Kelly Blewett

NonfictionEssays

These Precious Days

Review by Kelly Blewett

Ann Patchett’s new essay collection, These Precious Days, reinforces what many longtime fans like best about her writing: its levelheaded appraisal of what is good in the world. In one essay, she describes a photo of herself as “joyful.” She had given this photo to the Academy of Arts and Letters when she was inducted, and it brightly contrasted with the somber photographs of her colleagues. The photo was appropriate, however, since reading Patchett’s work does inspire a kind of joy—tempered by an awareness of what can be lost. When Patchett does convey fear or regret, it’s because she knows that life can change in an instant and that precious things need to be guarded. For instance, after Patchett became unexpectedly ill after a bad experience with psychedelic mushrooms, she apologized to her husband “for being careless with our lives.”

She writes in the introduction that what interests her at this stage in life is exploring the things that matter most. For Patchett, that means essays about friends and family (“Three Fathers” and “These Precious Days” are especially wonderful) and about reading (specifically, the works of Eudora Welty and Kate DiCamillo). She also pulls back the curtain on the writing life, letting readers see her daily habits (early-morning walks with the dog, restorative dinners, occasionally demanding travel), her work with publishers and her intense privacy while composing. She could write a novel, she says, without showing anyone a single page.

But when the COVID-19 pandemic threw everything into upheaval, Patchett found the work of a novel too overwhelming. Essays, though, were approachable, and she found herself returning to the form again and again. Though readers will cheer when her next novel emerges, this collection is a balm for the moment, a candle that sheds warmth and light during a dark season.

Ann Patchett's tender essay collection is a balm for the moment, a candle that sheds warmth and light during a dark season.
NonfictionMemoir

My Mess Is a Bit of a Life

Review by Kelly Blewett

Episodic, quirky, absurd: These are a few of the words that describe Emmy Award-winning comedy writer Georgia Pritchett’s memoir, My Mess Is a Bit of a Life: Adventures in Anxiety. Pritchett, best known for her work on “Succession” and “Veep,” writes in short bursts that pull the reader in with a manic sort of energy—but just as quickly push the reader away. This writing style echoes Pritchett’s anxiety, which is central to how she experiences the world.

Everyone in My Mess Is a Bit of a Life has a nickname. Pritchett’s mother is not her mother but The Witch. (She had a penchant for black hats.) Her father is The Patriarchy. Initially it’s hard to feel a close connection to the narrator because the vignettes fly by so quickly, even though they are zany and tilt-a-whirl fun. The memoir gains traction, though, as Pritchett transitions to her tentative forays into comedy writing. She describes climbing her way up and stepping around Oxford-educated men in a series of fascinating stories about the (somewhat familiar) experience of being the only female writer in the room. Pritchett’s natural reserve and distance served her well in those rooms; public criticism only made her more determined. With time, her steel began to shine through, though it was always tempered by sensitivity, kindness and a kind of off-center oddness that she treasured, protected and shared in her work.

Where I personally became fully immersed in the memoir was after Pritchett had her son, who has autism. She was told he wouldn’t speak. When she sent him to school, she sensed she was “putting him in a cupboard,” so she took him out of school and worked out a Plan B. Her poignant honesty in describing what she and her sons have experienced together, coupled with her fierceness and creativity, made me a true fan of the book, which is one that readers will not soon forget.

“Succession” writer Georgia Pritchett’s memoir is an episodic, quirky ride that readers will not soon forget.

Heartwarmers with star power

Feature by Kelly Blewett

What do Tony Bennett, Dolly Parton and the movie It’s a Wonderful Life have in common? They’re each the focus of new books that are guaranteed to inspire, advise and entertain.

Tony Bennett’s Life Is a Gift will be a hit with anyone who loves anecdotes about famous people (and, let’s admit it, that’s all of us!). From Cary Grant to Aretha Franklin to Lady Gaga, Bennett’s famous friends span the century, but readers will recognize them all, and his stories about them have the ring of someone who truly cares. Subtitled “The Zen of Bennett,” the book also offers nuggets of advice on many topics, including maintaining good relationships, insisting on a quality product and having fun. There are also a few surprises: Did you know that Bennett is an accomplished painter whose work is hanging in the Smithsonian? Did you know it was Bob Hope who coined Bennett’s stage name? This book is full of joyful appreciation for the life Bennett has lived and the audiences he’s served. His loving and happy attitude will linger in your ears like the sweet notes of his treasured music.

Dolly Parton keeps Dream More short and sweet—and very funny. There are four core pieces of advice the “Dolly Mama” (as she sometimes calls herself) offers: dream more, learn from everything, care for everyone and be more. These principles also guide the Imagination Library, an organization she founded that provides free books to children, first in the Smoky Mountains and now across the country. This book makes you want to cheer for Parton. For instance, she doesn’t just give books away to lower-income kids, but rather to any child in a participating community who signs up. She knows from experience that charity only directed to the poor can make the receiver feel “less than.” Parton dedicated this book to her father, who, as she puts it, “never learned to read and write, paid a dear price for that, and inspired me not to let it happen to others.”

Speaking of everyday heroes, Bob Welch’s new book celebrates one of America’s favorites, George Bailey, whose life forever changes his hometown of Bedford Falls in It’s a Wonderful Life. From this classic Christmas film, Welch pulled 52 Little Lessons from It’s a Wonderful Life. Be prepared to find morals in moments you might not even remember, like the transformation of George’s mother-in-law. These lessons are cut from the same life-affirming cloth as the film itself, and stitched lovingly together by an author who is clearly an affectionate fan.

What do Tony Bennett, Dolly Parton and the movie It’s a Wonderful Life have in common? They’re each the focus of new books that are guaranteed to inspire, advise and entertain.

Tony Bennett’s Life Is a Gift will be a hit with anyone who loves anecdotes…

Religion & Spirituality

Spiritual reading material

Feature by Kelly Blewett

Whether interested in religious history or prayer, heaven or the Holy Land, readers will find in these four books a wealth of information and personal stories to enrich their own spiritual journeys.

Help, Thanks, Wow: The Three Essential Prayers is a book for just about anyone who has felt compelled, at one point or another, to raise her eyes to the heavens and murmur some words to a Higher Power. Never one to get caught up in religious specifics, Anne Lamott offers a variety of hilarious titles by which her friends have referred to God, such as “Howard,” “Mother” and “H.P.” She celebrates the divine, and poetically explains why we frail humans are in such desperate need of it. Of the three essential prayers, help seems to be the one closest to Lamott’s heart. Fans of her previous books such as Bird by Bird will again enjoy candid conversation from a writer who feels like a friend.

While Lamott’s book may be characterized as a book about faith for doubters, Heaven Changes Everything by Todd and Sonja Burpo is a book about faith for believers—and a follow-up to the best-selling Heaven Is for Real, which related the story of their four-year-old son’s visit to heaven. Here the Burpos share more about Colton’s miraculous experience and what it’s been like for their family since making it public. Organized into 40 short, devotional-style readings that open with a quote from Colton and close with an action point, it is sure to please readers eager for the next chapter in the Burpos’ story.

In What Would Jesus Read?, Joe Amaral takes readers through the Scripture in the way Jesus might have read it: in short portions that combine a selection from the Torah (the first five books of the Christian Bible) and the prophets (a number of Old Testament books). Each week, Amaral assigns a portion of the Bible and offers daily insights on the reading. These insights are very brief, conversational and theologically non-denominational. As a Christian who lives in Israel and guides tour groups through the Holy Land, Amaral is in a unique position to help American readers understand the perspective of the Middle East and the traditions of the ancient Jewish world.

For readers interested in learning more about the world of Jesus, In the Footsteps of Jesus is another good place to begin. Published by National Geographic, this full-color and visually impressive book offers a more scholarly perspective on the world Jesus walked through and how we experience it today. The scope of the book—which combines political history, anthropological context, biography and an exploration of the contemporary Holy Land—is truly ambitious. Illustrations include photographs of artifacts, paintings, pull-out quotations and richly detailed maps. This worthy book could be read alongside the Gospels or could stand alone as a historical work.

Whether interested in religious history or prayer, heaven or the Holy Land, readers will find in these four books a wealth of information and personal stories to enrich their own spiritual journeys.

Help, Thanks, Wow: The Three Essential Prayers is a book for just about anyone…

NonfictionReligion & SpiritualityMemoir

Transformative accounts of faith and redemption

Feature by Kelly Blewett

For five writers from varied points on the Christian spectrum, God transforms dramatic circumstances into spiritual gain. From moving across the country to facing death itself, these authors amply illustrate that resurrection stories—far from being a thing of the past—are happening all around us.

LIFE-CHANGING SURGERY

For Steve Sjogren, author of Heaven’s Lessons: Ten Things I Learned About God When I Died, a near-death experience in 2000 led to an unexpected destination in his faith. Sjogren’s story is a humbling one. While pastoring a megachurch in Cincinnati, he went in for a standard hospital surgery that went horribly wrong. On the operating table, God told him that from now on he would “walk with a limp.” Following the surgery, Sjogren lost his position at the church, faced severely diminished health and was forced to re-examine some of the fundamental things he believed about God. He’s divided this book into 10 resulting lessons. “Though my experience with God in my near death experience was life changing, what followed it was depressing to me,” he writes. “If there is an option for a fast route, it seems I still always end up being placed on the l-o-n-g way forward.” This book offers readers the opportunity to benefit from Sjogren’s journey and to see how God turned a tragedy into a transformation. Sjogren, ever the pastor, is quick to provide applications of the book’s lessons to the reader’s life.

A PARENT’S STRUGGLE

In Beautiful Nate, Dennis Mansfield explores how his son’s drug addiction forced him to confront unwelcome truths about evangelicalism. Even though Mansfield tried to raise his son “by the book,” relying on experts like James Dobson, his boy still repeatedly rebelled and ultimately—in his 20s—died after an adverse drug reaction. Mansfield, a former Focus on the Family employee and lobbyist, loves Reagan, rhetoric and his family. His passions come through clearly, as does his pain. As Nate faced prison and life beyond, his father describes a softer side of their relationship: impromptu visits, staying up all night to watch movies and (most movingly) writing a novel the pair jointly penned during Nate’s incarceration. To his father, Nate was a follower of Jesus Christ forever torn by competing desires. While Beautiful Nate is certainly a sad story, Mansfield is consistently grateful for his son and the lessons learned about faith, parenting and life. He writes, “My hope is that you found [this] to be a poignant account of the realization that . . . things often turn out very wrong—and yet can turn out eternally right.” This is a good book for parents of faith who want to heal imperfect circumstances through the mercy of a perfect God.

NEW DIRECTIONS

In Landmarks: Turning Points on Your Journey Toward God, author Bill Delvaux describes a series of unexplainable choices that yielded satisfying results. He left a ministry position for teaching, and left his teaching position to write and speak about faith. A thoughtful writer, Delvaux was asked by a colleague to explain how his spiritual journey developed through these counterintuitive decisions. Delvaux responds that though he never knew he was going in the right direction, his Heavenly Father provided certain “landmarks” along the way. For frequent readers of evangelical nonfiction, the landmarks may seem unsurprising—giving up idols, addressing old wounds, seeking sexual purity. Yet Delvaux’s way of addressing these topics gives this slim book both gravity and purpose. When discussing idols, for instance, Delvaux shares his own former insistence that the details of his life be in order, right down to his junk mail. He realized that grasping toward perfection was ultimately idolatrous. As he reveals his own story, readers are gently guided to consider their own. A movie fan, Delvaux situates many of his lessons within the context of popular films. A small book that leaves a big impression, Landmarks tells how one man was transformed by embracing the principles he’d been teaching his whole life.

HEALING JOURNEY

For spiritual seeker and standout writer Beverly Donofrio (author of the memoir Riding in Cars With Boys) the pursuit of faith led to life in a small Mexican town replete with margaritas at sunset, yoga and plenty of time for writing. Yet Donofrio, a Catholic, felt herself drifting from God. Committed to rededicating herself, she planned an ambitious tour of monasteries around the country. Then a man broke into her apartment and raped her at knifepoint. In her new book, Astonished: A Story of Evil, Blessings, Grace, and Solace, Donofrio ponders the significance of the timing. What does the rape reveal about God? How do trials figure into God’s plan for our lives? What does it mean to heal and grow? Donofrio spends much of the next year completing her monastery tour and offering tentative answers to these questions and more. A nontraditional thinker who accepts parts of the “Jesus myth” and rejects other parts, Donofrio’s journey around the country and into her inner life is compelling material beautifully written. Perpetually humble, searching, honest and wry, Donofrio is a fine companion for a spiritual journey.

THINGS UNSEEN

Jack Perkins, best known as a longtime reporter for NBC News, left a successful journalism career to move to a remote island in Maine. In Finding Moosewood, Finding God, Perkins traces the spiritual lessons he learned, recounts favorite stories from his journalism days and offers a wholly appealing personal glimpse into his family life. In the wilds of Maine—reading the journals of Thoreau and following his spiritual impulses—Perkins’ personal journey with God truly begins. By rejecting the consumerist culture of Los Angeles, Perkins and his wife Mary Jo find what seems to be an incomparable happiness in island living and creative pursuits. Both read voraciously and explore their new home with enthusiasm. By embracing the blessings of God—in a sunset, in the view of the water at night, in spotting a passing lobster boat—the couple begins to appreciate His divine character. This fresh and invigorating story will help the reader appreciate her own life and, better yet, feel that anything is possible.

While these books vary in points of view, trials faced and solutions suggested, they share a common belief that God is in the midst of our circumstances. This divine God who resurrects new life from death is, they agree, more real than the world before our eyes. As Perkins writes in one of his poems: “Henceforth this is my plan: / Believe much more in what I can’t see, / Much less in what I can.”

For five writers from varied points on the Christian spectrum, God transforms dramatic circumstances into spiritual gain. From moving across the country to facing death itself, these authors amply illustrate that resurrection stories—far from being a thing of the past—are happening all around us.

LIFE-CHANGING SURGERY

For…

Religion & Spirituality

Companions for spiritual journeys

Feature by Kelly Blewett

Whether written by an iconic Southern author in 1947 or compiled from emails written by a young pastor to the president in 2010, these gift books explore the enduring themes of spirituality and faith, reminding us that contemplating the divine can confirm our very humanity.

Spiritual thinking has been with us from the beginning, as The Religions Book: Big Ideas Simply Explained reminds readers in its opening sentences. While it may be difficult to come up with a definition for the concept of religion, “cave paintings and elaborate burial customs of our distant ancestors and the continuing quest for a spiritual goal in life” indicate its timelessness. This book offers a remarkable overview of major world religions through recorded time. Though the introduction acknowledges the difficulty of covering such an unwieldy topic, the subsequent pages are easily comprehensible, and even feel nearly comprehensive. Organized chronologically, the book opens with prehistory, moves through the ancient and classical beliefs (devoting the longest sections to Hinduism, Buddhism, Judaism, Christianity and Islam), and closes with a selection of modern religions (such as Mormonism and Scientology). The material is both dense and broad, yet the book’s reader-friendly layout and clever graphics invite lingering. An impressive board of contributors (mostly academics) shaped this content. The result is a book at once egalitarian and open-minded, ideal for a visually oriented student of religion or anyone interested in scrambling up the mountainside of human spirituality and taking in the panoramic views.

GRACE AND ART

We move from the lushly panoramic to the intensely personal with Flannery O’Connor’s A Prayer Journal. Penned by the Southern Gothic legend when she was just 22 years old and a student at the University of Iowa, these pages reveal O’Connor at the very beginning of her professional writing career. She prays to get something published, to understand God better and to be free of an ever-present concern that she is simply mediocre. Anyone interested in creative writing or literature will be thoroughly charmed by lines like this: “I am too lazy to despair. Please don’t visit me with it Lord, I would be so miserable.” Though O’Connor is delightfully glib, she worries about some of the big questions of faith and finds few answers. The journal illustrates her complexity of feeling. She criticizes certain sentences because they sound “too literary” and strikes out others altogether. A facsimile of the original diary in O’Connor’s own hand lets readers in on her process and makes the book feel very intimate. The volume is quite short, but that isn’t a drawback. The material that is here is well worth reading. I especially loved the last lines, written in September of 1947: “Today I have proved myself a glutton—for Scotch oatmeal cookies and erotic thought. There is nothing left to say of me.”

AN ECLECTIC REIMAGINING

During a 2011 retreat in Utah, a group of Jewish artists and writers found themselves hotly discussing Abraham’s binding of Isaac. Several admitted, though, that it had been a long time since they had really read a biblical text. Dialogue ensued and, luckily for us, so did Unscrolled: 54 Writers and Artists Wrestle with the Torah, edited by Roger Bennett. After the Torah was divided into 54 sections—which reflects the annual reading pattern of many synagogues—each contributor created his or her own Dvar Torah (“word of the Torah”) for an individual slice. Their creations range from short stories to poems, from personal essays to imaginary recipes for “bloody guilt offerings.” There’s even a drawing detailing how the Tabernacle could fit in modern-day Manhattan. (Spoiler alert: It would have to be tilted on its side.) I especially like when contributors cleverly juxtapose the Torah and their response, as in Aimee Bender’s piece on the Tower of Babel. She celebrates how language defines individuality rather than lamenting the loss of shared consciousness. Brief biblical summaries preceding each Dvar Torah feel contemporary and edgy, and unify the collection. In short, these artists and writers can certainly now say that they’ve read—yes, even wrestled—with a biblical text recently, and readers can be counted among the lucky beneficiaries.

DAILY DOSE OF INSPIRATION

The President’s Devotional began as correspondence between a White House staffer and President Obama, and has since become a public daily devotional. Obama appointed author Joshua DuBois to be the executive director of the White House Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnership in 2008. Since then, DuBois has emailed Obama a spiritual reflection every morning. The book pulls content from the best of these, providing readers one for every day of the year. DuBois opens each month with a personal essay. Some of these tell heartrending stories about our nation’s leader, as in DuBois’ account of Obama’s interaction with families of the victims of the Sandy Hook shootings. Other essays are more personal, as when the president encouraged DuBois to propose to the nice girl he’d been dating (he did). The devotions themselves are a diverse bunch. Some feature national heroes like Jackie Robinson and Johnny Cash, while others take inspiration from theological texts. The reader cannot help but wonder what was going on in the nation when certain devotions were emailed—like the one that extols the value of having a well-prepared army. Whatever the initial context, faith-filled fans of the president will want to add The President’s Devotional to their nightstands.

Whether written by an iconic Southern author in 1947 or compiled from emails written by a young pastor to the president in 2010, these gift books explore the enduring themes of spirituality and faith, reminding us that contemplating the divine can confirm our very humanity.

Spiritual…

NonfictionFictionMemoir

Paris is a woman’s town

Feature by Kelly Blewett

There is something irresistible about a talented American woman in Paris. She feels sexy and alive while strolling the city’s streets, confident the world will unfurl in her hand like a blossoming flower. 

Such young women are featured in new books by Kate Betts and Christine Sneed, and both tell wonderful stories—one true, one fictional—about taking risks and pursuing dreams abroad.

Betts’ memoir, My Paris Dream, recalls her years in the city of light after graduating from Princeton in the 1980s. Her Paris was a ladder whose climb began with freelance writing assignments for travel magazines and culminated with a position as a fashion editor and associate bureau chief of Women’s Wear Daily. Betts, who later became the editor of Vogue and Harper’s Bazaar, is an instantly likable storyteller. She takes you to the Parisian boulevards and describes in terrific detail what people were wearing. Perhaps occasionally too much detail. “Only the French could invent seamless stockings that stay up with a rubber sticky band that grips the upper thigh,” she writes. As a young woman looking to make a good impression, she bought several pairs. “Fashion is tribal,” she explains. “It’s not about who you are but where you belong.” This is a story of how one American woman came to belong in the fashion capital of Europe, and how she wrote about that world for an American audience. Along the way, Betts made some terrific friends, fell in love and witnessed the world of style up close during a time of major transition. Full of slangy French, delectable food and swoon-worthy fashion, Betts’ memoir is well worth the read.

If Betts’ Paris is a ladder, then Sneed’s is an escape hatch. Jayne Marks, the protagonist of Sneed’s novel, Paris, He Said, is an aspiring artist in New York who can’t find time to paint. Then she meets gallery owner Laurent Moller. Decades older and maybe a little too suave, Laurent sweeps Jayne away to Paris to be his girlfriend and to live in his luxurious apartment. In her new life, Jayne has hours each day to paint, cook and work in Laurent’s French gallery, which is located on the same street as the Louvre. “I am closer to my twenty-year-old self here,” she thinks, “closer than I am at home.” Yet she finds it hard to settle into such a decadent existence. Can she maneuver the complexities of Laurent’s social world? Will her paintings ultimately be any good? Is Laurent being totally faithful to her? And why can’t she stop thinking about her ex-boyfriend in New York? Sneed, whose previous novel, Little Known Facts, drew considerable acclaim, expertly keeps the pages turning in this delightful novel. Paris, He Said offers readers, too, an entertaining escape from the mundanities of daily life. With clever and graceful prose, Sneed deftly guides a story that explores whether satisfaction follows when all one’s deepest wishes come true.

 

This article was originally published in the May 2015 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

There is something irresistible about a talented American woman in Paris. She feels sexy and alive while strolling the city’s streets, confident the world will unfurl in her hand like a blossoming flower.
Fiction

A first novel that truly sings

Review by Kelly Blewett

Sensual isolation: two words that come to mind when considering The Metropolis Case, the debut novel by Matthew Gallaway. In Gallaway’s world, characters burn with intensity. Their fiery glow makes them somehow terrifically alive but also, it seems, inevitably alone. Structured in a series of “acts,” this ambitious novel weaves together four stories, each occurring in a different time and place. The characters have at least one thing in common: All become nearly obsessed with the opera Tristan and Isolde.

Our cast is comprised of a mature opera singer about to deliver the best performance of her life, a dissatisfied lawyer who watches the Twin Towers crumble from his office window, a teenage soprano who desperately wants to escape Pittsburgh and a dapper 19th-century Parisian who will play the first-ever Tristan. Gallaway writes about the opera with such finesse that one can nearly hear the music—or at least long to purchase the soundtrack.

Even for a reader unacquainted with opera, The Metropolis Case enthralls. Theatrical history, training at Julliard, opening night at the Metropolitan—this is engaging and unusual subject matter. Gallaway draws unlikely but totally plausible connections between music from The Velvet Underground and Tristan and Isolde. Behind the lovely set, dark passions drive most of the characters. The women remain emotionally detached for much of the novel, maintaining distance in order to focus on their operatic careers. Meanwhile, the men pursue love affairs with other men, and seek to come to terms with their homosexuality in the context of two very different societies. The opera seems to offer a point of connection by which the characters might find themselves and each other.

Occasionally The Metropolis Case starts to feel heavy-handed, particularly toward the end, as the reader begins to glimpse how all the storylines may resolve (the characters themselves note this, and call it “fate”). Additionally, certain scenes seem like failed attempts at high drama. Despite these flaws, however, the tale has a masterful quality that satisfies. The Metropolis Caseis an intriguing debut from a fresh, unique voice.

Sensual isolation: two words that come to mind when considering The Metropolis Case, the debut novel by Matthew Gallaway. In Gallaway’s world, characters burn with intensity. Their fiery glow makes them somehow terrifically alive but also, it seems, inevitably alone. Structured in a series of…

NonfictionMemoir

Smile

Review by Kelly Blewett

“In fairy tale logic, you must trade something for something you desire,” writes Sarah Ruhl. “By this logic, I traded my face for my children. And it was a fair trade.” This is just one of the many arresting sentences in Ruhl’s new memoir, Smile: The Story of a Face, which details Ruhl’s pregnancy and subsequent experience of facial paralysis, a condition that set in immediately after delivery. The memoir moves from the intimately personal to the nearly universal: motherhood and medicine, soul and body, and the poetic logic that underlies everyday life. A playwright with an incredible eye for detail and a searing voice, Ruhl excels at putting striking ideas into simple forms that vibrate with power and energy.

Sarah Ruhl recalls passing her time on bed rest by reading the Twilight series. “We can’t predict how our minds will behave in extremis or when we are ill.”

Though Ruhl spent years avoiding her face in daily life, on the page she stares at it without flinching. She recalls refraining from looking at her reflection and how she came to rely on gestures and murmuring to communicate what her mouth and eyes could not—excitement, welcome, affirmation, connection. Behind this performance, or maybe because of it, Ruhl began to disassociate from her face, which no longer expressed her essential self. As a playwright, Ruhl works with actors, whose faces are the tools of their trade and who believe that bodily expression and the inner life are intertwined. Reflecting on these relationships, Ruhl wonders whether appearing more aloof and disengaged has, in fact, made her so. 

Meanwhile, life carried on. Ruhl wrote plays and essays, tried acupuncture and meditation and attempted to raise three children under five while remaining herself. Her memoir is wildly funny about the day-to-day realities of mothering. “My children’s temperaments can be summed up in the way that they vomit,” begins one memorable anecdote. In all, this is a beautiful book that expresses the big feelings of life and the daily practices that allow for incremental progress.

A playwright with a searing voice, Sarah Ruhl excels at putting striking ideas into simple forms that vibrate with power and energy.
NonfictionMemoir

Beautiful Country

Review by Kelly Blewett

From ages 7 to 12, Qian Julie Wang lived as an undocumented immigrant in Brooklyn, New York. Her hunger was regularly so intense that she broke into cold sweats—which, according to her Ma Ma, meant Wang was growing and getting stronger. One classmate referred to Wang’s family not as “low-income” but “no-income.” Her world was simultaneously frightening and normal as she sat listening to scuttling cockroaches with her parents nearby. She describes childhood trenchantly in Beautiful Country, allowing readers to feel her anger, longing, loneliness and fear—and to observe her parents’ desperation.

In Beijing, Wang’s mother was a published professor who spoke Mandarin, the language of intellectuals. But in Brooklyn, her mother lamented, “All these Cantonese assume that if you speak Mandarin you’re a farmer from Fuzhou.” Wang’s mother got a job sewing in a sweatshop, where “there was no day or night; there was only work.”

Wang’s parents regarded her as their best hope for a future, optimistic that she would be suited to this Mei Guo, “beautiful country.” They were right to believe in her. By fourth grade, Wang wrote so well that her teachers suspected plagiarism, and now Wang has written a memoir precise enough to chill her readers. The narrative is full of sharply rendered scenes, such as one in which Wang’s mother suffers in a cold sushi factory before coming home to warm herself in front of a pot of boiling water.

Wang dedicates her memoir to “those who remain in the shadows.” Indeed, Beautiful Country shines light on the childhood that continued to haunt Wang into adulthood, even as her professional accomplishments mounted. She is vulnerable in revealing her uniquely American trauma: a bruised wrist that never quite healed; a hunger that was never quite sated; a feeling that everything, at any moment, could suddenly be taken away. Wang, who is now a civil rights lawyer, is a voice we need. Readers will be grateful for the courage she has displayed in persevering and speaking up.

Qian Julie Wang courageously reveals her uniquely American trauma: a hunger that was never quite sated; a feeling that everything could be taken away.
NonfictionMemoir

The Arbornaut

Review by Kelly Blewett

Meg Lowman, known as “Canopy Meg,” has a big public presence, and her latest memoir demonstrates why: She excels at bringing the natural world to life in language. The Arbornaut: A Life Discovering the Eighth Continent in the Trees Above Us takes readers around the world, from the forests of New England to the hills of Scotland, from the jungles of Australia to the riverbanks of the Amazon. It also tells the story of a passionate young naturalist whose childhood collections of wildflowers and bird eggs were supplanted by mosses during adolescence until, during college, she discovered the enduring love of her life: trees. Specifically, the tops of trees, which have been historically understudied even though they compose a vibrant ecosystem that Lowman refers to as the “eighth continent” of the world.

Lowman’s driving curiosity finds a productive outlet in the scientific process, which she ably describes for lay readers. Her research is full of life, energy, intelligence and determination. It’s impossible to read about it without wanting to examine the natural world more closely! While reading The Arbornaut, I found myself staring out of my second-story windows, trying to discern whether the leaves of the “upper canopy” of my Midwestern trees differed from those visible at ground level. This is exactly the kind of response Lowman hopes for. She is dedicated to getting everyday folks into the canopies, which she argues can advance scientific discovery (more eyes collecting more data) and benefit the planet (more people dedicated to ecological preservation).

Across multiple projects, Lowman’s reputation has grown within and beyond her discipline, and in this memoir, she also attends to the impact of gender on her professional experience. After detailing multiple instances of unwanted attention, ranging from innuendos to attempted assault, Lowman describes herself as a “tall poppy,” a flower that others try to cut down because it stands out. And yet, she persists, leading expeditions to the Amazon, collaborating with scientists and citizens alike and sharing her results in both technical journals and delightful memoirs. She deserves her celebrity.

The Arbornaut is a book to reach for if you, like Lowman, love the natural world and want to live in it fully.

Meg Lowman’s research is full of life, energy and determination. It’s impossible to read about it without wanting to examine the natural world more closely.
NonfictionMemoirLGBTQ+

The Natural Mother of the Child

Review by Kelly Blewett

When Krys Malcolm Belc sees pregnant women, he turns the other way. He doesn’t want to hear pregnancy stories and finds it difficult to share his own. But in The Natural Mother of the Child: A Memoir of Nonbinary Parenthood, the transmasculine author doesn’t turn away from his story. Instead, he lays it out page by page, with pictures and legal documents juxtaposing his poetic prose.

Belc’s process of becoming himself—the growing realization that he identified as male, the move toward a nonbinary and eventually masculine presentation, the decision to start taking hormones—happened alongside the rest of his life, as he married his partner, as she bore children and as Belc decided to carry a child as well, only a few months after his wife gave birth. 

The result is a family that looks one way now—a father, a mother and three boys—but looked another way several years ago. This is the story of how that family came to be, and of the erasures (often painful) that happened along the way, including the legal erasure of the friend who donated sperm for all three pregnancies. There’s also the erasure of the body Belc had, which he generously laid out to birth his son Samson. “He has permanently altered my composition,” Belc writes.

But in the midst of these erasures, something new emerged: an identity and presentation that was always there but in shadow, just beyond view. Bearing Samson clarified the man Belc wanted to be.

The Natural Mother of the Child refuses easy stories or pat answers. Instead, Belc tells a counterstory that resists hegemonic narratives and pushes toward something messier and truer. Belc’s devotion to his son—and especially his bodily devotion—comes through powerfully, a clear signal. By comparison, some of the other signs that supposedly tell us who we are—birth certificates, marriage certificates, adoption certificates—seem desperately incomplete.

Krys Malcolm Belc’s growing realization that he identified as male happened as his wife bore children and as Belc decided to carry a child as well.
NonfictionEssays

Goodbye, Again

Review by Kelly Blewett

What does it mean to find work that you love? To make a home in one city only to move somewhere else for a job? To be friends—real friends—in adulthood? Jonny Sun approaches these questions in his new book, Goodbye, Again. Composed of dozens of short essays and illustrations, Sun’s captivating and immersive book invites readers to listen in as he thinks aloud on the page. 

This book is at once sad and hopeful. It’s sad about the cultural pressure to be constantly working. It’s sad about the inevitability of change. It’s sad about the many ways we say goodbye to each other, whether ending a visit or moving away. But it’s also attentive to life and movement in unlikely places. For example, Sun contemplates house plants—their small leaves, tilting to water and warmth. They need the right kind of care for life to take root, and even when a plant seems to die, it can in fact be growing in a different direction.

Through descriptions like these, the reader feels Sun’s desire for renewal. The book is hopeful as it shows how little moments from the past, something as simple as cooking an egg, can reverberate in the present. In this way, we never really say goodbye. We are still together, still remembering each other in small daily ways.

To spend time with this book is to spend time in the private world of a creative, sensitive person who finds life inviting, beautiful and rich, but also overwhelming, scary and exhausting. Goodbye, Again acknowledges the crushing constancy and anxiety of work, but it also celebrates the joy of creating something where nothing was before—the pleasure of being totally immersed in work and the way that work can make us come alive. By acknowledging both sides of this reality in gentle and specific ways, Sun ultimately gives his readers license to experience their own contradictions and to be fully human.

To spend time with Goodbye, Again is to spend time in the private world of a creative, sensitive person who finds life inviting, beautiful and rich.

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