Category: Gender
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The Murderbot Diaries vol. 1: All Systems Red
All Systems Red by Martha Wells Rating: 3/5, average I really loved the concept of this, but I wasn’t crazy about the execution. All Systems Red is about a nonbinary asexual robot who went berserk in their last job and killed a bunch of their employers, so in their head they call themselves “murderbot”…
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Yes, You Are Trans Enough by Mia Violet
Rating: 5/5, amazing I started following Mia Violet on Twitter (@OhMiaGod) once I started being more active on Twitter a year or two ago and she consistently posts good stuff, mostly on trans topics but also on mental health and other subjects. This book is a memoir of Mia’s life from her childhood in a…
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Venus Plus X by Theodore Sturgeon
Rating: 3/5, average Warning: This review contains spoilers! It really ended up being more of a summary than a review because I was having a hard time understanding the plot and I thought others might benefit from seeing the story written out. It’s well-written but there’s a lot of complexity in the language as well…
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Autonomous by Annalee Newitz
Rating: 4/5, good I was really excited to read this book. I’ve seen Annalee Newitz speak a bit in SF and I was a big fan of i09 while that was still running so I was really curious what they would write. They have a lot of experience in tech journalism and it comes to…
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Your and My Secret by Ai Morinaga
Rating: 4/5, good I’ve only read volume 1 so far, but this manga is really cute! It’s a bit old (2003), but I think it’s still worth a look. I picked this up at the swap meet at Fanime. It’s about a teenage boy and a teenage girl, Akira Uehara and Nanako Momoi, who switch…
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Space Opera by Catherynne M. Valente
Space Opera by Catherynne M. Valente Rating: 4/5, good When this was published last year (2018), it took the Twitter world by storm. It seemed like everybody was posting about it, but I didn’t buy it when it first came out because the premise didn’t appeal to me. It’s a scifi novel about some Earthlings…
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Play It As It Lays by Joan Didion
Rating: 4/5, good This book is horrifically, horrifically depressing. I usually enjoy dark books, but I didn’t get anything resembling “pleasure” out of this one. It is SO INCREDIBLY BLEAK. It doesn’t have the dramatic despair of Darconville’s Cat, the humble nihilism of Too Loud a Solitude, or the morbid curiosity of Susanna Kaysen’s Girl, Interrupted.…
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The Long Way to a Small Angry Planet by Becky Chambers
Rating: 4/5 Wonderful! This is a book that appeals to anyone with a heart (in the metaphorical sense). This book is what I always wanted scifi to be, but it never was… aliens who are really alien, but not othered by the narrative.
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The Bride was a Boy by Chii
Rating: 3/5, average This book is in the same vein as My Lesbian Experience with Loneliness, in fact, Amazon recommended it to me right after I added that book to my cart, so I got this as well. My spouse is undergoing gender transition right now and I thought it might have some helpful tips…