What I've been reading

"The Summer Prince" by Alaya Dawn Johnson. This novel a YA dystopia set in a futuristic Brazil, when some kind of nuclear disaster has radically changed the earth's climate and political structures. Teenage aspiring artist June Costa lives in Palmeres Tres and has a best friend name Gil. Every five years, her city elects a "Summer King" who gets to live for one year as king and then appoints the new queen as he is sacrificed at the end of his reign. June falls in love with the newly-elected Summer King, Enki, but Enki falls in love with Gil. Over the next year, Enki becomes June's close friend and artistic collaborator, and June begins to understand the ways her city is corrupt and in trouble and begins to question the way queens are appointed and young men are elected to be summer kings. Loosely based on the Epic of Gilgamesh, I adored everything about this book and am excited to see what else Johnson will write in the future. Highly, highly recommended.

and

"The Killer of Little Shepherds: A True Crime Story and the Birth of Forensic Science" by Douglass Starr. This book about 19th century French serial killer Joseph Vacher puts the killing spree in context and taught me a lot about the very beginnings of forensic science, as the subtitle suggests. Vacher was known to have killed at least 11 people, possibly as many as 25, and all but a few were teenage boys or girls, many of them sheepherders, thus the title "Killer of Little Shepherds." The case also sparked a huge debate about the insanity defense, which was very new at the time of these murders in the 1890s. The book was well written for the average person, and I would recommend it to anyone interested in *real* forensic science, which is very messy compared to the TV version, and anyone interested in true crime and serial killer tales.

My full comments on both books here.