February Reads

Just Kids - Patti Smith: Where did all the real artists go? Are they all hanging out together and I just don’t know about it? I just can’t imagine that anything like the gatherings of Smith’s group could happen now without being utterly pretentious and nauseating.

A Tale for the Time Being - Ruth Ozeki: Excellent novel. Rich characters, super layered, and I really dug the voices of the narrators.

Harlem is Nowhere - Sharifa Rhodes-Pitts: Living in Harlem as a white person is complicated; sometimes when I talk about this, especially with people who don’t live in very diverse places, I get surprised looks, like I shouldn’t be talking about race issues at all, ever, and especially not as something I’m personally dealing with instead of vague “others”. But anyway, living in Harlem as a white person is complicated. I’m a gentrifier, and not in just any neighborhood, but in THE black neighborhood. It is such a historic, rich community, and I absolutely love living here, but I also know that my presence represents a shift in the neighborhood that means it is changing forever, and not for the better (unless you’re a landlord or a realtor. Or a homeowner, which I am, which makes it even more complicated for me.) Some of the changes are good, but most of them will just drive long-time residents away because it’s getting so expensive. ANYWAY, this book is Rhodes-Pitts dealing with the idea of gentrification, especially as it applies to Harlem and its history and her own experience living in Harlem. Really interesting as a resident of the neighborhood. If you live here, read it.

Don't Let's Go to the Dogs Tonight - Alexandra Fuller: Excellent memoir of Fuller’s experience growing up in Africa. Fuller is funny, insightful, sensitive, and sharp.

The Glass Castle - Jeanette Walls: I didn’t think Walls’ writing was quite as good as Mary Karr’s, but if you liked “Liar’s Club”, I think you’d definitely like this. Walls writes about her crappy (but not super depressing) childhood with insight and depth, and I was fascinated by her parents. Definitely worth a read if you like memoir.

Evicted - Matthew Desmond: Great book about America’s housing crisis, based around the stories of families in the Milwaukee area. Desmond does a great job giving perspective and humanizing his subject. I think everyone should read it.

The Underground Railroad - Colson Whitehead: Ok, so I feel shameful saying this, but this just wasn’t my favorite. It’s good. It’s really good, and if you’re not too familiar with the awful history of slavery in America (my public education, for one, kind of glossed over the horrors), it might be enlightening. But Whitehead’s choice to make the underground an actual railroad didn’t really contribute to the subject for me, and the story felt a little disjointed. It gave me flashbacks to “12 Years A Slave”, which I think everyone should watch. It’s worth a read. But overall, I wouldn’t return to this considering all the other great narratives on the subject.

The Flamethrowers - Rachel Kushner: Kushner is a powerhouse writer, and this book covers everything from the 1970s New York art scene to midcentury Italian class warfare to motorcycle racing. Great characters, great writing, and a fresh story. Highly enjoyed.

The Lonely City - Olivia Laing: Laing writes through her loneliness living in New York by studying the lives and works of artists such as Warhol and Hopper. Super well-written and interesting, and packed full of art history tidbits.

Our Man in Havana - Graham Greene: My first Graham Greene and I had no idea what to expect, but since we were going to Cuba, I had to read it. I didn’t realize it would be super funny and stuffed with insightful irony; I loved it.

Telex from Cuba - Rachel Kushner: Kushner was following me around this month. Another super strong novel, about Americans living in Cuba in the 50s. A bit hard to keep track of all the characters, but I really enjoyed it.

How to Be Idle - Tom Hodgkinson: A quick, easy read all about doing less, thinking more, sleeping in, and not feeling guilty about not being productive. I loved it. I have a very hard time relaxing—even my leisure activities stress me out (as I’ve mentioned on here a few times.) This book provides an excellent argument for laziness, and I kind of felt like it was exactly what I needed.

January Reads

Another month, another book list.

2017 Book Reviews

Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Black Man - Henry Louis Gates: Fantastic collection of biographical pieces on men ranging from Colin Powell and James Baldwin to Harry Belafonte and Bill T. Jones. Gates uses these men’s stories to examine what it means to be a black man now and what it has meant throughout the past few hundred years. The stories are riveting and the social commentary is perfect—Gates is a model of engaging complexity and embracing narrative as a way to understand our culture. Highly recommended, especially in our current political moment.

The Fellowship of the Ring - JRR Tolkien: Loved it. Although compared to “The Hobbit” (the only other Tolkien I’ve read), it’s pretty dense (you probably already know this).

Anne of Green Gables - Lucy Maud Montgomery: A little literary stroll down memory lane. Anne and Gilbert forever.

The Handmaid’s Tale - Margaret Atwood: Dystopian novel about a near future where women have lost their rights and nearly all their functions, save those reproductory or housekeeperly. Sharp writing, chilling story, good stuff.

The Creative Habit - Twyla Tharp: I’ve had this book for a long time and never read it, and now that I’ve read it I kind of feel like I should stop reading books on how to be creative and just go create stuff, you know? This book had some good ideas and exercises, though, and Tharp is cool. I just need to stop lollygagging and actually write.

The Buddha of Suburbia - Hanif Kureishi: Funny, weird, irreverent coming of age story. Enjoyable.

I Am Malala - Malala Yousafzai: The writing isn’t anything special here, but the story is important and Malala is SO COOL.

The Red Parts - Maggie Nelson: A very Maggie Nelson telling of the trial of her aunt’s murderer, 40 (I think) years after the murder took place. If you haven’t read any Nelson, I think this is a really good place to start. It’s the most accessible of her books that I’ve read, and the writing is gorgeous.

The Braindead Megaphone - George Saunders: A nonfiction collection from Saunders? YES PLEASE. Saunders’ writing and being are pretty much everything I aspire to be. There is no one I love reading more.

Hausfrau - Jill Alexander Essbaum: UGH. If I have to read one more book of rich people whining while exhibiting zero self-awareness, I will . . . nothing, because I don’t actually have to read this stuff. But I did finish it (though I’ll cop to speed-reading the last third) and I thought it stunk.

If Our Bodies Could Talk - James Hamblin: Hamblin is a former MD and current editor for The Atlantic, and I love him so much. His little videos on various health topics are hilarious. This book was super enjoyable, filled with health questions from which Hamblin launched into an examination of the public health field, current issues in pharmacology, the agnotology of the public (I learned the word agnotology from this book! I love it!), the history of modern medicine, and narratives of all sorts—plus a good bit of practical health advice. Loved it.

The Christ-Centered Home - Emily Belle Freeman: Like “The Christ-Centered Christmas”, this book lays out a series of family nights, this time one for each month of the year focusing around filling our homes with the Spirit. I love Freeman’s ideas here, and we’ve started this month to put them into practice. Now I want to read her Easter book!

Traveling Mercies - Anne Lamott: Lamott brings her wit and undeniable charm to the topic of faith, and the result is a gorgeous, wise, and funny meditation on religion, belief, friendship, service, and forgiveness. I loved it.

Inherited Disorders - Adam Ehrlich: A collection of short shorts about fathers, sons, and inheritance. Most of the pieces are strange and delightful, some of them are very funny, and a few probably could have been cut from the collection without any tears on my part. But overall, I really enjoyed this.

Seinfeldia - Jennifer Keishin Armstrong: The history and cultural influence of Seinfeld. If you’ve watched the bonus features on the DVD versions, you probably know most of the info. It was a good book, but I think there was an opportunity to dig deeper here, if I can say such a ridiculous thing about Seinfeld.

I'm Thinking of Ending Things - Iain Reid: UGH THIS BOOK. It’s super suspenseful and does a great job cultivating a very creepy vibe, and then totally blows it all in the end by having an utterly disappointing and underwhelming conclusion. It’s a very quick read, and it is scary; a lot of people seem to have enjoyed it. I just felt like the payoff was way too low.

The Girls - Emma Cline: I had heard great things about this book, but also got a negative review from someone I trust, so I wasn’t expecting too much. But I really, really enjoyed it. Cline describes being an adolescent girl so well that I felt afterward like I understood my teenaged self better. Parts of the narrative are horrifying, but Cline writes with such adept self-awareness that it doesn’t come across as over-the-top at all. Loved it.

London, You’re Beautiful - David Gentleman: Mostly a book of illustrations of London, with Gentleman’s thoughts and meditations. I can’t get over his little sketches and watercolors. His lines are just bonkers expressive. Lovely.

December Reads

BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOKKKKKKKKKSSSSSSSSSZZZZZZ.

I Was Told There’d Be Cake - Sloane Crosley: The reviews of this book compare Crosley to David Sedaris, to which I say, “Eh. Maybe.” At its best, the writing is funny and fast, and it mostly stayed in that realm. Still, it was too fluffy to stick with me at all. Good for a light, mindless, but entertaining read.

The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat - Oliver Sacks: Sacks is a neurologist who writes here about his oddest cases. He's a wonderful storyteller and his tales here are deeply human and richly insightful. Great read.

Otherwise Known As the Human Condition - Geoff Dyer: If you enjoy magazine features, this would be a good book for you. It’s a thick collection of Dyer’s pieces, running a wide gamut of topics, all written with clarity and humor. Tough to just sit and read it through straight, though.

& Sons - David Gilbert: Excellent dysfunctional-family novel about the relationship between, you guessed it, fathers and sons. It gets a little fantastical at points, which is fun, and it's so self-aware, sharp and funny that it all works together beautifully. It reminded me of Tropper’s “This Is Where I Leave You”; if you enjoyed that, or if you liked “The Corrections” but wanted a touch less solipsism, I think you’d like this.

The Story of My Teeth - Valeria Luiselli: Weird, wonderful little book about a weird, wonderful little man who collects and auctions oddities like famous people’s teeth. Magical realism-lite, with beautifully drawn characters and landscapes. It’s a slim thing, and very enjoyable.

Daily Rituals - Mason Currey: I’d flipped through this book a few times at bookstores and was excited when it finally came into the library. It’s a collection of famous artists’ (past and present, mostly past) daily work habits and routines, and it’s fascinating. What I learned: writers take a lot of naps. Also, it seemed like most of the artists featured worked for only 3-4 hours each day, but did it consistently and filled the rest of their time with things they loved. I can get behind that. Also, though, the vast majority were supported financially by someone else, and had spouses who kept up the household and kept the children occupied and quiet.

Can't and Won't - Lydia Davis: A collection of short stories, many of them micro, many of them bizarre and hilarious, all of them super entertaining and extremely well-written.

Bark - Lorrie Moore: You know how I feel about short stories. These were EXCELLENT.

The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian - Sherman Alexie: Awesome YA novel about an Indian who decides to go to a high school outside his reservation. Drama and insights ensue. Growing up happens. There’s a lot of language for a YA book, so I’d recommend parents read it and approve before giving it to kids.

In Cold Blood - Truman Capote: This book has been haunting me for years, as I have this enormous fear of living in the country where no one could hear me screaming were a couple of murderers to barge into my house. And yes, it's a story about the Clutter family being killed, but it's not the horror story I was anticipating. Instead, it's a fascinating portrayal of the killers and of the town following the crime, and a peek inside the strange mind of Capote, who is not a visible presence in the book but is clearly an unreliable narrator nonetheless. But you all know this, because this is another one of those books everyone but me has already read.

Discover Your Inner Economist - Tyler Cowen: A sort of Malcolm Gladwell-lite, self-help-y behavioral economics book, of the sort I usually find interesting and helpful on some level. Pretty good.

Cities Are Good For You - Leo Hollis: Really interesting scholarly book about all things city: urban planning, the dynamics of crowds, the myths around city living, etc. If reading Jane Jacobs appeals to you, you’d probably like this too.

The Solitude of Prime Numbers - Paolo Giordano: This book was recommended by a reader I usually agree with, but I didn’t like it at all. It’s a coming-of-age story that marries unrealistic childhood trauma to over-indulgent, selfish lifelong behavior. Its main characters are surrounded by people who love them even though they exhibit no redeeming qualities, and the whole thing is topped off with an unsatisfying, too-neat ending that I didn’t buy at all. The writing is fine, but it’s not self-aware enough to provide any insight. If you liked “A Little Life”, you’d probably like this. I thought “A Little Life” was basically trauma porn and while this didn’t even approach the same levels, it still wasn’t a good read. And no, Paolo Giordano, I don't find it believable that the female lead could be anorexic for 20 years, subsisting on 100 carefully measured calories a day and suffer no consequences except a strained relationship with her husband who is, of all things, a handsome doctor. Please.  Come on.

Schindler’s List - Thomas Keneally: Good book, but rough reading, not only because the content is so horrific, but because it’s chock full of German and Polish names/locations. It made the reading slow and I confess I never really got into it.

Someone - Alice McDermott: A coming-of-age tale done beautifully. It follows a very ordinary life and it’s written very simply, and its power comes from its plainness.

Colors Insulting to Nature - Cintra Wilson: A hilarious book about a mother and daughter bent on achieving fame. The content probably wouldn’t agree with everyone, but it is incredibly funny and sharply written. The blurb on the front calls Wilson “the thinking woman’s David Foster Wallace,” which is confusing because I think David Foster Wallace is the thinking woman’s David Foster Wallace, but genuinely this book reminded me in some ways of “Infinite Jest”.

Celebrating a Christ-Centered Christmas - Emily Belle Freeman: A little book with ideas for spiritual family nights that center around each nativity figure. I didn’t read it in time to incorporate much into our celebrations this year, but I’m excited to use it next year.

Stiff - Mary Roach: I gave this book to my brother-in-law for Christmas, so I hurried and read it first so I knew what I was recommending him. Roach writes hilarious and weird science books; this one is about the various things that happen to dead bodies. It’s a bit morbid, but never crass, and always interesting and funny.

Treasure Island - Robert Louis Stevenson: Adding it to the list of books I’m dying to read to Graham and Margi when they get a little older.

November Reads

Good books this month! Still trying to catch up on classics, still trying to learn to cook, still feeling weird reading anxiety—overall, things are all thumbs up.

The Unbearable Lightness of Being - Milan Kundera: Weird book. I really, really loved it at the beginning, then gradually loved it less but still appreciated it. Kundera’s writing is rich and fascinating, sort of Italo Calvino-esque, and his characters were captivating, but also very depressing.

The Things They Carried - Tim O’Brien: I think this is an absolutely perfect book. Deep, spare, precise, gorgeous, haunting, and darkly funny. It is unbelievably good.

What We Talk About When We Talk About Love - Raymond Chandler: Short stories! The best! This is a gorgeous collection. Chandler is a master.

Pippi Longstocking - Astrid Lundgren: Sometimes I read children’s lit as an adult and I am deeply disturbed by some of the psychological trauma being exhibited by these kids. I hope Pippi got some help eventually.

How to Build a Girl - Caitlin Moran: I love Caitlin Moran so much. This book pulls zero punches and so is probably not for everyone. But if you’ve read and enjoyed her other stuff, I’d recommend this. A hilarious and surprisingly, wonderfully deep coming of age story. Moran is so stinking wise. And no one is funnier.

The Accidental Tourist - Anne Tyler: This little book is just golden. The characters are perfectly drawn and the writing is warm and perceptive. Super enjoyable.

The Call of the Wild - Jack London: I see why this is a classic and I enjoyed the read, but it’s not one I’m going to rush to pick up again.

The Kitchen Counter Cooking School - Kathleen Flinn: The premise of this book: Flinn, a Le Cordon Bleu-trained chef, finds ten kitchen noobs and gives them a series of cooking lessons.  I was hoping to gather my own primer on kitchen basics, and it was good for that. I didn’t care for the writing, though, so I sort of rushed through any part that wasn’t teaching me something about cooking.

Blue Nights - Joan Didion: This book is about loss, specifically the loss of Didion’s daughter, Quintana, but also the loss of her husband and her own health as she ages. I love Joan Didion, but this is not my favorite book of hers. Her writing is always beautiful, but her ruminations here just didn’t resonate. I loved “The Year of Magical Thinking”—read that instead.

The New York Trilogy - Paul Auster: I’d heard great things about this book, but I just couldn’t get into it. It’s a trio of detective stories, but they focus on the person uncovering the mysteries rather than the mysteries themselves. It’s more metaphysical than anything; the idea was really interesting and the writing was good, but the delivery was pretentious.

Leaving the Atocha Station - Ben Lerner: I read 10:04 last year and loved it, and I loved this one too. It’s a novel (that reads like autobiography) about a poet spending a year on fellowship in Madrid. The main character is sort of antisocial, disenchanted with his poetry, yet un-self-consciously romantic, both with women and with art generally. Lerner’s writing is undeniably contemporary, but it’s imbued with a hopefulness that is so refreshing for post(or post-post-, or post-post-post, or however many posts we are now)modern writing, and I enjoy him a lot.

Fierce Attachments - Vivian Gornick: This is a gorgeous memoir about Gornick and her mother. It’s one of the trailblazers of the genre, published in the 80s before this sort of memoir was en vogue, so it was strange to read—experiencing the book that so many other books are trying to live up to. Gornick belongs to that class of New York-based nonfiction-ers who seem to spend nearly all their time wandering the city (the rest of the time they are attending hopelessly fashionable salons with famous people, or else feeding their cats). So basically, living the life I aspire to.

October Reads

Went on a Ruth Reichl bender this month; trying to learn to cook and she's my inspiration. Also working on my classic book list, which is full of books that everyone else in the world seems to have read already, and I've been reading a lot since I was about 4 and still I feel like I have read maybe 2 of the classics. When did everyone else get to all of them? Mysteries.

Thank you for comforting me in my book anxiety last month :). I'm so glad to know I'm not alone in the struggle!

Sublime Physick - Patrick Madden: Pat is an essayist for essayists, and one of the first examples I pointed my students to when it came to teaching the form. Pat is the kind of person who can find interesting connections between almost anything, and it’s delightful to follow his mind as it meanders on the page. I think his writing especially shines when it gets emotional. My favorite essays in this collection are “Entering and Breaking” and “In Media Vita”. Excellent.

Confessions of a New York Taxi Driver - Eugene Salomon: I saw this on a table of recommended books at a bookstore and put it on my library list. It was pretty meh. Some interesting anecdotes about Salomon’s years driving a cab, but mostly he was a poor narrator of them.

Tender at the Bone - Ruth Reichl: I read Reichl’s novel “Delicious!” last year and loved it. My friend asked me about the book and was surprised I had no idea who Ruth Reichl is; I decided to remedy that by reading more of her. This memoir of her early life is super enjoyable, interspersed with recipes and New York-y anecdotes. It made me want to cook, which is exactly what I was hoping it would do. (Reichl, by the way, is a former restaurant critic, food writer, and editor of Gourmet magazine. And she is super, super cool.)

The Secret Life of the American Musical - Jack Viertel: Loved this! Viertel breaks musicals down into their structural parts and draws parallels across loads of different shows to demonstrate what moves they are making, why, and how they are able to affect an audience. I love musical theater more than just about anything, and reading about it from this viewpoint was fascinating and entertaining. I know “real New Yorkers” hate Times Square and whatever, but I love it because it’s associated for me with shows and there is nothing better than a show.

Practicing - Glenn Kurtz: I saw this book in a bookstore and immediately put it on my list, and then my wonderful friend Michaela ended up having gotten it for me for Christmas. This particular Christmas present made it to me in August :). I was expecting something more self-helpy, but it’s very much a memoir. It also gets into the history of the guitar and similar instruments, which was fascinating. Kurtz’s intensity and devotion to music made for a really interesting narrator, too.

Comfort Me with Apples - Ruth Reichl: Picking up where “Tender at the Bone” left off;  same feel, except with more adultery. And more celebrities.

My Kitchen Year - Ruth Reichl: Part diary of the year after Gourmet was shuttered, part cookbook, totally inspiring, and beautifully put together. I loved that all the recipes have stories and context; I found myself dog-earring almost every page so I could jot down the recipe later. It’s not a prescriptive cookbook, but more a collection of inspiring ideas to nudge you into the kitchen.

Tenth of December - George Saunders: I can’t think of many writers I’d rather read. Short stories are my favorite thing to read and Saunders is the best of the best. This collection is almost shocking in its perfection. Hilarious, tragic, cruel, deep—I don’t know how to describe him except brilliant. My friend Michaela took me to a reading with him and Carrie Brownstein and it was just stellar.

Sitting Still Like a Frog - Eline Snel: A book of mindfulness exercises for kids (and parents). Graham’s a little young for it, but I’m trying to work some of the ideas in here and there. The kid has a lot of feelings and we’re looking for any way to help him handle them productively!

And Then There Were None - Agatha Christie: Classic. This had me super freaked out late one night when David wasn’t home. Also, I totally had it solved before the ending :).

Non-Places - Marc Auge: Academic treatise on supermodernity and the concept of non-places, which are essentially transitional spaces, like stores, airports, highways, etc. Super interesting, but DENSE.

Play It As It Lays - Joan Didion: Good heavens, this book is depressing. I love Joan Didion so much, but everything she writes is so SAD.

The Color Purple - Alice Walker: So excellent. The revival of this musical that’s playing with Cynthia Erivo right now is just about the best thing I’ve seen. The book is a beautiful evocation of the human spirit, which is a lofty sentence but I stand by it.

The Awakening - Kate Chopin: I’m trying to read all the books everyone else seems to have read in high school. This is one of them. Every time I have a feminist realization, David jokes that I’m going to walk out into the ocean and never come back. And now I get the joke :).

September Reads

This month, my self-imposed library ban lifted, so I started trying to catch up on books people have recommended to me.

For no good reason at all, I occasionally (maybe more than occasionally) get really stressed out by reading. I don't get to check that many things off the list at this point in my life; I have so far been successful at keeping my kids alive, but I otherwise don't feel very productive. The things I really love doing—primarily writing and playing music—take a lot more creative energy than I usually have (although since that kind of energy feeds itself, it might only be a matter of getting started), but reading I can do. In fact, since I was a kid, reading is one of the few things I've ever felt I was good at—not in the sense of comprehension, or interesting interpretation, or even retention, and not in the sense of having read the classics; I haven't, not even close—but merely in the fact that I read more than average. Which is not very neat at all.

So now I'm stuck in this place where I recognize that I don't need to be reading if I'm not enjoying it, and I really should be spending more of my time creating instead of just consuming; on the other hand, there are SO MANY BOOKS. And the anxiety of knowing that I can't possibly read them all, or even very many, makes it hard to enjoy reading leisurely.

Any thoughts on this, dear four people who are reading? Please help. It is embarrassing to admit to being so incredibly lame that books give me anxiety. Let's call it an exercise in shame-sharing. Brene would be so proud?

Churchill - Paul Johnson: Saw this on the shelves of the house we were house-sitting for a week. I love biographies, but they’re usually behemoths. This one was very manageable, and very interesting.

How Literature Saved My Life - David Shields: Another house-sitting read. I went to a reading of Shields’ years ago and it really turned me off, so I wasn’t expecting to like this as much as I did. Shields in a fascinating thinker and watching his mind work on the page is engrossing, even if I still didn’t find him to be super likeable. His writing is self-aware, but it exudes privilege in a way that’s hard for me to embrace. I still really enjoyed the book and Shields is obviously a hugely important voice for creative nonfiction.

The Opposite of Loneliness - Marina Keegan: My sister recommended this book a while back and I couldn't follow through with it due to my obviously highly important library ban. I'd heard mixed reviews from my writerly friends and the upshot was that none of them loved it. But I actually really enjoyed it. Keegan was a 22-year-old recent Yale grad when she died in a car accident; the book is a collection of short pieces she wrote as a student. It’s hard to separate my thoughts on the book from the fact that it exists precisely because she died; the best part of the collection is its exuberant youthfulness, a quality few writers (even young ones) seem to embrace. And obviously since Keegan died, that quality becomes a sort of call to action: embrace life while you can. Anyway, and aside from that, there are several really strong pieces here and I loved the hopefulness.

The Art of Asking - Amanda Palmer: I had vaguely heard of Palmer’s music, but this book was especially recommended to me by my friend Mike Barney, who is ridiculously cool, so I added it to my list right away. The book is about being willing to ask for the help you need; Palmer has used this tactic to wild success in developing her music career and she has a lot of great points to make about how and when and why asking works. Palmer is insanely extroverted and even as an extrovert myself, albeit one without much social skill, the book sort of had me feeling like I’ll never be successful unless I become a starry-eyed optimist who couch-surfs and lets fans autograph my naked body. But even barring that possible future for myself, I still found the book inspiring and I dug its earnestness.

Seven Brief Lessons On Physics - Carlo Rovelli: Poetic little explanations of key concepts in physics; it went totally over my head but I loved it. And it became pillow talk fodder for David and I because, you know, nerd romance.

Moranthology - Caitlin Moran: I think Caitlin Moran is the funniest writer around. I LOVED “How to Be a Woman”, which tackles the ins and outs of feminism. This book is a collection of her pieces on more varied topics. It’s hilarious. If you like laughing, read it. (But really, REALLY read “How to Be a Woman.”)

I Thought It Was Just Me (But It Isn't) -Brene Brown: Oh, Brene. Can you please just be queen of the world already? My life/head has been so influenced by Brown’s work that when I talk to people about it and they haven’t heard of her, I don’t even know how to cope. This book is about shame; I’d read half of it before and it blew my mind so hard that I put it down for a while so I could just process. If you don’t know her work, go watch her TED Talk on vulnerability. I’ve reviewed her book “Daring Greatly” here before; I think her stuff is so powerful and important. The very best self-help I know.

Jesus’ Son - Denis Johnson: Holy wow. A collection of short stories that are just intensely good. The most original and gut-squeezing thing I’ve read in a while.

My Life in France - Julia Child: I love Julia Child and cooking and France, plus Julia and Paul had the cutest romance ever, so this book was just wildly enjoyable to me. Obviously I pictured Meryl Streep as Julia in my head throughout.

August Reads

Parenting with Love and Logic - Foster Cline & Jim Fay: The most useful and empowering parenting book I’ve read. It totally made sense to me and I’m trying my darnedest to put it into practice.

Housekeeping - Marilynne Robinson: My first Marilynne Robinson read! A poetic and haunting novel that deals with questions of place, transience and belonging. Lovely and lyrical.

Blindness - Jose Saramago: I’ve had this book for years and have been wanting to read it all that time and haven’t because there was a spider squashed between two of the pages and I didn’t want to deal with it. That is true, and it is pathetic. So I made David get the spider off and I read it and it was awesome. A truly literary thriller about an epidemic of blindness; most awesome is that the writing mimics the experience of being blind: no names, dialogue all run together so you’re not sure who’s saying what, long blocks of text with no concrete images to hang the details on (and none of this, I should add, is aggravating or cloying at all.) It’s disturbing and thoughtful and there were maybe a few moments of heavy-handedness, but mostly it was fantastic.

The Wonder Trail - Steve Hely: I cheated on my no-library rule because we were out and about one day and Graham had to use the bathroom and we used the one in the library and I ended up with this book. Hely is a comedy writer (30 Rock, The Office, American Dad) who traveled from L.A. to the southern tip of Chile, and this book is the story of that trip. Hely researched the heck out of the history of the regions he visited and gives a funny and quick overview of each place, which was super interesting. The problem with this book was that he did the trip in 3 months, which is WAY not enough time to thoughtfully cover what he covered. He was constantly saying that there was a cool opportunity to go do something else near him, but he had to get moving to the next destination. It could have been fine, I guess, but every section seemed like just a set-up for a great travel essay and then it stopped before it got to the meat. And maybe this too could have been fine, had he written about the placelessness of checklist travel, or parsed out his own intentions a little more. As it was, it was a funny, interesting, smart, and honest account, but it just left me kind of disappointed; I think it could have been way better.

Harry Potter and the Cursed Child - J.K. Rowling, John Tiffany & Jack Thorne: I don’t know how I didn’t read this the day it came out. Shameful. Still, once I finally started I devoured it and it filled my soul with happiness and nostalgia and a super strong desire to go to London and see this on stage. I hear it’s coming to Broadway and my heart skips a beat every time I think about that. It sounds incredible. I loved the story and I’m going to make David read it immediately so I have someone to feel all the feels with.

The Empathy Exams - Leslie Jamison: A collection of essays centered around empathy; Jamison’s voice is engaging, honest, self-aware and intelligent. A few of the essays in particular struck me, while one or two kind of lost me. Overall, I really enjoyed it.

Into Thin Air - Jon Krakauer: I picked this up at my parents’ house, read it pretty quickly, and then had nightmares about climbing/dying on Mt. Everest the rest of our time in Idaho. Fascinating, disturbing, and heart-breaking.

Let’s Explore Diabetes with Owls - David Sedaris: I love David Sedaris. I think some of his pieces are definitely stronger than others, but he’s always hilarious and his voice is delightful.

Diary of a Young Girl - Anne Frank: This was another book I grabbed at my parents’ house during our visit; somehow, despite having the most Holocaust-heavy grade school curriculum I have ever heard of, I’d never read it before. I really wasn’t expecting it to be so incredibly enjoyable—in case you haven’t read it, Anne is awesome: thoughtful, funny, wise, charming. I loved her as a narrator, and watching her mature over her two years’ in hiding was so interesting. And then, of course, she dies. So the ending is the worst.

The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams: Genius.