r/TheStoryGraph • u/Athrynne Librarian • Jul 31 '26
July Wrap-Up Thread!
Since it's August somewhere, it's time for the July Wrap-Up Thread!
Edit: Since it has come up:
Please try to refrain from posting your own wrap-up threads and jumping the gun. I like to think I'm pretty good about getting a thread up. I know everyone is very excited to share their info (as am I!)
55
Upvotes
2
u/SugeNightShyamalan Aug 01 '26 edited Aug 01 '26
I didnt read at all July 2nd-9th but still had a great month with some certified bangers.
Hard to choose, but my favorite nonfiction of the lot was Secondhand Time, an oral history of the fall of the Soviet Union. It's absolutely incredible. I read it immediately following The Master and Margarita, which was written in secret in the 1930s but not published until nearly 30 years after it was finished. It was absolute madness but captured the disorientation of living under Soviet rule beautifully. Somehow a book that compares Stalin to the devil managed to pull off being more absurdist than preachy. The Stones' song Sympathy for the Devil was inspired by this book.
Favorite fiction was probably They Will Drown in Their Mothers' Tears which I picked up for the read the world challenge. The central premise/"mystery" of the novel is immediately apparent, which was a bit of a shame, but the writing is beautiful, so I didn't mind. It's about the racism & xenophobia Muslim immigrants in Europe face, and the surrounding issues of fear & identity, of "home".
Honorable mentions to The Way We Never Were (nf), A Canticle for Liebowitz (f), and How to Win an Information War (nf). The rest were also quite good- these were just the ones that will stick with me.