A Short Bright Flash   
by Theresa Levitt (2013)

read: 29 September 2025
rating: [+]

A history of the Fresnel lens and lighthouses generally. Picked this up when I was idly browsing library shelves and it was much more interesting than I expected. French engineers! Civil War lighthouse attacks! World War II German lighthouse occupiers! Did you know that many Fresnel lenses floated in vats of mercury and this is believed to be why lighthouse keepers have a reputation for being drunk and/or crazy? Read this book, learn more.

Dreadful   
by Caitlin Rozakis (2024)

read: 27 September 2025
rating: [+]

What if you woke up in a ruined laboratory which was sort of on fire and you had no idea who you were? This is about a Dark Wizard who got his memories stolen after he captured a princess but before he could do whatever dastardly thing he had planned for her. But now he... doesn’t feel dastardly? There’s a longer surrounding story about other Dark Wizards and the townspeople and a few goblins who act a little bit as comic relief. This book isn’t laugh-a-minute funny but it is a humorous look at this situation and I liked it.

Love You A Latke   
by Amanda Elliot (2024)

read: 19 September 2025
rating: [+]

I knew this one was a romance going into it. I liked the general themes of small town Vermont (though much of it takes place in New York City) trying to do something new for December and settling on a Hanukkah Festival run by the woman who operates the town’s coffee shop. She has a frequent customer who she finds annoying but who helps her see the best in things. Various members of the town help in their own unique ways. Schmaltzy, funny, sweet and predictable, it was nonetheless fun to be surrounded by Jewish/Vermont themes for a bit.

Netherford Hall   
by Natania Barron (2024)

read: 16 September 2025
rating: [+]

I do not know how some books wind up on my TBR list. This was a Regency supernatural quasi-romance (maybe entirely romance, I am not familiar with the genre) which, if it sounds appealing, seems to be a good example of that genre. Not really my thing since there’s a bit too much of that fantasy “Whose magic will outmagic the other?” conflict, but that is a me problem. The characters, nearly all women, are interesting and have depth and there’s so much lovely description, especially of outfits. A lot of knowing glances and accidental hand-brushing, that sort of thing.

The House   
by Paco Roca (2019)

read: 14 September 2025
rating: [+]

An elegant graphic novel with a lot of “show don’t tell” going on in it. Three grown children of a man who has died come back to the house to clean it out and see what they might want to do with it. Each person reverts to type a bit, they’re all very different, and the current time is juxtaposed with glimpses from their childhood or of their father doing various things. Sweet without being maudlin or telling you how to feel about any particular thing.

Seeking   
by Nellie Crabb (1938)

read: 14 September 2025
rating: [+]

Book 92: Seeking. There is a longer story about why I ILLed a book of poetry from the 1930s all based on a postcard I found at a thrift store. I was pleased to get this book. I found Crabb’s poetry to be pleasantly evocative, mainly about nature themes. The one about the library was, sadly, a paean to silence which was what you might expect for the time. Longer story about why I was looking for this book written up on my blog.

Threadbare   
by Anne Elizabeth Moore (2016)

read: 11 September 2025
rating: [+]

This was more of a series of essays with some pictures that went with them (i.e. huge speech bubbles, not much storytelling in the images) than a graphic novel. It outlines, with footnotes, how the global fashion trade exploits women and transgender folk, obscures the lines between sex work and trafficking in order to maintain the status quo, and gives us shoddier goods at a much higher human cost. I wasn’t on board entirely with all premises but was happy to learn more.

The Lighthouse Keeper   
by Eugenio Fernandez Vazquez (2025)

read: 10 September 2025
rating: [+]

This is a short book for children that I got as part of Library Thing’s Early Reviewer program. It’s translated from the Spanish and has a bunch of rhyming verses. The drawings are, as seen on this cover, pretty great. The verses are pretty simple but there is a short narrative about the job this man has and also he’s got some sort of a thing going on with the moon. Highly enjoyable.

Alif the Unseen   
by G. Willow Wilson (2012)

read: 8 September 2025
rating: [+]

Alif is the online name of an Arab-Indian hacker young man, sort of a middle to lower class inhabitant of Dubai. After a breakup, he gets in way over his head trying to make a tool to make himself invisible to his ex (was she really his ex or just the first person he got to experience sexually?) and has to involve some shady underworld/paranomal folk to help him get it sorted. He’s being chased by someone powerful in the Dubai/UAE government who is also a highly capable hacker and spends some time in this world and... another. Lively and from a perspective I rarely see.

The Mistletoe Matchmaker   
by Felicity Hayes-McCoy (2019)

read: 31 August 2025
rating: [+]

This is another book in the Finfarran Peninsula series. I’ve liked the other two. This one had more of a “We’re making a movie where all the actors can’t be on set at the same time” vibe with a lot of plot lines happening at the same time but without a lot of overlap so it felt a bit disjoined. And not much happens. And it’s Christmas and there’s a fete brewing which is going to be different from the ones before. So not my fave of the series but it was enjoyable and a welcome balm from the angsty fiction I’d been reading.

The Autistic’s Guide to Self-Discovery   
by Sol Smith (2025)

read: 30 August 2025
rating: [+]

Sol runs a community for neurospicy folk and this is a very practical book on what it can be like to have autism diagnosed (or self-dignosed) later in life. He talks about his own experiences and shares a few stories from people he’s worked with, suitably anonymized. While I don’t entirely fit the criteria here, I’m also not what you’d call allistic so I read this with interest and think many people in the same boat could get a lot from it. Sol has some very particular opinions, which is not surprising, so there may be a few bits of advice here that don’t quite click for you, but it’s pretty simple to take what is useful and ignore the rest if you prefer.

The Folded Sky   
by Elizabeth Bear (2025)

read: 28 August 2025
rating: [0]

I like Elizabeth Bear’s writing and I liked the past two books in this series but this one did not work for me. Another very anxious protagonist. Nearly constant assaults by space pirates who are two-dimensional unknowable opponents so there’s not a lot of nuance or learning there. A lot of that Momma Bear “Now that you’ve threatened my children I am REALLY MAD” posturing which I’m sure works for some people but does not work for me. There’s a lot of interesting interspecies interactions and those parts are fascinating but that was not enough for me.

Vet at the Ends of the Earth   
by Jonathan Hollins (2023)

read: 23 August 2025
rating: [+]

This is about a veterinarian from the UK who moves to the Falklands for work and then goes to more and more remote islands nearby doing vet work. It’s humorous and interesting and comes with a fair bit of history about the various locales (though not a lot of critique of their colonial legacy). I enjoyed the vignette-style recounting of meeting the world’s oldest tortoise, troubleshooting a weird lamb disease, and searching for a lost dog in the island canyons.

Spent   
by Alison Bechdel (2025)

read: 21 August 2025
rating: [+]

I’m not always into anxious protagonists but I make a huge exception for this excellent book. Bechdel writes a graphic novel which is both about a fictionalized her but also has most of the cast of Dykes to Watch Out For, set against the backdrop of These Wretched Times both national and local. I saw a cameo of my congresswoman! I saw goats and seed art. The story is about Bechdel grappling with her fame, relationships, and trying to relate to the next generation of queer folk.

The Martian Contingency   
by Mary Robinette Kowal (2025)

read: 17 August 2025
rating: [+]

I read the last book a while ago, so I’m not sure what parts of my feeling sort of “eh” about it were not remembering details from previous books and which were that, as an anxious person with Shit To Do, it wasn’t fun reading about a Lady Astronaut who is anxious and has Shit To Do. It’s about the second expedition to Mars, with a permanent habitat on the planet and an orbiting space station above it. A lot of stuff goes wrong but there are also secrets from a previous mission, secrets which may be endangering safety. A lot of “Why won’t these people TALK to each other?” thinking from me as I read this. Also, no shade to this terrific lady astronaut but in some ways--while she is a brilliant computer and thinky math person--she doesn’t always seem suited to lead an expedition.