jjvaldezbooks's reviews
302 reviews

The Adventure Zone: The Suffering Game by Griffin McElroy, Clint McElroy, Carey Pietsch, Travis McElroy, Justin McElroy

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adventurous challenging dark emotional funny hopeful fast-paced
  • Loveable characters? Yes

5.0

The Lives of Saints by Leigh Bardugo

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3.25

Critical Role: The Mighty Nein Origins: Mollymauk Tealeaf by Jody Houser, Taliesin Jaffe, Matthew Mercer, Hunter Severn Bonyun

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3.0

Fathomfolk by Eliza Chan

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slow-paced
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

1.75

no stakes, got bored, too many chapters, and girl: fuck ur fascistass boyfriend. you know who you are.

this book wanted to be The Little Mermaid meets Jade City and ended up just mid in all aspects. could have been a 2 or even a 2.5 with a better ending but here we are
Witchcraft in the Southwest: Spanish & Indian Supernaturalism on the Rio Grande by Marc Simmons

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informative slow-paced

3.75

it's an older text, so not the most accessible, but charmingly written like a series of true stories with the themes pointed out as opposed to a dry academic text, and I appreciated that. the middle chapters that described the differences between the attitudes towards witchcraft in different regions of the southwest got a little repetitive but we survived it
Palestine: A Four Thousand Year History by Nur Masalha

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challenging informative slow-paced

4.0

i think i should have read his prior book first bc this is breaking down a TON of Zionist arguments without fully describing them, and it turns out I don't know much about what Zionists think. a real dense text but also once I got into it, I realized how full of shit the Zionist arguments I did know were. this will be an excellent reference text for me as I learn more 
Daughter of the Moon Goddess by Sue Lynn Tan

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slow-paced
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

1.75

The Dark Fantastic: Race and the Imagination from Harry Potter to the Hunger Games by Ebony Elizabeth Thomas

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hopeful informative reflective medium-paced

4.75

the intro is dense, especially if it's been a while since you've read an academic text

but keep going because the rest of the book is just stunning. this discussion of how "dark girls" are treated even in the most well meaning of fantasy is one I believe every author, teacher, and librarian should read and really spend some time digesting 

also why did this woman get called out in the HP fandom for quoting a myth story in fanfiction but Queen Plagerism herself gets to have book deals based on her stolen work? (fuxk Cassie Claire fr)
Guns, Germs and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies by Jared Diamond

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slow-paced

2.0

if this is the abridged version, I fear what he had to say for 10 more hours in the unabridged 👀

anyway this guy does an okay job for a biologist I guess, probably an anthropologist would have done better. really conveniently stops talking about differences in opportunities that each continent had right around the same time period that colonization ravaged certain areas

NK Jemison really out here bullying me with suggestions for worldbuilding books when I think reading a summary would have been fine
American Brujeria: Modern Mexican-American Folk Magic by J. Allen Cross

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hopeful informative reflective

4.0

great entry level research text for modern brujeria. the theme about being "Latinx enough" really hit home. and a wonderful introduction clarifying what is cultural appreciation vs cultural appropriation