Tag: non-fiction

My Top 10 Reads of 2022

On By Kate FlanaganIn BooksLeave a comment

Well, top 20 since I’m giving you fiction AND non-fiction. I am such a giver, I know.

Fiction

Jackal by Erin E. Adams *Thriller, Horror REVIEW

Before You Knew My Name by Jacqueline Bublitz *Thriller, Suspense

Alice Isn’t Dead by Joseph Fink *Horror

What Jonah Knew by Barbara Graham *Thriller, Suspense

Yours Truly by Abby Jiminez *Romance, RomCom

What Moves the Dead by T. Kingfisher *Horror

True Crime Story by Joseph Knox *Thriller

The Key to My Heart by Lia Louis *Romance, RomCom

Nightcrawling by Leila Motley *Thriller

Sundial by Catriona Ward *Horror

Non-fiction

Token Black Girl by Danielle Prescod *Memoir, Race, Pop-culture

The Rage of Innocence by Kristin Henning *Race, Politics, Education

How to be Perfect by Michael Schur *Philosophy, Ethics, Pop-culture

I’m Glad My Mom Died by Jeannette McCurdy *Memoir, Pop-culture

Before We Were Trans by Kit Heyam *Trans rights/history, LGBTQIA+

Finding My Voice by Emerald Garner *Memoir, Race, Politics, Education

Lady Secrets by The Lady Gang *Memoir, Pop-culture

Unraveling by Brandon Leake *Poetry

Who Do I Think I Am? by Anjelah Johnson-Reyes *Memoir, Humor

Unmasked by Paul Holes *True Crime

Did any of these make your list? Have something different on your favs of the year? Let me know what in the comments, I’ll add it to my tbr list! Happy holidays!

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When You Choose Anxiety

On By Kate FlanaganIn Anxious EventsLeave a comment

Not in the realistic sense, obviously. More so in the “I know this will make my anxiety go up a few notches but I’m going to do it anyway” way. This is just within the last few weeks. Things I’ve done that I should (read: did) know better than to do.

And yet:

1) I brought a new puppy home. Riff is less than pleased. He’s more along the lines of “you traitorous beehive, how could you do this to me, I’m dying and nothing will ever be okay again”. It’s been extremely stressful and so tense in the house but I mean. Look at our new Margot Doggie’s face! How could we NOT bring her home?

2) I decided to rent a car on my recent trip to Ireland. (Of which I am currently waiting in the airport to return home from.) You know, where they drive on the left side of the road? I’ve had multiple panic attacks and did more driving than I ever do at home, but I did it! At the expense of 90% of my nerves being fried and scaring the s%#t out of my parents for a week, I DID IT. I’m worried for Colorado drivers when I get back.

3) I started wearing makeup again after 10+ years of maybe occasionally wearing only mascara 1-3x/year. So now I play a fun game called “Is this makeup acne, period acne, mask acne, or just my skin being my skin acne?” I have gotten the answer right 0% of the time and continue to be mystified and stressed daily about it. Do I stop and ruin the progress of getting my skin used to makeup to where I can eventually wear it with no acne? Do I stop and my skin clears up immediately? Do I continue and I just don’t have skin that will ever just be cool? Will my skin ever be clear again or have I ruined the algorithm of my face?

4) I’ve spent time scrolling social media and news sites after the the SCOTUS “leak” about overturning Roe v Wade. Everything is infuriating and I am furious and these posts fire me right back up every time I’ve calmed down to what is just the high simmer that is my baseline now. Just writing this one is making my insides shake with rage.

5) I requested way too many books on NetGalley thinking I’d only get approved for like 25% of them and instead got approved for ~70% and now I’m on a time crunch to get books read and reviews submitted. I KNEW not to do that. But what did I do? I did it.

And finally, 6) I started this post 30 minutes before boarding my plane and I know it’s super readable and engaging and it seems like I can do all of this really quickly, and I can, but it takes a lot of work and nerves to get it edited and ready to go before they shout “airplane mode” over the intercom and I need to sign off. I know I seem super with it but that is actually, and very much so, not the case.

Happy anxiety! I mean, Saturday!

The Rescuer by Jason Sautel

On By Kate FlanaganIn Books2 Comments

A BarksBeachesBooks

Welcome, welcome! I’m here for my TLC Book Tour post this week to share The Rescuer: One Firefighter’s Story of Courage, Darkness, and the Relentless Love That Saved Him.

This was a powerful read. I was expecting an emotional and tug-at-your-heartstrings memoir but this was much more. From the first chapter Jason gives an eye-opening glimpse into what it is to be a fire fighter. Spoiler alert: it is not just fighting fires. And while it is camaraderie and brotherhood it is also a very emotionally and mentally difficult job. Jason takes readers through many different scenarios that can, and for him have, come up as a fire fighter. But deeper than that, he brings readers to see how he was affected and what was going on in his mind during the best and worst of times.

This was a truly incredible, heavy, and yet hopeful collection of stories that I am so glad I got the pleasure of reading. Everyone respects fire fighters in a general sense (especially since many will never need their help directly) but The Rescuer brings light to the many ways a fire fighter puts their life on the line every day. I recommend everyone reads this. Absolute must read and so important. It will completely change the way you look at fire fighters and give you a whole new sense of appreciation.

He helped save people every day—but he had no idea how to save himself.

Jason Sautel had it all. Confident in his abilities and trusted by his fellow firefighters, he was making a name for himself on the streets of Oakland, California. His adrenaline-fueled job even helped him forget the pain of his childhood—until the day he looked into the eyes of a jumper on the Bay Bridge and came face to face with a darkness he knew would take him down as well.

In the following months, a series of traumatic emergency calls—some successful, others impossible-to-forget failures—drove Jason deeper into depression. Even as he continued his lifesaving work, he realized he could never rescueeveryone, and he had no idea how to save himself.

In the end, Jason was forced to confront the truth: only the relentless power of love could pull him back from his own deadly fall. Action-packed, spiritually honest, and surprisingly romantic, TheRescuer transports readers inside the pulse-pounding world of firefighting and into the heart of a man who needed to be broken before he could finally be made whole.

Purchase: Amazon Books-a-Million Barnes & Noble

Followe Jason Sautel: Website Facebook Twitter

The Grown Woman’s Guide to Online Dating by Margot Starbuck

On By Kate FlanaganIn Books3 Comments

A BarksBeachesBooks Review

Welcome to my stop on the book tour for The Grown Woman’s Guide to Online Dating and a big thank you to Margot Starbuck and TLC Booktours for allowing me to read and share!

*Four years after an unexpected divorce, best selling writer and funny lady Margot Starbuck found herself venturing into the unknown waters of online dating. What she discovered surprised her – and changed her.* Read to find her tips and tricks for online dating as well some funny dating fails and even interviews Margot gives.

First, I actually finished this. I don’t usually finish self-help type books. The humor was a big help (and what got my attention to begin with) because even if I’m not looking for a man, this was very insightful. Also I love to laugh and Margot has the own-biggest-fan and self-depreciating humor down perfectly. (I laughed out loud more than once.)

My favorite part was probably the emphasis on female friendships. You realize how important those are every year you get older which makes it sad to think back on older articles in magazines and online and even parts of books I’ve read that say not to tell your girlfriends (or anyone really) anything about your relationship because you will ruin it. This book is not that: red flags are real and should be discussed. Trust your girls, trust your family and trust yourself. I love that.

This is a Christian dating advice book but even if you’re not religious I think this could be helpful in your online search for a man. Or a woman. If I had a criticism it would be that this is very hetero-oriented and I do wish it hadn’t been so “woman gets husband” specific because the tips definitely apply to everyone. Not that this blatantly excludes any gender by any means, it just is definitely for any and everyone!

Also, and again not that I have any dating profiles, but I think you should absolutely put your biggest passions on your profile even if it’s just a picture of you at a protest or being your activist self or volunteering. Personally, I don’t want to meet anyone who has the exact opposite passions as me (because I’m always right, right?) but I also have very little patience for people in general so I would think it’d make it easier to be up front in that arena.

This was a fun read overall. Margot goes through the ups and downs of online dating and the fun parts and even the ugly ones. She also is very clear that self care is important in this journey which is awesome. It was a really refreshing take on something like online dating in general, but also for grown ass adults who may or may not have been left by their husband for another man. Did you have a disappointing or rough end to your last relationship? Margot has tips on healing as well.

I guess what I’m trying to say is, are you in the dating scene? Then this book is probably perfect for you. Write your bio with Margot’s insight and hook the fish you’ve been angling for!

P.S. Margot, want to grab coffee and tell me jokes some time? I have a feeling you will make me laugh even more in person and that’s my favorite thing.

Does the thought of joining a dating site invoke feelings of fear and anxiety—or, worse, insecurity or unworthiness? If so, then The Grown Woman’s Guide to Online Dating is the book for you. With practical advice about how these sites work, what to expect, and when to join and quit, along with proven tips for making the most of them, The Grown Woman’s Guide equips readers with all they need to take the plunge.

Purchase: Amazon l Thomas Nelson l Barnes & Noble

Follow Margot Starbuck on: Facebook l Twitter l Instagram l Website

One Hundred Dogs and Counting: One Woman, Ten Thousand Miles, and A Journey into the Hearts of Shelters and Rescues by Cara Sue Achterberg

On By Kate FlanaganIn Books2 Comments

A BarksBeachesBooks Review

When Cara Sue Achterberg reached out to ask me to read and share One Hundred Dogs and Counting, I almost missed out on the opportunity. Due to the Covid19 pandemic, she could only offer an eBook, but I didn’t have an eReader. Over the next week I realized it wasn’t going to be quick for anything to arrive, so I decided to order an eReader. Once it arrived (because who knows if 2 days was going to be true (it wasn’t)), I reached out and confirmed with Cara. And I am SO GLAD I DID. 

I figured it would be a heart wrenching story about fostering dogs and that I would soon be crying. While it will tug at your heart strings, it is with information that you need to know. And while it will hurt the hearts of animal lovers a little bit, the information gained is worth the tiny bit of pain. In fact, I would recommend every animal lover IMMEDIATELY reads this. You will get insight into fostering dogs, but more than that you get to go on Cara’s journey visiting animal shelters in the south to see why there seems to be a never-ending flow of dogs going into and out of (and sometimes not) shelters. 

Additionally, Cara mentions how it would be possible to save all the dogs instead of just some if everyone were to have this knowledge and then pitch in however they can. Volunteer,donate to shelters (money, food, medicine), foster, spread the word on social media, and most of all just TALK about what is going on. Of course it’s a sad subject– but it is so worth your time to help save innocent pups and even some kitties too. 

Go with Cara on this journey to see her difficulties and successes with fostering. See what the animal shelters look like that need the most help and no help. See what Cara sees when there are no shelters or no space or no resources and a lone citizen is willing to take on the job. Invest yourself how Cara invests herself: wholeheartedly. See what YOU can do to help and if fostering might be for you. 

My personal tips: 

1) Don’t adopt unless you plan on keeping that fur baby. Check with your apartments/cities to make sure it’s allowed to that you aren’t having to rehome.
2) Training is available and you should use it if you need to, especially if you’re considering rehoming due to behavior issues. Google it, call shelters, ask friends and family, get a trainer, utilize fund raising sites.
3) Keep your pet healthier and vet costs down by not letting your pet drink from other animals’ water bowls. Make sure open areas are safe for them (there is an algae in Colorado that comes yearly and can kill pets so I have to be careful where and when I hike).
4) Adopt don’t shop-there are so many good animals in need of homes in shelters. The fees usually cover the adoption and spay/neutering and aren’t profiting people that breed animals and then send them to a shelter once they can’t have anymore litters.

To purchase: http://www.carawrites.com/100-dogs–counting.html

*Thanks to the author for my copy to read and review!*

Administrations of Lunacy: Racism and the Haunting of American Psychiatry at the Milledgeville Asylum by Mab Segrest

On By Kate FlanaganIn Books3 Comments

A BarksBeachesBooks Review

Welcome to my stop on the TLC Book Blog Tour for Administrations of Lunacy by Mab Segrest.

First things first, this book IS haunting. But unlike the title suggests, it is NOT a ghost story except in the sense of drawing out the history of the ghosts of our ancestors and how completely they wrecked psychiatry from the beginning for women and, especially, African Americans.

This is a rough and infuriating read about how the first white settlers in America used psychiatry to control women and people of color by extreme methods in the asylum as well as banning and refusing treatment to those deemed unable to have mental health issues outside of the asylum due to skin color.

Honestly, I was disgusted reading this and that is the entire point. We had so many chances to make a great mental health care system from the *literal* beginning, especially considering the fact that the first asylums were actually copied off the ones in Europe. The problem? The picking and choosing which parts to copied. If it was beneficial to white men (their own mental health, ridding them of wives and family members that were burdening them, power) then it was brought into the American asylum model. Was it beneficial to women and, again especially, to African Americans? Then it was disregarded.

It was a very hard read to get through seeing instance after instance after instance of people being thrown away or killed (because let’s be honest, MANY people died in these asylums) all for the benefit of white men rising to power. That being said, while a tough read, it is an EXTREMELY important read. Talk about history class omissions.

Here’s the thing about the book, the beginning is a lot of guessing about feelings (perhaps she thought, maybe he felt) which I didn’t care for. However, this quickly stops (and does serve a purpose) and as you continue through the book you see how even the smallest, most unlikely character (sometimes without even a name attached due to poor historical recording) ties into the stories of all and to the entire asylum scheme that still bleeds into psychiatry today. This reads like a textbook so don’t expect a fast-paced thriller, but do expect to take breaks because you will need them.

*Thank you to TLC Book Tours and Mab Segrest for providing my copy to read and review.*

About Administrations of Lunacy


• Hardcover: 384 pages
• Publisher: The New Press (April 14, 2020)

A scathing and original look at the racist origins of psychiatry, through the story of the largest mental institution in the world

Today, 90 percent of psychiatric beds are located in jails and prisons across the United States, institutions that confine disproportionate numbers of African Americans. After more than a decade of research, the celebrated scholar and activist Mab Segrest locates the deep historical roots of this startling fact, turning her sights on a long-forgotten cauldron of racial ideology: the state mental asylum system in which psychiatry was born and whose influences extend into our troubled present.

In December 1841, the Georgia State Lunatic, Idiot, and Epileptic Asylum was founded. A hundred years later, it had become the largest insane asylum in the world with over ten thousand patients. Administrations of Lunacy tells the story of this iconic and infamous southern institution, a history that was all but erased from popular memory and within the psychiatric profession.

Through riveting accounts of historical characters, Segrest reveals how modern psychiatric practice was forged in the traumas of slavery, the Civil War, Reconstruction, and Jim Crow. Deftly connecting this history to the modern era, Segrest then shows how a single asylum helped set the stage for the eugenics theories of the twentieth century and the persistent racial ideologies of our own times. She also traces the connections to today’s dissident psychiatric practices that offer sanity and create justice.

A landmark of scholarship, Administrationsof Lunacy restores a vital thread between past and present, revealing the tangled racial roots of psychiatry in America.

Purchase: Bookshop.org Amazon Barnes & Noble

Follow: GoodReads Instagram

Author, Mab Segrest

Mab Segrest is professor emeritus of gender and women’s studies at Connecticut College and the author of Administrations of Lunacy and Memoir of a Race Traitor (both from The New Press). A longtime activist in social justice movements and a past fellow at the National Humanities Center, she lives in Durham, North Carolina. Photo by Laura Flanders

A Dog Named Beautiful by Rob Kugler

On By Kate FlanaganIn BooksLeave a comment

When I first saw the title for A Dog Named Beautiful I was sure it was just another tear jerker dog story. When I saw that it was based on the true story of Bella and her marine Rob Kugler I knew it was another tear jerker dog story. I also knew that I had to read it. I was right, I cried. But I also laughed and learned a lot and was completely drawn into the story. Rob does an excellent job of telling Bella’s story as well as relating it to his own and how they ended up as the inseparable pair that they were. 

I’ll be honest, the first few pages I wasn’t sure about this guy because Bella kept calling Rob “daddy”-I mean a man talking to his dog? I don’t know why but it seemed so strange, but then I was like, “well yeah, of course Bella talked. My dogs talk too.” …to my dogs. This whole conversation was with my dogs to be completely honest. So, I kept going and obviously got sucked in because five hours later I was done with the book, having cried through the last quarter of it. And once I was done it would have been weird if father and daughter weren’t talking.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s not a book where the sole purpose is to make you cry. But it is the true story of a man and his best friend making the most of their time together. Plus, Rob and Bella had such an incredible bond that I could feel their love and it just pulled on my heart.

READ THIS BOOK. After all the heartaches, and ups and downs, and overall good times before Rob and Bella part you are left with a Rob who is still open to loving again (as he shows at the end of the book). I honestly think if I were Rob this story would have broken me, but Rob kept going in the name of Bella and it really is just beautiful.

I absolutely loved this book and it’s because of stories like these (and my inability to turn away from them) that I appreciate my dogs so much and treat them like the four-legged people they are. Cheers, to Bella and Rob – the non-stop duo that will help renew your appreciation and love for your own pup!

From left: Bella, Half of Rob’s Head, Sheriff Raff, Berlyn aka Lingy