Apr 02 2025
In an increasingly dark sociopolitical climate, it helps to know that there are people out there who genuinely care, who don’t think that empathy is a sin, and who understand that helping others in need isn’t a huge sacrifice but an everyday thing we can all incorporate into our lives. One such person is Karen …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2025/04/02/meant-for-more-following-your-heart-and-finding-your-purpose-by-karen-olson-excerpt/
Mar 10 2025
with Lisa Dickey. Subtitled Lessons for Anyone Who Wants to Make a Difference. Despite being fairly politically informed, I wasn’t super familiar with Governor Gretchen Whitmer until the news of her attempted kidnapping and murder made national headlines. Even then, her policies didn’t (and still don’t, as most if not all of my Midwestern friends …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2025/03/10/true-gretch-young-adult-edition-by-gretchen-whitmer/
Feb 20 2025
I deeply appreciate what Michael Toledo is trying to do with this collection of short stories, interspersed with several illuminating autobiographical entries. The parts that were written with young readers in mind are trying hard to reach them at their level, especially the at-risk kids like Cielo in Grandfather To Granddaughter and Gracie in Heart. …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2025/02/20/be-limitless-be-love-by-michael-toledo/
Feb 06 2025
subtitled Two Decades Of Photos From Comic Books & Hollywood. So I’ve been a comic book fan since the mid 1980s but darned if I can think of a single Gerry Duggan comic that I’ve read. This is not meant to be an insult, especially since my devotion to mainstream Marvel/DC Comics faded soon after …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2025/02/06/timing-luck-by-gerry-duggan/
Oct 29 2024
Extremely well-meaning but — and I hate to use this word because of the way it’s morphed so far from its more neutral original meaning — problematic. Pat is a 40-something American academic living in Montreal. His wife Ester has an important job, so he does his fair share of housework while they raise their …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2024/10/29/clay-footed-giants-by-alain-chevarier-mark-mcguire/
Oct 11 2024
subtitled A Father’s Memoir of Heartbreak, Parenting, and Love. Perhaps my most popular and controversial review over on Goodreads is of an absolutely abysmal “parenting” memoir by a blogger who lost his wife in childbirth and struggled to raise their child on his own afterwards. I have genuine sympathy for his situation — with my …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2024/10/11/i-will-do-better-by-charles-bock/
Aug 26 2024
Being a complicated woman who tries to deal with myself honestly, it wasn’t a surprise to me that a lot of what Charlotte Shane has to say in her memoir about sex work is stuff I’ve already thought about. Honestly, it’s stuff that most, if not all, thoughtful non-sex-worker-exclusionary feminists have grappled with too. At …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2024/08/26/an-honest-woman-a-memoir-of-love-and-sex-work-by-charlotte-shane/
Aug 12 2024
Younger me would be absolutely shocked to hear that I no longer have the time to read full blurbs or the back cover matter of books anymore, but such are the perils of having so much to read, and so little time to do it in! Present day me was thus quite surprised to get …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2024/08/12/hanami-you-me-200-sq-ft-in-japan-by-julia-cejas/
May 30 2024
Y’all, I was so excited when my friend Emily asked if I wanted to read Crying In H Mart with her, especially since it would help cap Asian American Pacific Islander Heritage Month for me here at The Frumious Consortium. We’d both heard so many great things about the book, and it looked short and …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2024/05/30/crying-in-h-mart-by-michelle-zauner/
May 11 2024
By the early 1960s, Vasily Grossman was in an odd position with the authorities of the Soviet Union. He had been a recognized writer starting in the 1930s, and as a war correspondent he was both beloved by regular troops and honored by the state. His novels were serialized in major newspapers, and his time …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2024/05/11/an-armenian-sketchbook-by-vasily-grossman/
Al Singh
Doug Merrill
Doreen Sheridan
Emily Lauer
John Pitzel
Lars N. Goldschlager
Laura Eilers
Professor X
Robert Maedgen
Sylvere Ap Leanan
The Shire