My main criticism is that noone uses their powers anywjere near enough but hey ho. Ignore the SFX and amateur acting. Just enjoy black supernatural shit.

I finished it. I was completely unsatisfied with the story overall, but it gets 4 of 5 stars for construction alone. The story itself wasn't worth the read - or suffering through the discomfort.

She has another one! This time on Rosa Parks!

She's now playing hide and seek with me behind the book! She's adorable!

The second book issssss....

One from the Little People, Big Dreams collection....

on Ella Fitzgerald!

Now THIS is England.

She has now finished that book and her mother asked her if she would like another book.

An enthusiastic yes and head nod! Too cute!

She is babbling a recital of her ABCs and some unintelligible words in a beautiful cadence and turning the pages as she goes, turning her little head to look at each page (so maybe she really is reading lol)

I despise the normalisation of any of it within the tales being told and that's what I think I respect the most. That I can loathe and love such masterful, heinous, wonderful work all at once.

I like her writing, her conceptualisation of mythology and characters, the immersiveness of her world-building. I'm even in awe of how she makes me wrestle with myself about how I feel reading her work, because the content is dark in these stories, and it's presented without moral judgement and

Like, I just don't feel like when folks are putting Ms Octavia on 'must read' lists that they're giving us the full 360 on what we're getting with her. That or they haven't really read her. Or her other stuff is far more sanitised - I dunno, it's only my second book - otherwise I'm not getting it.

Add on the racial dynamics that play into it as well and I'm about ready to put this book down, too. I just can't get the horror of it out of my head. And both books are so good. SO good. But I *can't* CAN'T get through them, or past the content in them.

Now, reading Fledgling, I am disgusted by the presentation of paedophilia. Like, hello, in both species Shori is considered a child!!!! And yet it's written such that her relative age to her human counterparts makes sexual relationships with human adults acceptable. And it's constant.

I couldn't finish Wild Seed because the philosophical and moral conundrum of the inc*st and r*pe plot line were too much mental gymnastics for me and I was repulsed. I still want to go back and finish the book at some point, but HOW. How?