fuck yeah reading: 2017 books
January 1st, 2018 10:00 am by Kelly Garbato
So 2017 was a terrible year, for a variety of reasons. I wish I could say that the books (like the dogs) were always good, but the truth is that I read some pretty bad ones, and my reading slump wasn’t exactly helped by my depression and anxiety and general state of panic. But 2017 will go down as the year I really dove into comic books; some of my favorite reads this year (shout outs to Fetch, The Last Unicorn, Bitch Planet, and Kindred) were graphic novels, and I suspect I had a little more luck engaging with this format on those days when my brain was feeling especially slow and foggy. This was also a pretty great year for YA fiction that sticks it to rape culture; see, e.g., The Nowhere Girls and Vigilante.
As is the custom, here’s a complete list of my reads this year, with my top picks starred. And you can check out my Year in Books on Goodreads here, which looks lovely but is entirely too much to screencap.

fuck yeah reading: 2017 book list
- The Furies by Natalie Haynes (2014)
- The Dark and Other Love Stories by Deborah Willis (2017); reviewed here
- The Impossible Fortress by Jason Rekulak (2017); reviewed here
- Wonder Woman, Vol. 1: Blood by Brian Azzarello, Cliff Chiang, and Tony Akins (2012); reread: originally reviewed here
- Kinski by Gabriel Hardman (2014)
- Amy Chelsea Stacie Dee by Mary G. Thompson (2016)
- The Last Final Girl by Stephen Graham Jones (2012)
- The Devil in America by Kai Ashante Wilson (2014); reviewed here
- A Crown of Wishes (The Star-Touched Queen #2) by Roshani Chokshi (2017); reviewed here
- Uprooted by Naomi Novik (2015)
- The Secret Loves of Geek Girls edited by Hope Nicholson (2016); reviewed here
- Everyone’s a Aliebn When Ur a Aliebn Too: A Book by Jomny Sun (2017); reviewed here *
- Final Girls by Mira Grant (2017); reviewed here
- Final Girls by Riley Sager (2017); reviewed here
- Waking Gods (Themis Files #2) by Sylvain Neuvel (2017); reviewed here
- The Stranger in the Woods: The Extraordinary Story of the Last True Hermit by Michael Finkel (2017)
- A Colony in a Nation by Christopher L. Hayes (2017)
- 20th Century Ghosts by Joe Hill (2007)
- Wonder Woman, Volume 2: Guts by Brian Azzarello, Cliff Chiang, and Tony Akins (2013)
- Wonder Woman, Volume 3: Iron by Brian Azzarello, Cliff Chiang, and Tony Akins (2013)
- Wonder Woman, Volume 4: War by Brian Azzarello, Cliff Chiang, and Goran Sudžuka (2014)
- Wonder Woman, Volume 5: Flesh by Brian Azzarello, Cliff Chiang, and Goran Sudžuka (2014)
- Wonder Woman, Volume 6: Bones by Brian Azzarello, Cliff Chiang, and Goran Sudžuka (2015)
- By the Silver Water of Lake Champlain by Joe Hill (2014)
- The Last Unicorn (The Last Unicorn Graphic Novels #1-6) by Peter S. Beagle, Peter B. Gillis, Renae De Liz, and Ray Dillon (2011) *
- Here We Are: Feminism for the Real World edited by Kelly Jensen (2017); reviewed here
- The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman (2013)
- How to Be Everything: A Guide for Those Who (Still) Don’t Know What They Want to Be When They Grow Up by Emilie Wapnick (2017)
- Bitch Planet, Vol 1: Extraordinary Machine (Bitch Planet #1-5) by Kelly Sue DeConnick (2015); reread
- Heart-Shaped Box by Joe Hill (2007)
- Bitch Planet, Vol. 2: President Bitch by Kelly Sue DeConnick, Taki Soma, and Valentine De Landro (2017); reviewed here *
- Our Endless Numbered Days by Claire Fuller (2015)
- For Want of Water: and other poems (National Poetry Series) by Sasha Pimentel (2017); reviewed here
- Super Narwhal and Jelly Jolt (Narwhal and Jelly) by Ben Clanton (2017); reviewed here
- Best Vegan Science Fiction & Fantasy of 2016 edited by B. Morris Allen (2017); reviewed here
- Lady Mechanika, Volume 3: The Lost Boys of West Abbey (Lady Mechanika: The Lost Boys of West Abbey #1-2) by M.M. Chen, Joe Benítez, Peter Steigerwald, Martin Montiel, and Beth Sotelo (2017); reviewed here
- Lessons from Shadow: My Life Lessons for Boys and Girls by Shadow Bregman (2017); reviewed here
- Feminist Fables for the Twenty-First Century: The F Word Project by Maureen Burdock (2015); reviewed here
- Kindred: A Graphic Novel Adaptation by Octavia E. Butler, John Jennings (Illustrations), and Damian Duffy (Adapted by) (2017); reviewed here *
- Star Trek Cats by Jenny Parks (2017); reviewed here
- Red Rising (Red Rising #1) by Pierce Brown (2014); reread: originally reviewed here
- Poisoned Apples: Poems for You, My Pretty by Christine Heppermann (2014)
- Getting Grief Right: Finding Your Story of Love in the Sorrow of Loss by Patrick O Malley (2017); reviewed here
- Unleashed by Amanda Jones (2017); reviewed here
- A Fist of Permutations in Lightning and Wildflowers by Alyssa Wong (2016)
- The Ship Beyond Time (The Girl from Everywhere #2) by Heidi Heilig (2017); reviewed here
- Golden Son (Red Rising #2) by Pierce Brown (2015)
- Fetch: How a Bad Dog Brought Me Home by Nicole J. Georges (2017); reviewed here *
- All Our Wrong Todays by Elan Mastai (2017); reviewed here
- From #BlackLivesMatter to Black Liberation by Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor (2016); reviewed here
- The Diary of Edward the Hamster 1990-1990 by Miriam Elia and Ezra Elia (2013)
- Morning Star (Red Rising #3) by Pierce Brown (2016)
- The Little Queen by Meia Geddes (2017); reviewed here
- Sorrow of the Earth: Buffalo Bill, Sitting Bull and the Tragedy of Show Business by Eric Vuillard; translated by Ann Jefferson (2017); reviewed here
- A Guide for Murdered Children by Sarah Sparrow (2018); review coming next year
- Dogs in Cars by Lara Jo Regan (2014)
- Vigilante by Kady Cross (2017)
- Invisible No More: Police Violence Against Black Women and Women of Color by Andrea Ritchie (2017); reviewed here
- Britt-Marie Was Here by Fredrik Backman (2016)
- The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah (2015) *
- The Hollow Girl by Hillary Monahan (2017); reviewed here
- Dread Nation by Justina Ireland (2018); review coming next year
- The Bazaar of Bad Dreams by Stephen King (2015)
- #Notyourprincess: Voices of Native American Women edited by Lisa Charleyboy and Mary Beth Leatherdale (2017); reviewed here
- Writing to Awaken: A Journey of Truth, Transformation, and Self-Discovery by Mark Matousek (2017); reviewed here
- Body Horror: Capitalism, Fear, Misogyny, Jokes by Anne Elizabeth Moore (2017)
- Get in Trouble: Stories by Kelly Link (2015)
- Ghost City by Madeline Claire Franklin (2014)
- Comics for a Strange World: A Book of Poorly Drawn Lines by Reza Farazmand (2017); reviewed here
- How to Be Perfectly Unhappy by Matthew Inman/The Oatmeal (2017); reviewed here
- If My Dogs Were a Pair of Middle-Aged Men by Matthew Inman/The Oatmeal (2017); reviewed here
- A Is for Asteroids, Z Is for Zombies: A Bedtime Book about the Coming Apocalypse by Paul Lewis and Kenneth Kit Lamug (2017); reviewed here
- Be a Unicorn: and Live Life on the Bright Side by Sarah Ford (2017); reviewed here
- Underground Airlines by Ben H. Winters (2015)
- Depression & Other Magic Tricks by Sabrina Benaim (2017); reviewed here
- Radical Hope: Letters of Love and Dissent in Dangerous Times edited by Carolina De Robertis (2017)
- The Creeps (Deep Dark Fears Collection #2) by Fran Krause (2017); reviewed here
- The Torture Report: A Graphic Adaptation by Sid Jacobson, Ernie Colón, Jane Mayer (Introduction) and Scott Horton (Afterword) (2017); reviewed here
- Touch by Claire North (2015); reviewed here
- How to Make Friends with a Ghost by Rebecca Green (2017); reviewed here
- My Depression: A Picture Book by Elizabeth Swados (2015)
- Blue Is the Warmest Color by Julie Maroh; translated by Ivanka Hahnenberger (2013); reviewed here
- Rolling in the Deep (Rolling in the Deep #0.5) by Mira Grant (2015)
- Fliers: 20 Small Posters with Big Thoughts by Nathaniel Russell (2017); reviewed here
- Three-Fifths a Man: A Graphic History of the African American Experience by Sid Jacobson and Ernie Colón (2018); review coming soon
- peluda by Melissa Lozada-Oliva (2017); reviewed here
- In My Hands: Memories of a Holocaust Rescuer by Irene Gut Opdyke (1992)
- Into the Drowning Deep (Rolling in the Deep #1) by Mira Grant (2017); reviewed here
- Menagerie (Menagerie #1) by Rachel Vincent (2015); reread: originally reviewed here *
- Survivors’ Club: The Complete Series by Lauren Beukes, Dale Halverson, Ryan Kelly, Iñaki Miranda, Mark Farmer, Eva de la Cruz, Clem Robins, and Bill Sienkiewicz (2016); reviewed here
- Moxie by Jennifer Mathieu (2017); I didn’t review it, but if I had, this is what I might have written *
- Warm Bodies (Warm Bodies #1) by Isaac Marion (2012) *
- Burger (Object Lessons) by Carol J Adams (2018); review coming soon
- Down Among the Sticks and Bones (Wayward Children #2) by Seanan McGuire (2017)
- Cry Your Way Home by Damien Angelica Walters (2018); review coming soon
- The Nowhere Girls by Amy Reed (2017) *
- All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr (2014)
- I Wore My Blackest Hair by Carlina Duan (2017); reviewed here
- Helium by Rudy Francisco (2017); reviewed here
- Wild Embers: Poems of rebellion, fire and beauty by Nikita Gill (2017); reviewed here
- The Mother of All Questions by Rebecca Solnit (2017)
- Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood by Trevor Noah (2016) *
- Pines (Wayward Pines #1) by Blake Crouch (2012)
- Herding Cats (Sarah’s Scribbles #3) by Sarah Andersen (2018); review coming soon *
- Quiet Girl in a Noisy World: An Introvert’s Story by Debbie Tung (2017); reviewed here
- Babyteeth, Volume 1 by Donny Cates and Garry Brown (2017); reviewed here
- Sugar Town by Hazel Newlevant (2017); reviewed here
- POS: Piece of Sh*t by Pierre Paquet and Jesús Alonso Iglesias (2017); reviewed here
- Wild Beauty: New and Selected Poems by Ntozake Shange (2017); reviewed here
- Lockjaw and the Pet Avengers Unleashed by Chris Eliopoulos and Ig Guara (2010); reviewed here
- Comics for Choice: Illustrated Abortion Stories, History and Politics edited by Hazel Newlevant, Whit Taylor, and O.K. Fox (2018); review coming soon
- Big Mushy Happy Lump (Sarah’s Scribbles #2) by Sarah Andersen (2017) *
- Elsewhere, Volume 1 by Jay Faerber, Sumeyye Kesgin, and Ron Riley (2018); review coming soon
- Black, Volume 1 by Kwanza Osajyefo and Jamal Igle (2017); reviewed here
- Emma in the Night by Wendy Walker (2017)
- Love Is Love: A Comic Book Anthology to Benefit the Survivors of the Orlando Pulse Shooting by Marc Andreyko, et al. (2016)
- OINK: Heaven’s Butcher by John Mueller (2015)
bonus list: miscellaneous
- My Rad Life: A Journal by Kate Schatz and Miriam Klein Stahl (2017); reviewed here
- Start Where You Are Note Cards by Meera Lee Patel (2017); reviewed here
- Do One Thing Every Day That Makes You Happy: A Journal by Robie Rogge and Dian G. Smith (2017); reviewed here
- The Daily Question: My Five-Year Spiritual Journal by WaterBrook (2017); reviewed here
- 30 Days to Peace: A One-Month Creative Journal by Waterbrook (2017); reviewed here
- 30 Days to Joy: A One-Month Creative Journal by Waterbrook (2017); reviewed here
2017 Cover Gallery































































































































Filed under books, fuck yeah reading, my year in books