I think my 18 month reading slump is ending. To be fair, it hasn’t been 18 months without books. I have started many books. I forced myself through some. I DNFed a fair few. I enjoyed some, too. But only some. My chosen books weren’t bad. They just didn’t appeal.

So what did I read?

The Folk of the Air series by Holly Black

I thought this series was the end of the reading slump. I chanced upon the Cruel Prince, then devoured The Wicked King. I was on the waitlist at several libraries to acquire the Queen of Nothing. It’s full of twists and turns. I was cheering and crying with Jude and gasp with hands over my mouth several times. Jude is a human who grew up in Faerie with her twin human sister and half-faery older sister. While keeping it short, there’s culture and race conflicts, treason in the royal family, double-crossing and mystery. Oh, and faeries.

Darius the Great Deserves Better by Adib Khorram

This sequel to Darius the Great Is Not OK was released just after I decided to stop blogging, so I missed it then. I’m kind of glad I read it earlier this month, because I was so burned out then I probably wouldn’t appreciate the book’s brilliance. It also became an accidental Pride read. I never thought of it as being a LGBTIQ+ story because it’s just Darius. Darius is a teen boy who loves soccer, is conflicted by a dual ancestry and happens to like boys. Darius’ sexuality is no different than any straight teen here. Well, there’s a little bit of bullying, but I love the author delves below the surface there. Darius having a boyfriend is so normalised that his mother makes a comment about their Persian friends being a bit old-fashioned and he assumed they were offended by his grandmothers, not him.

OK, quick summary, Darius’ life is going great, interning at his favourite tea shop, dating the tea shop owner’s son, has a best friend in Iran, getting along better with his father. Then life happens. Books about everyday events tend to bore me lately, but I want a third book in this series. There’s no reason to write one, but Darius is like a little brother and I want to enjoy his story.

Creativity Inc by Ed Catnull

It literally took me three years to read this. There are some excellent stories about how Toy Story 2 was nearly lost because all the files were accidentally deleted and the management culture issues when Disney bought Pixar. But, there was lots I couldn’t get into. I didn’t fawn over Steve Jobs the way Ed still does, and there are lots of little anecdotes that, to be honest, bored me. It’s probably a good book for the right person. I just could have got the same from a couple of articles or long blog posts.

Get Shit Done by Jeffrey Gitomer

I switch off from anyone who says the only way you can be productive is to get started before the sun each day.

The G Ring by Rebecca Tuhus-Dubrow

The subtitle gives a better description: How the IUD escaped the Nazis.

I borrowed a heap of short books to get my 2021 reading challenge done and only read some this year. This is an excellent story of how controversial the IUD was and how revolutionary it was, also, to medical history and women and society.

I read more than this but not much more. These were just the ones that stuck out, good and bad. It’s more breadth than I’ve shared here previously. I like reading a wide range and my new breaking the rules philosophy helps with that. Any suggestions of what to read next?

Oh, and I didn’t have time to do a new bookish shoot. The featured photo above is by Alisa Anton on Unsplash.