My good book fortune(s)

I'm not quite sure who this lovely lady is—Dionysus, I'm guessing—but I found her standing tall within a Philadelphia street festival, utterly and peaceably alone above the crowds (she was stilts-assisted). I return to her on this rainy morning because I feel her mood. Because I have looked out upon my pile of unread books and determined my short-term future.

Having just left Cleopatra (Stacy Schiff) in her tragic, epic Alexandria, I turn toward next titles. Some of them I've read before and will be re-reading. Some are brand-new both to the world and to me. Some are written by friends or friends of friends, one by a Pulitzer Prize winner who once surprised me with a glorious response to my Chicago Tribune review of her March, some by people I doubt I'll ever meet; two were gifts. I feel decadent, to be honest, to have found this time to read. But I have it; I'm claiming it; it will be forever mine.

My au courant (can I use that term this way?) book list, then:

Sweet Dreams, DeWitt Henry
When We Danced on Water, Evan Fallenberg (a Kindle book—about dance! about Berlin! Becca recommended!)
Dreamland Social Club, Tara Altebrando
Caleb's Crossing, Geraldine Brooks
A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, Dave Eggers
The Origin of Stories, Brian Boyd
Moments of Being, Virginia Woolf
The Liars' Club, Mary Karr
Touchy Subjects, Emma Donoghue
The Blue Flower of Forgetfulness, Cyrus Samii
The Boneshaker, Kate Milford

Stay tuned for my responses.

Read more...

Memoir Fetish (welcoming these new titles to my memoir library)

My appetite for books is insatiable, always, and when I teach, buying and reading memoir is a seamless compulsion.  Every student is on her own course.  Every young writer must be guided to just the right books at the right time.  To a memoir library already teeming, I this week add the following titles:

Devotion, Dani Shapiro

Mentor: A Memoir, Tom Grimes

How to Live:  Or A Life of Montaigne in One Question and Twenty Attempts at an Answer, Sarah Bakewell (yes, this is a biography, but it is a biography of one of our most iconic early memoirists)

History of a Suicide, Jill Bialosky

The Liars' Club, Mary Karr (I need a new copy)

Moments of Being, Virginia Woolf

House of Prayer No. 2:  A Writer's Journey Home, Mark Richard

Townie:  A Memoir, Andre Dubus III

Duke of Deception:  Memories of My Father, Geoffrey Wolff (hugely ashamed that I have not read this before)

Say Her Name, Francisco Goldman (classified as a novel, much like Dave Eggers classified his own memoirish story as a novel; my reflections on this book were posted two days ago)

Read more...