May 2021 Reads

In May of 2021, I read five books. Not a huge month, but the pace I need to hit my annual goal. Maybe one of these months I will do some catch-up to make up for the first few months of the year. Two of these were fiction, and three were nonfiction. It was a good month of reading: one book got four stars, and the rest got five stars. One of those I would probably demote to four stars now, but at the time I liked it.

The Parable of the Talents, by Octavia Butler:
Book club 1.5, we read this follow up to The Parable of the Sower. I preferred it. The first book seemed to live more in the black-and-white world, whereas this book had more nuance, I thought. No one questioned whether Earthseed was a net good for the world in Sower, and did here. I would recommend these books to just about anyone. 83/100

One interesting part of our discussion was that I was less shocked by some of the horrific abuse in this book than others. I think it is because I have read nonfiction detailing similar abuse, and so the fictionality of this book made it less acute. Solitary, below, is one book that makes clear that people in the real world can be as brutal as any created in fiction.

A Promised Land, by Barack Obama:
Took me longer to finish, but worth it, and I look forward to the follow-up. This (understandably, since he will never run for office again) felt more honest than his past memoirs. He was not only able to explain his worldview, but to be authentic in what he struggled with, both on a macro scale and in the details. He does a meaningful amount of advocating on behalf of his legacy, which perhaps shouldn’t have surprised me, but did. Powerful to hear his stories of just working through the same struggles as many, albeit with much higher stakes. 82/100

Nature’s Best Hope, by Douglas Tallamy:
An argument for the introduction of native plants to lawns. I am easy to convince. I will probably come back to this when I have a lawn of my own. Focused on biodiversity conservation. One review I read didn’t like how much he spoke down to the reader, which seemed true, but didn’t bother me, for some reason. 76/100

10 Minutes 38 Seconds in This Strange World, by Elif Shafak:
In my (December summary)[/posts/2020/12/decreads] I talked about reading Han Kang, who I had discovered through the (Future Library project)[https://www.futurelibrary.no/]. That is also how I discovered Elif Shafak. This book is odd. The first half is just character development, with no real central tension. The second half is a captivating tale. I didn’t think I would like it even as far as halfway through, but by the end really enjoyed it. I think it hasn’t stuck with me in the way I would want a five-star book to, so would probably revise this down, but originally gave it 82/100.

Solitary, by Albert Woodfox:
This is the best book I have read in months. The story of the Angola Three, men who were held in solitary in Angola State Prison for decades, is probably well-known to some, but was new to me. After being released in 2016, Woodfox wrote this book. He shows incredible resilience and strength through this decades-long torture. An inspiration, and a reminder of the horrors of prison, and particularly solitary.