I have to warn you, my husband left for a one-year work assignment in Washington D.C. at the end of the summer, so the list gets a little long! ; )
What I read in 2017:
January
Team of Rivals –
Doris Kearns Goodwin. I was really late to the party on this one, but after I
saw the terrific film “Lincoln” with Daniel Day Lewis, I vowed to get right on
it. I just looked—that film came out in 2012. Better late than never; this is a
fascinating read.
The Handmaid’s Tale
– Margaret Atwood. Along with many others I’m sure, one of my book clubs decided to reread this in light of the current
political situation. Still interesting and of course chilling, but it didn’t
really feel like so much of a commentary on current events, given that so much
of what is distressing about today has occurred without any coercion at all.
The Time In Between
– Maria Duenas. My first book club bailout of the year. The story just didn’t
grab me. At the meeting when other readers said that it really did pick up
around THE 350 PAGE MARK, I felt justified in my decision. No time for that
nonsense.
February
In the Unlikely Event
– Judy Blume. For the other book club. This was a really good read. I have
loved Judy’s young adult writing all my life (read Everything I Needed To Know About Being A Girl I Learned From Judy
Blume and then we can talk about Forever
making the rounds on the volleyball bus) but I wasn’t crazy about her previous
adult novel. This was a really engaging story about a New Jersey community
terrorized in the 1950s by a series of plane crashes.
The Man in the High
Castle – Philip K. Dick. Oh my word this book was terrible. Whoever took
this idea and translated it into the Amazon series deserves some kind of award
for making silk purses. I am addicted to the show (please come back) and wanted
to read the foundation. Trust me, don’t bother. Just terrible and terribly
racist to boot.
A Man Called Ove –
Fredrik Backman. I don’t have to tell you because you read it too. This was an
entertaining, warm and funny book with engaging characters. A light read that
should make at least a couple of good movies.
Family Life –
Akhil Sharma. Ok, David Sedaris, I read this on your recommendation but I found
it way too depressing and demoralizing. I guess David has more tolerance for all
the horrible things that can happen to an Indian immigrant to the U.S. I don’t
even remember the specifics—I think I blocked them out.
March
The Little Red Chairs
– Edna O’Brien. This was over the violence line for me, though I did finish it.
A doctor shows up in a small Irish village and stirs up quiet life there. But
then he turns out to be a notorious war criminal and bad things ensue. Well
written, but read with caution if you’re squeamish about violence like me.
Dead Wake – The Last
Crossing of the Lusitania – Erik Larson. Oh, Erik Larson, how the book
clubs love you. As with many of his previous books, I would recommend about
half of this one. He writes half a straight non-fiction on the subject at hand,
which I found informative and interesting, and half a slight dramatization of
the lives of some of the people involved, which I found a little too dramatic
and clever.
April
The Portable Veblen
– Elizabeth McKenzie. A winner! This was a quirky, well written novel with
interesting characters and a great title. The main character, a young woman
named Veblen, is named after an economist named Thorstein Veblen.
Unsurprisingly, she had an unusual upbringing and we follow her attempts to
negotiate grown-up life and love. And there’s a squirrel. Read it!
1984 – George
Orwell. Another book club review of classics with modern implications? But see
the earlier review of The Handmaid’s Tale—like
that one, the plot of this dystopian story revolves around control and
coercion, whereas I feel like the maniacal pursuit of mindless happiness and
the rejection of knowledge and ideas at the center of Fahrenheit 451 speak more to our time.
May
All the Light We
Cannot See – Anthony Doerr. I enjoyed this novel about a blind French girl and
a German boy whose paths cross in Paris in World War II. The story is gripping
and creatively told. This is a keeper.
Commonwealth – Ann
Patchett. Every year’s list should include something by Ann Patchett. Read this family
story for the memorable characters and beautiful prose. And then go back and
reread her earlier novels.
The Sandcastle Girls
– Chris Bohjalian. This is another one of those that I remember having read,
but I can’t recall a thing about it. Even the synopsis on Amazon isn’t
unsticking any memories. I guess it didn’t make much of an impression.
Strangers in their Own
Land: Anger and Mourning on the American Right – Arlie Hochschild. In yet
another attempt by a self-described liberal writer to understand a red state
point of view, Hochshild made an interesting choice to narrow her focus to a single
issue, environmental threats, in southern Louisiana. As with many other
narratives like this, she lays out the ways that the community seemingly votes
against their own interests, and examines why this makes sense from their point
of view. But ultimately I felt like she failed to push back against some of the
nonsense, either in person with her interviewees or later in the book’s
analysis. If you are a podcast listener, there’s an interesting discussion
about the book in the September 22, 2017 episode of Trumpcast. Search for the
title “Strangers in Their Own Land.”
June
Sisterland –
Curtis Sittenfeld. I really enjoyed this novel about the complicated
relationship between twin sisters with a mild form of ESP. It makes me think of
last year’s The Girls from Corona del Mar
which also dealt with women’s friendships over time. I see Curtis Sittenfeld
has a number of other novels I look forward to checking out.
A Short History of
Tractors in Ukrainian – Marina Lewycka. Two grown daughters deal with their
widower father and his completely inappropriate new love interest. Some of the
characters and situations were pretty over the top, but this novel had some
funny and poignant moments. I particularly liked the final scene.
The Rise and Fall of
American Growth: The U.S. Standard of Living Since the Civil War – Robert
Gordon. This was an interesting book that I used to substitute for the
economics classes I didn’t take in college. I want to know more about how our
present day economic situation fits into the bigger picture.
July
Five Came Back – A
Story of Hollywood and the Second World War – Mark Harris. A fascinating
account of arguably five of the most important and influential directors in
Hollywood and how they joined the war effort in the early 1940s. Also a great
documentary series on Netflix narrated by five contemporary movie directors. If
you love films of the 1930s, 40s, and
50s, don’t miss either the book or the movie.
Nobody’s Fool –
Richard Russo. I had been meaning to read this one for a long time (probably
since the 1995 movie) and I was not disappointed. I love Russo’s writing, and
he’s particularly funny and sharp in the story of small town life. The movie
starring Paul Newman as Sully is also terrific.
August
Life After Life –
Kate Atkinson. I’m not even sure how to describe this one. An English girl is
born on a snowy night in 1910. You follow along for a while and then the
timeline goes haywire. I don’t want to tell you anything else and spoil it.
Just go read it. I LOVED this one.
The Sympathizer –
Viet Thanh Nguyen. In the midst of the anniversaries of the Vietnam war era,
this novel was a really interesting portrait of a North Vietnamese undercover
agent who flees to the U.S. after the fall of the South Vietnamese government
where he’s been embedded. So complicated—I had to constantly remind myself who
the characters were really working for. There’s some heavy sledding there,
especially at the end.
A Wrinkle in Time
– Madeline L’Engle. I actually didn’t read this one as a kid and I think I may
have come to it too late, given how much other dystopian fantasy has come along
since. The good news is that since I’m not so attached to the book, I can look
forward to seeing the movie.
Brown Girl Dreaming
– Jacqueline Woodson. A lovely narrative of a young girl’s experience told in
verse. Very approachable poetry to share with the young people in your life.
September
Everybody’s Fool –
Richard Russo. The sequel to Nobody’s
Fool from above. A continuation of the stories of several of the
characters. As good as the first book.
My Jewish Year: 18
Holidays, One Wondering Jew – Abigail Pohgrebin. This has become a bit of a
genre—I’m calling it a Calendar book. Sometimes I like them but sometimes they
get too gimmicky. This one was ok; I liked the information about the holidays,
but the author, an incredibly well connected young woman in Manahttan, got a
little too name-droppy for my taste.
A Tree Grows in
Brooklyn – Betty Smith. I had read this many years ago from the Pulitzer
Prize list so I was happy to have it come up again as a book club choice. Such
a slice of life from just after the turn of the 20th century in
Brooklyn.
The Nightingale –
Kristin Hannah. Another story from WWII France. I didn’t think this was as good
as All the Light We Cannot See—there
were some plot points that didn’t completely make sense and the author made
some of her characters really too good to be true.
The Four Tendencies
– Gretchen Rubin. The latest from my friend Gretchen (I got to meet and talk
with her at a meet-up in LA this fall). This book goes into her personality
framework, which I find very interesting and useful. You can take the quiz at
GretchenRubin.com if you want to find out more! (Gretchen and I are both Upholders.)
The First Love Story:
Adam, Eve, and Us – Bruce Feiler. Continuing in his vein of Biblically
related non-fiction, this book looks at the ways the story from Genesis weaves
through our literature and culture. Feiler is always interesting.
Niagara Falls All Over
Again – Elizabeth McCracken. I liked this novel about a Vaudeville turned
Hollywood pair of comedy actors. I liked McCracken’s earlier novel The Giant’s House even better. Maybe
start with that one and if you like it, give this one a try.
October
Love and Trouble: A
Midlife Reckoning – Claire Dederer, read by the author. I listened to this
one on audio. She’s about my age, so there were certainly some cultural
touchpoints we shared. It was a little uneven, but worth it over all.
The Thousand Autumns
of Jacob de Zoet – David Mitchell. A novel about a Dutchman in Japan in
1799. Great story with suspense and history. It reminded me a little of Shogun by James Clavell, which I
loved with a passion when I was about 17. I suspect that this one is a lot
better, but I’m not going to reread Shogun
and instead leave my memories intact. I’d probably recommend you read this one
and leave Clavell on the shelf.
March 1917: On the
Brink of War and Revolution – Will Englund. During this one month there was
a series of consequential events that led to both the entry of the United
States into World War I and the outbreak of the Russian Revolution. I had to
keep reminding myself that all this happened over the course of a single month.
A Girl Called Zippy
– Haven Kimmel. I have been toting this book around for a very long time. I
think Haven Kimmel may have been a personality on public radio in North
Carolina when we lived there. The memoir was ok.
A Gentleman in Moscow
– Amor Towles. This seems to be another book club favorite and it’s easy to see
why. A good story, well written, though I did object a little to the very end.
But not so much that I’m not looking forward to reading his other book.
Hillbilly Elegy –
J. D. Vance. Rats, I was so disappointed in this one. Partly my fault—I was
expecting more of a sociological exploration, whereas this was more of a
memoir. But partly because I thought it felt like one of my hated genre of
Narcissistic Screw Up memoirs, though it was a variation “My murderously insane
Appalachian relatives are so CUTE!” I found some of the reminiscences
contradicted each other, I thought there was a lack of internal consistency,
and the Kentucky-holler-Appalachian-ness of his relatives seems less convincing
given that they had moved to Ohio as young teens. Also I’m just cranky about how
popular it is.
Kristin Lavransdatter:
The Wreath – Sigrid Undset. The first novel in a trilogy from Norway
written in the 1920s about a Norwegian woman in medieval times. I had never
heard of these books until someone on a podcast named them as her all-time favorite
book series. I was not disappointed. Such an interesting portrait of life in
this period. These books are so popular in Norway that people go on Kristin
Lavransdatter tours around the settings.
November
The Dolls’ House –
Rumer Godden. Oh, dear, this was a children’s novel by one of my favorite
authors recommended by my new best friend Gretchen Rubin, and they really let
me down! I’m so glad I didn’t read this book about the lives of a group of
dolls belonging to a little English girl when I was a child—one of the dolls
gets burned up in a fire! I would have been completely traumatized. But don’t
hold it against either Rumer or Gretchen. Go read my favorite Godden, The Greengage Summer, instead.
Happier at Home –
Gretchen Rubin. I let Gretchen make it up to me with one of her Calendar books
in which she tries different research-based strategies to improve happiness in
her home life, with each month focused on a particular area of life.
Department of
Speculation – Jenny Offill. A short novel about a marriage. Spare and
beautifully written.
The Sense of an Ending
– Julian Barnes. Another short novel, this time about a man remembering a love
triangle from his past and the ways these memories bleed forward into the
future. It seems that there is a movie coming out that looks really good too.
An Extraordinary Time:
The End of the Postwar Boom and the Return of the Ordinary Economy – Marc
Levinson. More econ curriculum. The U.S. experienced a huge and anomalous rate
of economic growth between the end of WWII and the 1970s. We’ve come to view
this anomaly as “normal” and we’re always talking about how to return to it,
which shapes a lot of our political discourse. Interesting examination of the
circumstances that led us here.
No One Can Pronounce
My Name – Rakesh Satyal. This novel followed the lives of several Indian
immigrants in their integration into American society. It was interesting to
see how the stories came to intersect, but overall this was just ok.
December
Kristin Lavransdatter:
The Wife – Sigrid Undset. Part 2 of the trilogy. See above.
The Burgess Boys –
Elizabeth Strout. Another just ok. Adult siblings with an misunderstood family
tragedy in their past come together over a crisis in the next generation. The
characters were all pretty unlikable and I still don’t understand why the
author went with The Burgess BOYS when
it seems to be equally about their sister. I guess The Burgess SIBLINGS just doesn’t have the same ring.
Happy reading in 2018!