More Reviews for the Read Harder Challenge

As I’ve written about before, one of my goals this year is to actually complete Book Riot’s 2018 Read Harder challenge. So far I’ve finished 14 of the 24 tasks, which is pretty good for less than half of the year. Today I’ve got some short reviews of several books I read for the challenge, along with an update of the other tasks I’ve finished up until now (with links to reviews where I’ve finished them).

The Prince and the Dressmaker by Jen Wang

8. A comic written and illustrated by the same person

By day, Sebastian is a young prince, with parents looking to marry him off as soon as possible. By night, Sebastian is a Paris fashion icon, masquerading as Lady Crystallia in elaborate gowns made for him by his best friend, Frances. But of course, a prince who wears dresses has to be a secret, forcing Frances to hide her gift until it all becomes too much. This comic was just utterly charming. The illustrations are beautiful, and the ultimate message of acceptance and friendship and standing up to help people be who they are was just so heart-warming. Highly recommended.

A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle

11. A children’s classic published before 1980

I cannot remember if I read A Wrinkle in Time as a kid or not. It seems right up my alley – I was very into science fiction and fantasy books as a tween – but as I was reading this one nothing felt familiar about it. Truthfully, I didn’t love it as much as I hoped it would, which I think says more about me than about the book. It felt a little heavy-handed in places, although I think if I’d have picked it up when I was the targeted age I would have connected with Meg, developed a crush on Calvin, and enjoyed it immensely.

An Unkindness of Ghosts by Rivers Solomon

17. A sci-fi novel with a female protagonist by a female author

Rather than fumbling for a plot description of An Unkindness of Ghosts, I’m going to let author Rivers Solomon do it for me: “In the low-deck slums of a generation ship on its way to a mythical Promised Land, a healer investigates the suicide of her mother and its connection to the ship’s mysterious voyage.” The healer, Aster, is an amazing character, a Black, neurodivergent, intersex woman trying to find her way in a world that’s transposed the world of plantations into the closed system of a spaceship. The book is brutal but hopeful in a way that’s difficult to explain, but it’s really, really good. For a less fumbling review, I suggest you read this one from Jenny at Reading the End.

Gone Rogue by Marissa Meyer

18. A comic not published by Marvel, DC, or Image

Gone Rogue is an extension of Marissa Meyer’s wildly popular Lunar Chronicles series, a book of fairy-tale retelling set in a futuristic world with cyborgs, androids, mutant wolves, and space-travel. I loved listening to the series on audiobook, and I’ve enjoyed both of the comics continuations. Wires and Nerve and Going Rogue are both set after the conclusion of the original series, and follow the work of Iko, an android on a mission to help track down a rogue pack of violent space wolves threatening her friends and the planet. It sounds insane, but it’s actually a lot of fun.

Murder on the Red River by Marcie C. Rendon

21. A mystery by a person of color or LGBTQ+ author

The main character of this story, Cash, is a 17-year-old Native girl who has been bouncing around through foster care since she was three, working on North Dakota farms since she was 15. She has a connection to Sheriff Wheaton, who saved her as a toddler and now sometimes turns to her to help him with difficult cases, especially those that affect the Native American population in that region. This book starts out with the discovery of a dead Indian in a farm field, but Rendon uses that plot point to tell a story about how past trauma and exploitation of native people can trickle down through generations. Cash was a difficult character to follow – I spent most of the book torn between cheering for her and wanting to sit her down for a long talk about life choices – but it ends on what felt, to me, like a both hopeful and challenging path for her to walk. The mystery in the novel is really secondary to Cash’s story, which I was totally ok with.

These are the other challenges I’ve finished so far, with links to reviews where I’ve gotten them written already. I’m hoping to get to the unfinished reviews soon, and then be well on my way to reading and writing about every book in the challenge. Hooray!

• A book published posthumously (1) – I’ll Be Gone in the Dark by Michelle McNamara
• A book of true crime (2) – The Dragon Behind the Glass by Emily Voigt
• A book in or about one of the BRICS countries (5) – The Milk Lady of Bangalore by Shoba Narayan
• A book about nature (6) – The Evolution of Beauty by Richard Prum
• A romance novel by or about a person of color (10) – Hate to Want You by Alisha Rai
• A celebrity memoir (12) – Born a Crime by Trevor Noah
• A book of social science (14) – Locking Up Our Own by James Forman Jr.
• The first book in a new-to-you YA or MG series (16) – Children of Blood and Bone by Tomi Adeyemi
• A one-sitting book (17) – Dear Madam President by Jennifer Palmeri