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.
Homesick
Homesick is a memoir by the writer and translator Jennifer Croft. (She won the Man Booker International Prize in 2018 for her translation of Flights, by Olga Tokarczuk.) If I had to use just two words to review it I’d say, “Mic drop.” (Alternate reasoning: If I were Michael Scott and tasked with reviewing books.) I’m not trying to be glib, but if ever there were a time to use “mic drop” in full sincerity, it would be in reference to this book, a memoir/”real-life novel” with photographic elements. I’m truly amazed by it. (As is the pooch, apparently.)
Homesick
Oh, this one was really, really good. Carmen Maria Marchado’s praise adorns the cover (of course with this library copy, it’s obscured…), and it’s true: If you like her work, I think you’ll like this one.
We Are Not Ourselves Was My Night Book
Maybe this is odd to many of you, but I generally don’t read in bed before falling asleep. I think this may be atypical for “readers” – after all, during my Covid isolation in May, I started re-watching Little House on the Prairie (hey, it was what I was in the mood for!), and I noticed that even Pa read in bed before reaching peak shut-eye mode. While Ma munched on popcorn. Btw, my family will tell you that I enthusiastically embrace both reading and nightly popcorn, ergo I am clearly an Ingalls at heart…aaaaand now my childhood dream has come true.
The Candy House
I’ve thought a lot about Jennifer Egan’s The Candy House in light of news stories that have popped up this year. If you know Egan’s brilliant A Visit From the Goon Squad, you’ll catch on quickly with The Candy House and its thinly interwoven storylines and exploration of technology, socialization, and human behavior/motivation. Whereas Goon Squad was very much about the music industry, The Candy House is more or less about the tech industry. Everything is subtle and clever and pretty much mind-blowing with her work, and what The Candy House spends a lot of time focusing on is authenticity and memory. (Just some ✨light topics.✨)
Homesickness
I’m trying to read as many books as I can with some variation of “homesick” in the title. So, ta da, this is Homesickness, a short story collection by the Irish writer Colin Barrett.
You Never Get it Back
You Never Get It Back by Cara Blue Adams is a stunning collection of interwoven short stories that was recommended to me by my friend Bethany. She texted, “I think you’d like this.” She was correct.
Mercy Street
I used to have #FictionIsRelevant in my bio because, well, even something wildly “made up” reflects real life. So how appropriate (nay, #Relevant) that my library copy of Mercy Street by Jennifer Haigh became available this week. The novel is about abortion (but like any good novel, is about so much more); the protagonist works at a clinic and another character is a creepy protestor and I think you get the gist. I whipped right through it.
Bright Lights, Big City
Let’s talk time capsules.
Passage West
While we were living in Ireland, I met a Taiwanese-American woman who was married to an Irish man. She had grown up some in Taiwan, but mostly in California and when she realized that I was also originally from the West Coast said something along the lines of, “People are different on the West Coast. It’s the whole ‘pioneering spirit’ that has evolved into innovation.”
On Homesickness
It’s a beautiful spring day in Boston. Finally! Finally? Everywhere I’ve lived, the air feels different and the seasons emerge differently, yet except for North Carolina — where we lived for five years — spring has never been an “early” season. So I don’t know why it continually surprises me when it shows itself so “late.”
Good Company
I’m reading a new genre
Plainsong
Plainsong by Kent Haruf is the book I chose for my book club. “Happy ending needed!” was the charge. Not sure I delivered according to those specifications in the way people wanted…
The Bone People
Why do you pick the books that you do? Let me tell you about why I checked out The Bone People by Keri Hulme. In early January, I read an obituary of Hulme because the NYT identified her in the headline as New Zealand’s first Booker winner. (The Bone People won in 1985.)
So Much Nonfiction in 2022?
2022’s been shaping up to be my year of nonfiction. Normally I’d read maybe TWO nonfiction books a year, tops. But here I am clocking in at 5 so far. Wowee! In case you’re a fan of nonfiction, here’s what I’ve read:
Tinkers
Tinkers by Paul Harding: A quiet, poetic, and pensive book that reminded (and assured?) me that these qualities can still “win” even in a world that prizes brashness, boastfulness, and rigid opinion. (I mean, it really did win…it won the Pulitzer in 2010.)
Jonny Appleseed
Whew.
Mother Daughter Widow Wife and The Life to Come
Someone asked me the other day how I select the books I read. I had to think about that, actually. Because truthfully, it’s just sort of a whim thing. I’m a greedy book acquirer, thanks to the library, so I’m often trying to read many books at once.
Wrap Me Up in a Complicated Blardigan: On Oh William! and Transcendent Kingdom
The Boston Globe Magazine’s January 23 cover story was “30 Great Comfort Foods”; the cover was festooned with a tantalizing picture of chicken and waffles from Brassica Kitchen + Cafe in Jamaica Plain, a fairly gentrified and artsy neighborhood in Boston that nonetheless still tries to cling to a working class/relatable vibe. Here’s the lead blurb to this compilation, which includes delicacies from honey-glazed biscuits, to ramen, to nine-hour French onion soup: “When temperatures drop and New Year’s resolutions fall by the wayside, we all need something to warm our souls.
Transcendent Kingdom
When’s the last time you started a book in one place and finished it in another? I don’t mean like the couch and then your bed; more like two totally different geographic locations. Or maybe I should just say “settings” because perhaps the act of reading a book can be like its own story in and of itself.
Swamplandia!
“Domestic fiction,” but make it on a swampy Florida island with a family of alligator wrestlers. Geek Love (Katherine Dunn) x Everything Under (Daisy Johnson) x a teeny tiny smidge of Where the Crawdads Sing (Delia Owens). Swamplandia! by Karen Russell.
