May Reading Wrap Up

During the month of May, I took part in a reading challenge we called #PagesforPeriods to raise money for the charity Bloody Good Period.

The aim was to read 100 pages a day for 26 days, inspired by the 2.6 challenge.

I closed out the month having read 13 books, 4,518 pages. As a collective, we raised over £2,500 and it’s one of my proudest achievements since joining the book community.

Here’s what I read throughout the month:

My Son the Fanatic by Hanif Kureishi ⭐⭐
Night Sky with Exit Wounds by Ocean Vuong ⭐⭐⭐⭐
Uncomfortably Happily by Yeon-Sik Hong (tr. Hellen Jo) ⭐⭐⭐⭐
Granta: Japan (a collection) ⭐⭐⭐
Eileen by Ottessa Moshfegh ⭐⭐
Children of the Sea by Daisuke Igarashi (tr. unnamed) ⭐⭐
Invisible Differences by Julie Dachez (tr. Edward Gauvin)⭐⭐⭐⭐
A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder by Holly Jackson ⭐⭐⭐⭐
One by One by Ruth Ware ⭐⭐
Breakfast at Bronzefield by Sophie Campbell ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Tim Ginger by Julian Hanshaw ⭐⭐⭐⭐
Nimona by Noelle Stevenson ⭐⭐⭐
Toffee by Sarah Crossan ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

My May Favourites

Although I read a lot of books throughout the month, some stood out to me as ones that I want to push into the hands of other readers.

The above books, plus Night Sky with Exit Wounds by Ocean Vuong are five titles that I think are absolutely worth reading. Here’s why.

Night Sky with Exit Wounds by Ocean Vuong is a beautiful poetry collection, in which Vuong explores his Vietnamese heritage and reimagines the experiences of his family.

It was extremely moving to read and I felt I gained a better understanding for his writing style and the aim of the collection after reading an interview with Vuong that featured in the Guardian.

Breakfast at Bronzefield by Sophie Campbell (pseudonym) is a book written by a Black British woman about her experiences of the criminal justice system in the UK and, in particular, living in HMP Bronzefield (a prison in England).

This was a book that made me angry. I was and am angry at the injustices in the justice system, angry at the abuse of power that pervades throughout this system and angry at the way that gender and race decide, at least in part, the way that you are treated.

Things need to change and I hope people read Sophie Campbell’s memoir, realise that and begin to campaign to make a difference.

If you’re looking to improve the intersectionality of your feminism or interested in women’s experiences of the criminal justice system, you will want to add this book to your reading list.

Sarah Crossan’s Toffee is an exceptional YA novel written in a poetic writing style.

I appreciated Crossan’s handling of the themes of dementia, loneliness and domestic violence.

I think it’s important that young people who have difficult home lives are able to make sense of their lived experiences through fiction if they would like to and I also loved the inclusion of an elderly character in this book.

A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder by Holly Jackson is a page turner of a YA mystery novel. I flew through this and it kept me guessing right up to the end pages.

If you’ve read this, did you notice any parallels to the Adnan Syed case?

Finally, the fabulous graphic novel Uncomfortably Happily by Yeon-Sik Hong (tr. Hellen Jo) was a book that brought me so much comfort and joy and I simply adored it.

Following a male-female couple who move from Seoul to the South Korean countryside, this graphic novel reflected little relationship-isms that I adored; such as the way this couple celebrated each other’s success.

I also loved the handling of (what read to me as) mental illness and this novel’s commentary, in a larger sense, on the way your living circumstances can impact upon your mental health.

I would recommend these five books if you’re looking to add to your to-be-read shelf and I would love to hear what you thought if you have read them, too. Let’s chat in the comments!