Books read February – June 2022

The last time I wrote a “Books read” recap was in February. Since we are halfway through the year, this seems as good a time as any to round up the books that I’ve read so far this year. (Books I particularly loved reading get a *)

February 2022:

Facing the Mountain: A True Story of Japanese American Heroes in World War II by Daniel James Brown, read by Louis Ozawa – This non-fiction book recounts the lives of four Japanese Americans during the Second World War. Three of them enlisted and were deployed to Europe and the fourth was a patriotic resistor who was jailed for being Japanese. While I knew about the Japanese interment camps in America, my knowledge was very general. This book is filled with so many gripping and specific details of the lives of these men and their families and the degree of racism they faced in the wake of Pearl Harbor. I found myself so angry every time these American born Japanese people were told that they weren’t American and had their freedom taken away from them because of fear.

*Harlem Shuffle by Coleson Whitehead – This was such a well written and engaging book. It’s not as heavy as Nickel Boys, but still touches on the same themes of race, class, and getting ahead. This is the third book by Whitehead I’ve read and each books has had such a different style to it; I’m always impressed by how chameleon like yet distinctive Whitehead is as a novelist. And there are parts of the novel where I’m just bowled over by how perfectly his writing can capture something – like in one passage he describes slow moving traffics as “honking molasses”. Another favorite quote:
“The store was a circus during the day but serious and calm late at night, when the real work went down. Time, straight world rules, what his watch said – it was topsy turvy now. The temperament and spirit of these hours, what you stuffed into them, mattered more than where they fell on a clock’s face.”

The Stand In by Lily Chu, read by Phillipa Soo – okay, truth – I picked this up because it was one of those free books on Audible, and because it was read by Phillipa Soo, of Hamilton fame. This was a fun, breezy book. The main character Gracie is a dead ringer for a famous Chinese movie star Wei Fangli and she is approached on day to be the movie star’s stand in at social events, an undertaking that requires being escorted by the very handsome movie star Steve Yao. Between the book being set in Canada (Toronto, to be exact) and the details of Gracie’s Chinese-American mother, this book felt really homey to me. One of my favorite parts of the book is that on the side Gracie is working on creating a planner, which I think such a great detail. And in her planner there is a section for the “Don’t Think. Do.” list – things that just need to be done without over thinking. I think everyone needs to have a “Don’t Think. Do.” list.

March 2022:
If The Shoe Fits by Julie Murphy, narrated by Jen Ponton – A breezy novel about Cindy, a recent fashion school grad, who ends up starring in a Bachelorette type reality show. This book had so many fun descriptions of clothes, particularly shoes since that is where Cindy’s main design interest was.

*What Do You Say? How to Talk to Kids to Build Motivation, Stress Tolerance, and a Happy Home by William Stixrund and Ned Johnson – I found this book really helpful in that the authors provide a lot of scripts for conversations to have with one’s child. So many parenting books I find are very theoretical and have great ideas but don’t really give a lot of practical advice on how to implement the ideas with your kids, and also explains a lot of the neurological reasons why kids act the way they do. I also really liked that they encourage parents/caregivers to talk to their kids about how their brain reacts to things, so that they can better understand their own reactions. Another of my biggest takeaways from this book is the idea that if we intervene too much for our kids, they won’t learn to self regulate. So a lot of their scripts have the parent as a coach, asking questions to help their child figure things out for themselves. “How does that upset you?” is one questions they give for being supportive yet not overbearing. “[R]emember your goal:” they write,” a kid who know when they’re getting out of balance, how to get themselves back, and how to run their own life before they leave home.”

Under the Whispering Door by T.J. Klune – I didn’t love this one as much as I loved The House on the Cerulean Sea. There was an effortless whimsy and charm in the previous book that was missing in this one, as if everyone was aware that this book was about very big themes.

Notes from a Young Black Chef by Kwame Onwuachi with Joshua David Stein – Onwauachi became famous for being on Top Chef and subsequently opened a much anticipated restaurant in DC that ultimately closed rather quickly after opening. I thought this book was a really fascinating look inside the world of fine dining, a world that wasn’t easy for a Black man to navigate and assert himself. There is certainly a fine line between not wanting other people to define you by the colour of your skin, but at the same time wanting to honour your heritage in the food you make. One of his insights, really made me think of the world of stage managment, though:
“Catering is like low-grade war games: hope for the best, prepare for the worst. So I prepare for nearly every eventuality. I’m so organized my systems have systems. A successful kitchen runs on plastic quart containers and paper towels, strips of tape and Sharpies. On the doors of my fridges are taped elaborate spreadsheets breaking down each dish into its component parts and assigning each element to a team member. Now I just have to trust the system.”

*Razor Blade Tears by S.A. Crosby read by Adam Lazarre-White – This was a gritty crime thriller about two men, one white and one Black, who are drawn together by the murder of their sons, a married couple with a toddler daughter. Buddy Lee Jenkins and Ike Randolph, both men who have spent time behind bars themselves are determined to find out who was behind the murder of their sons. The actual mystery of the couples’ death seems secondary to the story of how Buddy Lee and Ike both come to terms with the loss they’ve suffered and their own prejudices against their sons and each other. This book was nail biting and heartbreaking.

Chemistry by Weike Wang. I was very meh about this novel. There was something very unsympathetic about the main character

April 2022

The Golden Compass by Phillip Pullman full cast audiobook – We listened to this book on our road trip to Tennessee. I had listened to it before and the Husband and I are working our way through the HBO miniseries, so we thought it would be a good road trip book. I don’t know that I will every understand the theoretical aspects of Pullman’s series, but the characters are really well drawn and Pullman does know how to weave a really suspenseful adventure story. I don’t always love full cast audiobooks – they tend to seem disjointed to me somehow.

*The Devil’s Highway by Luis Alberto Urrea – I had heard Urrea’s interview with Krista Tippett on On Being and I thought he said many wise and beautiful things, so I wanted to read some of his books. This non-fiction book tells the story of a group of men who attempt to cross the US Mexico border only to get lost in the desert of southern Arizona. This was such a tragic desperate story, one that really made me think about both the personal aspects as well as the global implications of our current border policies.

Matrix by Lauren Groff– This book was on so many “Best of” lists and I just couldn’t get into it. I did love all the details of life in the Middle Ages, and the sly cheekiness of the main character Marie de France, a seventeen year old deigned unmarriageable and instead made a prioress at an abbey that is floundering. I think the style of the novel, encompassing nearly all of Marie’s entire life, felt like it meandered a little too much for me to fully grasp the weightier things that Marie was tackling.

May 2022

Dial ‘A” for Aunties by Jesse Q. Sutanto– This was another fun rom-com romp of a book. Wedding photographer Meddelin Chan accidentally kids her blind date and her very hands on mother and aunts – who work together putting on weddings- come help, all while trying to pull off the wedding of the year. Breezy, hilarious and written with lots of heart. I especially loved how familiar the main character’s Chinese-Indonesian Aunties felt. I mean the book was ridiculous on so many levels, but it was a good time and I laughed out loud several times.

With the Fire on High written and read by Elizabeth Acevedo – I really liked Acevedo’s Clap When You Land so I wanted to read more of her books. This book tells the story about Emoni Santiago, a high school student and talented chef who is trying to find her way and do what is best for herself, her baby daughter, and her family as well. I loved how Acevedo’s descriptions of food were moments of pure poetry and hearing her read her own words was a treat.

June 2022

*Firekeeper’s Daughter by Angeline Boulley – I guess this is technically a YA novel, though I feel like YA novels these days are more sophisticated and nuanced about the topics they tackle than when I was a teenager. In this novel, the main character Daunis, an Ojibwe teenager, has to face how she can best help her community after she witnesses a violent crime. I really appreciated how this book took place in a Native American community, and Boulley was able to write about it in a way that didn’t feel heavy handed or, conversely, dismissive. For example, she often uses Ojibwe names or terms, but allows the context to help the reader discover the meaning rather than directly translating or explaining things. I really enjoyed this novel – the plot was absorbing and the characters struck the nice balance of flawed yet sympathetic. I was sad when this book was over because I felt really invested in the characters.

*Happy and You Know It by Laura Hankin– I really liked this book a lot. This satirical novel centers around a Manhattan mom’s group and the musician that they hire to play for their babies. In exploring what life is like as a new mom, susceptible to many influences yet at the same time deeply isolated, parts of this novel made me laugh out oud, parts of this novel hit a close to home. While greatly entertaining, this book also made me think about what aspects of motherhood are heroic and what parts are oppressive – and what is perhaps both? My favorite quote: “TrueMommy was the same old patriarchal bullshit dressed up as empowerment, and Amara had fallen for it like a fucking idiot.”

*The Dawn Palace by H.M. Hoover read by Alyssa Bresnahan– I first read this book, a re-imagining of the Medea story, years ago, when I was perhaps twelve or thirteen and it left a huge impression on me. I don’t remember why, but I suddenly got a hankering to read it again, but I could only find an audio copy at my library. Hoover’s novel, written in 1988, is told from Medea’s point of view, recounting how she fell in love with Jason and then abandoned her home to help him fulfill his ambitions. It was my first encounter with the story of Medea, and for the longest time, I didn’t realize that people actually though Medea was the villain of the story. Re-visiting this book after almost thirty years, I found the story just as engaging, but I think I was even more outraged by Jason’s callousness this time around and more aware of what a strong feminist statement it was to make Medea the hero of the story.

Dear Committee Members by Julie Schumacher– I’m a sucker for an epistolary novel and this was was a lot of fun. Breezy, irreverent, and hilarious, this novel tells the story of Professor Jason Fitger’s attempt to hold it together as his life and his department falls apart. The story is told via letters that Fitger writes, most notably recommendation letters in which he perfectly displays the art of damning with faint praise. This was an enjoyable book – slight and crusty with a big heart beneath.

The Menopause Manifesto by Dr. Jen Gunther – Something about rounding the corner of 40 and realizing that even though I’m still breastfeeding, I’m rapidly approaching middle age and all that that means for a female… so I picked up this book in hopes of some insight into what might be in store for me physically in the next ten to fifteen years. I have to say this book was not entirely helpful. Gunther says again and again that the research on menopause is scant and not terribly reliable and then blames the patriarchy for our limited understanding. She points out that in a society that only values women for their ability to breed, menopause essentially makes them irrelevant. That is the “Manifesto” part of the book, and while I agree it is enraging, there is a perhaps more rhetoric than useful information to be found here. My main takeaways: excercise, healthy eating and giving up smoking are the only things proven to alleviate the symptoms of menopause.

Five Little Pigs by Agatha Christie – A Hercule Poirot novel, this is one of her more straight forward mystery novels, but still charming and intriguing nonetheless. I had an idea of who did it, but not of the how. I have an affection of Agatha Christie novels and like to read one every so often for that blanket of familiarity that a cozy mystery can bring.

A Holiday by Gaslight by Mimi Matthews- A sweet romance novella by a new to me author. I love a good romance novel, but there are many out there that are not to my taste. I like it when authors write novellas because then I can get a sense of their style without investing in a whole book. I really enjoyed this novella which tells the story of Lady Sophie Appersett who breaks off her engagement to business Edward Sharpe because she thinks they will not suit, much to Sharpe’s dismay. Sharpe very much wishes to marry Lady Sophie, but isn’t quite sure how to navigate the anodyne rules of polite society. Matthews prose is not too modern and her story was full of lovely period details. There was just enough angst to make my heart ache a little bit, and the characters were smart enough that I did want them to end up together in the end. I’m encouraged to read one of Matthews longer novels.