Grady Hendrix: Horrorstör

The physical design of this book is fantastic. The faux-Ikea descriptions and illustrations are pitch-perfect, right up to the point they turn sinister and twisted. I enjoyed the earlier, funnier, half more than the second, but a lot of that is due to my personal preferences. I wanted the protagonists’ economic stresses to play into

Lucy Score: The Worst Best Man

I loved Mia Sosa’s book of the same title so much that I read a bunch of reviews, looking for other readers as enthused about it as I was … and I stumbled on one that mentioned also really liking this novel. And I did, eventually, really like this too. What won me over primarily

Olivia Jaimes: Nancy

A bold, creative, and FUNNY reboot. People had been sharing some of the more fourth-wall-breaking strips with me for a while on the screen-things, but sitting down with a bookful gave me a new appreciation for how solid a body of work this is.

Catherynne M Valente: Space Opera

I loved this book so much it’s hard for me to write coherently about it. The language: dense, rich, vivid musical. The premise: yes, Eurovision in space, played for laughs, but not JUST for laughs, also a glorious, delirious refutation of “rare earth” and “habitable zones,” a dizzying celebration of near-infinite diversity. A plot twist,

Sara Benincasa: DC Trip

liked this better after I stopped worrying about the geographical inaccuracies and just went with the full-on zany. the framing device didn’t work for me, and some of the backstory digressions seemed a bit OTT, but I did like the alternating chapters from the kids’ perspectives and the chaperones’ perspectives. sweet (if a bit raunchy)