• ARCs,  Book Reviews,  Fiction

    BLAINE FOR THE WIN by Robbie Couch | ARC Review

    12th April 2022
    Illustrated cover of Blaine for the Win (Robbie Couch).

    BLAINE FOR THE WIN by Robbie Couch

    Click on the cover for my review on Goodreads.

    I couldn’t put down Blaine for the Win and finished it in two sittings. The vibe of it reminds me of TJ Klune’s The Extraordinaries (my review) but without superpowers.

    Blaine Bowers (~16, achillean) cannot believe he got dumped by Joey Oliver (gay). On their one-year anniversary. At the fanciest restaurant ever. Joey said he didn’t want to date the mural painter who isn’t the kind of Serious Guy he needs to become President of the United States one day. Blaine will win him back by showing that he can ditch his mural painting gigs and be serious… by signing up to run for senior class president? Enlisting the help of his best friends Trish MacIntosh (sapphic, Black) and Camilla (sapphic) as well as the not-friend-only-acquaintance Danny Nguyen (bi, Vietnamese American) for an insider perspective from the student council, Blaine is ready to prove himself to be worthy of Joey. As the race kicks off, is winning Joey back still going to be Blaine’s goal?

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  • ARCs,  Book Reviews,  Fiction

    PORTRAIT OF A THIEF by Grace D. Li | ARC Review

    5th April 2022
    Cover of Portrait of a Thief (Grace D. Li)

    PORTRAIT OF A THIEF by Grace D. Li

    Click on the cover for my review on Goodreads.

    ★★★★★

    I love this book with my whole heart.

    Prior to reading Portrait of a Thief, I had heard other readers rave about Li’s writing. But no amount of praise had prepared me for this level of gorgeousness.

    Li writes in a way that makes my heart weep, the sheer power and rhythm and emotions her sentences carry. She captured the yearnings of the future, relationships, and connections with a familiar land that is too far away in the best way possible.

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  • ARCs,  Book Reviews,  Fiction

    DISORIENTATION by Elaine Hsieh Chou | ARC Review

    23rd March 2022
    Cover of Disorientation (Elaine Hsieh Chou)

    DISORIENTATION by Elaine Hsieh Chou

    Click on the cover for my review on Goodreads.

    Disorientation follows a 29-year-old Taiwanese American PhD student Ingrid Yang (cishet) as she works on her dissertation on Xiao-Wen Chou, a fictional “Asian American” icon. Ingrid starts out as someone who is ignorant on the subject of racism and other social justice issues, which is the realm of her nemesis and fellow graduate student Vivian Vo (sapphic, Vietnamese American). Throughout her research, Ingrid finds substantial dirt on Xiao-Wen Chou, and it becomes the start of her journey of unlearning as well as sets off catastrophic events in Barnes University.

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  • A header banner featuring the covers of the five books mentioned in the post.
    Writing

    5 Books that Helped Me Reimagine the Craft of Fiction Writing

    27th February 2022

    It has, once again, been a while since I wrote a post that was not a book review. Some of you might have heard that I have a short story coming out in Awakenings: A Cute Mutants Anthology (edited by SJ Whitby) on March 1st (see here for preorder links). And some of you might know that while “Island Burnt by History” is going to be my first published story, I have been dedicating myself to writing fiction over the past two years. There are a few short fiction pieces that I hope would see the light of day sometime soon. I will keep you updated.

    Foreword

    This blog post, or essay if you will, is inspired by my self-reflection of what it means to be a reader and writer of color, of diaspora, of queerness. This is not a post about books from the point of view as a book reviewer. I am relatively new to the writing scene where I interact with other writers as a writer even though I grew up writing stories in both English and Chinese.

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