June Reading

This is my monthly wrap up where I talk about some of my favourite things from the last month. What I’m reading, enjoying, looking forward to—sort of anything floating my boat.

In June, I travelled to two places that both happened to have signature purple flora.

It got me thinking about places and home and people who are lucky enough to be from a place they call theirs. Does an Angelino get a sweet tightness in their chest when the jacarandas are in bloom? Do Cape Codians think of home at the sight of a hydrangea?

This is something I’ve always struggled with. I’m certainly a bilingual product of Montreal, and I’ve grown to know the city like the back of my hand but knowing isn’t everything. I don’t get a tingle when I smell poutine or smoked meat or bagels, and my heart doesn’t flutter when I hear French Canadian colloquialisms.

I guess what I’m saying is I’m still looking for my purple flower.

Here is an overview of how my month went:

• I published an anthology full of queer writers writing about queerness! Read it here:

• Found a new favourite Michael Kors bag on eBay, you can read about it on Savannah Scott’s Going Broke!

• Went to LA and made a little video about it

• Published a piece sponsored by Hinge, and had a lot of fun writing it! You can read it here:

• Went to Cape Cod and ate more lobster in 5 days than I have in my entire life

• Already memorized the outdoor pool schedule

What I Read

Below is a rundown of every book I read last month. I’ll be adding a star next to my standouts, like a starred review where a star isn’t a 1 to 5 scale, it just means good!

Before the written ramblings, here is a video version of my monthly wrap up if you’re more of a visual person:

Woodworking by Emily St. James

This is the story of a teacher in South Dakota as she’s coming to terms with her transness. She turns to the only out trans person she knows: a 16 year old student at her school. The book follows their unlikely bond and the tangled web of people around them.

The novel discusses family, queerness, kinship, and really shines in its depiction of a person finding the courage to be themselves. It reminds the reader that everyone has an inner world and it’s a privilege to have it shared with us.

I don’t want to give anything away, but we really get so many different trans narratives packed into this book. It isn’t just a coming out story, it’s so much more, and I love that it touched on all these lives coloured by choice.

People will often ask me for a queer book recommendation that isn’t completely devastating, and this is it. It’s not a happy book per se, but it has so much queer joy eclipsing the sadder moments.

After the Blue Hour by John Rechy

This was my first John Rechy, and I think I need to read another one of his works to wrap my head around him.

It’s the (fictional?) story of John Rechy, a twenty-something writer, as he gets invited to a private island by an admirer. He stays there with the man’s girlfriend and teenage son, and joins a very strange familial dynamic.
I found it interesting that all three of the island’s inhabitants reflect back to John a different version of himself. However, I did get bogged down by how unlikable all of the characters were. There wasn’t much for me to hold onto.

The story is taut with sexual tension and sizzling summer heat. It warps into intrigue and suspense and dips into erotic thriller territory. This made it an easy read, despite some challenging sections.

I thought I would enjoy this way more than I did. I kept thinking I was missing something about the tone, the style, the atmosphere, something to make it all come together but I’m not sure I ever got it. I’m definitely going to read City of Night (Rechy’s most iconic book) before making up my mind about him.

Open, Heaven by Séan Hewitt

This is Hewitt’s first novel and first book since his memoir, All Down Darkness Wide. I still haven’t read his other book because I have only heard great comments about how heartbreaking it is—I promise I will be ready for it one day!

Open, Heaven is the story of an out gay sixteen year old boy living in a small village in the north of England. It follows one summer in his life as he develops feelings for a straight boy his age. At first glance, that narrative feels overplayed, but it feels fresh, new and done really well here.

It’s a story of friendship and desire, and the confusing merging of the two that can happen in youth. The narrator follows his desire and we see that trajectory shift at the slightest hints of a feeling. I loved how true this all felt: The confusion of rugged working hands and beautiful women and the way he couldn’t control what caught his attention.

I love what this said about people and the narrator figuring himself out through his relationships with others. It made me want to run through a field and swim in a creek. The perfect summer book.

A Language of Limbs by Dylin Hardcastle ★

Not to oversell it, but this is one of the best books I’ve read this year.

One night and two choices splinter a life. On one side, we follow the choice to repress and push down queer desire. On the other side, we follow the choice to live authentically. Throughout the novel, we see how different paths can have the same destination.
Both lives follow their course over thirty years, starting in 1970s Australia. They explore family (chosen and not), identity, community, parenthood, art, love, and the changing landscape of their country.

We switch POVs at every chapter, and this builds out a push and pull between both lives, both realities. Everything this book has to say happens in the contrast and in the unsaid middle of these two lives.

I love a stylistic choice when it’s done right, and this hit it out of the park. The alternating of the voices feels purposeful and earns its existence in the world this book creates. It allows the reader to feel so much without having to over-explain.

The writing is lyrical and sharp, the tone feels unique, I’m just in awe of this book and such a fan of Dylin Hardcastle.

The Town of Babylon by Alejandro Varela ★

A gay Latinx professor returns to his hometown to visit his parents, and that visit coincides with his high school’s twenty year reunion. Past and present collide as he navigates what it means to go back home when you intentionally left it behind.

The book also dissects suburbia in the most interesting way. How these places came to be, how the people living there came to be, how it changed over time. So much of it is mapped out through different characters and different vignettes that complete the tapestry of this novel.

The coming-of-age in reverse here is so well done. Our narrator faces trauma, grief, family, love, himself, but twenty years later. It’s such a vivid exploration because he’s faced with his past while dealing with his present. This is something I think about quite a bit in my writing, and this is just an exceptional example of it.

I first read this when it came out in 2022 and I have not stopped recommending it since. I’m so happy it still lives up to my memory of it, and I will continue to push it on anybody I can.

Open Throat by Henry Hoke ★

A slim book that centres a gay mountain lion living in the hills of Los Angeles. It’s one of the most unique books I’ve read in the last few years.

This novel is an examination of humanity from the perspective of an outsider, sort of like Beautyland by Marie-Helene Bertino. The narration is detached from personhood, but is injected with the right elements to be a punch to the gut.

The mountain lion is an observer who notices the darkness in people: destruction, hate, violence. It tries to figure out the feeling of hunger and how it is controlled by it. A hunger for connection, for sex, and not just food.

This was a reread for me and this time around I was struck by the pacing. It’s written in verse and all of it feels so intentional, I could not put it down. This is the perfect book to rip through on a sunny Sunday.

Memorial by Bryan Washington ★

This is my first Bryan Washington, and certainly not my last. I’m not sure what took me so long or why I started with this one, I’m just glad to be on the bandwagon.

Memorial is about a gay couple, Benson and Mike, on the brink. They’ve been together for years, but their relationship is in limbo, it’s not quite right and it’s not quite wrong. When Mike goes to visit his dying father in Japan, he leaves Benson with his mother in their shared Houston home.

We get an exploration of so many different facets of family through these messy dynamics. What people expect from each other, what people know about each other, what family means to all of them. It’s relationships, and grief, and confronting the challenging parts of life which can sometimes be the mundane.

I love the way this story unfolded and the writing was delightfully smooth. It felt like popcorn in that I couldn’t stop reaching for it and, once I was done, I had kernels jammed between all of my teeth.

On My Bedside Table

A dispatch from my bedside table and the books that litter it, hoping to be read soon.

• Greek Lessons by Han Kang (translated by Deborah Smith and Emily Yae Won), a mute woman and her Greek teacher become entangled.

• We Think the World of You by J.R. Ackerley, a young man in love starts to unravel when the target of his affection is sent to jail.

• The Brittle Age by Donatella Di Pietrantonio (translated by Ann Goldstein), a mother and daughter navigate the shadows of their family’s past.

• Disappoint Me by Nicola Dinan, the story of a couple from two POVs—one is a trans woman entering a new relationship and the other is her partner.

• Fox by Joyce Carol Oates, a literary thriller about a charming English teacher who turns up dead.

Have you read any of these? Are any of these non-negotiables? Are any of them skippable?

What did you read and love in June?

Tell me what you think in the comments!

That’s been my month!

Until next time 🤠