Weekly Mews: My Bookish Mewsings on The Kaiju Preservation Society, The Roanoke Girls, & A Good Cry

I am linking up to the Sunday Post hosted by Kim of Caffeinated Book Reviewer and The Sunday Salon (TSS) hosted by Deb Nance of Readerbuzz  where participants recap our week, talk about what we are reading, share any new books that have come our way, and whatever else we want to talk about. I am also linking It's Monday! What Are you Reading? hosted by Kathryn of Book Date where readers talk about what they have been, are and will be reading.

 

It was quite windy and chilly out today, blue skies with a few white clouds here and there. The snow capped mountains on the horizon are quite picturesque. We got a lot of rain earlier in the week. It was nonstop there for awhile. We attended an award ceremony for Mouse at her school Thursday evening and made sure she could hear us cheering for her when her name was called. There was quite a crowd, but we had good seats. Mouse has the beginnings of a cold this weekend, unfortunately. The rest of us are hoping our scratchy throats are just sympathy symptoms. 

This past week I finished reading The Kaiju Preservation Society, The Roanoke Girls by Amy Engel and A Good Cry: What We Learn from Tears and Laughter by Nikki Giovanni. My thoughts on all three are farther down in this post. 

I currently am reading an essay collection called Why We Read: On Bookworms, Libraries, and Just One More Page Before Lights Out by Shannon Reed. I am finding it easily relatable and at times funny. It's got me reflecting on my own reasons why I read. 

 

One of my bookish goals this year is to read three books recommended by my daughter. Her first pick for me is the graphic novel, Misfit Mansion by Kay Davault, a story about misfit monsters, found family, and a dark secret . . . I have just begun reading it, but I am already loving it.

Thank you to everyone who voted in my February TBR List poll! This was a close one at times, but in the end a clear winner came out on top. Slay by Brittney Morris got three (3) votes, followed by Black Cake by Charmaine Wilkerson with six (6) votes. The winner of this month's poll is Women of the Post by Joshunda Sanders which won with eight (8) votes! I am looking forward to beginning Women of the Post soon. 

My TBR List was the idea of Michelle at Because Reading, and while Michelle has not been hosting this monthly event for some time now, it's one of my favorite traditions that I cannot bring myself to give up. It's just too much fun! The 1st Saturday of every month, I will list 3 books from my TBR pile I am considering reading and let you vote for my next read during that month. My review will follow (unfortunately, not likely in the same month, but eventually--that's all I can promise). 

"Jamie Gray!" ~ opening of The Kaiju Preservation Society

The Kaiju Preservation Society by John Scalzi
Tor Books, 2022
Science Fiction; 264 pgs
Source: From my own TBR

In the author's note at the end of the book, John Scalzi explains that he wrote The Kaiju Preservation Society as an escape from the horror that was 2020. He likened it to a pop song, something that entertains and comforts us.

Jamie Gray loses his job right as the pandemic begins to sweep through New York City. Forced to take a job as a food delivery person, he is doing what he can to get by. A fortuitous encounter with a former acquaintance, Tom Stevens, leads to a job opportunity Jamie cannot pass up. All Jamie knows is that Tom works for an animal rights organization that everyone is very tight-lipped about. It isn't until Jamie arrives in Greenland that he discovers why. The Kaiju Preservation Society (KPS) is a top secret organization, located on an alternate Earth. While there are similarities to our Earth, there are many differences, including the existence of giant creatures who are both valued and feared. It is the mission of KPS to study these creatures and to keep them from breaking through the barrier between the dimensions. It would be quite disastrous if that happened.

This was such a fun book to read. There are a lot of pop culture references to movies and fantasy novels. The author's wit comes through on just about every page. There were characters I could root for, bad guys to root against, suspense that had me sitting up in my chair, and a setting that took me out of my own world for a little while. The kaiju are fascinating creatures with their very own ecosystems. There was a moment or two when the scientific explanations were a bit much for me, but I found it all interesting.  I think the author accomplished what he wanted and then some with The Kaiju Preservation Society. I thoroughly enjoyed it and look forward to reading more by John Scalzi. 

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The first time I saw Roanoke was in a dream. ~ opening of The Roanoke Girls

The Roanoke Girls by Amy Engel, narrated by Brittany Pressley
Random House Audio, 2017
Mystery/Suspense/Thriller; 288 pgs (10h 41 min)
Source: From my own TBR

This was my first novel narrated by Brittany Pressley and I think she did a great job. Her tone and reading style fit Lane's character so well. 

Lane Roanoke returns to Osage Flats, Kansas after eleven years after learning her cousin, Allegra, is missing. She had sworn she would never go back after that one terrible summer she had lived there but she feels she owes it to Allegra. 

Author Amy Engel takes the reader back and forth between the present and the past as Lane searches for her cousin and remembers that long ago summer in Kansas. She was fifteen when her mother died and she was sent to live with the very people her mother had cut off all contact with. Lane's cousin, Allegra, abandoned my her own mother, introduces Lane to small town life and the advantages to having money. Lane's return after all these years means facing a past she longs to forget, including an ex-boyfriend who never quite got over her. 

Early on we find out the darkest secret of the Roanoke family. When a teen-aged Lane comes to live at the Roanoke estate, she is immediately drawn to her grandfather, whose kindness and attention she craves. Her own childhood was a difficult one, having been raised by a mother who seemed to hate her. As the past comes to light, the reader can better understand why Lane's mother behaved the way she did--the trauma she endured, why she ran, and how that impacted the way she parented her daughter. The impact extended to Lane's own relationships, past and present. Her lack of trust. Her self-hate. Her inability to form attachments. No one in this novel is without their own trauma and wounds. The history of abuse and the way the family normalized it over the years is extremely disturbing. 

I liked that the author included snippets from past Roanoke girls of previous generations, all of whom had disappeared or died young. It gives the reader a more fuller picture of just how dysfunctional this family was and how deeply the manipulation and trauma went. In some ways, this novel felt like a character study in how familial sexual abuse can affect one generation after another. There was no romanticizing of the abuse in this novel. I focus a lot here on the family's dark secret, and the novel does too. But there's still the mystery of what happened to Allegra, and whether she's alive or dead.

Did I like this book? I have mixed feelings about it, but I know that has more to do with the subject matter than it does with the execution. I generally avoid books (with a few exceptions) that delve into incest or child sexual abuse and probably would not have picked this one up had I known what it was about. Still, it says something that I kept listening. I was invested enough in the characters and their fates to continue to the end. 

A Good Cry: What We Learn from Tears and Laughter by Nikki Giovanni

William Morrow; 2017

Nonfiction/Memoir/Poetry; 128 pgs

Source: From my own TBR  

I started to read this poetry collection a year or so ago, set it aside, and it got lost under other books. I discovered it again recently and decided the time was right. 

Nikki Giovanni is an award winning poet, one I had not had a chance to read before. I enjoyed reading her poetry for its simplicity and depth. She writes about every day tasks from childhood and present, growing up in a home with domestic violence, her love for her grandparents, about the Civil Rights Era, and Denmark Vesey and the outlawing of the drum, just for starters. She pays tribute to people who have touched her life, including Maya Angelou, one of my favorite poets and her dear friend. Just as the subtitle says, I found myself laughing and tearing up. 

I often struggle over what parts of poems to share. Sometimes there are favorite verses that pop of the page. With this collection it was entire poems that captured my heart. I cannot share them in their entirety, but here are some excerpts from a few of my favorites. 

Among my favorite poems in this collection is "Summer Storms":

There are those who say 

We should run

inside from the storm

But that would be 

like leaving Grandmother

at the kitchen table

alone and sad 

A tribute poem to Maya Angelou called "At Times Like These" also moved me. It begins:

At times like these

We measure our words

Because we are

Measuring a life

My heart ached for a young Nikki in her poem called "Surveillance" as she witnessed her father beat her mother:

I am a camera

I am the silent film

It was recorded because

I surveilled

Another favorite of mine is "We Marched", in celebration of the 100th Anniversary of the founding of the Sisterhood of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority:

    The Suffragettes did not want us

Offering only the back of the March

Our other did not understand us so we went

Our separate ways

    But The Time Had Come

Black Women would no longer Wait

    We Marched

I often dogear pages in my poetry books when I come across a poem I especially like, and A Good Cry has quite a few. I enjoyed this collection of poetry and am so glad I finally pulled it off my shelf to read. 

I hope you have a great week! Let me know what you have been reading!

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