Show & Tell: Not Show & Tell, Actually
This is not a really installment of Show & Tell it is just a few reminders and updates.
This is Show & Tell where I tell you some things I loved from the week and the one thing I hated, plus round up everything else going on around these parts. The first half of Show & Tell is free to all. The adoration and hateration are for paid subscribers only.
Hi all, technically I’m on a little break, but I did want to make sure to remind you about few things around these parts.
I extended the membership sale through the end of 2024. As long as you subscribe by December 31st you can get 20% off. This includes gifts, and if you are gifting don’t forget to print out and share this little gift card.
Voting for Battle of the Books starts today on The Stacks Instagram! Details below.
We dropped our best books of the year episode with guests
and MJ Franklin, and it is a really good time.We also did a bonus episode (for paid subscribers…hello, get after that sale folks) with Chelsea Devantez and Sam Sanders all about the best and worst of the pop culture that defined 2024.
Over on the Patreon, we dropped the 2nd Annual Mega Reading Challenge and my reading tracker. If you’ve considered joining that community now would be the time.
Books I Read This Week
Hot Air by Marcy Dermansky
A romp of a novel that starts with two divorcées, Joanie and Johnny, on a first date at Johnny’s house when a hot air balloon crash lands in Johnny’s backyard. Out come a billionaire, Jonathan, and his philanthropist wife, Julia. Surprise, Joannie knows Jonathan. Chaos, right? This is a fun little book with some extremely unlikable characters who are pretty awful to each other. It moves quickly and takes a lot of turns which allow Dermansky to get in critique of the power of wealth, parent culture, and social norms. This book implements a lot of perspective shift, which are pulled off nicely. The question I was left with when I finished the book was what was Dermansky trying to do here? Is this a subtle satire, in which case, brilliant? Or is this a straight comedy, in which case, meh. All that is to say I enjoyed my reading of the book but was left feeling unclear and unsatisfied in the end.
Fave of the week!
Ok that is all for this very non-Show & Tell. I will be back with regularly scheduled programming on Monday January 6th. Look out for some really fun end of year things in your inbox on Friday December 27th and Monday January 30th. And don’t forget to grab hold of that sale before it is gone.
I have not read Hot Air but I have read Dermansky’s Hurricane Girl. I’d say land on the side of brilliant satire.