Reviews and Comments

They say don't judge a book by its cover, but I am absolutely reading this book because its title is Dim Sum of All Fears

At its face, Find The Good is a kind of surface-level self-help book. Something to tell you how to live your life in a way that will make it better. That genre of product - quick easy solutions for complicated problems - tend to be vapid at best and dangerous at worst.

Here, I cannot say the intent of the author, but I don't feel like viewing the list of lessons provided as chapter titles are really what need to be taken away. The stories within these pages aren't simply a means to an end; they are accounts of deeply human experiences within small communities. They express the meaning of all the things we do, big and small, and the impact that has on those around us. Almost like a high quality textual people watching. People reading, if you will.

Presented from the perspective of the author, an obituary writer and grandma, it does read like stories from grandma. That has its pros and cons, but it feels fitting in this particular context.

Feel The Good isn't going to instill profound lessons, but it is a collection of touching slices of life, and I think that's enough.

Death By Dumpling is everything you expect, and maybe a little more. The first in the Noodle Shop Mysteries series, Death By Dumpling is a murder mystery that tows the line between the seriousness of a capital offense without taking itself too seriously.

Like balancing flavours in delicious Asian cuisine, there's enough subterfuge and drama to go with messy interpersonal affairs and fun twists without feeling like turning the page is an emotional burden.

The central character isn't the first-person protagonist, but rather, the community she is in. Death By Dumpling creates a little insular world that makes all the secrets under the surface come to life in a way that just wouldn't land without it. Everyone is a distinct personality, even for those whose appearances are limited.

There's nothing revolutionary about the approach, but if you call up the Noodle Shop for a serving of interpersonal intrigue that is about the complexities of humans, community, and culture, then Death By Dumpling delivers.

Seven Devils introduced the futuristic queer rebellion against a mind-controlling Empire, and Seven Mercies is a necessary sequel. The original didn't really reach any conclusions or stand entirely on its own.

Seven Mercies really finds its feet. The writing is smoothed out compared to the original, even if still slightly stilted. Small tweaks in balance, such as adding a tinge more comedic relief, does a great job of smoothing over the rough edges. Characters, fully established, have room to have the big important moving moments that the original lacked.

The delicate balance of an epic space opera is taking soaring through the stars and grounding it in the essential facts of being human. More than anything, that is what the story gets right. While the characters may also have incredible superhuman abilities, they are still portrayed as complex, imperfect people with complicated motivations and sloppy attempts at doing their best.

It is necessary to look at Seven Devils and Seven Mercies as a single novel. Neither stands on its own, so there is a 900ish page investment to appreciate what is on offer, but that offer is a good one.

When asked when there would be enough women on the Supreme Court, Ruth Bader Ginsberg famously replied, "When there are nine". I think the same reasoning can be applied to when there will be enough queer characters, and Seven Devils comes close, without it being the point of the novel. They incidentally just are, like any other characters and that feels wildly refreshing.

The first half of a space epic, Seven Devils has a loving balance between exposition, interpersonal relationships, and political intrigue. It jumps around in timelines, but in a way that is carefully organized, with background being introduced at appropriate times to flesh out characters motivations when it becomes relevant.

As with most well done sci-fi, the book comes with prescient social commentary abstracted into the realm of a space epic while still be applicable to today. Class and race dynamics are front-facing without it specifically placing our world's current issues in the forefront. Combined with flawed, multi-dimensional characters manages to make a fantastical world feel grounded.

The writing is at times slightly stilted with some repetitive phrasing, but not to the point of being an issue. Perhaps the result of it being the first of two books, it concludes without any sort of satisfaction, and feels a bit lacking in particularly resonant emotional moments that given the everything else about the book that they ought be right at home. The few instances of comedic relief, while still welcome, almost feel out-of-place due to their infrequency.

My overall impression was that Seven Devils works as a slow burn that effectively draws the reader in over time, but ends at a frustrating point, not really designed to be read alone, despite having 456 hardcover pages to do so. Overall imperfect, but a worthwhile venture for anyone who could use some more human diversity in their sci-fi.

Sounds Fake But Okay is a long-running podcast about asexuality and culture. With so little representation and focus on asexuality, especially at its inception, simply existing has had a lot of value.

The same can be said of it in book form. Having accessible, personal, and humanized accounts of asexual existence is essential.

While the book leans a fair amount on various quotes and anecdotes, it also weaves a story about what it means to be on the ace spectrum in a decidedly allosexual world. How that being outside such a central cultural norm fits very neatly and obviously into queerness.

It can at times feel a bit like people talking at you. Like when you hit a particular area of interest of someone and they go off. But that's not necessarily all bad. The kind of emotion and passion around the subject is needed when there's so few voices to go around.

There isn't anything particularly revelatory here. If you're already well-versed in the subject, this isn't going to be a deep dive into theory. I think Sounds Fake But Okay operates best as a long letter to someone new or unconfident in their asexuality and could use words to reassure, show they're not alone, and give some ideas of how they can move forward.

And I think that's a good thing.

These two won't disappoint me T_T

The very broad-strokes concept of the Power Threat Meaning Framework (PTMF) is that systems of power should be necessary components in how we treat mental illness, diagnoses can be an impediment to care, and to shift the focus from "what is wrong with you" to "what has happened to you."

The acknowledgement of systemic forces, personal circumstance, and how frequently how own mental struggles are the consequence of experience are useful generalities. But the authors seem to take that to extremes that lose the thread. The primary call to action appears to be eliminating the concept of psychiatric diagnosis. Its support for this extraordinary suggestion is extremely meek. The most prominent reason provided is that we haven't found precise biological causes after all this time, therefor they don't exist, therefor it can't be pathological.

I must admit I only read about 1/3 of the book. After a few instances of odd references to schizophrenia, then quoting a woman with the seeming intent of suggesting bipolar disorder isn't a real disorder than can be helped with medication, I decided to background check the authors.

Mary Boyd I found had previously written Schizophrenia: A Scientific Delusion? (1990). These combined appear to delve into the kind of conspiracy theory that schizophrenia does not exist, and explains the slant of the book as being soundly in the anti-psychiatry genre.

Lucy Johnstone's record is more fraught. She has a series of articles posted only about neurodiversity. She blames the "rapid rise" of ADHD and ASD on "neoliberalism" and social media. She claims self-diagnosis isn't valid because it's "a misuse of language". It is a very odd angle to take on neurodiversity, given the PTMF's focus on systems to not acknowledge that self-diagnosis is a response to systemic failures for this group.

And if these types of arguments sound familiar, you may already anticipate what comes next. Lucy Johnstone was a speaker at the 2025 Society for Evidence-Based Gender Medicine (SEGM) Conference. SEGM is an anti-trans organization that pushes the "social contagion" hypothesis. I could not find the content of her talk, only that it was titled "Taking on a Diagnostic Label." and was otherwise able to confirm any expressly anti-trans statements. However, she should be more than aware of the active harm being caused by SEGM, and presenting there is tacit support.

As such, I opted to not finish this. The fundamental principles supposedly being espoused to appreciate the importance of people's experiences and the systems of power that cause harm in their lives, but proceeds to show both in the text and elsewhere that they are ineffective at applying those principles.

False is a difficult book to summarize. The world could use quite a bit more content like the majority of its contents. It does well to include many factors involved in how we are faulty thinkers and susceptible to poor reasoning leading to false beliefs. The author takes care to include all of us in the potential victims of our own biases, which a reminder we can never have enough of.

However, when Pierre chooses to shift from psychiatric topics to politics, racial and social justice, and philosophy, he finds himself quickly out of his depth. These chapters serve as something of a public forum for his seeming unaware internal conflict between his deep centrist leanings with his informed understanding of the existence of racial injustice and far-right extremism in the United States.

His apparent need to sit neatly in the middle and suggest that the most healthy approach is one that includes "compromise" on issues such as "racial equality" and "abortion". Framing being "pro-choice" and "pro-life" as "contested ideologies". He exposes himself and his own biases in describing an archetype of a man who is "middle of the road", endorses "conservative economic stances" and "free-market capitalism", "believes in the right to bear arms" and "isn't particularly politically active" as someone who reaches this position as an example of a "mentally healthy way of believing".

Pierre also appears to not understand the concept of moral relativism while trying to use it as an example. At least, I hope he doesn't understand it. Because under the proper understanding of moral relativism -- that what is acceptable is contextual to facts involved when making the decision to act -- what is written excuses pedophilia and slavery.

Ultimately he appears to abandon the importance of being factually correct once it dips into politics, seemingly, though unspoken, by the belief that if people can get along more nicely, then we'd stop having extremists.

The last major flaw in the writings on politics is that it barely acknowledge the media ecosystem driving extremism on the right. Factors in faulty reasoning like confirmation bias and motivated reasoning don't really come into play when it someone is simply internalizing what they're told from authority figures because they are conditioned to do so.

Most of the book provides useful, interesting facts on how we think and come to conclusions. When Pierre tries to pull these points together into a sort of worldview of how politics should look like in America, it comes across naive, uninformed, and frankly, what you would expect from a well-off middle-aged White guy. And as such, I can't really recommend this book.

Lawless is very successful in compiling a substantial indictment of the Supreme Court comprised of many decisions over its history. The summation of the politically motivated decisions devoid of coherent judicial philosophy or reasoning is encapsulated by the author in the term "vibes". The court rules by vibes.

Despite the levity (and accuracy) of the description, the book doesn't stray far from dry facts. Even the narrative is more implied than directly stated throughout, drawing together relevant details to paint a picture over time.

I would highly recommend this book to anyone not especially familiar with the slanted nature of the court, but while Litman does walk through cases all the way back to the start of the court, there may not be a huge amount here for anyone who has been keeping tabs on John Roberts and company over the past decade.