These themes will vary! It could be based off of some book mail I just received, pop culture, something personal to me, a headline from the news, a trend I noticed when I was buying books for my library system, etc. I hope you stick around to see all the themes and book recs I come up with!
Today’s Theme: Cancer Chronicles
I was given this book by Penguin Teen and I’m forever thankful. My mom is a cancer survivor and her story is very similar to the author’s. Because of that, I don’t think I would have picked this up on my own. Why? Because I was still very mad at that fact. But in reading this and hearing about their struggle with fat shaming, and medical racism, it made me less upset to know my mom wasn’t alone. Not that I found comfort in their struggle, but I found it in their company and to know I wasn’t making a big deal out of what happened. This book tells the real life cancer story of Walela Nehanda. And I mean the good, the bad, and the ugly. I love that they didn’t shy away from anything and we hear about everything they went through.
I haven’t read this one, but reading the synopsis it shows that it’s also a memoir of Audre Lorde’s life and time with cancer. Audre Lorde was also queer. This is an adult book, but I think this is the perfect book to pair for teens that are reading Bless the Blood. Nehanda also references this book through quotes many times in Bless the Blood. I wonder if Nehanda wrote this as an ode to this one? This is going to be an interesting one to research and learn more about. I don’t know how I never read this one before.
Well, there you go! Here I’m just going to talk about why I grouped these two books together. I hope you enjoyed a look at this small part of the books. For a full synopsis of the book or to add it to your TBR, click the picture and it will take you to their Storygraph. The link on the caption will take you to it’s Goodreads.
Do you think these sound good? Does this topic make you want to add these to your TBR? Will you go pick one up today?! Let me know in the comments!