Read Recently

These are some books that I read recently. For Ascension, I just couldn't find the energy to do a post on it even though I loved it. And the others I enjoyed after my deboobing, when I was mostly tired and not in the mood to use computers. Anyway. Here are some short opinions.

Ascension by Jacqueline Koyanagi

I really really loved this book and am heartbroken that although it looks like part of a series, there is no second book (yet). It's about a starship mechanic who works on the ground and knows that she needs to fly, which, of course, happens.

My only issue with it was that a lot of hard to believe things happen that made me go "yeah... right..." sometimes. But I don't really mind that. It's incredibly fluffy. It's also terrible! So much bad stuff happens to the characters! But it is about loving starships and people, about chosen family, about disability, about negotiating relationships, about death, about the Big Quiet. There's a doggo person. And someone learns that polyamory works for them, but in a way that I like a lot even though those plots often make me eyeroll. There is more magic than I expected, but I didn't mind at all.

Animorphs 1 & 2 (& part of 3) by K. A. Applegate

You know, the ones where a good alien gives some teens the ability to turn into animals to save the earth from bad aliens. I read these books so long ago, but it feels like I know them and they know me. Re-reading them doesn't make me feel as many things as reading them the first time did, but heck, it is nice enough to remember how intense everything was. How scared I was for all of them and how happy I was with them. I'm a bit annoyed by some of the takes on animal behavior, but only by some, most of them are simply incredibly cute. I love how fast they are to read even now that I have far less book reading spoons than when I was a kid.

My Solo Exchange Diary Vol 2 by Nagata Kabi

The second of the sequels to My Lesbian Experience with Loneliness and thus part of my favorite queer thing of the past few years, because this autobiographical manga series is all about pain, loneliness and mental illness, and has some the loveliest depression metaphors you can find. This is the first volume that didn't make me cry, but that's ok. It was a bit hard to read because a lot of the things that I related to in previous parts are re-framed in this one. But I liked it.