I'm not ready, but my books are!

Soooo yeah, I'm not sure I'm emotionally prepared to be a year into *waves hands* all this. March 16th will be the official date that my (now former) work sent everyone home and everything where I live shut down, and the fact that that date is just over two weeks away is difficult to process.

At least I've got one thing going for me, though, and that...is books. I finished Death is Hard Work, Queer: A Graphic History, and And the Band Played On for my Read Harder reading tasks in February. I don't know if I've ever read a translation of a novel originally written in another language before, and reading about the civil war in Syria was a new topic for me. I would file both this novel and And the Band Played On under "heartbreaking, but enlightening." Queer: A Graphic History was equally enlightening and, although still serious, much more upbeat. 

For March's challenges, #5: Read a genre novel by an Indigenous, First Nations, or Native American author and #6: Read a fanfic, I'll be reading Five Little Indians by Michelle Good and Pride, Prejudice, and Other Flavors by Sonali Dev (cheating a little bit with that second one, but hey, I don't like reading on a computer). Honorable mentions for task five also go to The Night Watchman by Louise Erdrich and Love After the End by Joshua Whitehead, both of which I have on hold at my library.

I'm also really looking forward to April's tasks of reading a fat-positive romance and a romance by a trans or non-binary author. Have any April suggestions for me? Share them in the comments!

And the Band Played On - Randy Shilts

 My rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

From the cover:

"By the time Rock Hudson's death in 1985 alerted all America to the danger of the AIDS epidemic, the disease had spread across the nation, killing thousands of people and emerging as the greatest health crisis of the 20th century. America faced a troubling question: What happened? How was this epidemic allowed to spread so far before it was taken seriously? In answering these questions, Shilts weaves the disparate threads into a coherent story, pinning down every evasion and contradiction at the highest levels of the medical, political, and media establishments.

Shilts shows that the epidemic spread wildly because the federal government put budget ahead of the nation's welfare; health authorities placed political expediency before the public health; and scientists were often more concerned with international prestige than saving lives. Against this backdrop, Shilts tells the heroic stories of individuals in science and politics, public health and the gay community, who struggled to alert the nation to the enormity of the danger it faced. And the Band Played On is both a tribute to these heroic people and a stinging indictment of the institutions that failed the nation so badly."

Reading this book a year into the pandemic is...an experience. Early on, we read this quote:

"The bitter truth was that AIDS did not just happen to America - it was allowed to happen by an array of institutions, all of which failed to perform their appropriate tasks to safeguard the public health. This failure of the system leaves a legacy of unnecessary suffering that will haunt the Western world for decades to come."

Like, hello...sound familiar? I knew this would be an emotional read going into it, but with all the parallels to present day, it was doubly so recognizing those similarities in the response to COVID. Like cool, cool, we really have learned nothing in 40 years, that's great. Of course, COVID is nowhere near as fatal as AIDS was when it appeared, so I don't want to minimize any of that experience, because I can't even comprehend how horrible that must have been. But for fuck's sake, if people could show a little bit of growth over time, that would be nice.

And the Band Played On is told in a narrative style, but it is a journalistic work. I expected it to be a little on the dry side as a result, but it was not at all. The way Shilts wove the different narratives together was intensely personal and pulled me in immediately. Initially, it was heartbreaking reading about the response of the gay community as a whole and their unwillingness to stop engaging in risky behaviors even after being warned. If the government isn't going to respond with adequate funding, at least individuals can take steps to protect themselves, and in a time where so many people refuse to wear a mask for idiotic reasons, I found myself immediately angry at those refusing to listen to warnings. Then I paused and thought about how after a lifetime of being discriminated against, bullied, and mistreated for being gay, it was pretty logical to be suspicious of this mysterious "illness" mandating they stop having sex. I would have been suspicious too, and that makes it even more heartbreaking.

"The story of these first five years of AIDS in America is a drama of national failure, played out against a backdrop of needless death."

Even before the government and news media failed American people by refusing to take AIDS seriously because of their homophobia and bigotry, we as a country had already failed them. How many lives would have been saved if the LGBTQ community hadn't been given so many reasons to be suspicious of the warnings they were given after the virus showed up? It was difficult to read about case after case being diagnosed, knowing how preventable many of those cases should have been. As difficult as it was though, I am glad to have read this history and learned more about what happened in the 1980s. If you, like me, grew up surrounded by assholes who only ever referenced AIDS as "God's curse on homosexuals," I strongly recommend you pick this up. Obviously I don't believe it was a curse from some vengeful douchebag god, but I knew almost nothing about what had actually happened. This thorough, well-researched history of the first ten years of the virus was emotional to read but incredibly informative.

(Also, fuck Reagan, he was trash.)

Punching the Air - Ibi Zoboi and Yusef Salaam

My rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

From the cover:

"The story that I thought/was my life/didn't start on the day/I was born

Amal Shahid has always been an artist and a poet. But even in a diverse art school, he's seen as disruptive and unmotivated by a biased system. Then one fateful night, an altercation in a gentrifying neighborhood escalates into tragedy. 'Boys just being boys' turns out to be true only when those boys are white.

The story that I think/will be my life/starts today

Suddenly, at just sixteen years old, Amal's bright future is upended: he is convicted of a crime he didn't commit and sent to prison. Despair and rage almost sink him until he turns to the refuge of his words, his art. This never should have been his story. But can he change it?"

As a white woman, I feel a little weird writing a review of a book about the disproportionate (frequently wrongful) incarceration of Black people and the broken justice system in the United States, particularly since white women so frequently and disgustingly weaponize their privilege to harm Black people and other people of color. But this book is so powerful and Amal's voice so strong, that I had to share this book in case I have friends who didn't have it on their radar. Potential spoilers included.

The book starts off with Amal's trial. We don't find out details of what happened right away, just snippets about a fight with a white teen, who ended up in a coma. Amal is found guilty and sent to a detention facility, and details of the fight gradually unfold, interspersed between his experiences in prison. We also get glimpses into the experiences of some of the other boys with him, and we see a lot of the ways in which all of the boys in this detention center have basically been abandoned to the system. 

The one bright spot for Amal as he grapples with fear, hopelessness, and despair in the face of violent, racist guards, an educational program that is vastly inadequate, and very little support aside from his mother's visits, is a poetry class led by an outside volunteer. The class, basically a reward for good behavior, is one of his only connections to his life outside of prison and is a vital outlet, a place for him to use his words to remind himself of his humanity. As a volunteer-run class, though, the poetry group is not a guaranteed offering, even though without it many of the kids who attend are losing one of their only sources for a healthy outlet. What will happen to Amal and the other boys if they lose the class, and with it their connection to the one person inside the detention center who treats them like human beings?

This book may be fiction, but it was inspired by Yusef Salaam's real life experience as one of the exonerated five, and we all know that Yusef and his friends are far from the only people living in the US to have been wrongfully imprisoned (or imprisoned for bullshit reasons). Amal's story is a heartbreaking reminder not only of how the United States' decision to favor punitive action over restorative justice is failing a majority of black and brown Americans, but also of how our refusal as white people to confront our implicit biases, unlearn the white supremacist bullshit we have grown up steeped in, and use our privilege for good is propping up the rampant racism in our country.

Clap When You Land - Elizabeth Acevedo

 My rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

From the cover:

"Camino Rios lives for the summers, when her father visits her in the Dominican Republic. But this year, on the day when his plane is supposed to land, Camino arrives at the airport to see crowds of crying people...

In New York City, Yahaira Rios is called to the principal's office, where her mother is waiting to tell her that her father, her hero, has died in a plane crash.

Separated by distance - and Papi's secrets - the two girls are forced to face a new reality, in which their father is dead and their lives are forever altered. And then, when it seems like they've lost everything, they learn of each other.

Papi's death uncovers all the painful truths he kept hidden, and the love he divided across an ocean. And now Yahaira and Camino are both left to grapple with what a new sister means to them and what it will take to keep their dreams alive."

Everything Elizabeth Acevedo writes is impossible to put down, and Clap When You Land is no exception. This book is beautiful, breaking and warming your heart at the same time. The alternating perspectives of Yahaira and Camino were handled beautifully, and I loved the way the two narratives came together at the end. Even though they've been apart their whole lives, their voices intermingle, and without a clear distinction like in earlier pages, sometimes it's hard to tell who is speaking until we get context. It reminded me of how sometimes when one of my siblings is speaking their voice sounds so similar to another sibling that I can't be 100% sure who it is until something they're saying gives it away. (Or let's be honest, how sometimes I'll play a video of my sister talking and for a second think it's me and I just forgot I said that.)

There are a lot of complex emotions at work in this story, and you will feel every single moment along with the characters. When Yahaira's mom tells her she has a sister, I was angry on her behalf. When Camino talks about being mad at her father for his lies and also shattered that she'll never talk to him again, I felt that mixed-up grief. I am blown away by how real these characters became and how their experiences leapt off the page. Also, I know there are lots of conversations and jokes about how New York is the "fifth" character in Sex and the City, but for real, the Dominican Republic felt like a character in this book, and I loved it. The personality, the vibrancy, the feel of Camino's home was all around me as I read. Just...incredible, the magic Elizabeth Acevedo is able to weave with her words. Read this book. Read all of her books. Read her grocery lists if she decides to publish those at some point. I will read anything Elizabeth Acevedo gives me.

Read Harder update

I mentioned participating in Book Riot's Read Harder challenge in my New Year's update, so I figured now that we've made it to February I would share an update. For Task #2, read a nonfiction book about anti-racism, I read So You Want to Talk About Race by Ijeoma Oluo, which was fantastic. I borrowed a copy from the library, but this is a book I definitely want my own copy of, because it's something I would love to return to regularly.

As mentioned previously, I couldn't come up with anything for Task #1, read a book you've been intimidated to read, so I only completed one of the challenges for January (womp womp). To make up for it, though, I've got two titles chosen for one of my February challenges...although there is a wait list for it, so we'll see if I get it in time. 😬 But what are February's challenges, you ask?

Task #3: Read a non-European novel in translation

Task #4: Read an LGBTQ+ history book

For these challenges, I will be reading Death is Hard Work by Khaled Khalifa (#3), Queer: A Graphic History by Meg-John Barker (#4), and And the Band Played On by Randy Shilts (#4 - if it comes in in time...I mean, I'll read it either way. Just maybe not in February.) What would you choose for each challenge?