For 2024, I’m doing something different. Instead of telling you every story I’ve read each month, I will tell you my top five favorites. So! While I have read eighteen books for June, here are my Top 5 favorites.
The Paper Menagerie by Ken Liu
Believe it or not, I found this story through a Google search. I came across this story while trying to understand magical realism better. This story made me cry, and I don’t know how many stories have affected me. The idea of a mother losing her son to the social acceptance of society really tugged at my heartstrings.
Girl by Jamaica Kincaid
So, I read this flash fiction through one of my earlier graduate classes. I think it was an Intro to Storytelling or something of the sort. Anyway, it was the rhythm of the story that enthralled me. It had such a flow to it that I found myself reading it so many times. Along with that, I just loved the fact that it was so candid and, yet, so relatable to a girl of any race from any generation.
Bloodhound by Thomas Page McBee
Science fiction has always been – and will forever be – my first love. But the LGBTQ sub-genre has been something that the literature world has been sorely lacking so it’s always nice to see a little nugget. I figured that I – a cis gay man – enjoyed this action story, then I can imagine that thousands of trans men and women felt powerful after listening to it.
To See the Invisible Man by Robert Silverberg
It’s the Twilight Zone’s episode of the same name that got me to this gem of a short story. I kinda already knew that the Twilight Zone got some of its inspiration from short stories, but this was the first time that I actually found one, read it, and enjoyed it thoroughly. The idea that “being cold/anti-social” can be a crime is something to really ponder about. I’m going to have to find the other ones.
Bluebeard by Jim Clemente
I do a guilty pleasure for true crime and Jim Clemente has become one of my favorite true-crime writers. I’ve already read his installment regarding the Golden State Killer and the DC Sniper. Now, I got to learn about Walter Andrew, LA’s first known serial killer. I also liked how it was dramatized as just hearing one person talk about the whole would have turned me off.
