggie Hoskie, a supernaturally gifted monster hunter and killer, who must face her past in order to defeat them. This is a powerfully fun read, one that has me excited to explore more of this world.
Secret Passages by Axelle Lenoir is a fictional memoir about growing up in a small town. The story imagines the author as a young girl being raise by parents who may or may not be aliens and whose brother’s imaginary friend may be a blood-thirsty demon. As a girl, she has a hard time relating to school, which seems like a strange place to her, and so she communes with the forest for comfort. It’s a delightfully weird book, and I hope the author continues the tale.
Nghi Vo’s Siren Queen is a stunning work of art. Presented as the life story of a Chinese American woman, who rises to become a star in Hollywood — but this is not the Hollywood of this world. Instead it is a kind of fairy realm, one that exacts a sharp (and sometimes deadly) price on those who long for fame, a realm in which it is all to easy to loose yourself and the ones you love.
I read two phenomenal comics. The first is Maw, written by Jude Ellison S. Doyle with art by A.L. Kaplan and Fabiana Mascolo. Maw is a story of rage and monstrousness. When Marion joins her sister Wendy at a remote feminist retreat, she begins a strange and horrifying transformation, one that leads to bloodshed and a renewed sense of power.
I fell in love with the Saga series from page one. Written by Brian K. Vaughan and illustrated by Fiona Staples features a beautifully illustrated and rich scifi fantasy, in which two people from the opposing sides of a multi-generational war fall in love, have a child together, and attempt to escape the conflict — only to be hunted down as outlaws.
Let’s kick things off with a couple of fantastic poetry collections.
Second, This is How the Bone Sings by W. Todd Kaneko is a stunning collection of poems focus on Minidoka, a concentration camp for Japanese Americans built in Idaho during World War II. The author blends history with myth and folklore to explore how the scars of the past carry through generations — from grandparents through to their grandchildren. The wounds caused by racism and hate are continue on through memory and story. These poems are evocative and beautiful, providing an important memorial for an aspect of American history that should never be forgotten.
Delving into fiction, Nnedi Okorafor’s Noor is the story of Anwuli Okwudili, a woman who prefers to be called AO, who has a number of necessary body augmentations on her arm and legs — a fact that that makes some superstitious people in Africa believe she is evil or wicked. When she is attacked by men in her local community, she fights back with incredible power and flees into the desert. On her journey, she finds new companions, faces off against an powerful corporation, and finds hope filled utopian community finding safety within the winds of a man-made natural disaster. I loved the characters and communities portrayed with Okorafor’s Africanfuturist vision of a future. It’s a great read.
Cosmobiological: Stories by Jilly Dreadful is a collection of hopepunk short stories that explore love, relationships, passion, the resilience of the human spirit, and the possibilities of hope through myth, fantasy, and science fiction.”5×5″ (which you can read at