Completely Full Bookshelf

Not to be a week behind on traumatic national events (sigh), but today (Monday) is the last day to enter in the 2021 Books by Asian-American Voices Giveaway , which I am holding as a response to the hate crimes committed recently against Asian-Americans. The linked page also has a set of valuable resources, so check it out! With that, today, I am recommending the YA graphic novel A Map to the Sun  by Sloane Leong. As usual, a reminder that this book is young adult (YA), not middle grade (MG), and contains some mature content. Also, TRIGGER WARNING  for arson and relationships between adults and minors. (I feel like the trigger warning really does set a certain tone for the rest of the post, but I certainly don't want people reliving any trauma, so here we are.)            As we all know by now, I love graphic novels, so I was thrilled to see a recommendation for a new one from the wonderful #IMWAYR blogger Sue Jackson, who blogs about an impr...

Lots to discuss today! First of all, I have redesigned my blog! I won't get too far into the details (since I already did so in this post ), but suffice it to say that the new template works better on smaller screens and is far more aesthetically pleasing. (It also has a new header image that I took myself, which features the book I am reviewing today alongside Faith: Taking Flight  and The List of Things That Will Not Change !) Also, it has officially been (a) an entire year since I joined #IMWAYR and (b) an entire year of me blogging every single week! I'm honestly as shocked as you are that I've managed it this long—as the MMGM bloggers know, I have had a history of dropping of the face of the Earth for months at a time. But I've finally managed to stick with blogging, and I plan to keep participating in both MMGM and #IMWAYR for as many consecutive weeks as I can manage! One more thing: make sure to keep going past the end of today's review for information about...

There are many things about Blogger that I have found frustrating in the past—the comment section that does not notify people when I respond to their comments, the archaic email subscription system, the random glitches, etc. I cannot fix any of these things, but there is one thing about Blogger that I discovered I could fix—my blog's design! The previous theme I was using looked like this: It was one of the older Blogger themes (which I literally chose because it was the first one on the list), and though it was reasonable enough, I never liked how it appeared in comparison to some of the other bloggers who were lucky enough to start out on WordPress.com. But as it turns out, Blogger has some new, much more aesthetically pleasing themes available, so I selected one and customized it to where my blog now looks like this: Here's what's different (and the same): I have a new header image of blue books without their dust jackets that I took myself! I think it came out well (and...

Time for some pre-post ranting. We had to get a new washing machine because the 3-year-old one from GE we had ( basically this one ) has been broken in progressively ridiculous ways for 2 years. Let's see...it would randomly stop in the middle of cycles (i.e. filled with water and soap), it would randomly start again with the lid open , it would forget to undo the electronic lid-lock and prevent us from getting our clothes out at the end, it would make random beeping noises (and not error beeps—just random, arrhythmic chirping), it would be constantly off-balance and making a racket during the spin cycle, and it would use so much energy as the agitator ran that our house lights would flicker, almost imperceptibly (but of course not imperceptibly, because I perceived it), to the rhythm of the agitations. So glad that beast is gone. That is now the fifth GE laundry appliance we have owned that lasted less than four years (including two dryers that made accordion-esque scraping noise...

I realize it's a bit late, but I want to condemn the recent increases in violence against Asian-Americans and remind everyone to keep on educating themselves as much as their emotional state can allow them to tolerate. Also, I want to mention that, at least on #IMWAYR if not MMGM, it sounds like literally every blogger had a terrible week last week. I know that staying hopeful and energized has been difficult for me recently, and I can imagine it has been a similar struggle for others, so I want to empathize with everyone for how awful everything is (both on a global and personal level), thank everyone for putting up their posts every week (which is definitely a little constant source of joy in my life), and hope to bring a little joy to your lives with today's posts! With that, we can move into the gentle art of Swedish death cleaning  book reviewing with a recommendation of  Hollowpox: The Hunt for Morrigan Crow  by Jessica Townsend. I am proud to announce that this rev...