Month: February 2021

Ms. Adventure

~ rachelbenzine ~ Leave a comment

Plot:

Can you even imagine if someone asked you what your job was, and you legitimately replied that you were a Volcanologist? Because that’s actually a job that some people can have. It blows my mind. Jess Phoenix is a Volcanologist. In Ms. Adventure, she shares stories of working on the side of a volcano with hot lava flows, studying the ocean depths, being the only woman on most job crews, and chasing down cartel members when they stole her favorite rock hammer. This book is part science, part memoir, and part adventure.

What I loved most:

I used to say that I wasn’t a science person. Chemistry and physics were my least favorite classes in high school. My brain leans more toward books and writing than it does toward atoms and matter (and yes, I definitely just googled “physics basic concepts” to have an example of a physics thing that I’m not drawn to. #crushing it). But THIS BOOK Y’ALL. Phoenix makes science SO interesting, and SO accessible to absolutely anyone who wants to learn. You are so wrapped up in reading about lava flows and the ocean depths that you forget you’re actually learning scientific concepts. Come for the volcanoes, stay for the incredible scientist teaching you geology.

Read this book if you like:

Memoirs, science (but even if you don’t like science, read this anyway), adventures, smashing the patriarchy by dominating in your field

Book details:

  • Author: Jess Phoenix
  • Publisher: Timber Press
  • Date of Publication: March 2, 2021
  • Interest Level: Adult

A Spy in the Struggle

A Spy in the Struggle cover
~ rachelbenzine ~ 1 Comment

Plot:

Yolanda Vance wasn’t planning on becoming an FBI agent. She’s a lawyer by training, and ended up at the FBI after her huge corporate employer got busted for being shady. When the Bureau assigns her to infiltrate an extremist group near the college she attended, saying no isn’t an option. Yet when she meets the group of teenagers that have been labeled extremists by the Bureau, and starts to fall in love with one of their adult mentors, she quickly realizes that not everything the Bureau had told her was true. But y’all, we all know that the Bureau wants their employees to stick to the party line… and when Yolanda starts questioning what she’s been told, she isn’t going to be safe for long.

What I loved most:

Sometimes, you just need to read a book with spies and double crossing and dirty government agencies. I generally don’t read many mysteries or thrillers anymore, because I 50000% get nightmares when I read things that are too dark. This was an engaging, well-written novel that satisfied my desire to read suspense without going way too far off the deep end.

Read this book if you like:

Suspense, spies, trying to figure out how you would handle a tough situation, social justice, activism

Things to be aware of:

There is explicit sexual content in this book. And while it’s not at a nightmare level, there’s definitely violence.

Book details:

  • Author: Aya de Leon
  • Publisher: Kensington Books
  • Date of Publication: December 29, 2020
  • Interest Level: Adult

Never Caught

~ rachelbenzine ~ Leave a comment

Plot:

We all know of George Washington. He’s an American hero. What we don’t talk about as often is the fact that he owned hundreds of slaves. Ona Judge was technically the property of his wife, Martha Washington. When George and Martha moved to Philadelphia to begin their reign as America’s first family, Ona was one of the slaves they took with them. And at age 20, she successfully escaped from the Washington household. Never Caught is the story of the Washingtons, their human property, and their pursuit of one woman determined to live in freedom.

What I loved most:

American history is messy. George Washington helped found this country that is built on the concepts of freedom and all people being equal – and he also owned hundreds of slaves. Both of these things are true. This is the kind of history that you’re not taught in school (or at least the kind of history that I wasn’t taught in school), but if we’re truly committed to loving America and making this country the best that it can be, we absolutely have to explore our history in its entirety. Ignoring the evil in our past doesn’t make it any less real. Never Caught shares an eye-opening, brutal story that I’ll forever be mad about. This is an important read, y’all.

Read this book if you like:

History, biographies, unlearning and relearning, Black history month

Book details:

  • Author: Erica Armstrong Dunbar
  • Publisher: 37 Ink
  • Date of Publication: February 17, 2017
  • Interest Level: High schoolers and adults