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The long (long) awaited film adaptation of The Woman in the Window finally dropped on Netflix last week. And while the release was met with excitement, particularly from readers, the reviews have been a resounding meh. Emily and Susan both read the book and saw the movie, and they have some thoughts.
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Kelli: Shadow and Bone is the new(ish) and long-awaited Netflix adaptation of Leigh Bardugo’s bestselling Grishaverse novels. Technically, this show is based on both the original Grisha trilogy and the Six of Crows duology, though from what I understand, the events of this first season actually serve as a prequel to Six of Crows. Of course, I’ve never read the books, and it is very possible that Wikipedia is leading me astray.
Emily: Yeah, full disclaimer that neither of us have read these books.
(Some spoilers for Season 1 of Shadow and Bone ahead!)
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Hello and welcome to Bellows, Pennsylvania.
Mary: Welcome and helloooooo! This time on YA Book Club we’re talking about Lycanthropy and Other Chronic Illnesses by Kristen O’Neal. The novel follows Priya, a young med school student who has to take a break from school after contracting Lyme disease. While staying with her parents, Priya makes several friends online via Tumblr, and they form a support group for people with chronic illnesses. Her best friend out of the group, Brigid, is reluctant to talk about her chronic illness. As Priya and Brigid grow closer, they learn more about each other and explore what it means to be chronically ill in a world that doesn’t really accomodate for that. From here on out, there will be spoilers!
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I recently jumped into Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure, an anime I’ve heard about for a long time but had never given a chance. I knew two things about it going in.
First, it’s an action show in the tradition of Shonen Jump manga. Most episodes feature elaborate fights and lots of screaming and naming of one’s attacks. Secondly, I knew that the internet deemed many of the characters of Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure queer icons with audacious fashion taste. I had to watch it.
Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure does a few things very well, but it has a ways to go in a couple of areas. I’m going to break it down in this handy dandy list of things you need to know about, what else, Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure.
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BSG #54: The Twist is Misogyny / Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 / Interview w/ Ethel Rohan
This week, we’re off to South Korea to discuss Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 by Cho Nam-Joo (translated by Jamie Chang), a book that helped spark a women’s rights movement when it was first published in 2016. The Squad talks about the controversy surrounding the book and gets into some of our shared experiences of misogyny and sexism in America. After that, Emily interviews Ethel Rohan, author of the new short story collection In the Event of Contact, winner of the 2021 Dzanc Short Story Collection Prize.
Join us on May 31st for our third-ever Hatepisode on Ready Player Two by Ernest Cline (Kelli assures us we’ll all hate it!). Then read along for our next Bookpisode on Earthlings by Sayaka Murata on June 14th. In the meantime, check out the Book Squad Blog for additional content on books, movies, video games, and more! Send your feedback, thoughts, and weird gynecologist stories to thesquad@booksquadgoals.com, or DM us on social media.
Click through for summary, table of contents, and show notes!
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Snooze.
I felt really excited for Resident Evil 8, the follow up to Capcom’s 2017 Resident Evil 7. It’s the first time in a long time that a Resident Evil game has built on the story of its predecessor, and I was curious to see where the story could go. I was also extremely excited, like the rest of the world, to meet Lady Dimitrescu, the 9 foot tall vampire lady that every ad seemed to showcase. I even wrote about her for work. No regrets there.
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I am not what one would call a gamer. Or at least I don’t think so. I play video games from time to time, but they’re not the kinds of games that the gamer gatekeepers would call “real games.” More than anything, I enjoy a nice session of The Sims 4. Sometimes I hop on to Animal Crossing to dig up a few fossils, buy a new outfit, and do a little fishing. And yes, I love a good dating sim game. So when I, a cat lover, heard that there was a dating sim called Purrfect Date where you got to go on dates with cats? Yeah, I had to check it out.
I don’t know what you think when you hear “cat dating sim,” but I certainly had some ideas about how this was going to go. And well… I was wrong.
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Othersode #53: Pizza is Satanic / The House of the Devil with Clay McLeod Chapman
Light some candles and gather ‘round the pentagram, because things are getting satanic (panic!) on this episode. Author Clay McLeod Chapman joins us to talk about the 2009 film House of the Devil. We talk about the cultural context of the early 1980s, Greta Gerwig’s pizza performance, and the anxiety-making pacing of the film. Tangents include Cabbage Patch dolls and the forbidden television of our childhoods. Next, we chat with Clay about his new novel, Whisper Down the Lane, which was inspired by the McMartin Preschool trial of the 1908s. We all loved this book, so we kept the chat about it spoiler-free! He tells us about why he is drawn to this subject matter, as well as what’s coming up next for him and his writing. (Also, there’s a fantastic story about one of Clay’s readings in New York that you absolutely do not want to miss!) Read along with us for our next Bookpisode on Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 by Cho Nam-Joo (May 17th), and then take a detour with us for our third-ever Hatepisode (though some of us might not hate it?) on Ready Player Two by Ernest Cline on May 31st. Subscribe to Book Squad Goals on your favorite podcast app, and go read Whisper Down the Lane right away!
Click through for summary, table of contents, and show notes!
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I’m back on my bullshit, and that bullshit is talking about podcasts all the damn time. This time I’m here to talk about You’re Wrong About, which is a podcast I absolutely cannot stop listening to right now. Hosts Michael Hobbes (Maintenance Phase, HuffPost) and Sarah Marshall (journalist, currently working on a book about the Satanic Panic) delve into the stories behind the cultural phenomena, moral panics and public figures that we all think we know the stories of, but in fact, we’re wrong about. Here’s why you should check it out.
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As I mentioned in a previous blog post, I’m reading the Old Kingdom Chronicles, a series by Garth Nix. The series isn’t new by any means, but it’s new to me, and I’m having a lot of feelings about it. We need to talk about Sabriel, the first book in the series.
Read moremade with love by emily, kelli, mary, and susan. <3 thanks to Katelyn Elaine Photography for our group photos.