Hello everyone and welcome to another reading wrap up. February was a month of children’s books and comics for me and I was able to read four books total, whoo! My goal was only two books this month, but I was in the mood for more so I let my mood guide me. While it seems that many people tend to read romance for the month of February since it’s the “month of love”, I did not go that route as I am not really a romance reader. I read books with romance in them, but romance as a genre with love stories at the forefront and main driver of the plot is not entirely my taste. Instead, I read two comic anthologies and two children’s books that were actually poems.
Marvel Voices Legends #1
This anthology was just…okay. I didn’t really know what to expect therefore I wasn’t really expecting anything, but I can honestly say that I was left feeling very meh after reading this. Anthologies normally aren’t my thing, but since it’s been so many years since I’ve read an anthology or any kind of short story collection, I thought I would give some a go this month just to get back in the swing of reading.
My issue with anthologies is that I tend to dislike more stories than I like and it makes me feel like my time was wasted. I felt much of the same here. None of the stories truly stood out to me except maybe the Captain America one, but even with that one, I was left wanting more. A short story just isn’t enough to make my reading experience feel complete.
One of the major dislikes I had across the entire anthology was the very deliberate “comic book speak”. At least, that’s what I call it. It’s the very obvious type of speech that you only ever really see in comics. By that I mean, do you remember back in the day when little boys used to play with action figures, complete with play-fighting and sound effects? That is what was happening in this anthology. Lot’s of instances of “take this!”, “You’ll never defeat me, your just a weakling shrimp just like your father, ha ha ha!”, “Why don’t you crawl back into the hole you came from” type of talking, complete with the sound effects written on the page like, “BANG, SMASH, BOOM!”, and villains giving entire monologues. Note that these are not quotes from the comic, these are just my own examples.
I hate to say this, but it felt sooo………..corny. I hate how overused the word “cringey” is nowadays, but many instances in this anthology felt like exactly that, cringey. It felt like this comic book was for little boys of the 80s and 90s. I’m sure there is an audience for that. I am just not a part of it.
The Girl Who Married A Skull
It’s hard for me to say that I enjoyed this little anthology too. It started off fine and I was enjoying the stories, the artwork, and even got some chuckles out of a few of the stories. But as the stories went on, I enjoyed them less and struggled to even find the moral or tale of caution of the story. For a few of them, I felt like the moral/tale of caution was the wrong lesson to learn. But maybe that’s just a cultural thing as I am not African and these stories were taken from countries from all over Africa.
Would I read this again? Maayyybeee. But only the first third to first half. After the first half of the book I enjoyed myself significantly less as the stories just really didn’t work for me.
Songs Are Thoughts
This book is a collection of poems from the Inuit people who believe that poems are meant to be sung. Music is a very large part of the culture and they start creating songs at young ages. I do not have much to say about this book other than it was nice to read and get a snippet into a culture that I do not have much experience with. I also liked seeing the artwork throughout the book and how it matched the poems on each page.
Life Doesn’t Frighten Me
This is a poem by Maya Angelou with artwork by Jean-Michel Basquiat. I liked this poem and it’s safe to say that this was my favorite read of the month. I found the poem to be uplifting and empowering for people (read: me) who might be having a hard time just doing life. But I understood this poem to mean that even when life is tough, we should never be afraid to look life in the face, tell it “you don’t frighten me” and to keep on living. Look back at all the things you’ve been through that you thought was hell on earth, including many parts of childhood. You survived it, and since you survived it, why do other parts of life frighten you? What makes you think you can’t also get through that too? Although told in a way suitable for kids and other young readers, I really got something from this poem and I recommend it.
The art of Jean-Michel Basquiat has always been interesting to me since I first discovered who he was. I first heard of him back in…I want to say around 2019. And like many other artists I’ve come across, I did not understand what was so appealing to the masses about his work. His work looks like it’s been done by a young child, slapped on a page and completed within minutes. And maybe that’s the appeal. That an adult could be so rebellious to disregard what’s seen as adult level skillset, to continue to embrace the chaotic freedom of childhood by painting crooked shapes and coloring outside the lines, and using stick figures and animals to tell whatever story he’s trying to tell. Who knows. But for some reason, his artwork matched very well with this poem and I recommend this book.
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So, that was my month of February! For March, my goal is to read another novel length book, maybe two. I took another trip to my local library (even though I have shelves filled with books at home 🙈) and picked up a few books that I’ve had my eye on for a while. Some are recent releases, a couple are a few years old, while one is a backlist read from many years ago. Here they are.
I don’t expect to get to all of these books this month, but these are what I am going to be choosing from. I’ll also probably read another children’s book because I’ve been enjoying them recently. But anyway! I hope all your reading is going well and that you’re enjoying your picks. I am hoping March is a better reading month than February was and that I can enjoy many more books.
Thank you for stopping by!
~ TheCloudRunner ❤
The Cloud Runner 