Moé for Solarpunk Books

Navarre started reading When We Hold Each Other Up by Phoebe Wagner

No cover — Phoebe Wagner: When We Hold Each Other Up (2023, Android Press)

When We Hold Each Other Up by Phoebe Wagner

Navarre wants to read The Overstory by Richard Powers

Richard Powers: The Overstory (2019, W. W. Norton & Company)

The Overstory by Richard Powers

The Overstory, winner of the Pulitzer Prize in Fiction, is a sweeping, impassioned work of activism and resistance that is …

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sarah reviewed The Overstory by Richard Powers

The Overstory, winner of the Pulitzer Prize in Fiction, is a sweeping, impassioned work of …

let it rewrite your relationship to trees and time

5 stars

This book pulled me into its world of trees and gutted me. I loved the richly drawn human characters and the stories they and the author tell about and learn from trees. I didn’t love the whiteness of the book, but also the relationship Powers describes between people and trees is a particularly white western one—some sense of indigenous stewardship before the end would have made that less irksome. But the book is beautiful and devastating to read, and I can’t stop thinking about trees.

Navarre set a goal to read 12 books in 2022

Navarre reviewed The Deep by Rivers Solomon

Rivers Solomon: The Deep (Hardcover, 2019, Saga Press)

Yetu holds the memories for her people—water-dwelling descendants of pregnant African slave women thrown overboard …

Review of 'The Deep' on 'Goodreads'

5 stars

This story covers a number of different themes in such a rich way that it seems impossible it could be as short as it is. I personally really resonated with how the main character, imbued with the memory of their people, runs away from this duty because it is killing her. Much like Atlas bolted when Hercules gave him the chance, Yetu can't take it anymore. When coupled with the environmental and human (mermaid?) rights themes of this book, I couldn't help but think of how many people have burned out of activism while fighting to make the world a better place.

Yetu's struggle with balancing her own well-being and that of her people is really the conflict here, with the fate of the world dependent on one person. The story didn't pull any emotional punches and hit me a lot harder than any typical farmboy with a sword narrative …

This story covers a number of different themes in such a rich way that it seems impossible it could be as short as it is. I personally really resonated with how the main character, imbued with the memory of their people, runs away from this duty because it is killing her. Much like Atlas bolted when Hercules gave him the chance, Yetu can't take it anymore. When coupled with the environmental and human (mermaid?) rights themes of this book, I couldn't help but think of how many people have burned out of activism while fighting to make the world a better place.

Yetu's struggle with balancing her own well-being and that of her people is really the conflict here, with the fate of the world dependent on one person. The story didn't pull any emotional punches and hit me a lot harder than any typical farmboy with a sword narrative might.

I also really love that the story didn't end in the traditional, singular sacrifice of our hero, but in a more collaborative solution that was better for Yetu and her people. It felt optimistic, but realistic, and was a welcome change to the one person saves the world on their own narrative even if Yetu's own actions are a critical piece of that solution.

Despite the short length, the characters beyond Yetu held their own and felt like real people, not just cardboard cutouts there to advance the plot, which I've sometimes found to be the case in novellas.

I can't recommend this book enough. It deals with some heavy stuff, but makes you feel like anything is possible if you don't try to do it all on your own. It's definitely going on my list of tidalpunk recommendations.