Happy Womb-Leaving Anniversary, Zoée!
(I didn’t start writing this post yesterday, but let’s pretend I did.)
The gift I left behind last week has been located. Zoée started their search as soon as they read my last post.
“Dear god, it’s like finding a needle in a haystack.”
Not wanting to stress Zoée out, I granted them one hint per day until the 12th. My first hint was that I’d hidden it in plain sight. With Zoée’s place being reminiscent of a miniature museum of curios/art gallery amid a jungle of houseplants and assorted doll parts, hiding anything in plain sight isn’t exactly possible.
My second hint was, “Below the waist.”
This either eliminates the top half of their place as a search zone or leads them to believe I’ve purchased them something like socks. Or panties.
The third and final hint was:
“There is a good story behind this gift.”
Their response was: “Oooooh, can I have a hint that helps me narrow the search down? 🕵️♂️”
My internal response conjured the Twin Peaks-inspired scene from The Simpsons, where Lisa enters Chief Wiggum’s dream to uncover hints of who shot Mr. Burns. As Zoée is more of a Seinfeld reference kinda person, I kept this thought to myself.
Finally, a light bulb went off in their head as they stood in their inadequately illuminated living room: “Bookshelves!”
Despite only needing to search the lower half of their book collection, it took another 10 minutes to find the gift!
I should have just left the book on their coffee table.
“OH! I was actually looking at that book the other day going, ‘I don’t remember that book, but I must’ve gotten it at some point.’“
It’s not that Zoée overlooked the book. Rather, they incorrectly credited themselves for the book until they checked inside and found the birthday card. I’ll take it as a sign that I’d chosen the right book to add to the library of Zoée.
The book is What Kind of Paradise by Janelle Brown, and it is one of my favourite reads from 2025. The story follows a girl, Jane, who moves to a secluded cabin in the woods with her seemingly devoted father after her mother dies when she is just a toddler. Growing up with virtually no friends and limited contact with the outside world for the first 17 years of her life, Jane’s conspiracy theorist father dictates her entire narrative.
One day, while Jane’s dad is out restocking supplies in town, the now-teenaged protagonist discovers a relic from her past that her father has kept hidden. Around the same time, Jane’s father decides to connect his computer to the internet to publish his manifesto online, with Jane’s help. As Jane uncovers the truth about her family history through her online research, she becomes entangled in her father’s plot to take down Silicon Valley.
The bulk of the story takes place in 1996, a time when the internet was still a novelty for many people. Reading all these references to the internet of yore brought me back to my years of soaking up the cathode rays of my monitor, chatting it up with people across the country, free of the usual communication barriers that come with being deaf. The little deaf bubble I’d grown up in had burst; the internet allowed me the freedom to participate in society and explore viewpoints beyond my own.
To this day, I struggle to understand how many of my deaf friends growing up seemed uninterested in the world wide web. Although Zoée and I did not meet until we were both in our early 20s, we bonded over the internet. Loners in real life, our personalities shone through the internet at 32.2 kilobytes per second. Many of the friends we made online, we went on to meet in person, including each other.
I’d recommend What Kind of Paradise to anyone who enjoys a good coming-of-age story full of suspense and twists that are neither predictable nor far-fetched. But I’m counting on the book’s early internet element to captivate Zoée the same way it did me.
I am currently reading a Marianne-recommended book: Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin. I’m only 18% through the book, so I don’t have much to say about it beyond that I’m enjoying it.
The last book I 100%’d was a Matt-recommended book: Project Hail Mary, a story that has been picked up by Hollywood and will be released in theatres in one week! I’m glad I got to read the book before the film could potentially ruin it: I was mildly peeved to find Ryan Gosling on the book cover the first time I put my ereader to sleep. I prefer to visualize the main character based on the author’s description, but thanks to the cover, I spent two weeks imagining Ryan Gosling in outer space. At least, as far as Hollywood Ryans go, Gosling is one of the better ones, and the extraterrestrial lifeforms in the tale were still left up to my imagination.
For a story set among an immeasurable number of stars, I give this one a 3. The ending reads as if the author was rushed to wrap up the book in time for the publisher’s deadline, and the corny conclusion to Ryan’s space mission felt forced, likely intended to appeal to Hollywood.
If my conclusion to this post seems rushed, it’s because it’s getting late and I want to read a bit of Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow before it’s actually tomorrow.
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