Backlogged

As many of you know, I get most of my review ARCs as ebook files from NetGalley. Every now and again, I’ll get advance titles directly from the publisher, but I’ve noticed that many publishers are sending out fewer physical ARCs overall. Whether this is due to the high cost of producing them or an attempt at curbing scalpers trying to sell their ARCs online (may they live in shame always), the fact is that it’s easier (for me and many other reviewers, that is) to keep up with physical ARCs than it is digital ones.

Thus the backlog. I have a veritable mountain of ebook ARCs to get through, so I’m going to *attempt* to limit my time online in order to get through a large chunk of these titles. Not to worry, though, I’m not going anywhere. I might not be posting as often as I have been, but you’ll still see fresh content on the regular.

Thanks as always for being a faithful reader of The Voracious Bibliophile. If you like what you see, please follow, like, comment, and subscribe to my email list to get notified of new posts as soon as they drop. You can also email me at thevoraciousbibliophile@yahoo.com or catch me on Twitter @voraciousbiblog. Keep reading the world, one page (or pixel) at a time.

All Aboard the ARC: I Hope This Finds You Well: Poems by Kate Baer

***Note: I received a digital ARC of Kate Baer’s forthcoming collection, I Hope This Finds You Well, from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.***

There is something profound, one might even say holy, about taking back space from those who would push you to the margins. I Hope This Finds You Well does just that. Kate Baer’s newest collection is a reclamation, a clarion call, and a battle cry all at once. Never one to shrink away from her detractors, Baer takes the vitriol hurled in her direction and turns it into verse. Herein lies not only an alchemical affirmation, but a jagged path home. Please read this book.

I Hope This Finds You Well is due to be released on November 9, 2021 and is now available to preorder wherever books are sold.

Some of My Favorite Tweets

Sometimes Twitter is just *chef’s kiss* magnificent. While no social media platform is perfect and some are downright godawful (here’s looking at you, Facebook!), I always return to Twitter for conversation, community, clarity, and hilarity.

I am so dedicated to Twitter, in fact, that I have a Google Drive folder full of screenshots of tweets that speak to me. I hope you enjoy them as much as I do.

Note: Under the screenshots, I’m going to re-type the text appearing in the tweet as well as text descriptions for any gifs or photos so they’re accessible to everyone.

@kat_armas: Them: be like Jesus Me: ok *drinks wine, calls people hypocrites, upsets men in power* Them: not like that Me: *shrug emoji*

So, I love this tweet for many reasons, not least of all because it paints Jesus as a rebel contrarian, which he was. If “Fight Me, Heathen” Jesus isn’t your favorite Jesus, what are you even doing with your life?

@socompliKATIEd: Phil Collins created that Tarzan soundtrack with the passion of someone whose parents were personally killed by a leopard

Yes! It has always been my assertion that Tarzan has the best soundtrack of any Disney film ever, and that still tracks. Frozen could never.

@Potatopolitics: Vikings worshipped crossdressing genderfluid gods, I am fairly sure they’d be fine with trans folks actually

The beauty of this tweet is the fact that it’s so many things at once: a call for trans rights and visibility, a history lesson, and a call-out on the ahistorical ignorance of the heteropatriarchy.

@internetanja DKNY: is a fashion label my brain: donkey kong new york

I am so glad I’m not the only person who’s said this in their head. Also, I have a tendency to read initialisms as actual words in my head so I’ve also read DKNY as dick-knee, which is something we should have access to. If I had dicks on my knees and could slap people with them when they’re rude in public, the game would be over. Game. Set. Match.

@CornOnTheGoblin: im a bitch / im a plumber it’s-a me / luigi’s brother

You have to be from a very specific micro-generation to appreciate the humor in this tweet. I am specifically talking about people who were school-age in the early-to-mid aughts, with at least one parent who owned an NES console as a child. Fun fact: my first exposure to the song referenced in this tweet was the critically-unappreciated-but-still-managed-to-get-a-remake banger of a movie, What Women Want, starring the goddess Helen Hunt and the human trash bag Mel Gibson.

@realemilyattack: I’m locked out of my dogs Facebook account that i created in 2010 and they won’t let me back in unless I send over a copy of his drivers license

This reminds me that I used to know a girl who had a Facebook account for her bedroom. Like, her actual bedroom. I’ve also friended people’s pets but in the end, it’s too much to deal with because they always die and I don’t think you can make a legacy account for a non-human.

@dannybarefoot: Gay culture is your English teacher being the only friend you keep up with from high school.

Why is this so painfully accurate? True story: when my high school girlfriend and I broke up (stop laughing, you swine!), we returned each others’ books using our English teacher as a go-between. Nothing says petty like telling your English teacher to tell your ex that you want your Capote back. Jesus Christ, how did no one realize I was gay?

Nothing says petty like telling your English teacher to tell your ex that you want your Capote back. Jesus Christ, how did no one realize I was gay?

@_RobertSchultz: millennials love picking a movie they watched once as a kid that has a 20% on Rotten Tomatoes and then making it their entire personality

Okay, first of all, I saw Batman & Robin way more than once and I’m fairly certain it has something like a 7% rating on Rotten Tomatoes. I don’t understand the lack of appreciation for this cinematic masterpiece. People didn’t like the Schumacher Batman films because they were expecting them to be like the Burton (and later, the Nolan) Batman films, and that wasn’t Schumacher’s schtick. Those movies were *supposed* to be campy and overdone, and so what if they were a little too focused on the bat-nipples and bat-codpieces?! Chris O’Donnell is the reason a lot of comic book-loving little boys grew up to be raging homosexuals—it’s science.

Chris O’Donnell is the reason a lot of comic book-loving little boys grew up to be raging homosexuals—it’s science.

@SHEsus_Christ: The fact that we blur women’s nipples but Ted Cruz’s face is still visible is blasphemous.

This one pretty much speaks for itself.

@BibliophlMarie: tfw you’re tidying your bookshelves & find that book you were thinking about buying.

Is this callout culture? This has happened to me so many times, but more often than not I don’t discover a book until I’ve already purchased it for the second time and then not until it’s way past the date by which it was returnable.

@VinMan17: i know ben shapiro is going to lose sleep over a gay black man doing a lap dance on satan and id like to say thank you lil nas for that

Y’all, people in the Evangelical Christian Right really lost their minds over that video. My question is: what did they expect? If you tell someone they’re a vile and irredeemable sinner enough times with enough vitriol, damning them to an inescapable hell, why do you get mad when they say they’re going to enjoy the trip?

Fun fact: did you know that Mara Wilson (of Matilda fame) and Ben Shapiro are maternal first cousins? Don’t worry, though; they don’t speak and she has him blocked on all the socials.

I really don’t like any of the right-wing blowhards, what with their demagoguery, proto-fascism, and intellectual dishonesty, but I really dislike Ben Shapiro. He’s an idiot’s version of a smart man—all bluster and no substance. Not to mention that whole Aryan master race thing he’s got going on with his face.

He’s an idiot’s version of a smart man—all bluster and no substance. Not to mention that whole Aryan master race thing he’s got going on with his face.

@billielurked: Quarantine has me living like a sim. It takes me six hours to cook spaghetti. If something is blocking my path i just cry

Ah, Sims. I *loved* that game. I was also a bit of a sociopath with it, though. Apologies for the armchair self-diagnosis, but what do you call it when someone makes a Sim-ulacrum (see what I did there?) of someone they know in real life just to sabotage them and ensure they fail in the world you’ve created? You deserved to flunk out of Sim College. You know who you are.

You deserved to flunk out of Sim College. You know who you are.

@danielleweisber: how do astronauts not cry all the time from being scared

I would also like to know the answer to this question. Being in space would be like the mega-souped-up version of when you’re a little kid and you’re staying away from home for the first time and it’s the middle of the night and you don’t want to be a little bitch and admit you want your mom so you sit in the bathroom with the lights on and wait for daybreak. There’s no one you can panic call in the middle of the night from space.

Being in space would be like the mega-souped-up version of when you’re a little kid and you’re staying away from home for the first time and it’s the middle of the night and you don’t want to be a little bitch and admit you want your mom so you sit in the bathroom with the lights on and wait for daybreak.

@bigestaban: RIP to the citizens of Pompeii, they would’ve love that song by Bastille

Would they have, though? Wouldn’t it be kind of like when Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring caused a riot when it first premiered at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées in Paris? Would it have been so far outside the listeners’ experience that they couldn’t really appreciate its artistry? I think that’s a question worth asking.

Wouldn’t it be kind of like when Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring caused a riot when it first premiered at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées in Paris?

This post was so much fun to write. If you enjoyed it, please let me know and I’ll make more of these in the future.

Shot Twice (But I Survived)

I tried to go to work today. In fact, I made it nearly six hours. But I just couldn’t swing it. Yesterday I received my second dose of the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine and it has really wiped me out. I ran a fever for a few hours, and I’ve been experiencing body aches, congestion, and lethargy all day long.

But I don’t regret getting it. I’d much rather deal with (temporary) side effects from getting vaccinated as opposed to potentially contracting the virus and risking having life-long ailments stemming from it.

The truth is, I’m just a big crybaby and I always have been. I don’t deal well with any sort of ache or ailment, and I don’t think I’ll ever develop the long-suffering fortitude of my ancestors. I’ll just take a long, healthy life with a very brief demise, thank you very much. No protracted battles for life for me, if you please. I don’t have the constitution for it.

No protracted battles for life for me, if you please. I don’t have the constitution for it.

So, I said all of that so I could say this: if you haven’t already been vaccinated, there’s no better time than the present. Just maybe make sure you have a day or so afterward to recover so you don’t put yourself in the predicament of begging God to kill you in front of all your coworkers (not lying). Bye for now!

I’m Just Not Feeling It

Do you ever have a day where you wake up and you know that you have a list of things that need to be accomplished, but you just can’t seem to care about anything?

That’s how I feel today. It is beautiful outside, the birds are chirping, and Julie Andrews is singing The Hills Are Alive while butterflies caress her with their wings. And I’m just so irritable I can’t stand myself, much less anyone else. As I’m looking at the clock, I have just barely over an hour to go before I have to start getting ready for work. Yes, I know I’m lucky to be employed. Yes, just the other day I made a post dedicated exclusively to talking about my hard-won promotion. On an intellectual level, I am grateful— but I’m so freaking tired.

It is beautiful outside, the birds are chirping, and Julie Andrews is singing The Hills Are Alive while butterflies caress her with their wings.

Days like this make me think of Shelley, which makes me smile. Shelley is an older Australian woman I used to work with at my store. She was contrarian, pugnacious, cynical, and sarcastic. She designated herself as our resident Mean Old Bitch and wore the title like a badge of honor. Sometimes I miss her so much that it makes my bones ache. We had a bond, we two. I love her and I know she loves me, and that’s for forever.

She designated herself as our resident Mean Old Bitch and wore the title like a badge of honor.

The rapport we quickly developed morphed into a beautiful friendship I’ll cherish as long as there’s breath in my body. One day when we were working together, she looked at me and out of nowhere exclaimed, “Shit, there’s got to be something fucking better than this.” A gentle warning for you: if the word “fuck” offends you even mildly, never work with an Australian émigré. I’m fairly certain Australian elementary school teachers end the school week by telling their pupils to “fuck off and have fun”.

One day when we were working together, she looked at me and out of nowhere, exclaimed, “Shit, there’s got to be something fucking better than this.”

I think about what she said that day a lot. She was right; there’s got to be something fucking better than this. I’m going to make it my life’s work to try to find it. For both of us. Bless her heart, the sour old bitch had to work retail right up until the pandemic forced her into an early retirement, followed by a move to Florida with her son. If you ever read this, Shelley, I love you. If we both end up in hell, please save me some space in your cabana.

If you ever read this, Shelley, I love you. If we both end up in hell, please save me some space in your cabana.

There’s not a tidy resolution for this post. I always get irritated when I’m reading something about someone having a bad day and they “somehow turned it around”. Nope. You can stop right there. A big part of self-care for me is just allowing myself to feel like shit when I feel like shit because it’s my brain’s way of telling me there’s something I need to process that I can’t happy-think my way out of.

A big part of self-care for me is just allowing myself to feel like shit when I feel like shit because it’s my brain’s way of telling me there’s something I need to process that I can’t happy-think my way out of.

I mean, let’s be real. I’m working a full-time, public-facing retail job in the middle of an ongoing global pandemic in a world that’s literally on fire from climate change and living with more mental health disorders than Meryl Streep has Oscar nominations. Ergo, I’m allowed to feel like shit. And so are you!

If you also feel bad today, know that I see you and I stand in solidarity with you, not to talk you out of your pain but to weather it with you until we all feel better. Much love.

Album Review: ELIO and Friends: The Remixes by ELIO

When a zennial chooses as their moniker the name of one of your favorite characters in modern literature (and cinema), you just know you’re bound to like them.

Enter ELIO, a.k.a. Charlotte Lee. According to an interview she did with Jess Grant for We Are: The Guard, The 1975’s eponymous debut album was life-changing for her, and you can totally hear that influence in her sound. It’s EDM-infused atmospheric pop: contemplative, nostalgic, and anxiety-riddled. And how could it not be all of those things at once? To be young in a world on fire, looking to the Internet (because sometimes it’s the only place) for clarity and community, and knowing with an airtight certainty that you won’t live to be old (because of climate change), sometimes you just have to groove to your own beat.

It’s [her sound] EDM-infused atmospheric pop: contemplative, nostalgic, and anxiety-riddled. And how could it not be all of those things at once?

The first time I listened to “Jackie Onassis”, one of the tracks remixed on this EP, I was transfixed. Like the icons she emulates, ELIO’s style is effortless and unpretentious, which makes it all the more alluring.

We can go to dinner in Paris / And we’ll be trends in fashion like Jackie Onassis / I’ll keep taking antidepressants / And we can drive away from this adolescence
Jackie Onassis by ELIO

My take: If you don’t seat-dance your way through traffic or make a complete fool of yourself in your living room crumping and twerking and bopping while listening to this EP, there’s something wrong with you. I hate to be so frank, but facts are facts.

Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Album Review: One Foot In Front Of The Other by Griff

I’m always looking for the next thing that’s going to break me open. I use art as emotional catharsis. I never know what the medium is going to be—the truth just has a way of finding me and it never comes unprepared.

I’m always looking for the next thing that’s going to break me open.

That said, One Foot In Front Of The Other is the perfect mixtape for Sad Girl Summer and I am here for it. Bring on The Purge (of feelings, that is). There’s a desperation in Griff’s voice. An overflowing melancholy colors every lyric on every track. But there’s also hope—buckets of it. And resilience. And it overpowers everything else.

It’s somewhat of a disservice to Griff (real name Sarah Griffiths) to compare her to her forebears or contemporaries, but nevertheless her sound is familiar in an endearing, ear-tickling way. There’s some 1989 and reputation-era Taylor Swift here. Some Lorde, though more Melodrama than Pure Heroine. A dollop of Billie Eilish and a sprinkling of Lana Del Rey. Halsey hangs at the edge of the frame of tracks like “Earl Grey Tea”. Some of the production on the last track sounds like Bleachers.

I’ve tried to pray / I’ve bruised my knees / I’ve tried to bring you back to me
Black Hole by Griff

All in all, it’s just a really great time to be an angsty songstress. She brings to mind a couple of noteworthy contemporaries; namely, FLETCHER and ELIO, but also Olivia Rodrigo without all the rage. Her alchemy, though, is all her own.

Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Album Review: JORDI (Deluxe) by Maroon 5

What is it about Maroon 5’s sound that is so deliciously irresistible? I mean, if we’re being honest, their oeuvre is little more than rock-inflected sugary pop bops one after the other. That’s not meant to be an insult, but it also doesn’t explain the love I have for the band. Am I basic or are they actually really good?

Am I basic or are they actually really good?

Available in Dolby Atmos on Apple Music, the band’s newest offering has received mixed to negative reviews from critics, but if you’re asking me (and why else would you be here?), JORDI is much better than Red Pill Blues, which was released in 2017 and was largely forgettable, apart from a couple of tracks.

Is JORDI going to win any Grammy Awards? Probably not. Do I care? Not in the slightest. When they dropped the second single from the album, “Nobody’s Love”, on July 24, 2020, I kept it on repeat for my next dozen showers. It’s a freaking bop.

Everything you’ve been through / Say what you got to lose
Can’t Leave You Alone (feat. Juice WRLD)

Featuring appearances by Megan Thee Stallion, blackbear, Stevie Nicks, Bantu, H.E.R., and others, JORDI is just a sheer pleasure to listen to.

Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️

Favorite Films 🎥: The Passion of Joan of Arc (1928)

Year: 1928

Director: Carl Theodor Dreyer

Country: France

Cast: Renée Jeanne Falconetti, Eugène Silvain, André Berley, and Maurice Schutz

Cinematography: Rudolph Maté

Streaming: HBO Max, Amazon Prime Video, and Apple TV

Why I Love It: Renée Jeanne Falconetti’s performance as Joan of Arc is one of the most moving in cinematic history. This silent masterpiece is full of startlingly intimate close-ups in which Falconetti’s face is the only thing in your field of vision. Because there’s no audible dialogue, she has to convey everything in her performance through movement, through her facial expressions—everything is an exercise in the theater of the body.

Because there’s no audible dialogue, she has to convey everything in her performance through movement, through her facial expressions—everything is an exercise in the theater of the body.

The Passion of Joan of Arc is the first silent film I can remember bringing me to tears. At times it is painful to watch, but films like this one are the reason cinema is its own art form. For the true cinephile, the Criterion Collection edition is a must. Along with numerous other extras which add depth and context to the viewing experience, Criterion’s home release comes with two different presentations of the film: the traditional 24 frames per second and another at 20 frames per second.

Also noteworthy is the expressionistic lighting used by cinematographer Rudolph Maté, who later immigrated to the United States and became a director and producer as well. His cinematography credits during his career in Hollywood include such films as Dodsworth (1936), Stella Dallas (1937), Love Affair (1939), and Foreign Correspondent (1940), among many others. You can clearly see the influence of his earlier work in European Expressionism in his later work in American film noir.

You can clearly see the influence of his [Maté] earlier work in European Expressionism in his later work in American film noir.

How does one begin the process of classifying superlatives in art? Once you start drawing lines of demarcation and establishing hierarchies, it is inevitable that some works just as worthy as those classified as “The Greatest” will be pushed to the margins, relegated to the corners—all but forgotten. But then again, if everything is great then nothing is great.

Once you start drawing lines of demarcation and establishing hierarchies, it is inevitable that some works just as worthy as those classified as “The Greatest” will be pushed to the margins, relegated to the corners—all but forgotten.

So we have experts. We have aestheticians. We have people who spend their entire lives studying one particular subject so we can go to them when we need a professional’s opinion. As in science, so in art. We look to the learned, the credentialed, and the eloquent. We look outside our own limited experiences and perceptions for something that rings true.

We look to the learned, the credentialed, and the eloquent. We look outside our own limited experiences and perceptions for something that rings true.

Why did I say all that? So I could then say this: The Passion of Joan of Arc is one of the greatest films of all time. So say the film scholars, the cineastes, the commentators, and the iconoclasts. And so say I. Don’t trust me. See it for yourself.

I hope you’ve enjoyed the first post in my new series. Check back soon for more of my Favorite Films.

New Blog Series: Favorite Films 🎥

I’m starting a new blog series here on The Voracious Bibliophile that I’m calling Favorite Films. With each post, I’ll highlight a film that I love. These posts won’t be long-form reviews; instead, they’ll include just enough information to entice you to check out the films yourself. Where applicable, I’ll try to add streaming information as well.

Author: Fred Slusher