Every year I set aside a bunch of LGBTQ+ books and authors to put on my Pride TBR. Inevitably, I never actually read them and I end up feeling guilty about it. So I decided that 2022 was going to be the year I did Pride right and finish my unread books. I’m pleased to announce that I’ve already finished 2 Pride books. Although, neither of them was on my TBR. Instead, I bought the first 2 volumes in this series. It’s everywhere right now that I had to do it.
I like to think that I’m a musical theatre geek but, the truth is, I don’t actually watch a lot of musical theatre. I’m not just talking about during the Pandemic but in general. I know the classics but there are so many modern examples that I know very little about. Aside from Hamilton, I’ve not kept up with contemporary musicals. Add that to the fact that I’d not watched the BBC3 documentary Jamie: Drag Queen at 16 and you can see that I wasn’t really rushing to watch the film adaptation of Everybody’s Talking About Jamie. But, I also think it should be celebrated for putting drag culture further into the public domain and, you know, Richard E Grant is everything. So, I settled down this weekend to watch it.
I know that people complain that Hollywood has run out of fresh ideas and is only interested in sequels, prequels and reboots. Of course, this isn’t true. There are plenty of great films that don’t fit into this criteria. Although, not all of them are worth praising. I mean, if I have the choice between another Marvel sequel or a film starring Paul Rudd and Steve Coogan as gay parents, I know what I’d rather watch. That’s not to say that the concept of a film about gay parents is flawed but the decision to cast Paul Rudd and Steve Coogan in it. As we’ve seen from James Corden’s performance in The Prom, Hollywood hasn’t exactly caught up to our contemporary view of gay people. Coogan is a great actor but, let’s be honest, he’s not known for being subtle. Despite my absolute certainty that it would be a car crash, I decided to watch this film to see for myself. It was short and I couldn’t skip another post.
One of the best things about my Spell the Month reading challenge is that I’m reading way more books that I’d never have known about. Having to search out certain letters is opening my eyes to titles I’d have never have thought about picking up. This is one of those books. I’m not a real YA fan anyway but a YA romance? Definitely not my usual kind of book. I thought I’d take the chance to step out of my comfort zone while also finding an easy read for the letter Y. Whatever the actual story was like, I could at least be confident that it wouldn’t take a long time to read.
I’d started reading The Mystery of Love in February for LGBTQ+ history month. Although, I didn’t really get very far. I just wasn’t in the mood for it and I had plenty of other books to finish first. So, I decided that Pride month was the perfect time to finish it. I ended up listening to the audiobook on my lunchbreaks so it took a few days to actually get to the end but I managed it just in time for the end of June. I actually think getting the audiobook made a big difference to how easy this was to read. Whether it was the narrator, the book or both, The Mystery of Love was the perfect thing to listen to.
Number of books read: 10
Number of rereads: 1
Number of physical books: 5
Number of ebooks: 1
Number of audiobooks: 1
5* reviews: 2
4.5* reviews: 0
4* reviews: 5
So, another month is over and I feel like as I’m actually in a good place with my reading. Back up to 10 books but, admittedly, some of those barely had any words. Still, it was good to actually achieve my goals for this month. I read a number of Pride books including 2 that I was desperate to get around to. Hopefully it starts me off on a high before heading into July. Another short month in terms of letters but they’re tricky letters. I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it though.
I wasn’t entirely sure whether I would finish this in time or not. I’d had a slow end to the week and had let my reading go. Thankfully, it was a pretty quick read and I got the majority of it done on Sunday. I forget that YA novels don’t take as long to read as the books I usually read. Mostly because it doesn’t have that literary fiction desire to complicate things. It did take a bit longer because I was so careful not to ruin the gorgeous stencilled edges of this book. It’s such a beautiful thing and I need it to say as pristine as possible.
I’m having a nightmare with my photos at the moment. My Instagram feed is all over the place because I can’t the lighting consistent. The image at the top of this post was the worst to edit so far. Nothing went right and I was ready to pack it in completely. But I persisted and it will do. This book was my book club’s pick for Pride month and it was my suggestion. I normally don’t get too involved in the picking process because I was the last to join. I know it’s mental but it feels as though my opinion is less important than the others. So, I am a little worried about what they’ll think of this one. It’s been on my TBR for ages and I was looking forward to reading it. The book group is mostly full of people looking for gruesome murders though. I’m not sure this will be everyone’s cup of tea.
I promised myself that I would try and read some Pride appropriate books during June and, so far, I’ve not done a great job. I’ve got my book club’s choice to go yet but I decided it was time to get some LGBTQ+ representation up in here. I had originally set aside Giovanni’s Room to read during Black History Month but that never happened. It’s probably a good thing as well because James Baldwin doesn’t address race in this book. Instead, his entire focus is sexuality. Making it the perfect book to read in the month of June.
As soon as I saw the trailer for this on Netflix, I knew that it wasn’t going to be the film for me. It just looked stupid and just sitting through a short preview made me cringe. Yet, part of me did want to watch it. I was intrigued about just how bad it was going to be. I wanted to see just how embarrassingly awful James Corden’s performance turned out. How over-the-top and unsubtle Ryan Murphy’s message of inclusivity was. How cheesy the choreography would be. I knew that I’d watch it eventually so it was just a question of when. I decided that, whatever happened, I couldn’t let it be the first film that I watched in 2021 because that would have felt as though I was jinxing my entire year. It also felt like the most appropriate film to end 2020 on. After all, the year has been a huge shit show. It’s not as if this film could make it anyway worse. And maybe it would put everything into perspective?
Yipee ki-yay, motherbooker 