Tag: non fiction

Books Read September 2025

September was a solid reading month. One very “meh” book, but lots of entertaining reading otherwise. I’m looking ahead to my reading for the rest of the year and I think I would like to focus on fun reads since it’s going to be busy. Maybe some holiday reading. And also maybe something really fun/engrossing/immersive to read for the plane trip to Taiwan.

Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir, read by Ray Porter. This very popular novel is about a scientist/ middle school science teacher, Ryland Grace, who gets involved in a plan to save the world from destruction and is sent with a team to the far reaches of the galaxy to carry out said plan. Along the way, his fellow travellers do not survive so he has to carry out the mission on his own. Or maybe not on his own. I didn’t know what the book was about when I first picked it up, only that it was getting a lot of raves. Science fiction/space travel really isn’t my thing, but I really loved this book. The science really went over my head, but there is such a human element to the story telling. I’ve read a few books the past few years – this is one, Ministry of Time is another – that have made me realize that I really like books that try to explain what it’s like to be human to an outsider, in all it’s contradictory, messy, fragility. I though Ray Porter did a really good job reading the audio version.
Funny story – the 13 year old noticed I was listening to the book and she got so excited because she had listened to it a few years ago and also loved the book and couldn’t wait for me to finish it so we could talk about it together. Also there’s a movie coming out next year… I’m so intrigued about how they make the story work!

Fat Ham by James Ijames, production by Audible Originals. I’ve recently discovered that Audible has a large selection of plays in their collection, many of which they produced themselves. I like listening to plays because they are shorter than books, but pack just as big of a wallop. Also – I don’t get to the theatre very often and this is like bringing the theatre to me. Fat Ham, which won the Pulitzer Prize in 2022, is a modern day re-telling of Hamlet, set against the backdrop of a Black family’s BBQ empire. I really liked seeing where the story paralleled Hamlet and where it offered a twist on the Shakespeare. It was kind of irreverent and fun but also thoughtful and emotional. Listening to Fat Ham has prompted me to try to read/ listen to all the Pultizer Prize winning plays of the 2000s. Maybe this will be my reading project for next year.

Winnie and Nelson: Portrait of a Marriage by Jonny Steinberg. I read this after reading Nelson Mandela’s biography and this books was fascinating. All the infidelities and violence and family drama that gets glossed over in Long Walk to Freedom are detailed here. Winne Mandela’s life in particular was really fraught. While Nelson was in jail, she had to raise her two daughters, was constantly unemployed. She was banned to a rural part of South Africa, she assembled a group of bodyguards under the guise of being a football club that carried out some truly violent acts, all the while trying to advocate for the end of Apartheid. Reading this book made the Mandelas more human, framing their fight against apartheid with very human struggles that we all face- looking for love and friendship, making ill advised choices, financial difficulties, temptations, protecting the people you love, work life balance…. Of course, there is something extraordinary about the context of their struggles – I don’t imagine I’m going to have a spouse in jail for thirty years, or that I’m going to be under house arrest – extraordinary situations make for extraordinary choices.

Emily Wilde’s Encyclopaedia of Faeries by Heather Fawcett – This book is told in diary format, as Professor Emily Wilde records her experience researching fairies on a remote Scandinavian village. I have to be honest, this was not a book for me, even though I pushed on to the end. I thought the diary format was not really well executed, and the story stretched the limits of the diary device. At one point, another character starts writing in the journal, which just felt forced. The world building was really hard for me to follow and I still don’t really understand what all was happening. I did like the gruff village inhabitants and the dog, though.

Heartwood by Amity Gaige – This novel details the search for a lost hiker on the Appalachian Trail in Maine. It is told through three main perspectives – the lost hiker, the Maine Warden who is leading the search, and a 72 year woman living in a retirement home. This book has been billed as a “thriller”, so I wasn’t really sure if it would be for me because that’s not really my genre, but it’s been getting a lot of buzz and I kept reading about people loving this book, so I decided to pick it up when I saw it at the library. I will say, it didn’t come across as a thriller to me – rather I felt that the mystery of whether or not Valerie would be found, while gripping, took backseat to the characters’ personal stories. I was really sucked in by that character driven aspect of the novel, each character seemed to genuine and well drawn to me and I really liked that.

Be Ready When the Luck Happens by Ina Garten read by the author- This cozy memoir is a perfect autumn read. Garten recounts her life from growing up in Brooklyn to working in DC government to buying The Barefoot Contessa in the attempt to escape her career in bureaucracy. Listening to Garten talk about food and friends and dinner parties made me want to invite a bunch of people over for an impromptu dinner party; the descriptions of food were mouth watering. Garten also talks about the challenges she faced personally, professionally, and financially as she builds her empire. I really liked hearing about how she made certain choices about Barefoot Contessa and projects she was willing or not willing to take on. I do always take memoirs of very successful people with a grain of salt, though, because I think even though it’s clear that Garten is super smart and driven and savvy, she clearly had a lot of support when crafting her career. Sometimes memoirs make it seem super easy to become wildly successful, like good things just happen, but it does seem to me that people who are successful entrepreneurs have a lot of personal and financial connections that they can leverage. I still really enjoyed this book, though.

On my proverbial night stand:
The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan – Cool Blogger’s Book Club read.

Say Nothing by Patrick Radden Keefe- 2018 non-fiction book about the Troubles in Northern Ireland during the 1960s and 1970s. I guess reading about civil conflict has been a theme of my non-fiction reading this year.

Say You’ll Be Mine by Naina Kumar – Romance novel featuring the fake engagement of two people who are introduced through the matchmaking efforts of their Indian parents.

Do you like reading memoirs? What are you looking forward to reading to round out the year? Have you ever listened to a play in audio?

Books Read September 2024

Last week of October, and finally got around to writing up the books I read last month. Not a lot of books read, but I was determined to finish that Bronte biography, and I did!

Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi – I picked up this book at a Little Free Library and it just sat in my shelf until a lot of you told me to read it. What a beautiful powerful book. I wish every chapter were its own book. I think that might be one reason I didn’t love love this book- I just wanted more of each story and the format almost felt like it was a short story collection. Interestingly enough, I just listened to an author interview where the author talks about how short story collections don’t have to end with a big satisfying bow the way novels do. I think once I accepted this book as a collection of connected short stories, I enjoyed it more.

History of Women in 101 Objects: A Walk Through Female History by Annabelle Hirsch, read by Read by Gillian Anderson, Katy Hessel, Anita Rani, Jackie Kay, Len Pennie, Annabelle Hirsch, Shirley Manson, Rebecca Solnit, Sandi Toksvig, Marina Hyde, Naomi Shimada, and a Full Cast– This book looks at history, specifically Female History, through the lens of objects . Some objects are very pedestrian (like the Miele vacuum cleaner, the bikini), some less so (a 16th century glass dildo…) Some chapters drew my interest more than others, but as a whole it was a fascinating way to walk through history. I would say this audio book kind of felt like a podcast on occasion because each chapter was so short and varied.

Pride of Bagdhad by Brian K. Vaughan and Niko Henrichon– This is a graphic novel based on a true incident where lions escaped from the zoo during the bombing of Baghdad. In this book, the lions wander the city looking for food and trying to grapple with what it means to be free and have the ability to interact with other animals. I borrowed this when I was on my graphic novel kick a few months ago. I think my problem with graphic novels, though, is the writing/dialogue can sometimes read somewhat stilted for me. Maybe that’s the nature of unfurling a story panel by panel? Despite that, though, I thought this book was beautiful, and the story really sad. There were times when I turned the page and then gasped at the stunning images or story.

Life is Hard: How Philosophy Can Help Us Find Our Way by Kieran Setiya – I had read Setiya’s Midlife: A Philosophical Guide and found it gave me a lot to ponder in regards to what is fulfilling and the purpose of setting goals. My big take away from that book is that learn to enjoy activities for the sake of doing the activities rather than achieving goals because you don’t know when life will end. I didn’t find Life Is Hard as compelling or as focused. Each chapter looks at one things that might give use despair (Infirmity, Loneliness, Grief, Failure, Injustice, Absurdity, and Hope. That last is kind of a spoiler for what the book ultimately says) Setiya looks at ways that philosophers and thinkers have examined these problems and reconciled how to live with them. The book is a little dense, but there were some quotes that I liked:

“…being happy is not the same as living well. If you want to be happy, dwelling on adversity may or may not be of use. Bur mere happiness should not be your goal.” – I agree that happiness is overrated.

“Projects fail and people fail in them. But we have come to speak as if a person can be a failure as though failure were an identity, not an event. When you define your life by way of a single enterprise, a narrative arc, its outcome will come to define you.” I love this idea of failure as an event, not a identity. People are not failures. So important to remember.

“Hope coexists with quiescence. If there’s courage in hoping, it’s the courage to face the fear of disappointment that hope creates. When things turn out badly, hope is more harrowing than despair.” I feel like this is very apt to our current times as we count down the days to the election.

The Brontes: Wild Genius on the Moors: the Story of Three Sisters by Juliet Barker – After two years of steady reading, I’ve finally finished this door stop of a book. I found so much of this book fascinating – it vividly captured the tedium of living in remote rural England. (I guess most of England was remote and rural at the time.) I mean this was before the internet and electricity! Interestingly, though, the lives of the Brontes seemed a combination of loneliness and connection. They were often far from friends, but the letters flew back and forth with great frequency and there were frequent visits and community events. It made me think of how we fill our time so differently now. I loved how much of a person’s personality shines through in their letter writing. Reading the excerpts from correspondence was one of my favorite parts of this book. The letters were always polite and correct, but could convey so much. I think about how we can offload the task of writing such correct and proper letters to ChatGPT now, and it makes me sad. I mean this phrase, in which Charlotte declines a proposal:
I am not the serious, grave, cool headed individual you suppose – you would think me romantic… and say I was satirical and severe. However I scorn deceit and I will never for the sake of attaining the distinction of matrimony and escaping the stigma of an old maid take a worthy man whom I am conscious I cannot render happy.
We certainly don’t write like that anymore.
There was also so. much. death in this book. Of the six Bronte children, two died in infancy as well as the mother. And then, of course, Emily and Anne and brother Bramwell also died before they were into their thirties. Bramwell was a trip – troubled, aimless and full of scandal. I thought a lot in this book about their father as well, who outlived all his kids and kept doing his work as a minister until his death at age 84. If you’re into dense literary biographies, this is probably a good book to sink into.

On my bookshelf: I just finished reading a couple books, so there are only two books on my books in progress shelf:

This is so awkward: Modern Puberty Explained by Cara Natterson and Vanessa Kroll Bennett – This book is what the title suggests. It looks at the science behind puberty and then offers tips and scripts for how to talk about it with kids. Natterson and Kroll Bennett are the co-hosts of one of my favorite parenting podcasts.

Confessions of an Unlikely Thru-Hiker by Derick Lugo – Lugo is a young Black comedian who decides to hike the Appalacian trail, even though he had never even been camping before. I have a fascination with stories of people who do epic hikes (Wild, The Salt Path).

I’m going to start having a longer commute in a few weeks, so if anyone has any good audiobooks to recommend, please tell me!

Books Read – December 2022

The last Books Read for 2022!

Husband Material by Alexis Hall – This was the sequel to Boyfriend Material, which I had read earlier this fall and adored. In this book, the main characters Luc and Oliver, contemplate getting married as it seems like everyone around them does. (I think it was in no small part inspired by Four Weddings and a Funeral. Also – incidentally, I was poking around Alexis Hall’s blog and he has a series of posts dedicated to watching every single movie that Hugh Grant ever made, which makes for delightful reading.) I didn’t feel like Husband Material was quite as good as Boyfriend Material – there were too many silly side plots – but I still really enjoyed this book; it was fun, funny, cute, had a big heart, and explored some nice themes about what commitment looks like. I love the idea of a romance novel sequel and seeing how characters continue to grow – life doesn’t end after “happily ever after” and this book felt like there was some really credible personal growth going on. Oliver continues to be swoony and regimented, Luc continues to be an adorable mess.

Joan is Okay by Weike Wang – I almost didn’t read this because I didn’t care for Wang’s first book Chemistry. I’m glad I gave this book a chance because I ended up liking it so much better than Chemistry. The main character, Joan, is a Chinese American ICU doctor and in this novel, she is grappling with the death of her father in China and her mother’s subsequent move back to the the US from China, while trying to figure out how to just go back to life as usual when life keeps changing. A lot of the questions Joan asks herself about being the child of immigrants felt like questions that I have wondered myself. I liked this better than Chemistry because Joan was actually contemplating these questions, whereas the main character in Chemistry just sort of drifted through life without a lot of self awareness. Some highlights I made:

You made zong zi? I asked, the entire breakfast table covered in food. I had to, she [Joan’s mother] said. Yesterday I was so bored, and this was the most time-consuming thing I could think of to do.
This made me laugh because my mother also makes zong zi – sticky rice filled with meat and peanuts and then wrapped in bamboo leaves and steamed. I love zongzi, but yes, they do take a lot of work to make – it’s a multi day process.

Director, the first time I put on my white coat, it felt like home. From having moved around so much and with no childhood or ancestral home to return to, I didn’t think myself capable. I didn’t prioritize home or comfort, because if everyone did, then immigrants like my parents, brother, and sister-in-law couldn’t exist. Home was not a viable concept for them until later, and it wasn’t a concept for me until the day I put on that coat, this coat. I pulled at my white lapel to show him. From then on, I knew that my occupation would become my home. To have a home is a luxury, but now I understand why people attach great value to it and are loyal to defend it. Home is where you fit in and take up space.
This exchange with her boss – I’ve always been fascinated by the idea of people leaving their home to make a life in a new country and how these immigrants contribute to their new country. What were the forces that pull someone away from the place they were born? I think maybe not all people give home the same weight in the calculus of life choices.

The Weight of Ink by Rachel Kadish – I picked up this book for two reasons: 1) I wanted a lengthy tome to read this winter, and this one clocked in at 592 pages, and 2) the blurb compared it to Possession, which is a book I loved. This novel tells two intertwined stories, both set in England, separated by 400+ years; in the present day, two scholars try to unravel a historical mystery centered around Jewish theology, and in the 1660s we follow the story of Ester Velasquez a young Jewish immigrant from Amsterdam, who is at the center of that mystery. This book didn’t have the same romantic sweep of Possession, but it did have a similar complex, intertwined onion-like layers of plot. I thought this book was so well researched and well crafted and I loved all the details. Reading, I realized that sometimes the difference between a lengthy book and a shorter one is the amount of ink devoted the descriptive details of things, from the smell of the ancient manuscripts in the research library, to the sounds of a seventeenth century theatre… Kadish’s writing is immersive and specific. I’m pretty sure I didn’t understand all the historical points in this book – I had to Google many things – and I think that if I had understood all the history of philosophy or the migratory patterns of Jews in early modern Europe, I may have liked the book more. But as it is, though slow to start and with some awkward info dump narrative devices, this book proved to be a pretty satisfying to sink into. I liked how nuanced the three main characters were. Ester, in particular, is one of my favorite heroines I’ve read in a while – she’s smart and bold to the point of subversive, and doesn’t ever fall into self-pity – I like that in a character. I loved this observation she makes:

“You asked once,” Ester said, “What my mother counseled me about love. But it was her life rather than her words that gave the plainest counsel. My mother was so angered by love’ failures, Mary, that she navigated with spite as her compass. But if you’d seen her, though she was beautiful, you’d have understood how easily the blade of spite turns in one’s hands, and cuts one’s own palms. So that one can grasp nothin, Mary. So that life is … no longer life.”

Also this realization from the scholar Aaron about the uptight reference librarians (both named Patricia), gatekeepers to precious manuscripts:

“… she was among those whose worry took the form of anger at the world for its failure to remain safe.
‘I haven’t seen her in days,” Patricia said, and as if his own troubles had given him new ears, Aaron understood that her terseness was love, that all of it was love: The Patricias’ world of meticulous conservation and whispering vigilance and endless policing over fucking pencils.”

This is How it Always Is by Laurie Frankel – This beautiful book struck me as actually being a parenting fable masquerading as a novel. It’s the story of a family whose youngest son at a very young age decides he is a girl and how the family handles and supports that change. There was so much in this book that I really related to – this line, “Bedtime was a study in chaos theory … Three of his four children were naked, which, while one step closer to pajamas, was still a long way off from bed,” was spot on. And also there was so much of this book that I wanted to hold close to my heart and remember, particularly the theme that hard things are necessary in life. The parents in the book try to make it easy for their child to transition to being a girl, and at one point they are told that just because they made it easy when she is young doesn’t mean they are making the hard part disappear. There will always be something hard and it’s just a question of when their child would have to face it. At one point the husband says, “Easy is nice, but it’s not as good getting to be who you are or stand up up for what you believe in… Not much of what I value in our lives is easy.”

Currently Reading…
The Brontes, Wild Genius on the Moors: The Story of Three Sisters by Juliet Barker – a door stop of a biography on the Bronte sisters. The everyday happenings of a small English town is proving surprisingly fascinating. I don’t imagine I’ll finish it before Spring.

The Death of Vivek Oji by Akwaeke Emezi – Someone had listed this as one of their three favorite books, the other two being The Great Believers and The Nickel Boys. These latter two books are two of my favorite reads too, so I thought I’d give this book a try. I started reading it without reading the blurb on the back, so I’m not quite sure where the story is going. (Anyone else dive into books without reading the “back”? I like to do it once in a while with fiction, just to come into a story with fewer expectations.)

The Charm Offensive by Alison Cochrun – Romance novel set against a Bachelor-like reality dating show. I don’t watch reality dating shows, but I love them as a backdrop for books. I’m so fascinated by how manufactured everything is. A fun romance novel is always a nice way to start the New Year, and this is proving to be just that.

Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer – I’ve been slowly working my way through this book for over a year now. The essays are not to be rushed because there is a lot of digest in them, but I’m trying to make the time this year to sit and read savoringly.

And some other books that I’ve started a page or two of, but I’m not sure they will stick.

What’s on your (proverbial or literal?) night stand?