READ ALL ABOUT IT
Since 2012, I’ve been writing about books. And the act of reading. And the importance of story and narrative. But, mostly, the underlying theme of all I write is how taking a moment to stop and digest some longform text — instead of scrolling, instead of watching a video, instead of multitasking — can be one of the most grounding things we can do for ourselves. Here’s the one-stop online home for all this writing.
You can read more about me and my work by moseying over here. Want to peruse periodic “essay drops” — excerpts from my work-in-progress essay collection about Homesickness? Here ya go.
How Review-Bombing Can Tank a Book Before It’s Published
Penny for your thoughts?
Actually, no, I admit that I’m not interested in what the vast majority of readers think of a particular book. (Except perhaps for the utility of gauging cultural phenomena.)
Memory Circular Drive
Some 🌀 thoughts on reading…
Calabash International Literary Festival
“Why is it that reggae achieved global status, but very little else did?” This question appears near the end of this NYT piece about the Calabash International Literary Festival in Jamaica, but this question — posed by Kwame Dawes, one of the founders of Calabash — encapsulates some of my own thoughts about not just literary festivals (or book festivals, or whatever you’d like to call them), but about the role of books in the greater “entertainment” ecosystem. In the case of Calabash, the festival has “strive[d] to create an authenticating pipeline for Jamaican writers along the lines of what brought local musicians international attention.” Booker winner Marlon James “was ready to give up writing” until he attended a Calabash session in 2000. (!!)
Langston Hughes Wrote a Children’s Book
In 1936, Langston Hughes and the artist Elmer W. Brown collaborated on a children’s book called The Sweet and Sour Animal Book. They were never able to get it published, but now, in 2023, if you happen to be in Cleveland, you can view an exhibit called ‘The Sweet and Sour Journey of Langston Hughes and Elmer W. Brown’ at the museum ARTneo.
Boston Literary and Library Love
Here are two snippets of Boston literary/library love for you today.
Reading and Remembering With Annie Ernaux
Life has been so frenetic lately. Adult (gah…my youngest is nearly 18!) children coming and going, finishing school, starting their jobs. House on the market and all the hectic activity that comes with that. Work travels. Family visits. Lining up what seems like a bazillion interviews for this book I’m working on. (Yay!) All good stuff — life churning and chugging along.
I’m a Reader: Here’s My Response
From Newsletter Issue No. 14:
The other day, I came across a draft of my thesis for my masters program. I have a MA in Media Studies, and in 2003 — just a few months before I had my first child (timing is everything!) — I completed an ethnography of a group of children of immigration in one neighborhood in Charlotte, NC and how their media preferences were shaped. Because of guidance from my advisor, I used a framework from a book called Is There a Text in This Class? by the scholar Stanley Fish as a way to frame my own work. In academic circles, Fish is known as one of the main proponents of something called Reader-Response Criticism. The Cliff Notes version of RRC is that the main lens through which to view literature is the reader and his or her experience as opposed focusing on the author. In the introduction to Is There a Text in This Class? Fish writes…
Fiction, Reality, and The Beautiful South
I’m really intrigued by “the role of the reader,” but on the flipside, I’m also very intrigued by how “real life” infiltrates fiction — or not.
The Library at Home
As we prepare to leave this house — and as we let prospective buyers through if they’ve heard about its future availability — Matt and I have spent many weekends organizing, purging, donating, scrubbing. Which of course included a massive tidy of some bookshelves. I know it’s likely I’ll be asked to “stage” them better — fewer books, more #decorativevases. Because as we all know (due to pox-on-society HGTV), the goal is to “remove” traces of oneself and one’s family from a home when it’s for sale. And since, in many ways, the books on our shelves tell my life’s story…out they go. But I can’t live like that in real life.
Planes, Trains, and Automobiles: Amy’s Version
Planes, Trains, and Automobiles: Amy’s Version. Matt and I have been in Charlotte for a few weeks but have taken turns going back to Massachusetts on weekends. This weekend was my turn, and when I got up at 4 am on Friday to get to the airport, I saw that my flight was cancelled. Flying to Boston was going to be essentially impossible until Monday. Not helpful! After going through possible parent-less scenarios (could our son Uber to our house from his school, get our car, and criss-cross New England alone to these appointments at colleges?), we decided I would fly into a different airport and figure out the last part when I landed.
Colleen Hoover, Crocs, and Bestseller Lists
So what are bestseller lists good for? I mean, I know they’re good for authors and publishers and might give a book a nice zeitgeisty pat on the back, but from a reader’s perspective…what’s the point? Are they “good” for readers? The number of books I’ve read in the past few years that I’d put in the “excellent” category *and* were on some sort of bestseller list is minuscule. #venndiagram
Reading Culture
I’ve been thinking about the interplay between a person helping to shape a culture versus a culture helping to shape a person. “Culture” meaning the shared beliefs and values of any subset of people, I suppose.
Weird Ideas
I’ve been mulling over these two quotes from the bottom of yesterday’s @literaryhub daily email. I like them not just because they resonate with me as a writer, but they force me to reckon with why a book is “good” (in my eyes) or not. I love reading things that take me to unexpected places (I don’t mean that in a #readinginspo travel-via-reading kind of way) — writing that makes me go, “I would never have dreamed of mixing those words up like that.”
Remote Control
I’ve been thinking about “active” reading, not just a let-the-story-wash-over-me thing. It’s on my mind because, lucky me, I got some (v minor) insights into student life recently.
St. Patrick’s Day with Roddy Doyle
“If you are a writer you're at home, which means you're out of touch. You have to make excuses to get out there and look at how the world is changing.” – Roddy Doyle
I Finally Read American Dirt
From Newsletter Issue No. 13:
Remember when a little novel called American Dirt by Jeanine Cummins was published in 2020? It was a much-anticipated work of fiction that was meant to shed light on and give voice to people who found themselves in the crosshairs of the migration crisis happening at the border between the United States and Mexico. Oprah selected it for her book club. Stephen King provided a blurb and called American Dirt “Extraordinary.” Sandra Cisneros (family roots in Mexico) and Julia Alvarez (family roots in the Dominican Republic) both praised the book.
Laura Zigman and Gap Khakis
In January, The Boston Globe published a story about the writer Laura Zigman. Maybe you remember her as the author of the bestselling 1998 novel Animal Husbandry. Or maybe you just remember the movie adaptation called Someone Like You starring Hugh Jackman and Ashley Judd. When I think of Animal Husbandry, I think of chick lit that was more literary than what is currently marketed that way. Remember the 1999 novel A Girl’s Guide to Hunting and Fishing by Melissa Bank? To me, these two novels — plus Bridget Jones’ Diary by Helen Fielding — encapsulate a specific late 90s vibe. They were like the literary world’s version of Gap’s dancing-in-khakis ads.
Snow-Bound: A Winter Idyl
We’ve got another snowy day today, and I’ve been thinking about how snow is often romanticized. Don’t get me wrong: There is something so satisfying about “tucking in” and feeling unburdened by the rigmarole of daily life. Especially if it’s over a weekend; today is Saturday. Somehow Laura Ingalls Wilder even managed — in the rose-colored, made-for-publishing view of her childhood — to make The Long Winter seem dreamy.
Frances Ellen Watkins Harper
The NYT’s “Overlooked” column, “a series of obituaries about remarkable people whose deaths, beginning in 1851, went unreported in The Times” — has got to be one of the most interesting recurring features in a daily newspaper. (Just my 2c.) I’ve posted about different ones before, including Theresa Hak Kyung Cha (author of Dictee). This one, about the 19th-century Black poet Frances Ellen Watkins Harper, was published toward the beginning of February, Black History Month.
Through the Window
Nearly 10 years ago, I read this: “…writing is a matter of examining the world, reflecting upon it, deducing what you want to say, putting that meaning or message into words whose transparency allows the reader, now gazing through the same window-pane from the same position, to see the world exactly as you have seen it.” – Julian Barnes, Through the Window: Seventeen Essays and a Short Story
