Everyday I Write the Book - It'll help you figure out what to read.

THE CARETAKER by Ron Rash

Years ago, I read Ron Rash’s novel The Risen, about the complicated relationship between two brothers and a young woman who comes to their small Appalachian town, driving a wedge between them that survives into adulthood. I was taken by the quietness of Rash’s writing, and the deceptive simplicity of his story. I’ve always wanted to pick up another Rash book, so this spring I bought The Caretaker, his newest novel, on one of my many research trips to independent bookstores. The title character is Blackburn Gant, a lonely cemetery caretaker whose face and body was left deformed after a

GOOD MATERIAL by Dolly Alderton

Good Material by Dolly Alderton flips the usual sad breakup story by telling it from the guy’s perspective. Andy, a mid-thirties stand-up comedian, has just been broken up with by Jen, his girlfriend of three years, and he’s devastated. With his career stalling, his friends all married off and the love of his life gone, Andy is at loose ends. Good Material tracks the months after the breakup, as Andy tries to put his life

REMARKABLY BRIGHT CREATURES by Shelby Van Pelt

My book club’s pick for this month was Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt, a book whose bright cover has been ubiquitous this year. I picked this one up on a recent trip to Parnassus Bookstore, based on the buzz about the book. (Also, I think octopuses are pretty cool.) It’s about Marcellus, an elderly octopus living in an aquarium in Washington state; Tova, an older woman who cleans the aquarium; and Cameron, a

SAM by Allegra Goodman

Remember me? I used to blog about books here. Sheesh. It’s been a while. To make up for the lack of posts, here’s a review of a book I really liked. Probably a 4.5 or 5 star read. It’s Sam, my first book by Allegra Goodman, and it came out last year. Sam is a character-driven coming-of-age story about a girl navigating childhood and adolescence. That’s pretty much it – not a lot of drama.

THE BERRY PICKERS by Amanda Peters

The Berry Pickers by Amanda Peters is a novel about an indigenous Mi’kmaq family in Nova Scotia who travels to Maine every summer to pick blueberries as migrant workers. One summer, 4 year-old Ruthie, the youngest of the family’s five children, disappears while they are working out in the field. Her disappearance is the first in a series of devastating losses suffered by the family, and is a loss felt especially hard by her brother

THE ART THIEF by Michael Finkel

One advantage to listening to a book vs reading it is that you can be truly surprised. With reading, your eyes sometimes jump ahead and sort of absorb the words even before you mean them to, which can blunt the impact of shocking words. But with audio, you really have no idea what is coming. That works to the great advantage of the audiobook of The Art Thief by Michael Finkel, non-fiction about prolific (understatement)

THE LAST LOVE NOTE by Emma Grey

Of all of the various literary genre mashups, grief/romance might seem one of the more incongruous. But Emma Grey pulls it off in her novel The Last Love Note, the story of one young widow’s resistance to the idea of getting involved again with a new – albeit familiar – man. While the pendulum swing between very sad story of loss and standard trope romance was occasionally jarring, both halves of the book were equally

ABSOLUTION by Alice McDermott

On the surface, Alice McDermott’s Absolution – historical fiction that takes place in Vietnam in the 1960s , seems like a straightforward story. It’s about expat white wives who have followed their husbands overseas, and their lives of serving as “helpmeets” for their partners. Patricia, a young, naive newlywed, is befriended by another wife named Charlene soon after arriving in Saigon. Charlene is domineering, quixotic and alluring, quickly drawing Patricia into her circle and embroiling

THE WOMAN IN ME by Britney Spears

I picked up The Woman In Me expecting a celebrity memoir. I didn’t realize I was going to be getting dystopian horror as well. Wow. Why I picked it up: I can’t resist a celebrity memoir. This book may be one-sided, but it’s clear that Spears was treated terribly by her family and the men in her life. Not only did they profit greatly from her success, but they held her captive in her own

2024 EDIWTB Reading Challenge

Happy 2024 everyone!! I am celebrating the new year with a relatively mild case of covid. Hopefully that’s a good sign for the rest of the year – get it out of the way early, right? I am a little late announcing the 2024 EDIWTB Reading Challenge, but here we go. As always, my goal is to provide a reading challenge that is 1) manageable; 2) enjoyable; and 3) helps you find and read books

2023 Reading Year In Review

Another reading year in the books. This was my lowest number of books read in recent memory. I lost my job at the end of 2022, and while I thought I’d have a lot of time to read, I ended up spending all my time at my desk looking for a job and feeling guilty when I wasn’t. And now I am back at work with more to do than hours in the day, so

BOOKENDS by Zibby Owens

Zibby Owens is a juggernaut in the publishing world. She is the host of the Moms Don’t Have Time To Read Books podcast, the founder and CEO of Zibby Books, and the owner of a bookstore in Santa Monica, Zibby’s Bookshop (among many other bookish things). She is also a published author, with a memoir called Bookends and a novel on the way. I greatly admire Owens and all that she has accomplished and done

DELE WEDS DESTINY by Tomi Obaro

Dele Weds Destiny is one of those friends-from-college-reuniting-as-adults books that I usually like. Funmi, Zainab and Enitan were best friends in school in Nigeria, but have since headed in different directions. Funmi married a wealthy man and lives an opulent life in Lagos. Zainab lives a few hours away and cares for her husband, who has suffered from a stroke and can no longer provide for his family. And Enitan married an American ex-pat and

Favorite Books of 2023

Here are my favorite books of 2023! These are the ones that stayed with me over the months, that said something important or moving or memorable. 7 fiction, 1 non-fiction, and mostly sad/depressing (what else is new?). In no particular order: Romantic Comedy by Curtis Sittenfeld: A completely realistic, relatable story of an unlikely pair who reconnects during the pandemic. I adored this book. The Light Pirate by Lily Brooks-Dalton: Dystopian cli-fi about the demise

HOT SPRINGS DRIVE by Lindsay Hunter

I’ve been in a major reading rut the last two months, too distracted to focus, so I keep starting books and reading 20 pages and then stopping. I thought I might get out of the rut with Hot Springs Drive by Lindsay Hunter, a book I had heard compared to Gone Girl. It’s about Jackie and Theresa, next door neighbors who become best friends and then decide to lose weight together. Their physical transformations change

TANGERINE by Christine Mangan

I just finished up the last few categories of the 2023 EDIWTB Reading Challenge. My final three unread books were all from the same category – Book From My Bookshelf – one that I love because I get to pick a random book from my unread shelves, no matter how old. #1 was Young Jane Young by Gabrielle Zevin and #2 was Adelaide by Genevieve Wheeler. #3 was Tangerine by Catherine Mangan, a 2018 debut