Meredith’s Comments (group member since May 11, 2014)

Meredith’s comments from the The Diverse Shelf group.

Did anyone read them?

My library didn't have Love, InshAllah: The Secret Love Lives of American Muslim Women, and my used copy only got here a week ago, but I look forward to eventually reading it.

I loved Ten Things I Hate About Me. I think Abdel-Fattah did a really excellent job with the subject, and I loved Jamilah. Everything was predictable, but being a teenage is pretty predictable, and that wasn't really the point of the book. The audiobook was also really well done. I have a thing about Australian writers (never been disappointed by them), so I was happy to see that's where this author hailed from (and where it's set).

I have an Egyptian half-aunt who we found out about after my granddaddy died (sigh), and we helped her and her sons prove their citizenship and move here. I often wonder how my little cousin dealt with issues of identity (and racism/Islamophobia). I think he was 10 when they moved to Atlanta from Cairo (same age as my oldest aunt when they moved to a Cairo suburb from New Jersey).

That's fine! Maybe it was just a Goodreads glitch then? If there's something you want to post about but don't have time shoot me a message.

I tried to make a discussion topic for August's books but it wouldn't let me, so I guess that's a mods only thing?

Let us know what we can do!

YA: First Spring Grass Fire
Adult: The Testosterone Files: My Hormonal and Social Transformation from Female to Male

All the books I find are hard to get, unfortunately, or very new and thus also harder to find in libraries, etc... Maybe we could do the picking and voting for the rest of the year this month, and that way we'd have longer to get titles (and a possibility that our libraries could order them in time).

It's not another country for US people, but here's another diverse reading help list (it's a PDF):
Indigenous Hawaiian Authors

I forgot about this challenge!

May:
Ancient Egyptian Literature: An Anthology

June:
Purple Hibiscus

July:
War with the Newts
Rabbit-Proof Fence: The True Story of One of the Greatest Escapes of All Time
Who Fears Death
A Train in Winter: An Extraordinary Story of Women, Friendship, and Resistance in Occupied France
Empress Dowager CIXI

I don't think my modding would add a new perspective at all, and I'm not sure I can commit to keeping up with things. What exactly do you want a new mod to do?

I just finished Mean Little Deaf Queer and absolutely loved it.

Maybe in future we should avoid new books and make sure the choices have been out in paperback for a few months?

I haven't tried to look for it, in part because I don't think I'll enjoy it. I'd like to find some takes on it by people with synesthesia because I worry the author just threw it in there for the exotic factor.

Though for any other non-fiction lovers/history buffs, Destiny Disrupted: A History of the World Through Islamic Eyes by Tamim Ansary is an incredible book. Feels too long to officially suggest here though.

Glad you're here to make suggestions! It's hard looking for random things when you're not connected to the diversity issue at hand and can be out of the loop for problematic stuff. Partly since I just want everyone to constantly read Naguib Mahfouz and there's a modern world beyond him.

Hello, EJ, nice to meet you!

Young adult first:
Skunk Girl
Guantanamo Boy

If you've already signed up for an Audible free trial but want the audiobook, you might see if a friend or relative who isn't into audiobooks will sign up for you.

Also, if you have an independent bookstore (that deals in new books) in your region, they're usually happy to mail things to customers who are unable to pick things up (though you will have to talk to someone on the phone).

✿Lilac✿ wrote: "Aristotle and Dante is amazing, oh my god. Do you know how the average teen feels about The Fault in Our Stars? That's how I feel about it."

Me too, though I don't get it so much for The Fault in Our Stars. Green will write a great character who feels real and then insert an "ideal teen/how we wish we were as teens" character and it leaves me so cold. Of course I'm not a teenager, and reading about teens isn't my first choice for various reason. I can understand that some teens wouldn't mind that as much, but all the young adults reading, surely they notice it too?

Aristotle and Dante felt all real to me. Those weren't idealized teens, they were just teens.

Soccer has eaten up my reading time almost entirely. Hoping to read The Golem and the Jinni in July though.

Not yet! It's on my list, but it's also the World Cup so I'm not getting as much reading done as usual. I'll probably try to start it after my current book is finished.

I'm definitely glad people get so wrapped up in book characters, that's just never been me. I always liked non-fiction best, even as a kid, so maybe that's part of it. I was a daydreamer but I got lost in pretending to be Caesar. It's more the imagining the character doing other things, in other situations, the character as a very separate entity (vs putting myself in their place) that's hard for me to grasp.

By the end I was soo hoping for the ending he gave us. I only get wrapped up in character feelings while I'm reading the book but I could not stop reading either (never think about them much after unless I'm actively discussing it, the level of people's 'fandoms' so baffles me).