February 2024 Reading

Another month has gone by.  I read seven books in February.

Audio first:  I am continuing to listen to Dorothy Sayers mysteries (have I mentioned that I love getting audiobooks from the library?).  Clouds of Witness was fun to listen to.  I have read it many times before, so I enjoy seeing how the story is put together.

 

I read three nonfiction books this month.  The first was Elliot Page’s memoir Pageboy.  I really wanted to like this book.  As a person who loves a trans person, I absolutely applaud Page’s courage and his successful navigation of his transition.  The prose pained me.  I’m glad I read it.  More stories like his need to filter into our collective consciousness so that we learn, as a society, to let people be themselves, whoever that turns out to be.  Your mileage may vary.  Verdict:  good story, bad writing.

 

Speaking of writing, I enjoyed Conversations on Writing by Ursula K. Le Guin with David Naimon.  The interviews are amusing, smart, and thought-provoking.  It’s clear that the two of them had some chemistry.  It felt kind of like eavesdropping on the cool kids.

 

Principles of Movement was written by Brent Anderson, the founder of Polestar Pilates, where I did my Pilates education.  The book, as one would expect from the title, distills the founding principles he uses to conceptualize what we do in Pilates and in movement in general.  While it is perhaps most useful for movement professionals, there is a fair amount that can benefit the general reader who wants to know more about how to move well.

 

On to fiction.  My church book group is reading The Inquisitor’s Tale by Adam Gidwitz.  I’m going to miss the next few weeks of discussion and I really wanted to know how it ended, so I finished it.  It’s a Newberry Honor book with lovely illustrations by Hatem Aly.  I am not sure that there is a book more up my alley.  It’s set in the medieval period, narrated by various different folks in turn, and has a saintly dog in it.  Three children, all outsiders in their own ways, meet up and overcome all kinds of obstacles, including a farting dragon.  It’s funny and deep and wise.  Read it.

 

Finally, I polished off the last two of Gail Carriger’s Custard Protocol novels, Competence and Reticence.  Totally satisfying reads.  I have no complaints.  Go read them.

 

February total:  7

Spring total to date:  26

Year to date total:  26