2022 felt like three separate eras packed into one year. Season one started off modestly–I was still crashing with my parents in my hometown as I waited patiently for my big move (which I didn’t know would only be the first of the year). My first destination was Chicago, where I moved in with my platonic life partner, Camila! I was working three to four jobs from home for most of the year, until I made the life-changing decision to go to graduate school. I then had to pack up my stuff again and move all the way to London.
Needless to say, 2022 was characterized by movement. My reading was stalled when I was working multiple jobs (I will NOT be doing that again), and moving to a new country was a big adjustment. However! I read a lot of great books in and outside of my degree that I’d like to share.
Stay and Fight by Madeline Ffitch
I listened to this as an audiobook on Libby (support your local libraries!) because I saw it on an independent bookstore’s TikTok. Actually, I saw the TikTok months before I actually picked it up–it wasn’t until I realized that I knew Madeline Ffitch from when I was a teenager that I started reading it immediately.
Stay and Fight was intimately Appalachian. I read it during my first few months in London when I really needed the warm drawl of the foothills. Though the narrative follows the challenges of homesteading and living off of the land, the story is a heartfelt exploration of community and belonging. There’s lesbian love, found-familial love, and a deep love for the land that shines in this multi-perspective story of resistance. The story also touched on nuanced themes of poverty, education, privilege, and the foster care system. I wish I had a physical copy to read with pen in hand; it was definitely one of my top reads for the year.
Himawari House by Harmony Becker
A Japanese American woman, a Korean woman, and a Singaporean woman walk into a Japanese sharehouse…
This graphic novel really blew me away. While it’s authentically laugh-out-loud funny, I also feel like the story will resonate deeply with anyone trying to balance a desire for belonging and escape. These girls are messes, each going through their own self-discovery journey in a foreign land. The graphic novel masterfully captured what it’s like to experience a language barrier and how difficult it can feel to not have the words to express your inner world.
Notes of a Crocodile by Qiu Miaojin
This was one of three books that made the original journey from Chicago to London because I couldn’t bear to leave it behind. Described on the back cover as a story of “queer misfits discovering love, friendship, and artistic affinity while hardly studying at Taiwan’s most prestigious university,” I picked this up for it’s exploration of gender roles and queer community in Taiwan–a country that intrigues me as the only Asian country to legalize same-sex marriage.
Notes of a Crocodile also ended up being an important pre-reading for my friend’s translation of Solo Dance by Li Kotomi that I read later in the year!
Goals for 2023
I am admittedly writing this in April, when we are already rooted in the year. But I think it’s important to always be checking in on your goals!
This year I’m aiming for 50-60 books. As most of this year will be focused on writing my dissertation, I will have to be intentional about setting time aside to read for fun. So far I’ve read maybe 8 books. I’m hoping that this summer I can find a balance between my academic readings (mostly short stories and articles) and reading books for the hell of it. Here’s to 2023!
Only Naengmyeon 
Leave a comment