September, (October), November 2019 Reads

I'm doing a bit of throw-back as I try and catch up with my reading blogs for this year.  Please excuse the backlog :)

In September, school started up again, so my reading life slowed down a bit, but I still managed to read several good books:

• The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood
• Scythe by Neal Shusterman
• Will My Cat Eat My Eyeballs? by Caitlin Doughty
• Paper Wishes by Lois Sepahban

October was an abysmal month in terms of reading and I didn't finish a single thing, but in November, I finished these books: 

• Last Things by Marissa Moss
• Long Way Down by Jason Reynolds
• Smile by Raina Telgemaier
• Croquette & Empanada by Ana Oncina

I'm lucky that most of these were incredible reads, but I will just talk about a handful of them, since they have managed to stick with me well after I have finished reading them!

Last Things by Marissa Moss

I went and sold a bunch of book club books for school with a teacher friend and while we were wandering around the book store waiting for our offer, I stumbled upon this guy.  I've found that one of my favorite things to read ever is graphic memoirs.  I just love being able to look into other people's lives, even for a short while.

This book gives you a glimpse into what it looks like to see someone slowly decline from ALS.  I felt a lot of different things while reading this.  I felt for Marissa's husband, who just wanted to live as normal and as independent of a life as possible, all things considered.  But I think roughly halfway through until the end, I felt nothing but anger towards him.  I thought he was being awfully selfish (especially when he refused to do things that would make his family's life a little easier) and handled the end of his life rather poorly, but it also feels weird to say that and feel that about someone who is dying and really going through someone.  You want to offer some grace as they tie up loose ends in their life to the best of their ability.  But I won't deny my feelings about this.  I mostly felt for Marissa.  She is the glue to this entire story-- she does as much as she possibly can to make sure her sons are okay and that they have a chance to process and more importantly that they get a break every once in a while from this situation.  She tries to ooze love and care when she feels that her husband is lacking in this area.  She takes on so many roles because she has to and I think that's admirable, even though she is absolutely exhausted.

It's not a light book if you're in a reading slump, but it is a really engaging read.  I couldn't put this book down until I had finished.  I hope this book can be that for you too.

Long Way Down by Jason Reynolds

Another teacher recommended this book to me.  It's a story told in verse and it centers on a boy who lost his brother to gun violence.  It highlights other people in his life (and who are in the margins) who have also been cut short by gun violence.  There is a discussion about revenge and recovery after such violent ends from people close to you.

I could see this being a really engaging read for students since this is a topic they want to read about and talk about.  I think this is a good medium to start this conversation because it's a fairly quick read.  But this book is also worth revisiting and I'd love to read this again in 2020 (and I'm going to try and give myself that space to do just that in 2020, but I'll talk about that more in a separate post). 

This is a great book if you're in a reading slump, but this is also a great book to read if you're looking to hear more about the conversation around gun violence and police brutality, especially because this time you're invited to hear from people whose lives ended.  They have perspective now that they didn't have before.  But you're also being asked to pay attention to the people who are left behind after these lives are ended.  Really important read.

Scythe by Neal Shusterman

This book snuck up on me a little bit this year.  My math teacher friend started reading this book and texted me saying something along the lines of, "OMG THIS BOOK."  So I listened through Audible and was immediately hooked.

In this society, death doesn't really exist.  People don't just get killed or die.  But you can't have people living and regenerating forever, so someone has the job of ending lives.  That is the job of the Scythes.  You can't have this job unless you don't want the job.  It was weird to think of death happening in this way and it was even weirder, once you were involved in this world, to see people who actually relished the job and enjoyed seeing people suffer as their lives permanently came to an end.  It's just an interesting world to get yourself involved in, even for a short time, while you're reading this book.

This is another book where I feel like I have so many thoughts that I can't speak eloquently about it.  I will say that I am looking forward to reading the rest of the series in 2020 and then maybe I'll be able to speak much more clearly about my feelings on this book.  This is an incredible read and I hope you choose to spend your time reading it next year.

Will My Cat Eat My Eyeballs by Caitlin Doughty

I have loved Caitlin Doughty's previous books about her experience starting out in the death industry and then about death practices around the world.  This book is all about the questions that young people (kids, really) have about death that, I would wager to guess, adults are also wondering the answer to.  They're weird questions about what happens after you die and what happens if you suffer a certain kind of death... it's just a cool read.  I love the illustrations that are scattered throughout (I think at the beginning of each new question).  I also appreciated the really short chapters.  Short chapters motivate me to keep reading because I feel like I'm making more progress than I actually am.

If you want an interesting read or are interested in learning more about death and death positivity, this is a great place to go!

----

I'm happy that I get to read such neat books like the ones I just told you about.  Hopefully, my luck continues into the 2020 year!

Thanks for Reading!

--Jude