Book Noted

june gloom? i don’t know her! 🌈🥳

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Image Descriptions:
 [1] A South Asian woman, Geetanshi, sitting cross-legged on a driftwood bench at the beach, smiling under a cap that says “Audre Lorde,” with wildflowers and ocean in the background. Text overlay: “June.”
[2] A smiling sibling duo standing in front of a brick wall—one in a ruffled navy dress, the other in a graduation cap and gown holding a bouquet of colorful flowers. Text bubble says: “celebrated my little brother’s graduation! he’s amazing!”

[3] Display table at a cozy bookstore featuring q***r books like “Gender Queer,” “Stone Fruit,” and “Only This Beautiful Moment.” Text overlay points to “Only This Beautiful Moment”: “saw my fav q***r book displayed at an indie bookstore!”
[4] Baking sheet with raw puff pastry squares, each topped with fresh sliced or chopped peaches. Captioned: “made pastries with a friend!”

[5] A South Asian woman and a white woman in their mid-twenties sitting close together outdoors at sunset with the Seattle skyline and water in the background. Text reads: “celebrated my friend sam’s graduation!”

[6] Geetanshi smiling at an outdoor table with two cups of vegan ice cream. Text reads: “got my first big teaching job! & celebrated w/ vegan ice cream.”

[7] Close-up of a white mug on a wooden shelf with a smiling rainbow tea bag illustration and the text “LGBTEA.” Caption: “found this pretea cute mug at a q***r art popup.”
[8] Two hands, one brown and one white, wearing matching beaded bracelets, one with a rainbow charm, in front of a window. Text reads: “made bracelets with my friend at the same event.”

[9] A table with crispy dosas, sambar, chutneys, and vada on silver trays. Text overlay: “dosas! yum!”

[10] Colorful graphic with people on a rainbow ramp, including someone in a wheelchair, under the title “All Bodies Welcome Pride Party.” Text at bottom: “attended (& helped host) my first accessible pride event!”

I have been feeling angry and sad and frustrated lately. I feel like every day I wake up and realize all over again that so many people…don’t care about other people. And sometimes my anger feels even stronger towards those who do, but only when it relates to them in some way. Those whose advocacy, whose feminism, doesn’t include disabled, q***r, trans, poc lives, and any reordered variation of that sentence. If the marginalized cannot begin to see and consider other marginalized groups, how can we expect those who aren’t marginalized to see and consider anything beyond themselves either? I am astonished, for one, at how so many organizing and social justice spaces have continued to fail to consider the lives of their disabled community, even and especially amidst the pandemic. There is no liberation without collective liberation. Your advocacy isn’t advocacy if it isn’t intersectional.

I have been turning to books and writing more than ever during this time. Some pieces that I have read lately and loved:

- The book Brotherless Night by V.V. Ganeshananthan

- The essay SILENCE BREAKING WOMAN by Terese Marie Mailhot

- The book THE MESSAGE by Ta-Nehisi Coates

- The book CARE WORK by Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha

I would love to hear what you have been reading recently, what you have come back to and rereading, during this time.

With care and solidarity ❤️ geetanshi

ID: An image of a book display titled RADICAL READS featuring mulitcolored zines and books of all genres centering intersectional and diverse perspectives.

🏷️:

February’s prompt for the   is “a memoir by a disabled author.” I’ve selected the book YEAR OF THE TIGER by Alice Wong, a genre-bending memoir in essays about an activist’s journey finding and cultivating community, and the continued fight for disability justice.

You can join my 2025 Disability Reading Challenge Discord (link in bio) if you’re interested in reading my picks for the challenge in community with others!

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Do you want to learn more about disability justice and culture, but don’t know where to start? Do you want to read books by disabled authors, and include disability in your journey of decolonizing your reading? If so, this is the 2025 reading challenge for you! 

Prompts and IDs pinned below!

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