January 2016 Book Reviews

After posting my 2015 book list, I realized that I am beyond terrible at remembering the things I’ve read enough to make any kind of trustworthy review or recommendation on them. So I decided to do it by the month instead, primarily for my own benefit in the hopes that writing about them will preserve my memories a bit longer because my brain these days is basically made of Jell-o.

This month was excellent for reading because I got a bunch of recommendations from end-of-the-year Best-of-2015 book lists, particularly this one from WSJ which compiled the most frequently mentioned books on those lists. I still have a lot that I’m on hold for at the library, but I did manage to get my hands on several.

Big Magic - Elizabeth Gilbert: An excellent examination of what it takes to live a creative life. My favorite thing about it was that it didn’t treat creativity as precious, but still, as the title suggests, imbued it with magic. I really love Elizabeth Gilbert, and I really, really loved this book. In fact I’m planning on buying it when it comes to paperback, and that is kind of a big deal for me because I have been trying to Kondo the crap out of my books. If you want to spend your life making things, read this.

Modern Romance - Aziz Ansari: I love that Ansari wrote this. Interesting research, with a pretty thorough examination of what it’s like to date these days (if you’re middle-class, hetero, and based in a city, at least). I’ve read the same kind of information in articles, but Ansari’s writing was fun to read and I loved his asides. Recommended, especially if you are currently part of the dating world. (And, oh man, if nothing else, this book made me so glad to not be dating anymore. Sounds way too complicated.)

The Argonauts - Maggie Nelson: A lyrically gorgeous meditation on gender, relationships, motherhood, identity, and the body. It’s a pretty short book, but the prose demands to be savored; also, Nelson is a critical theorist, so it can get heavy (not in a bad way, just in a decidedly un-beach-read way.) Highly recommended for my MFA friends.

Between the World and Me - Ta-Nehisi Coates: An incredibly important, vivid book, one that should be required reading for everyone. The prose is gorgeous, and being inside Coates’ experience and thought-process is absolutely wonderful. This book demands reflection on the meaning of race in our society and generation, and that’s a reflection we should all have anyway; let this book be your guide :).

The Girl on the Train - Paula Hawkins: Well-written mystery with great characters and pacing. Super enjoyable read and, unlike a lot of the other books I read this month, the content is not challenging; just a straight-up fun book.

The Bassoon King - Rainn Wilson: I’ve read a bunch of comic’s autobiographies, and they usually aren’t my favorite. The ones I’ve read (with the exception of Bossypants) just didn’t seem funny enough or essayistic enough to justify all the navel-gazing. I still enjoy them enough to give them a shot, but I wasn’t expecting much from Wilson’s book. So maybe that’s why it blew me away. Wilson is freaking WISE, his story is kind of bonkers, and there were more than a few laugh-out-loud moments. It lost a little magic for me toward the end, but only a very little. The beginning is especially superb, and I loved how into the craft of acting Wilson is. Super good stuff.

The Girl in the Spider’s Web - David Lagercrantz: It’s been a while since I read the original Millenium series, so it took me a while to put my finger on just what this book seemed to be missing from Stieg Larsson’s books. In the end, I think Lagercrantz just didn’t quite capture the compelling oddness that Larsson’s narratives had.  I still thought it was good, just that the energy wasn’t quite so captivating.

Fates & Furies - Lauren Groff: This book is the story of a marriage told from the perspective of both participants, and it is downright lovely. Maybe a titch pretentious, but I didn’t mind, and the writing is excellent. I absolutely loved it and I’d highly recommend it.

The Martian - Andy Weir: The science and math get pretty dense, but this is a fun, fast read. (I also really loved the movie, but read the book first.)

Hold Still - Sally Mann: This is a memoir that makes heavy use of photographs and visual content. I was aware of Sally Mann’s photography before I read this, but only vaguely. Now I am kind of crazy about it, and her writing is pretty great, too. My favorite parts dealt with the American South, which I am super fascinated by, and with Mann’s ideas about mixing art and family. More reflective than narrative, and also sort of haunting (especially when you consider that there are a TON OF PICTURES OF DEAD BODIES. Just wait til you get to that part. Decaying corpse photography—gnarly stuff.) If you read it, please call me so we can talk about it. I just have thoughts. (Also, just as an aside, she foreshadows the whole “dad is obsessed with death” thing way too heavily and then never really delivers with it. That was my main issue with the book, but it was a minor thing.)

Lovable Livable Home - Sherry & John Petersik: Basically a bunch of Pinterest-y blog content.

Super Sad True Love Story - Gary Shteyngart: Excellent, bizarre, thought-provoking, disturbing. This book isn’t quite like anything I’ve read before. It’s critically acclaimed, but it seems like kind of a polarizing book for readers; at least, it has very mixed reader reviews. It’s dystopian satire (not a satire of dystopian literature, just a satire that is also dystopian), and has a lot of say about our culture, but says it so subtly that it requires quite a bit from the reader, even though it’s ostensibly easy to read.

Better Than Before - Gretchen Rubin: I have mixed feelings about Rubin’s books. The information is great, but there’s something off-putting about her writing, especially the way she uses dialogue. She just doesn’t seem like a natural storyteller and it made this book choppy—not unpleasant to read, though, and much better than Happier at Home. This book focuses on habit-formation, and particularly on how different personalities need to approach habits and goals differently. Her examples are largely to do with diet and exercise, but the principles are more broadly applicable. Overall it was useful, and right up my alley. It made me want to read The Power of Habit again, which I liked better.