Hello everyone and happy new year ! The book club is back and we have a mini calendar this time (WOOO). For those of you that have been with us since last year, thank you for being a part of this club!

If you're new here, welcome! My bestie A'isha and I host a book club for anyone to join in my Comic Cove Discord. We alternate between reading a fantasy/scifi book and comic every month with the theme of liberation/resistance woven into every pick. These books are chosen to specifically support diverse cartoonists/writers, indie publishers, and storytellers that don't often get a spotlight. There are a few popular titles on the calendar this year, but I mainly focused on choosing stories that show a different perspective than what we typically see.

A brief note before we get into each title and why I picked them:

Our communities are under attack. We have all been witnessing the violence the US exports around the world swing back around here in full force for 5+ years, and with this recent administrations, the headlines have been flooded with one devastation after the next. This book club is meant to be a space where we gather and highlight stories that come from Black, Indigenous, queer/trans, and immigrant voices of all backgrounds that have shaped the "America" we know, live in, and fight for today. Coming together in community spaces and reading books is a part of radical tradition. Not to be dramatic or overstate the club or anything, but I believe this space is a part of that. Reading is a revolutionary act in a time and a country where government suppression is at a high and literacy is under attack.

I started this book club to be a safe space for my community that I've built over the last 4 years. A space where we can dive into the heavy shit through fantasy and fiction. I hope these picks are jumping off points for us to have deeper conversations on immigration, land back, resistance to fascism, trans rights, liberated futures and everything in between as we did last year.

The way it works: Each month, I'll create a forum for the book we're reading and all discussions will live there. At the end of the month we will host a virtual meeting to discuss the title.

Some of these picks are subject to change throughout the year if we feel like it, but for now, these are the books we'll be reading. Excited to grow the club this year and have more of you join the meetings either virtually or (if we can swing it once or twice this year) in person. The club is 100% on the discord for now though.

Now, onto the books!

The first book we'll be reading is Pet by Akwaeke Emezi. If there is any book I have read in the last few years that feels timely as fuck it is this one. I can not wait to discuss this. We'll only have a few weeks to pick this up so hopefully it's enough time to grab a copy from the library if you don't already have one.

There are no monsters anymore, or so the children in the city of Lucille are taught. Jam and her best friend, Redemption, have grown up with this lesson all their life. But when Jam meets Pet, a creature made of horns and colors and claws, who emerges from one of her mother's paintings and a drop of Jam's blood, she must reconsider what she's been told. Pet has come to hunt a monster--and the shadow of something grim lurks in Redemption's house. Jam must fight not only to protect her best friend, but also uncover the truth, and the answer to the question How do you save the world from monsters if no one will admit they exist?

The first comic we'll read is a new comic to me, and a debut. The Blue Road: A Fable of Migration is another story that truly meets the moment and shares a narrative of connection through the use of fables.

Lacuna is a girl without a family, a past, or a proper home. She lives alone in a swamp made of ink, but with the help of Polaris, a will-o'-the-wisp, she embarks for the fabled Northern Kingdom, where she might find people like her. The only way to get there, though, is to travel the strange and dangerous Blue Road that stretches to the horizon like a mark upon a page. Along the way, Lacuna must overcome trials such as the twisted briars of the Thicket of Tickets and the intractable guard at the Rainbow Border. At the end of her treacherous journey, she reaches a city where memory and vision can be turned against you, in a world of dazzling beauty, divisive magic, and unlikely deliverance. Finally, Lacuna learns that leaving, arriving, returning -- they're all just different words for the same thing: starting all over again.

The next is The City in Glass by Nghi Vo You'll notice a lot of these picks are relatively short (under 300 pages) and this was by design. I wanted to make it easy to pick up a book even if it took longer to get them before our next meeting. The pick for March is by a new author to me but one I've been meaning to read for a long time. This stand-alone fantasy is described as: a brilliantly constructed history and an epic love story, of death and resurrection, memory and transformation, redemption and desire strong enough to burn a world to ashes and build it anew.

April is arab american heritage month and we'll be reading the latest graphic novel from Palestinian cartoonist Iasmin Omar Ata, Wallflower. I'm soo excited to pick up their next release, I have loved everything from this cartoonist so far.

For as long as Marlena can remember, she has seen flowers growing on everyone she personalized poppies and daisies and roses of every color that give away what their owners truly feel. Invisible to the rest of the world, the flowers have always felt too overwhelming, too much for Marlena to take in when they don't always match what their owner shows. She’s long since given up convincing anyone else that they’re there.

Until she meets Ashe, a charming transfer student who can somehow see these mysterious flowers, too. Unfortunately for Marlena, Ashe wants nothing to do with her. But as their thorny connection blooms, so do hidden secrets buried years ago. In this stunning graphic novel where dreams are woven into reality and not everything is as it seems, Marlena and Ashe must unfold the truth together, no matter where it may lead.

The next book pick The Black God's Drum is by P. Djèlí Clark, another author I have been meaning to read but still haven't. A'isha will likely read this in shock (I never finished A Master of Djinn whoops) I would like to remedy that this year. This novella is described as: bringing an alternate New Orleans of orisha, airships, and adventure to life in his immersive debut novella. Very excited to pick it up.

Saw the cover, knew I needed to read it. On Starlit Shores is completely new to me, created by a biracial queer, UK based illustrator, this story follows Alex Wilson who must return to the town where she was born to unravel the magical mysteries her late grandmother left behind.

I read Aspara Engine a few years ago and it remains a unique collection of speculative fiction comics the like of which I have not yet found. Bishakh Som is South Asian trans-femme cartoonist and educator that has many interesting works out, I highly recommend checking out her other work.

The eight delightfully eerie stories in Apsara Engine are a subtle intervention into everyday reality. A woman drowns herself in a past affair, a tourist chases another guest into an unforeseen past, and a nonbinary academic researches postcolonial cartography. Imagining diverse futures and rewriting old mythologies, these comics delve into strange architectures, fetishism, and heartbreak.

We'll be reading A Magical Girl Retires during Women in Translation month. I have seen this one circulate a lot since it came out but it was never on my radar. This is one of A'isha's picks. I'm excited to check it out!

Described as: A millennial turned magical girl must combat climate change and credit card debt in this delightful, witty, and wildly imaginative ode to magical girl manga. Sign me up.

A new NK Jemisin adaptation? Yeah sign me up. Another author I have not read yet but need to! This is an adaptation from one of the essays in the collection: How Long Till Black Future Month? This comic adaptation comes out September 1st and we will be picking it up immediately.

We are introduced to Emma, a single Black mother of three in a backwater Alabama town in segregated 1940s America. In this alternative universe, magic and faeries exist, and Emma must use her Afrocentric cultural “magicks” against a supernatural force that wants to enslave her daughter, Pauline. Jemisin infuses this world with the magic, complexity, and power of oral Black folklore that have become trademarks of her work in trilogies like The Broken Earth and Inheritance.

For spooky month we'll be reading some Pakistani folktales (the scariest kind imo). I found this author on instagram and they had just come out with this collection in 2025. I would love to read more Pakistani authors in 2026 so this is on the list.

Inspired by truths, twisted beyond recognition (like deadly candy) until only a glimpse remains, reshaped into something darker, stranger, and far more delicious.
Rooted in Pakistani myths and folklore, Dark Tales of Wonder is an anthology that peels back the veil on the supernatural.

Some stories will haunt you.
Some might make you laugh.
And some? You just might fall in love with.

For Native heritage month this year we'll be reading this YA graphic novel called Surviving the City written by Tasha Spillett and illustrated by Natasha Donovan and Donovan Yaciuk. Excited to get into this comic, I only discovered Tasha Spillett's, an Afro-Indigenous author/speaker last year. This is part of a series, if we like this one, maybe we can pick up volume 2 as well.

Miikwan and Dez are best friends. Miikwan is Anishinaabe; Dez is Inninew. Together, the teens navigate the challenges of growing up in an urban landscape—they’re so close, they even completed their Berry Fast together. However, when Dez’s grandmother becomes too sick, Dez is told she can’t stay with her anymore. With the threat of a group home looming, Dez can’t bring herself to go home and disappears. Miikwan is devastated, and the wound of her missing mother resurfaces. Will Dez’s community find her before it’s too late? Will Miikwan be able to cope if they don’t?

This novella will be my first CL Clark title, can you tell there's a pattern of authors I really want to read but haven't gotten around to yet making this list?

Warring clans. Burning hearts. Deadly fate.

The clans of the fens enjoy a tenuous peace, and it is all thanks to Agnir, ward and hostage. For as long as she can remember she has lived among the enemy, learning their ways, growing strong alongside their children. When a burgeoning love for the chieftain’s daughter lures them both to a hidden spring, a magic awakens in them that could bind the clans under one banner at last―or destroy any hope of peace. By working their intentions into leather, they can weave misfortune for their enemies… just like the Fate’s Bane that haunts the legends of the clans.

Ambitions grow in their fathers’ hearts, grudges threaten a return to violence, and greedy enemies wait outside the borders, seeking a foothold to claim the fens for themselves. And though their Makings may save their families, the legend that gave them this power always exacts its price.

If these sound interesting, please join the club! Once you become a Bindery member, just click the discord link on my page and you'll be brought straight to the server. We're a small club but steadily growing. I'd love to see you in a virtual meeting some time this year. <3