zinka – Page 2 – Cannonball Read 17

More of the same, but with a bit of personal nostalgia

The Elvenbane by Andre Norton and Mercedes Lackey

January 28, 2021 by zinka Leave a Comment

The Elvenbane is written by two giants of fantasy and science fiction, Andre Norton and Mercedes Lackey. Specifically, two female giants of fantasy. I have learned that Norton was supposedly a mentor or Lackey as were other giant names like Marion Zimmer Bradley. Norton is apparently often called the “Grand Dame” of science fiction and fantasy. Lackey may be less well known, I’m not sure, but she was a name that was more familiar to me when I first read this book. I like to […]

“We will find life, joy, and longevity in breaking what needs to be broken.”

Glitch Feminism: A Manifesto by Legacy Russell

January 24, 2021 by zinka 4 Comments

Glitch Feminism, by Legacy Russell, is a powerful manifesto that challenges gender binaries as well as other binaries including hegemonic understandings of our relationship to our bodies and cyberspace. Part critical theory, part art theory, art history, and contemporary art survey, I don’t think I’ve been so deeply entranced by reading a text like this in some time, maybe ever. I also know, that to really understand it, I’ll have to reread it a few more times but I’m attempting to review it anyway, so […]

Tom Robbins re-reads #1: Skinny Legs and All

Skinny Legs and All by Tom Robbins

January 18, 2021 by zinka 7 Comments

I discovered Tom Robbins on my mom’s bookshelf when I was in High School. A fan herself, she had an assortment of his novels and I devoured, quickly, Even Cowgirls get the Blues followed by the rest of her collection. Cowgirls has remained my favorite of his novels, but I’ve always felt that Skinny Legs and All seemed more important, somehow more serious and more fantastical at the same time, and I always felt like I had learned something from it even if I couldn’t […]

Memory and trauma and loss and family

Memorial Drive by Natasha Trethewey

January 14, 2021 by zinka Leave a Comment

Memorial Drive, by Natasha Trethewey, is a memoir where Trethewey tells the stories of her childhood homes, growing up as a child of a black mother and white father, the shift in her relationship to her mother, and, eventually, her mother’s murder while Trethewey was still a young woman. This is the core of the book, but it really is so much more than that. A relatively short read, Memorial Drive is captivating and visceral. At its length, I would have expected to read the […]

“What if you have a child, and that child wishes with every bone in her body that she’d never been born?”

Breasts and Eggs by Meiko Kawakami

January 2, 2021 by zinka 4 Comments

The inside cover of Mieko Kawakami’s Breasts and Eggs is extremely misleading. I don’t think I usually put a lot of faith in the short descriptions that live on the insides or backs of books, so I guess normally this wouldn’t have bothered me, but I received Breasts and Eggs as a gift and knew only one thing about it when I unwrapped it: the book had been featured on a very short list of recent stellar stories that contained asexual protagonists. So maybe that’s […]

It’s just so good and I really need to know if the other book deserved that prize too

Girl, Woman, Other by Bernardine Evaristo

April 6, 2020 by zinka 2 Comments

In Girl, Woman, Other, Bernadine Evaristo traces the impacts of identity, racism, xenophobia, feminism, slavery, classism, and so much more through many generations of British women of color who are not tied to each other only by blood but rather through encounters and relationships, some briefer than others. Each of these women has a different history and understanding of their relationship to the world that greatly affects how they view themselves and others around them. Each of their stories comes beautifully up against conflict where […]

Zirza on A Gothic Classic for a ReasonIt's one of those wish-you-could-read-it-again-for-the-first-time books. I loved it.
Emmalita on “It came to something when you found yourself hoping that the footsteps you heard were ghosts.”I loved the ending! I don’t think it’s been out long enough to talk about why though.
Dixie on Track Her Down by Melinda LeighI am just starting Track Her Down and I have read them all in order till now and thought I...
Roland of Gilead on How can you give us the gift of a crazy character named Rando Thoughtful and then just as suddenly take that gift away? We need to talk, Uncle Stevie.I came across this randomly years after it was written because I was searching "Random Thoughtful. But I have the...
Emmalita on “Only you, Em, would refer to heartbreak as a distraction. I think I would have a more sympathetic response if I asked to marry a bookcase.”Oh my goodness, Gallifrey was beautiful. I’m sure her mittens were gloriously murdery.

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