January was a weird month for me. My partner and I started the new year sick at home with Covid-19, which caused us to miss a trip to see my family, so I was pretty bummed for a while. My fellow mood-readers will know that when we struggle with our mental health, it can be hard to find and enjoy a new book or story. That’s definitely how it felt for me, and it took me almost a week to commit to a new read. At one point I started Call Me By Your Name by Andre Aciman, but it just didn’t fit the vibe check at the time. Once I was invested in one, however, it didn’t take me long to get back on track. Here’s all the books I ended up reading in January.
#0. The Seven Principles of Making a Marriage Work by John Gottman
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...by holding your relationship to the highest standards, you are far more likely to achieve the kind of marriage you want than you are by looking the other way and letting things slide.
I call this #0 because I started reading it in 2021, and was most of the way done by January; but it was the first book I finished in 2022. I was recommended this book by a friend who is a therapist, and I’m so glad I finally read it. In it, Dr. Gottman provides his best tips for cultivating a long, healthy relationship with a partner; the information he presents is supported by decades of peer-reviewed research, yet is provided in a way that will be accessible to the average couple.
If you’re not as much into the data-aspect, it also provides some easy and helpful exercises and strategies to explore with your partner that will help put some of the information into context.
My primary (and only) gripe with this book is the high use of gendered language. Many of the examples throughout the book are of heteronormative couples, who often fit into fairly narrow gender stereotypes. This could be alienating to any queer couples, or even to any heterosexual couple that doesn’t fit standard gender roles. However, I have been reassured that this issue has been noted by the Gottman Institute, and that they are working to remedy it.
All in all, I think this a super helpful book to anyone in a long-term relationship if you can ignore the gendered language. I would also recommend checking out more of the Gottman Institute‘s work and following them on Instagram if you’re interested in topics like this.
#1. Darkly Dreaming Dexter by Jeff Lindsay
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In my troubles deciding on a book, I also couldn’t settle on an audiobook. I eventually picked this one out of decision fatigue. I was obsessed with the Dexter show several years ago, and even though I remember reading this at some point, the audiobook is narrated by the author convinced me to re-visit it. Plus, the new season of the show had just ended; I heard it was awful, but it still had me aching for Dexter content.
Jeff Lindsay’s inflection certainly gave a more lackadaisical and apathetic dimension to Dexter’s character, in contrast with Michael C. Hall’s dark and deeply serious portrayal on screen. While I’m probably biased in preferring Hall, I did love hearing that author’s inflection with the story.
The first book is entertaining, but I think I still prefer the plot of the show. It was an entertaining story, but it didn’t grip me the same way I remember it doing so during my first read. By the end I wasn’t sure if I wanted to continue with the second in the series or not.
#2. Over the Top by Jonathan Van Ness
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Joyful accomplishments exist next to painful memories. I found a lot of my healing when I realized that my suffering didn’t undo my joy.
TW: drug addiction, sexual compulsivity, childhood sexual abuse
After I binge-watched the ATX season of Queer Eye, I fell back in love with the Fab Five and wanted to dive in to any of their stories further, and settled on JVN’s. I honestly did not expect myself to enjoy it as much as I did! For starters, the audiobook is narrated by JVN himself; his inflections and infectiously buoyant demeanor are perfectly portrayed to make you laugh a lot, make you ponder, and even make you cry a few times.
Although the fun, flamboyant, high-energy and positive JVN that we all know and love certainly exists in this story, he also offers some poignant and unfiltered insights into his past struggles with things like gender identity, sexual compulsion, queerness, grief, and childhood sexual abuse; he details how he acknowledges and heals from his struggles , and how those journeys have contributed to who he is today.
I’m not going to lie: after I listened to JVN tell their story and explain their healing process, I was more than half-way convinced that they should take over for Karamo doing the therapy/healing portions of Queer Eye; because damn, has that queen done some hard, internal work!
If you enjoy Queer Eye and/or JVN to any extent, or you are going to love this one! I promise.
#3. On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous by Ocean Vuong
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I was once foolish enough to believe knowledge would clarify, but some things are so gauzed behind layers of syntax and semantics, behind day and hours, names forgotten, salvaged and shed, that simply knowing the wound exists does nothing to reveal it.
This is a heart-breaking coming of age story framed as a letter written from the main character, Little Dog, to his mother, am immigrant from Korea who cannot read English. While the typical struggles of adolescence are difficult for any soon-to-be-adult, Little Dog’s story is also wrapped up in the hardships of being queer in a rural community, drug addiction, and the struggles of living as immigrants in America.
While I certainly tend to favor more straightforward text in stories, I was captivated by the poeticism of Vuong’s prose. There were some phrases and passages I had to turn over in my mind a few times before finally digesting their beauty, like a sommelier swirling wine around the palate. It was almost as if I felt some of the words intuitively before my brain could logic out their meaning, and that’s a feeling that’s hard to experience with less-poetic work.
There is a scene towards the end that absolutely made me bawl. I won’t get into spoilers, but Little Dog experiences something I experienced last year, and his depiction of the situation certainly opened up a lot of deep emotions with me.
I’m proud of myself for sticking with this one, despite not intuiting some the poetic prose until about a third of the way through. It was well worth the read, and a truly beautiful story.
#4. Dearly Devoted Dexter by Jeff Lindsay
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I caved and decided to listen to this one too. I realized about 1/3rd of the way in that I’ve actually read this one as well in the past. The main antagonist in this story is super dark and disturbed, as are the depictions of what he does. It’s pretty different from anything the show ever did.
However, this book did solidify for me how 2-dimensional most of the characters are. It makes sense for Dexter, but not everyone else. The plot also was fairly unrealistic at points, especially towards the end. Certain plot decisions just felt kind of silly.
If I continue listening to the series after this, it will mostly be to see how Dexter’s relationship with Astor and Cody develops further. I think that Cody (and by extension, Astor) having the same urges to kill as Dexter and Dexter wanting to “train” Cody in the Harry Code is an interesting plot point that the show neglected to pursue. We shall see if I read the next one!
#5. Detransition, Baby by Torrey Peters
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TW: graphic sexual content, suicide, drug use
I wanted to prioritize this read because I have read very little writing by trans authors, and just as little about trans characters. Aside from that, the plot itself seemed unique, and the contrast of gender identity among the three primary characters seemed like an interesting way to frame the presentation of women’s issues, more specifically trans women’s issues.
While there are a few passages, specifically when the characters internally monologue about how gender ties into sexual power play, that initially triggered my inner-feminist into indignation, I kept reading and realized that reaction was probably deliberately manufactured by the author. This sentiment is nicely summarized by this quote:
She didn’t make the rules of womanhood; like any other girl, she had inherited them. Why should the burden be on her to uphold impeccable feminist politics that barely served her?
The contrast of the 3 different women musing about what motherhood and parenthood means to each of them and how they have reached those conclusions overall was a masterful way to frame this important story. Some internal monologues and musings into the past did get a tad lengthy, but it did not detract from the story too heavily.
Overall, there were definitely some uncomfortable parts, but there is no growth without discomfort. By the end I fully appreciated all of the different emotions this book fished out, and the importance of this story cannot be overstated.
What was your favorite read from January?
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