A Holy Shield
I usually wait until the very end of the year to post my list of books I read over the previous 12 months. (Here’s the list from 2021, the list from 2020, the list from 2018; 2019 is lost in the ether.) I mean literally the very, very last day - after all, who knows how many books I might still cram into those final, quiet days of the year! In theory, at least five, right? In practice, well…no.
This year, I’ve decided to write them all down in this newsletter rather than on Instagram, and sooner than the end of the year, just in case some of you are still looking for gift inspiration or are popping books on your own last-minute wishlists. I realize that today is just a little over a week before the big day, so it’s still rather last-minute, but I hope it’ll be useful regardless.
I read 56 (57 if you count Maus as two) books this year. To some that will seem like a preposterously high number, to others a pretty low one. To me, it felt good. It’s a little more than one book a week…with two kids and two books on my plate, not too shabby, right? My exhaustive list of tips for making more time for reading are as follows:
Creating a sort of holy shield around my bedtime reading time. It is my favorite part of the day and I guard it ruthlessly.
Canceling most of my newspaper/magazine subscriptions.
That’s it. I have no other tips. Look, number 1 has actively improved my life! Number 2, I really don’t feel great about, for a few reasons. But at the end of the day, I realized that in this season of life, in order to read more books, I had to read fewer news/magazine articles. So what are you going to do? For now, this is the way it is.
In the list below, I’ve used affiliate links to Bookshop.org, a business I love to support (and I earn a commission if you purchase a book through my links), but that only ships to United States readers. As soon as I figure out an equivalent for readers elsewhere, I’ll update this list. The books are listed in the order in which I read them, from January to December.
And now my question to you:
Did you read any of them? Did you have thoughts on any that you wanted to share? Anything you want to discuss? Please feel free to comment away and we’ll ourselves a little book chat in the comments section. Can’t wait!
Stoner by John Williams - A classic for a reason, this novel is the story of one academic’s life from nearly beginning to end and while it is bleak and devastating, it is also a beautiful portrait of a life that seems from the outside to be unremarkable, but is of course filled with depth.
The Land Where Lemons Grow: The Story of Italy and Its Citrus Fruit by Helena Atlee - Surely the book that most blew my mind this year, I haven’t stopped thinking about it, recommending it and buying it for friends. It’s a fascinating history of citrus fruit in Italy and will be the book you keep insisting on reading aloud from in astonishment to the people around you. (Also, the recipe for Amalfi lemon salad is perfect.)
Black Sea by Caroline Eden - I have not once cooked from this sensitively written and atmospheric cookbook, but I have read it from cover to cover in bed. I learned so much about the history, food and cultures around the Black Sea, from Romania to Turkey to Ukraine, and it gave me complete wanderlust for that part of the world.
Maus Volumes 1 and 2 by Art Spiegelman (rereads) - Hugo discovered these on our bookshelf this year and tore through them in a few days, so I decided to reread them. They are, as ever, astonishing and brilliant works of art.
Foreverland: On the Divine Tedium of Marriage by Heather Havrilevsky
Rodham by Curtis Sittenfeld - While this year was most definitely my year of Sittenfeld, as you can probably tell (and I’m so excited that her next novel Romantic Comedy publishes in just a few months - preorder here!), I think Rodham was my favorite so far, though Eligible is close behind it. I loved the alternate fantasy life that Sittenfeld creates for our heroine and whether you love or dislike HRC, I’ll wager that this book will make you think differently about her by the end.
Why We Can’t Sleep by Ada Calhoun - All I’ll say is that this should be required reading for all Generation X women and a few grizzled Millennials too.
Eligible by Curtis Sittenfeld - Okay, confession time, this English major and female writer was 44 years old before reading Pride & Prejudice for the first time and, fine, I only did it so that I was prepared to read Eligible next! Which I loved. Of course.
In Love by Amy Bloom - The book that pierced my heart the most this year and made me think, over and over again, of the choices we are faced with at the end of life and the iron will needed to greet them with grace. Bloom writes about her husband’s Alzheimer’s diagnosis and his subsequent decision to end his life with Dignitas in Switzerland. This memoir is a howl of love and grief and once you read it, it will never leave you.
The Upgrade: How the Female Brain Gets Stronger and Better in Midlife and Beyond by Louann Brizendine - Required reading for all women staring down perimenopause or menopause! Empowering, interesting, a tall glass of water, to be frank, when it comes to this subject.
All of This: A Memoir of Death and Desire by Rebecca Woolf - A bold and fearless memoir about the end of a complicated marriage. Reading it felt like bearing witness to something elemental: a woman finding her voice and empowering the rest of us to find ours.
This Time Tomorrow by Emma Straub - You probably don’t need me to tell you about this time-traveling love story between a father and daughter—it was a New York Times bestseller, after all—but I loved it, how well-paced it was, how nicely it balanced love and emotion with humor and action, and how it tugged at my heartstrings.
Serve the People: A Stir-Fried Journey Through China by Jen Lin-Liu
Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan - A tiny yet ferocious novel that you will read in probably mere minutes and that will crawl under your skin.
The Palace Papers: Inside the House of Windsor — The Truth and the Turmoil by Tina Brown - Yes, I read this entire book (dang, Tina is a master of the form). Yes, I am also sort of watching Harry & Meghan. I have ONE MILLION thoughts about the whole thing, but I am not about to let this lovely list of books get derailed by the travails of the Mountbatten-Windsors, so let’s keep moving!
Lucy by the Sea by Elizabeth Strout - *whispers so that no one throws a shoe at me* sooo as much as I love Elizabeth Strout and everything she writes, I am ready for her to start writing about other people now. Shhh!
Less is Lost by Andrew Sean Greer - Didn’t love this nearly as much as Less, which I adored and wanted to clasp to my bosom upon finishing, but such is life?
Giving up the Ghost: A Memoir by Hilary Mantel - When Mantel died earlier this year, I discovered that I knew very little of the physical and mental anguish she’d spent much of her life enduring. This memoir is sharp and crushing and it will astound you how much art she was able to create despite her truly unimaginable circumstances.
Five Tuesdays in Winter by Lily King (stories)
And with that I’ll sign off for now - it’s time for me to go to bed, where Emily Wilson’s translation of The Odyssey awaits me!
I love that you do this (list). Reading before bed is really the one way I sleep well, so I'm adopting this new term--the holy shied. Vowing to make this time for myself more sacred, and add a few of these to my own list.
This is so great and encouraging. Do you keep most the books you read? You have so many in your living room, it seems!