the virgin suicides by jeffrey eugenides

I'm not the target audience for the nostalgia, but I thought the whole thing about urban decay was clever. The sleazy feeling combined with the writing worked well. 

the saint of bright doors by vajra chandrasekera

It's okay that this book was extremely milennial because the purple prose was good and dense (you can tell the author was doing more than just playing with sounds) and because as much as it was about unlearning your generational trauma in therapy, the theme of religious hegemony specifically was pretty unique. 

There were quite a few passages that should have stayed in the worldbuilding drafts; this is normal for a first novel. 

native speaker by chang-rae lee

 It's an excellent novel in its own right, and I completely understand why it has so many diaspora-novel imitators. It's multi - layered, the writing is very good, and it's only a little bit corny. The diaspora angst is fully realized and genuine, introspective, yet carefully written, to perfectly suit the narrator. I didn't know this would be such a nyc-grounded novel, but it's also a fitting time in my life right now to have read it. 

the deep by rivers solomon

Not only is the story uninteresting, but there is basically no inventive or descriptive language, and no emotional impact. Even with how short it is, it feels stretched out with the word thesaurus feature or superfluous repetition. 

 "in one of the rememberings, there was still hair caught in a comb belonging to the foremother... She could only imagine how the bonds of black keratin had once choked the carved ivory." 

"Her stomach was bloated and overstuffed, so even though she was hungry, she could not bear to eat another bite."

???

the true deceiver by tove jansson (trans. thomas teal)

 It's the quintessential "adult" book not in sex or gore, but depictions of cynicism and social norms. Short and sparse, but all the loops are closed neatly and the themes play out perfectly. Not comparing this to roald dahl because of the Scandinavians writing about coldness trope, but an author of slightly disquieting children's work going no holds barred unsentimentality for adult novels. 

woman on the edge of time by marge piercy

The whole thing was basically two layers of the noble-savage trope, but given how long ago this was written, it was pretty imaginative and politically motivating. The writing was good, but from my point of view, the "ethnic" aspect of the voice was overdone. 

transfigurations by michael bishop

The writing is good, there are some quite interesting parts, and overall it seems aware not only of what biological anthropology "is" but what biological anthropology "is for".