March At An All-Time Low

this month was a fever dream

The “all-time low” does not mean the books I read were bad — it means that I have read a lot less than I usually do, and the amount of horrible controversies that went on on BookTok brought the community to an all-time low.

I finished four books, and many authors showed their true colours this month. Let’s get into it.

Monthly Stats

As always, I have to start with a beautiful wrap-up graphic courtesy of Storygraph.

What Did I Read?

I read amazing books this month and I’m excited to discuss them! The first book I finished in March was We Do Not Part by Han Kang.

Han Kang is a fantastic writer and I’m so glad that I have started reading her books recently. She can truly bring a scene to life, and her writing is so intricately woven together.

Kang writes about contentious topics that South Korea wants to keep hidden; this book highlights the Jeju Island massacre that occurred in the late ‘40s. The story told is deeply horrifying, yet Kang doesn’t hide from the brutality that took place.

Snow is used in multiple ways throughout the book as a focal point: to bring back memories, show the connection between timelines, a metaphor for death, etc. As you read on, you wonder if what Kyungha, the main character, is seeing is real or part of a dream.

“The thing is, every time it snows, it comes back. I try not to think about it, but it keeps coming back.”

“Who's to say the snow dusting my hands now isn't the same snow that gathered on their faces?”

She was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature for a reason. I think everyone should read Han Kang’s books.

The next book I finished was Oathbound by Tracy Deonn, the third book in The Legendborn Cycle series.

If you haven’t read this series yet, READ IT!!! It is so fun, fast-paced, has found family, and also tackles important themes in the story like racism, misogyny, white supremacy, slavery, and more.

It draws from the Authurian legend, following Bree Matthews, a teenage girl who stumbles upon a group called the “Legendborn” after witnessing a magical attack on campus.

This was one of my most anticipated reads of the year ever since I finished Bloodmarked, book two of the series. Unfortunately, it is not fully completed yet, as book four still needs to be released and is the last of the series. However, I think it is so worth it to start it right away. You are seriously missing out if you have not read it yet.

The second-to-last book I finished in March was A Bánh Mì for Two by Trinity Nguyen.

This was a very cute read. It’s a sapphic romance novel about family, food, love, and Vietnamese culture and history. I really enjoyed this, and I learned so much about Việt Nam and its history. It was very heartwarming, and I even teared up a bit near the end.

I found it a bit too insta-lovey for me, but other than that, I liked it. I definitely recommend it.

And, finally, the last book I finished in March was Assata: An Autobiography.

This is the first non-fiction I read this year, and it was an essential one. One of my professors recommended this, so I obtained it as quickly as possible and started reading it.

I may do a full review of this book just because there is so much to talk about that I can’t fully articulate here. Assata Shakur was a part of the Black Panther Party, and she was taken into police custody for crimes she did not commit, yet the United States tried very hard to charge her for them.

Her autobiography goes over her experience in the hospital after her arrest, in different prisons she was unjustly thrown into, her trials, as well as her childhood, adolescence, and adult years leading up to the incident, and then after she escaped.

I had to put the book down multiple times because the content in her book is heavy and frustrating to read. Not frustrating because of her, but because of the system, the police, and how she was treated throughout it all. While it is not new knowledge that the police and the “justice” system treat Black people horribly (and they still do), to read a first-time account was difficult.

Despite this, I still believe it is a book you all should read.

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A lot went on this month on BookTok and, surprisingly, Threads. It seemed like every day, there was a new controversy going on.

I already wrote about Sophie Lark’s racist, zionist, and anti-immigrant remarks in her books. The only update I have about this is that she took down her “apology post”. I’m not that surprised, honestly. It was very performative and did nothing to actually remedy the situation. This just confirms that she was never genuine about fixing her mistakes.

Oathbound at Barnes and Nobles

Something that took BookTok by storm was the release of Oathbound by Tracy Deonn. When people went to Barnes and Noble to purchase the book, many found that it was initially nowhere to be found. Many BookTokers filmed their journey to buy Oathbound, and in almost every video, it would either not have its own table or be found in the very back of the store. Sometimes, the person would have to directly ask an employee if they had any of the books in stock because it was not displayed anywhere.

This is an issue because books like Onyx Storm are still being displayed in B&N and have full tables even though it was released back in January. Yet, a very popular YA series released its third book, and almost no B&N had it displayed properly. Some B&Ns had it up, but the fact that employees needed to be asked to find the book is ridiculous.

Many people use the excuse that Onyx Storm was way more popular and had more anticipation for release day, and sure, but there is another issue with that. Legendborn is a very popular series. The reason it is not getting as much attention as books like Onyx Storm is because the publishers do not make the effort to market it or push it out to readers. As far as I heard, almost no ARCs were distributed for this book, even though it was highly anticipated.

Pushing out ARCs and marketing the book properly will get people to know about its release. The publishing industry heavily favours white authors (with 81% of authors published being white as of 2022). Many books written by Black authors get suppressed and end up not being as popular on the market as books written by white authors.

As I’ve talked about many times before, white authors (not all) can write books with half the quality as a book written by a Black author and still get heavily praised and displayed in huge bookstore chains like B&N months after the release day.

So to those pretending it is solely a popularity issue, it is much deeper than that. Oathbound is popular and would be on the level of Onyx Storm popularity if publishers cared more for their BIPOC authors.

Britandherbooks Smear Campaign

Britandherbooks on BookTok makes hilarious videos and it’s always a treat to have them come up on my fyp. She made a video about audiobook narrators, basically saying to not look them up because their “looks” may ruin the listening experience. She mentioned no narrator in particular; she kept it very general.

Raven Hill, an author I’ve never heard of, took it very personally, however, and started insulting Brit very viciously on Threads. She named Teddy Hamilton, her “friend” I guess, as the person Brit was talking about in her video. Again, Brit did not mention anyone at all. So Raven completely blew it out of proportion and made a problem out of nothing. She insulted Brit’s looks and tried to get a smear campaign against her, literally telling her followers to hate on and block her.

The funny thing about this is that Raven basically called her own “friend” ugly since she thought Brit was talking about Teddy Hamilton in her video when she didn’t name anyone. Raven’s smear campaign completely backfired on her and people started blocking her instead. Many people vowed to never pick up this author’s books.

Honestly, it seemed like a complete excuse to go after a Black woman. Raven insulted Brit’s features very harshly when Brit never did it to her. And, to wrap this up perfectly, Teddy Hamilton messaged Brit on TikTok and told her that her original video was very funny. He said to her, “… but even as a generally facially challenged narrator this made me laugh out loud.” And they are mutuals now, too. So Teddy took the joke, even if the video wasn’t about him, leaving Raven in the dust.

Tori Woods and Her Pedophilic Book

Trigger warning for this section: Pedophilia, grooming, and child sexual abuse material.

This one is honestly still hard for me to discuss. It is just such a disgusting topic and I can’t believe that there are people who are actually defending this behaviour.

If you haven’t heard, Tori Woods wrote a book called Daddy’s Little Toy and, well, here is the synopsis. For full context, I am going to include it. I couldn’t find the picture because I believe Woods deleted her social media, and I cannot find this book on Goodreads anymore.

“Lucy:

I can’t help myself when I’m around him. I wet my pants in excitement. At night, I use my unicorn stuffie’s horns on myself. All I think about while I’m being naughty is my dad’s best friend and how I wish he could be my Daddy. I’m the freak of the family. My dad is disappointed in me. My mom dismisses me. And my sister despises me. I’m delusional if I think Arthur would ever want to play with me.

Arthur:

My juicy Lucy. She’s finally eighteen. I’ve wanted her longer than I can ever legally admit. She doesn’t know it yet but she’s going to be my perfect little toy. My precious little unicorn. And I’m going to be her Daddy. When I see her playing dress-ups, I forget about the fact that she’s my best friend’s barely legal daughter, or that her mum hasn’t protected and cherished her like she should. All I know is that she’s meant to be my baby girl.”

Even writing that out was displeasing, to say the least. At first read, Lucy still sounds like a little girl. And when did Arthur start fantasizing about Lucy? When she was three years old. He wanted a partner that exhibited the same traits as Lucy when she was three, and in a scene when she is eighteen, he expresses a dislike for her pubic hair, saying it should be clean shaven. These examples clearly show that he is attracted to pre-pubescent girls. With the cover art being kids playing blocks, this is clearly a messed-up, pedophilic book.

The author’s dedication used to say something along the lines of, “I will never look at my kids the same”, but was promptly changed to, “I will never look at the Wiggles the same”. What in the world could that mean other than she was so affected by writing this book that now she can’t look at her kids the same way?

What is the desire to write romance novels about barely-legal teenage girls and adult men? Even if the male character didn’t fantasize about her when she was three years old, this would still be extremely weird. The language in the synopsis itself is very problematic and disgusting, and I can’t even imagine what the actual book said.

Usually, I do not go into what people’s ratings of books are because even if I do not like a book, I will not care about what other people rated it. However, some people rated this book five stars. Even a four and three-star rating is outrageous. What exactly about this book is likable?

The grooming aspect is very noticeable here, too. We can see in the synopsis that Lucy’s family doesn’t like her, or that is what she thinks from her perspective, and Arthur also comments on it. Many grooming victims are very vulnerable and do not have a support system, and we can see this here. With Lucy’s perspective on her family, they do not love her, and while I am purely guessing as I haven’t read this book (thank God), I’m assuming that Arthur exploits that insecurity and makes it seem like he can “love” her better.

Everything about this book is gross. Thankfully, Woods took this book off of Amazon and I think she pulled it altogether. Of course, BookTok would have a say in this, and not all are in agreement with this decision.

A lot of people (too many for my liking) said that censorship in any way is bad and that this book shouldn’t have been pulled off the shelves. It would, in their opinion, “snowball” into censoring other taboo books and books with LGBTQ+ content.

This is an issue for many reasons. First of all, this wasn’t “taboo”; it is pedophilia. Secondly, I think there was a very clear line crossed in the making of this book that warranted it being taken off. Thirdly, LGBTQ+ books and authors are already being censored and banned. While the government does like to conflate pedophilia and LGBTQ+ content, it is obviously not the same thing, whereas THIS IS pedophilia.

Lolita was brought up, and a lot of people were saying why this book wouldn’t be censored as well since it contains pedophilia. There is a clear difference between romanticizing pedophilia and writing it in a bad light. In Lolita, it is clear that their “relationship” is gross and should not be rooted for. In this book, the male character is being rooted for, and their “relationship” is written as if it is right for them to be together.

Another point being brought up is the possibility of Tori Woods writing this through her own experiences. If that were the case, it would not be marketed as a romance book. She can write about her experiences, if she had any, but this is not the way to go about it. If this were about her experiences, why wasn’t there a clear message that pedophilia is wrong and this relationship should not have happened?

As far as I know, Tori Woods was arrested in Australia for contents in this book. I have learned that Australia has very strict rules surrounding CSAM, whether it be written or physical. She is out on bail now but is awaiting a court date. This brought up a whole other problem: Should authors be arrested for fictional material?

In my opinion, I think it needs to go case-by-case. Because yes, Tori Woods wrote very disgusting things while having toddlers and saying this affected her opinion on those kids. However, I think this can set a precedent that could potentially hurt authors. As I said, LGBTQ+ content is usually seen as inherently erotic, sexual, and inappropriate for children. Conservatives could use this to get authors arrested. I think the line is drawn clearly when it comes to children and kids being sexualized in romance books, though. But it’s hard to say how the trial will go and how this will affect future authors.

At the end of the day, this book was disgusting, should have never been written, and deserved to be taken down. I really do not understand those who disagree. Dying on the hill defending a pedophilic book in the name of “censorship” is weird. I’ll definitely be looking out for the court case when it comes up.

Conclusion

This month was unbelievable, honestly. I didn’t think BookTok could get any worse, but of course, there would be people defending pedophilic material. Hoping that April will bring better things (as well as more books read from me).