2022 Books of the Year

I re-read Middlemarch again this year and finished Karen Baugh Menuhin's Heathcliff Lennox cozy mystery series. I loved Mr. Fogg the dog. These were the other standouts from 2022:

Poetry

Bonfire Opera by Danusha Laméris

Woman Without Shame Poems by Sandra Cisneros

Postcolonial Love Poem Natalie Diaz

Nonfiction

Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants by Robin Wall Kimmerer (everyone who recommended reading this was right)

The Wild Edge of Sorrow: Rituals of Renewal and the Sacred Work of Grief by Francis Weller (beautiful and insightful)

The Ponies at the Edge of the World: A Story of Hope and Belonging in Shetland by Catherine Munro (I don't expect this to necessarily be any one else's cup of tea, but during the pandemic I was obsessed with Shetland)

Fiction

These authors are masters. In awe! Delightful.

The Sentence by Louise Erdrich

Booth by Karen Joy Fowler
Kaiju Preservation Society by John Scalzi

This list not including my animal behavior and animal chaplaincy reads. More on that in 2023.

Comments

Springy story review: "State Change" by Ken Liu

Why it springs to mind: You'll never look at an ice cube the same way again. Where read: In the 2014 Hugo award-winning Lightspeed Magazine , August. Length: 5,194 words Summary: A woman has an ice cube for a soul. Memorable: How the story invites us to think about the shape of our soul, how it (or our perception of it) influences us and how it changes. What ordinary every day object would your soul be? A silver spoon, a beech stick? A great party conversation starter, this. Quote: “All life is an experiment." Notable: The protagonist Rina is an avid reader (always a good choice). Pairs well with: T.S. Elliot, Edna St. Vincent Millay Origin: The story was written in 24 hours based on a writing prompt. (See Author Spotlight: Ken Liu ) About the author: Ken Liu’s debut novel, The Grace of Kings , the first in a fantasy series The Dandelion Dynasty, is due out from Saga Press ( a new Simon & Schuster imprint ) in 2015.

What is Solarpunk? Good question, great answers from our community

What is solarpunk? My fellow Glass and Gardens: Solarpunk Summers authors Commando Jugendstil and Tales from The EV Studio put together this video for the Turin International Book Fair . It features editors and authors from the solarpunk community sharing their thoughts. Together we're imagining optimistic futures based on renewable energy. My soundbite was: "Solarpunk futures are — green spaces with clean water that are pedestrian, collective, feminist, creative communities. And they include non-human animals. " Mary "solarpunk" Shelley cat did a great job (at 6:15) helping from her rather ridiculous cat tree which she absolutely loves. And what better time to wear this solar-colored "Veganism is Feminism" tee from The Herbivore Clothing Company . Seriously. I'm holding a stack of solarpunk books: Glass and Gardens: Solarpunk Summers edited by Sarena Ulibarri which includes my story "Watch Out, Red Crusher!". Wings of R...

Springy story review: "Torching the Dusties" by Margaret Atwood

Why it springs to mind: Relevant thoughts about how we view aging and how we treat the aged in our society. In this story, young people protest the existence of old people in an assisted living facility for taking up resources. Not far from the callous viewpoint of people sometimes expressed in the national news. Where read: The last story in Stone Mattress: Nine Tales (2014) a collection by Margaret Atwood Summary: Wilma and her boyfriend Tobias escape an assisted living facility, Ambrosia Manor, that has come under attack by protestors carrying signs that say "Time to Go" and "Our Turn" who think the old people are just taking up space and resources. Memorable: the delightful use of Charles Bonnet Syndrome as a character trait for Wilma Quotes: "We have to be kind to one another in here, she tells herself. We're all we have left." "According to Tobias, women hang around longer because they're less capable of indignation and...

Shel Graves' Sensorium

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