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NonfictionParentingMemoir

Parenting: There is no handbook, but these come close

Feature by Amy Scribner

Let’s be real: Parenting fails happen, and meltdowns and mistakes are par for the course. This set of parenting books offers fresh solutions and insights into what makes your kids tick—and how to handle the most trying of situations.

We’ll start with the good news: Children are supposed to misbehave sometimes! And you’re supposed to let them! In The Good News About Bad Behavior, journalist and mom Katherine Reynolds Lewis dives into neuroscience research and interviews with dozens of families. She concludes that “[w]hen adults crack down on bad behavior they undermine the development of the very traits that children need to become self-disciplined and productive members of society.”

That’s not to say that Lewis advocates letting children run wild in the streets. But she argues that by undermining children’s ability to learn to regulate their own behavior, we are raising a generation of kids in chaos. We are so disengaged (how many times a day do you mindlessly pick up your phone?) and so tightly scheduled that we are forgetting to let children learn to control their own choices and make mistakes. Find ways to engage with your children, set firm limits and routines, and watch your children thrive as their perfectly imperfect selves.

PARENTING IN FEAR
It was an impulsive decision that would haunt her: Kim Brooks ran into a store to pick up one item, leaving her 4-year-old son Felix happily playing in the car. In the few minutes she was gone, a bystander filmed her unaccompanied son and called the police.

Small Animals is Brooks’ recollection of the months that followed when she was unsure what the consequences would be for her and her family. But Small Animals is more than a memoir: It is a call to action for all of us to quit the judgmental parenting Olympics.

Brooks talks to Lenore Skenazy, who rose to infamy in 2008 when she wrote a piece about letting her 9-year-old son take the New York subway by himself. Skenazy founded the “free-range kids” movement and fights against the belief that our kids are in constant danger. A certain amount of freedom is important to growing independent children, Brooks argues, but we are so mired in fear of failing—of kidnapping, of injury, of not raising the next president of the United States—that it’s hard to let go.

EMBRACING THE OFFBEAT
Many parents worry about their child not fitting in and being different from the pack. In Differently Wired, Deborah Reber tries to shift the paradigm of how we think about kids with neurodifferences such as ADHD and autism.

Reber and her husband found themselves at a loss when their son, Asher, was diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder, ADHD and disruptive behavioral disorder. He bounced from one elementary school to another because teachers didn’t know how to handle him. Reber finally chose to home-school, but it took several painful years of trial and error to get to that point.

“When we first realize something different is going on with our child, most if not all of us feel overwhelmed with one big question: What now?” Reber writes. “Many of us are relying on word-of-mouth referrals and hours-long Internet searches for things we don’t even have the language for. We’re pioneers without a map, let alone a destination. And this lack of clarity about how to move forward adds an incredibly stressful layer to our already tapped-out lives.”

With empathy and been-there-done-that confidence, Reber outlines 18 concrete and achievable changes (what she calls “tilts”) to transform the way you approach parenting. From letting go of what others think to practicing relentless self-care and identifying your child’s stress triggers, Reber offers rock-solid steps that will shift your family dynamic.

PLAY TIME
The Design of Childhood is a fascinating look at how our surroundings shape our childhoods, both today and in the past. Architecture historian Alexandra Lange traces how changing views on raising children has impacted the way we build schools and playgrounds, the toys we buy and the cities we build.

“Our built environment is making kids less healthy, less independent and less imaginative,” she writes. “What those hungry brains require is freedom.”

Consider the block. The universal, simple children’s toy has been reimagined endless times over the years: Think Legos, Duplo, Minecraft. “To understand what children can do,” Lange writes, “you need to give them tools and experiences that are open-ended, fungible: worlds of their own making.” Lange applies the same logic to other elements of a child’s life: Playgrounds should offer challenges and options. Planned communities should include communal spaces, access to mass transit and short commutes that support family time. This is a fascinating look at the world from a pint-size perspective.

THE RIGHT WORDS
When I picked up Now Say This by Heather Turgeon and Julie Wright, the subtitle seemed a little lofty: “The Right Words to Solve Every Parenting Dilemma.” Really? This book will tell me the right thing to say to a petulant toddler or a tired fifth-grader? As it turns out, though, these women really know their stuff, and they offer priceless tools to work with your child without losing your mind.

Turgeon, a psychotherapist, and Wright, an early childhood expert, base their advice on this simple but effective model: prepare, attune, limit set, problem solve. For example, you need to leave the park, but your toddler is not on board. You prepare (let the child know these are the last few swings), attune (acknowledge the child doesn’t want to go because he’s having so much fun), limit set (explain it’s time to go because dinner is ready) and problem solve (offer to carry him or let him walk). This approach requires patience and practice, but then, isn’t that what parenting is all about?

 

This article was originally published in the August 2018 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

Let’s be real: Parenting fails happen, and meltdowns and mistakes are par for the course. This set of parenting books offers fresh solutions and insights into what makes your kids tick—and how to handle the most trying of situations.

NonfictionMemoir

Let them entertain you

Feature by Linda M. Castellitto

Our society may adore celebrities, but we can’t know what really goes on in their hearts and minds unless they choose to tell us. These standout new entries in the crowded celebrity-memoir field are fascinating chronicles of lives spent answering Hollywood’s siren call.

Ellie Kemper’s biographical essay collection My Squirrel Days traces her path from suburban St. Louis, Missouri, to the titular lead in the acclaimed TV show “Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt.” Kemper loved performing from an early age, whether she was writing dramatic pieces for a beloved second-grade teacher or creating elaborate, often grueling, holiday shows with her siblings. “These shows took years off my life,” she writes. Kemper jokes about her neuroses and obsessions, but she doesn’t apologize—after all, her relentless perfectionism served her well when she used that drive to create a one-woman show that caught the eye of “Saturday Night Live.” She didn’t get the gig, but she did get a call from the creator of “The Office,” and her career blossomed from there. Kemper is open about her missteps, too, whether embarking on an unfortunate attempt at method acting (“Squirrel”) or falling on historian Doris Kearns Goodwin. My Squirrel Days takes readers up to the present, in which Kemper is a wife, new mom, show-lead and SoulCycle devotee. It’s a great read for comedy fans, thanks to a deft balance of life lessons and madcap goings-on, and it’s proof that hard work and optimism really can pay off.

AN EXAMINED LIFE
With roles like Gidget, Sybil, the Flying Nun and myriad others under her belt, Sally Field has been a household name since the 1960s, yet for the most part, she has lived a private life. But in her affecting and compelling memoir, In Pieces, Field shares with fans the truths, many of them painful, of her life. The book is framed by her relationship with her late mother, Margaret. “I wait for my mother to haunt me as she promised she would,” she writes. “This isn’t new, this longing I have for her.” In fact, she felt distant from her mother her whole life, the consequence of a painful secret Field held onto for decades. Field writes movingly about the loneliness she felt even while surrounded by family and colleagues. In Pieces also includes plenty of period details about how studios were run, auditions conducted and money paid (not to mention the perils of typecasting and endemic sexism). Readers will feel nervous—and then triumphant—right along with her. By book’s end, Field answers important questions for herself, gaining clarity from how the pieces fit together.

FEMINIST, FUNNY, FABULOUS
In her second essay collection, Everything’s Trash, But It’s Okay, fans will be happy to see that Phoebe Robinson is, to borrow an Oprah catchphrase, living her best life. She’s been in a movie (Netflix’s Ibiza), launched another podcast (WNYC’s “Sooo Many White Guys”), turned her “2 Dope Queens” podcast with Jessica Williams into HBO specials and hung out with the likes of Julia Roberts and Bono. That last one’s especially notable, because Robinson’s been carrying a torch for him (as devotedly noted in her first book, You Can’t Touch My Hair) for some time. Once they met, he was charmed, and now they’re doing charity projects together. Speaking of social activism, Robinson offers incisive and insightful cultural criticism in essays like, “Feminism, I Was Rooting for You,” which explains her frustration with today’s feminism (which, she notes, is mainly about “protecting the institution of white feminism”) and makes an unassailable case for allyship and inclusion. Whether sharing tales of misadventure or dating tips, Robinson is a top-notch storyteller who takes readers on a funny, memorable ride.

DEEP IS THEIR LOVE
Megan Mullally and Nick Offerman have been an adored celebrity couple for many years. With humor and delightful vulgarity, the two let readers eavesdrop on their conversations in The Greatest Love Story Ever Told: An Oral History. Although the book is composed mostly of transcripts, essays by Offerman and Mullally add variety, and there are photos, too, including cute baby pictures and stylish shots of the duo in various costumes. They dish on how they met and reflect on 18 years together through the lens of family, religion, music, art and the vagaries of fame, offering an earnest, insightful window into their relationship, past and present (though readers who don’t like transcripts may prefer an audio version). As a way to turn off work and reconnect, Mullally and Offerman recommend doing jigsaws together, and the book ends with a collection of triumphant photos of completed puzzles. From the looks of it, their beloved dogs get a kick out of it, too.

FAR FROM IDLE
In Always Look on the Bright Side of Life: A Sortabiography, writer/comedian/musician Eric Idle offers fans an excellent way to gear up for Monty Python’s 50th anniversary in 2019 via immersion in his own life story, along with his take on the members and memories of the comedy troupe. Idle starts at the beginning: “By coincidence, I was born on my birthday.” Specifically, in 1943 England. When he was a child, Idle’s widowed mother put him in an austere charitable boarding school for boys, where he lived until age 19. Despite the grimness of the place, Idle found comedy in dark moments. “Humor is a good defense against bullying,” after all, and “unhappiness is never forever.” That attitude—and his unflagging drive to create—has stayed with him (he’s 75 now) and informed his work in all its guises, and he’s certainly found lots to be happy about. He shares stories about fellow famous folk like George Harrison, Robin Williams, the Rolling Stones and the cast of Star Wars (all sometimes at the same parties). There are lots of concrete lessons for aspiring creators, too. It’s a fascinating, warmly told, often zany memoir of a life fully lived so far—with more fun sure to come.

 

This article was originally published in the October 2018 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

Our society may adore celebrities, but we can’t know what really goes on in their hearts and minds unless they choose to tell us. These standout new entries in the crowded celebrity-memoir field are fascinating chronicles of lives spent answering Hollywood’s siren call.

NonfictionMemoir

Well Read: There and back again

Feature by Robert Weibezahl

The work of Greek-born Swedish writer Theodor Kallifatides is not widely known in the United States. But based on the merits of his charming, late-life memoir, Another Life, that shameful wrong needs to be righted. Slender in size, yet anything but slight in scope, this inviting meditation on age, writing and sense of place, beautifully translated into English by Marlaine Delargy, is witty, profound and thoroughly captivating.

When Kallifatides turned 77 a few years ago, totally spent after producing more than 40 books, he decided it was time to retire as a writer. That decision would prove troublesome for a man whose identity and purpose were inextricably tied to the act of writing. What transpired was a kind of spiritual journey that took Kallifatides both mentally into the past and physically to the central places of his life as he sought a new objective.

The first of these places is his longtime studio in the heart of Stockholm, where he continued to go each day even after making the decision not to write. When he ultimately gives up the office and stays home each day, it proves a jarring experience—not only because of the routines he must abandon, but also because he suddenly finds himself negotiating for space with his wife. Worst of all, he feels he is losing touch with the people and the rhythms of the city in which he was formerly and quite naturally immersed.

He and his wife then head to their summer cottage in a lovely coastal town that has lost population over the 40-some years they have stayed there. Despite the beauty and memories of the place—or perhaps because of them—Kallifatides feels the emptiness within himself growing.

Finally, he travels to Athens, Greece, and to the village where he grew up, where the local school is to be renamed in his honor. He encounters a country that has changed greatly since his departure 50 years before, not least of all because of Greece’s financial crisis and the widening gap between rich and poor.

This inviting meditation on age, writing and sense of place is thoroughly captivating.

Despite the aging writer’s ennui, Another Life is far from somber. Kallifatides is a companionable and funny guide (his 13-year-old grandson states that at Kallifatides’ funeral he will remember his grandfather not as a great writer but as the funniest person he knows—a declaration that brings tears to the old man’s eyes). So while Kallifatides ponders the dilemmas that plague Sweden and Greece and beyond—intolerance toward migrants, materialism, the growing propensity to offend others in the name of free speech—his manner is rueful, but not pessimistic. His friendly encounters with others—on the streets, in cafes—speak to our shared humanity and concurrent desires for a better life.

In the end, as he witnesses Greek high school students performing Aeschylus in his honor, his life as an expat comes full circle, and he reconnects with his native tongue after years of speaking and writing in Swedish. The floodgates open, and he begins to write again—for the first time in many years—in Greek. These writings eventually become Another Life. “You can say what is to be said in every language of the world,” Kallifatides writes in the final pages of this exquisite book, but some things are best expressed in your mother tongue.

 

This article was originally published in the October 2018 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

The work of Greek-born Swedish writer Theodor Kallifatides is not widely known in the United States. But based on the merits of his charming, late-life memoir, Another Life, that shameful wrong needs to be righted. Slender in size, yet anything but slight in scope, this inviting meditation on age, writing and sense of place, beautifully translated into English by Marlaine Delargy, is witty, profound and thoroughly captivating.

NonfictionMusicMemoirArt

Where words leave off, music begins

Feature by Hilli Levin

Five new gift-ready reads are here for the music lover in your life. From operatic rock to Americana, from classical to soul, we’ve got a pitch-perfect match no matter their genre of choice.

Queen superfans may be looking forward to the upcoming biopic Bohemian Rhapsody—starring “Mr. Robot” lead Rami Malek as iconic frontman Freddie Mercury—but the publication of Martin Popoff’s lovingly compiled Queen: Album by Album is an event in its own right. Popoff, who claims Queen is “absolutely the greatest band to ever walk this earth,” takes a deep dive into the band’s catalog and discusses each record in lively, conversational Q&A’s with musical figures like Sir Paul McCartney, Dee Snider, David Ellefson of Megadeth, Patrick Myers (lead in the Broadway musical Killer Queen) and more. Starting with Queen’s 1973 self-titled debut, the book moves chronologically, and every chapter begins with a detailed and passionate essay from Popoff on each album’s merits. Absolutely packed with photos of the band, gig posters and fun ephemera, Popoff’s freewheeling guide is definitely one to display.

TWEEDY'S TRUTH
Since 1994, the Chicago-based alternative rock-turned-Americana band Wilco have been pioneers of the indie scene, winning multiple Grammys and inspiring countless other musicians in their wake. Founder, frontman and lead songwriter Jeff Tweedy finally opens up to his devoted fans in his first memoir, Let’s Go (So We Can Get Back): A Memoir of Recording and Discording with Wilco, Etc. Put your well-loved copy of “Yankee Hotel Foxtrot” on the turntable and settle in as Tweedy takes you through his childhood, early creative days in Chicago, the writing and recording of celebrated albums like 2004’s “A Ghost Is Born” and lays out some of his biggest struggles and triumphs.

A CLASSICAL TRADITION
Let’s be honest: Classical music has a bit of an image problem. For many, the mere mention of the genre conjures up images of the snooty bourgeoise in stuffy symphony halls. But BBC radio host Clemency Burton-Hill aims to change your perceptions and make you a bona-fide classical fan with Year of Wonder: Classical Music to Enjoy Day by Day. For each day of the year, Burton-Hill provides a piece of music by a wide range of composers—from a soaring hymn by medieval nun Hildegard of Bingen to stripped-down contemporary pieces composed by Philip Glass—along with a short rundown of the piece’s history and a description of what to listen for.

Joni Mitchell from Women Who Rock. Illustration by Anne Muntges, reproduced with permission from Black Dog & Leventhal.

LADIES LEADING THE WAY
Music journalist Evelyn McDonnell has written extensive biographies of groundbreaking artists like Joan Jett and the Runaways and Bjork, and she lends her decades of experience to editing Women Who Rock: Bessie to Beyoncé. Girl Groups to Riot Grrrl. The goal of this gorgeous coffee table book is “to tell a narrative story by focusing on key select figures who were true game changers.” And although the title suggests a focus on rock artists, the included essays offer “portraits of diversity, from Patsy Cline’s country melancholy to Joni Mitchell’s folk jazz to Missy Elliott’s avant rap.” Written by women and illustrated by women, this is a powerhouse collection that is completely, unapologetically celebratory. Revel in the greatness of Women Who Rock.

THE ONO FACTOR
Speaking of women getting some well-deserved credit in the music industry, did you know that Yoko Ono was only recently co-credited as a writer on John Lennon’s 1971 single “Imagine”? And now, her role in shaping Lennon’s late-period music and art is fully explored in Imagine John Yoko, a celebration of their partnership. Compiled by Ono and replete with photos from her personal archives, facsimiles of Lennon’s handwritten lyrics, stills from their narrative videos, excerpts from key interviews conducted during their collaborative period, concept sketches and photos of Ono’s pivotal art exhibits and more, this book will be a must-have for any fan of this world-changing pair. In a time when Ono’s activism seems as relevant as ever, she offers a rallying cry in the powerful preface: “Remember, each one of us has the power to change the world. Power works in mysterious ways. We don’t have to do much. Visualize the domino effect and just start thinking PEACE. It’s time for action. The action is PEACE.”

 

This article was originally published in the November 2018 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

Five new gift-ready reads are here for the music lover in your life. From operatic rock to Americana, from classical to soul, we’ve got a pitch-perfect match no matter their genre of choice.

NonfictionMemoirFashionArt

Elements of style

Feature by Alice Cary

By definition, fashion is always in flux. As New York Times “On the Street” photographer Bill Cunningham explains, “An idea that is elegant at its time is an outrageous disgrace ten years earlier, daring five years before its height, and boring five years later.” These three books offer engaging looks at how trends evolve in the fashion world.

When Cunningham died in 2016, the world lost a trailblazing fashion icon. Thankfully, he left behind one last gift: a secret manuscript that’s now a book, Fashion Climbing: A Memoir with Photographs. And what a gift it is! You’ve never had such an effervescent guide through the style world—even fashion haters won’t be able to resist his charm.

Cunningham lived and breathed fashion from his earliest days, even though his mother “beat the hell out of him” when she caught him parading around their home in his sister’s dress as a preschooler. Despite his family’s shame, he doggedly pursued his passion, working after school in Jordan Marsh and Bonwit Teller department stores, where the gorgeous gowns made him think he’d “die of happiness.” With endless optimism, believing that “good came from every situation,” the Harvard dropout-turned-hat maker managed to transform being drafted into the Army in 1950 into a zany gig leading soldiers on weekend tours of Europe. Back home, he lived hand-to-mouth in his millinery shops and gate-crashed fashion shows, all the while making a name for himself.

Fashion Climbing is a multilayered fashion excursion and a heartfelt memoir that grabs you and never lets go. If only Cunningham had left behind a sequel covering the rest of his joyful, fashion-filled life.

STAN BY ME
Sometimes it’s best to simply embrace your worst feature. Early on, tennis player Stan Smith felt that was his feet: “One of the few disappointments of my tennis career were my big size 13 feet—yet the shoe I eventually wrapped around them enabled me to become better known than I could have ever imagined.” After being deemed too clumsy at age 15 to be a Davis Cup ball boy, Smith trained hard, eventually becoming a tennis great. Later, Smith’s sneaker deal with Adidas in the early 1970s led to a fashion craze and then a 1989 Guinness World Record, with 22 million pairs of those eponymous sneakers sold, more than any other “named” shoe.

Stan Smith: Some People Think I’m a Shoe—a weighty tome that’s nearly as big as Smith’s foot—is a self-contained sneaker museum, detailing the many incarnations and influences of his famously green-trimmed, white-leather shoe, which originally featured the name of French tennis star Robert Haillet. With detailed, personal commentary from the modest, affable Smith, this fact-filled compendium takes the form of an alphabet book, with entries like “V is for Versatility,” explaining how Stan Smiths became hip-hop’s favorite footwear. As Smith confesses, “I guess that I have become somewhat of a modern sneakerhead since my closet is full of both everyday and rare shoes that all happen to be Stan Smiths.”

Stan Smith is a unique blend of sports history, funky fashion chronicle and chic celebrity memoir.

Sarah Barrett Moulton: Pinkie, by Thomas Lawrence, 1794. From Pink, edited by Valerie Steele. Courtesy of the Huntington Art Collections, San Marino, California.

 

TICKLED PINK
Perhaps like me, you have a love-hate relationship with the color pink. If so, you’ll enjoy exploring those complicated emotions with Pink: The History of a Punk, Pretty, Powerful Color. Consider just a few of its many shades: Drunk Tank pink, Kissing pink, Millennial pink, Naive pink and, of course, Princess pink. You’ll learn that Asians, especially the Japanese, seem to like pink more than Europeans do, while in the United States, pink has been called “the most divisive of colors.” And guess what: Pink didn’t become associated with girls in the U.S. until the 1930s, and the “pinkification of girl culture” didn’t take over until the 1970s and ’80s, spurred by Barbie’s wardrobe.

This lavishly illustrated pink menagerie features everything from French fashion of the 1700s to a 1956 ad for a pink Royal Electric typewriter and plenty of political pussy hats, plus the likes of Marilyn Monroe, Sugar Ray Robinson, Rihanna and Mamie Eisenhower all looking pretty in pink. Pink’s publication coincides with a major exhibition on view now at the Museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology. Editor Valerie Steele, the chief curator of the exhibit, includes an intriguing mix of essays written by a costume designer, an art historian, a gender studies expert and more.

Whatever you think of pink, there are fascinating tidbits on every page of this eye-catching history.

 

This article was originally published in the November 2018 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

By definition, fashion is always in flux. As New York Times “On the Street” photographer Bill Cunningham explains, “An idea that is elegant at its time is an outrageous disgrace ten years earlier, daring five years before its height, and boring five years later.” These three books offer engaging looks at how trends evolve in the fashion world.

NonfictionPhotographyNatureMemoirAnimals

For the animal aficionado

Feature by Julie Hale

Do you know someone who likes animals a lot more than they like people? We’ve rounded up a gaggle of delightful books that celebrate creatures great and small.

Award-winning naturalist and author Sy Montgomery has visited remote regions of the world to study some of nature’s most uncommon creatures. She looks back on what she’s learned from them about communication, sensitivity and kindness in How to Be a Good Creature: A Memoir in Thirteen Animals, beautifully illustrated by Rebecca Green. In this funny, moving book, Montgomery recounts transformative episodes with beasts both domesticated and exotic. “Being with any animal is edifying,” she writes, “for each has a knowing that surpasses human understanding.” From Clarabelle, a “pretty and elegant” tarantula, to the playful, 40-pound Pacific octopus Octavia, the animals in Montgomery’s book have unique dispositions that align them with humankind. Montgomery’s writing is rich and lyrical, her insights invaluable. And as all animal lovers know, “Knowing someone who belongs to another species can enlarge your soul in surprising ways.”

HONORING THE ANIMALS
A touching tribute to the creatures we let into our hearts and homes, Love Can Be: A Literary Collection About Our Animals brings together contributions from a remarkable lineup of authors. Susan Orlean, Lalita Tademy, Rick Bass, Joyce Carol Oates, Alexander McCall Smith and Juan Felipe Herrera are among the 30 writers spotlighted in this excellent anthology. Standout selections include a moving essay by Delia Ephron about the bond between pets and humans; Dean Koontz’s remembrance of his golden retriever, Trixie; and an ingenious cat-inspired poem by Ursula K. Le Guin. Literature fans will love the photos of authors and their animal companions that accompany each piece. In keeping with the spirit of the season, proceeds from sales of the book will go to animal charities. This is a heartwarming, hopeful anthology.

PAMPERED POOCHES
In Puppy Styled: Japanese Dog Grooming: Before & After, Grace Chon celebrates dog grooming the Japanese way, with hand-scissoring techniques to create cuts that play up the personalities of canine clients. For this irresistible volume, Chon—an acclaimed pet photographer—snapped nearly 50 pups as they transitioned from scruffy to smart. She writes that Japanese dog grooming “has one objective: to make the dog as cute as possible!” Cuteness undoubtedly abounds in the book, along with fresh ideas for turning your frowzy mutt into a chic chien. Check out Rocco, a Yorkshire terrier whose bangs get lopped into an asymmetrical ’do, or Bowie, a bichon frise whose wayward tangles are trimmed to form a fluffy nimbus. From start to finish, Puppy Styled is crammed with tail-wagging glamour.

 

This article was originally published in the December 2018 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

Do you know someone who likes animals a lot more than they like people? We’ve rounded up a gaggle of delightful books that celebrate creatures great and small.

NonfictionFictionMemoir

Book clubs: New in paperback

Feature by Julie Hale

In the electrifying memoir The Only Girl in the World, Maude Julien looks back on her nightmarish upbringing in France. Raised by her unaffectionate mother, Jeannine, and conspiracy-theorist father, Louis, to become what he called a “superior being” who could survive under any circumstances, Julien is often confined to the rat-inhabited cellar of their home at night and told not to move. When she gets sick, her parents won’t send for a doctor, and when she’s abused by the family’s odd-job man, they do nothing. Julien lives in isolation, without proper food, heat or hot water. But thanks to books and the animals she encounters on the family property, Julien manages to cultivate an inner world that sustains her. Now a psychotherapist, Julien gives an unflinching account of the horrors of her home life and eventual escape in this brave and probing book. In making sense of her own past, she offers an unforgettable story about the enduring need for human connection.

AFTER THE FALL
Named a best book of 2017 by NPR, Owen Egerton’s novel Hollow tells the story of a religious studies teacher in Austin, Texas, and his painful coming to terms with life’s harsh realities. Once an esteemed professor, Ollie Bonds has fallen on hard times. His home is a shack behind a beauty parlor, and he is grappling with the loss of his young son. As a hospice volunteer, Ollie’s connection with a dying man named Martin has unforeseen consequences. As Ollie tries to atone for his mistakes, the details surrounding the death of Ollie’s son and the path that led to his present circumstances are revealed gradually. Bringing levity to the book is Lyle Burnside, a rather convincing member of the Hollow Earth Society—a group that’s organizing a trip to the North Pole. Egerton has created a beautifully realized, rewarding and poignant narrative about loss and mercy that’s sure to stimulate emotional conversation among readers.

TOP PICK FOR BOOK CLUBS
Anna Quindlen’s shrewdly observed novel Alternate Side chronicles the lives of the Nolan family in the wake of a violent episode in their close-knit Upper West Side neighborhood. Investment banker Charlie Nolan is contentedly married to Nora, the director of a museum, and savors his good luck when he lands a coveted permanent space in the parking lot near their apartment. Quindlen presents a detailed portrait of the Nolans’ affluent, settled lifestyle, only to shatter that image when lawyer Jack Fisk attacks handyman Rick Ramos because his van is obstructing the entrance to the parking lot. In the aftermath, the neighborhood is never the same, and long-percolating questions about race and class erupt. In this perceptive novel, Quindlen delivers a rich exploration of social dynamics and the nature of marriage. It’s a book that captures the tenor of the times.

 

This article was originally published in the December 2018 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

Three books that will hold your group's attention even during the hustle and bustle of the holidays.
NonfictionFictionMemoir

The Hold List: Books to warm you from inside out

Feature by bookpagedev

If your primary tactic for surviving the winter is to drag a big blanket into a cozy chair and hibernate with the most inspiring books you can find, then these five reads, selected in partnership with Vintage Books, are for you.

The Stars Are Fire
By Anita Shreve

Shreve’s novel draws inspiration from Maine’s history and follows a young woman as she comes into her own after a devastating fire in 1947. The disaster destroys over a quarter of a million acres and ushers in a new life for Grace Holland, whose husband goes missing during the fire. Now effectively a widow with children to raise by herself, Grace begins to build something new from the ashes. As she slowly realizes how stifling her marriage was, she tentatively opens herself up to a new life and new love. Shreve captures the joy of self-discovery in this stunning novel.

Lab Girl
By Hope Jahren

Laugh, cry and fall madly in love with the world around you while reading paleobiologist Jahren’s bestselling memoir, an entertaining, spirited look into the world of plant researchers. Whether she’s sharing the challenges of being a female scientist or the unique relationship she has with her lab partner, Jahren displays an effervescent, clear-eyed delight in her subjects, and never more so than in her insights into the natural world. Even if science and nature books aren’t your cuppa, Jahren’s descriptive writing style makes this an enjoyable reading experience for just about anyone.

Magic Hours 
By Tom Bissell

Take a break from wintry binge-watching with this updated edition of celebrated cultural critic Bissell’s 2012 collection of essays on the act of creating. The 18 passionate essays are an aerobic dance between highbrow and lowbrow, exploring our culture through its creations, whether it’s a sitcom, a documentary on the Iraq War, the cult classic film The Room, David Foster Wallace’s Infinite Jest or a movie made in Bissell’s hometown in northern Michigan. There’s so much to enjoy here, but it’s a particular pleasure to read his gleeful takedown of how-to books, especially those that will (supposedly) tell you how to write.

Swimming in the Sink
By Lynne Cox

In a straightforward, candid style, Cox shares a comeback tale that’ll have you flipping the pages like you’re reading a thriller instead of an inspiring sports memoir. Legendary open-water swimmer Cox has a unique ability to acclimatize to extreme cold (jealous, much?), which has allowed her to swim the Bering Strait, among other frigid waters. But after the deaths of her parents, Cox was diagnosed with broken heart syndrome, which seemed to mark the end of her swimming life. But behold the power of mindfulness and positivity, because Cox learns to swim again—beginning in her sink.

Nobody’s Fool
By Richard Russo

Pulitzer Prize-winning author Russo knows a little something about the human heart, and hope blooms like your most stubborn houseplant in this folksy, poignant tale set in the blue-collar town of North Bath, New York. Centering on down-on-his-luck, 60-year-old Donald “Sully” Sullivan (his knee is bad, he drinks a little too much), it’s a perfect balance of little tragedies and dark comic relief. Once you’ve gotten well acquainted with the town’s wonderful characters—as well as you might any neighbor in a small town—you can pick up Everybody’s Fool, which returns to Sully’s world, 10 years later, for another old-fashioned tale.

 

This article was originally published in the January 2019 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

If your primary tactic for surviving the winter is to drag a big blanket into a cozy chair and hibernate with the most inspiring books you can find, then these five reads, selected in partnership with Vintage Books, are for you.

AudioMysteryMemoir

Audio: February 2019

Feature by Sukey Howard

The title of Michelle Obama’s blockbuster bestseller, Becoming, lets you know that you’ll get the answers to many of the questions you’ve had about this extraordinary woman. You’ll find out how a kid who grew up in a cramped apartment on Chicago’s South Side graduated from Princeton and Harvard Law to ultimately become our first African-American first lady and one of the most admired women in the galaxy. More importantly, you’ll understand how she kept her authenticity, grace and sense of self while in the glare of an unrelenting media spotlight, where everything you say and do and wear is scrutinized. Obama is candid and frank, talking about the problems in the early years of her marriage, about being a mother, her dislike of politics and her distress with the current administration. She reads in her warm, familiar voice, and you’ll be swept up in her story, her triumphs and her trials. She’s lived a version of the American dream, but one shadowed by the very American nightmare of racism and prejudice.

It’s been much too long since I spent time with Precious Ramotswe and her colleagues at the Number 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency, and it’s always a quiet joy to return. Colors of All the Cattle, Alexander McCall Smith’s 19th installment in his bestselling series, wonderfully narrated again by the liltingly voiced Lisette Lecat, transports us to the sunny charms of Botswana and Mma Ramotswe’s unshakable belief in “old-fashioned” Botswana kindness. Though she’s taken on a difficult case for a victim of a hit-and-run accident, Mma Ramotswe has been pushed into reluctantly running for city council by her friend, the formidable matron of the local “orphan farm.” Smith and Mma Ramotswe never let us down—modesty and honesty trump bravura, and keen but gentle detecting skills solve the case.

A private investigator went missing in 2006, his body never found, the case marred by mistakes and innuendos of corruption. That cold case heats up when some kids come across a red VW in a remote, wooded park, with a handcuffed skeleton in the trunk. That’s for openers in Ian Rankin’s 24th Rebus novel, In a House of Lies, performed by James Macpherson in an authentic Scottish burr that’s still soft enough to be easily understood. Though John Rebus is officially retired from Police Scotland’s Major Crime Division, he was on the case 12 years ago and is as eager as ever to get involved again. And with his former protégé, Detective Inspector Siobhan Clarke, assigned to the investigating team, that’s not hard to accomplish. Pay close attention—Rankin’s in great form, and there’s a lot going on in this intricately plotted police procedural.

 

This article was originally published in the February 2019 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

The title of Michelle Obama’s blockbuster bestseller, Becoming, lets you know that you’ll get the answers to many of the questions you’ve had about this extraordinary woman. You’ll find out how a kid who grew up in a cramped apartment on Chicago’s South Side graduated…
NonfictionMemoir

Let’s talk about love in all its many forms

Feature by Hilli Levin

We all should be so lucky to find love—in family and friends as well as in romantic partners. These six new books fit into anyone’s life, regardless of relationship status. 

How to be Loved: A Memoir of Lifesaving Friendship
By Eva Hagberg Fisher

Eva Hagberg Fisher built a career writing about architecture in her 20s, but her raw and honest debut memoir, How to be Loved, is quite a departure from chronicling design and the hottest goings-on in New York real estate. Fisher doesn’t sugarcoat her journey from a confused social climber who was struggling with addiction to a person who discovers, for the first time in her young life, true friendship with Allison, an older woman in her recovery group. Fisher confesses to being selfish and withholding for most of her early adult life, seeing her relationships with men and women as means to an end, whether that end be social status, housing when she was jobless or artistic fulfillment. But when Fisher was diagnosed with a brain tumor, it was Allison, steadily coping with her own cancer diagnosis, who gently but persistently loved and cared for her. Allison showed Fisher a way to engage with another person to an extent she didn’t know was possible, which in turn helped prepare her for her relationship with her current husband. Grab a box of tissues for this one and have your best friend on speed dial. You’ll definitely want to call them after you turn the last page. 

Hard to Love: Essays and Confessions
By Briallen Hopper

As Fisher’s memoir proves, romantic partnerships aren’t the only life-altering relationships built on love. And in Briallen Hopper’s first collection of essays, Hard to Love, she takes a deep dive into many essential but far less glamorized types of relationships: found families, platonic friendships, emotional connections with inanimate objects, fandom (you’ll never look at the classic Ted Dansen-helmed sitcom “Cheers” or its theme song the same way ever again) and the hard-won beauty of learning to love yourself. And yes, Hopper even spares some ink to cover marriage and romance, but as a whole, this is a refreshing collection that probes the expanse of the human heart.

Love Understood: The Science of Who, How and Why We Love
By Laura Mucha

If you have a dogeared copy of Aziz Ansari’s 2015 bestseller, Modern Love, then British poet and artist Laura Mucha’s Love Understood, a well-researched and deeply human study of the intricacies and science of love, is right up your alley. After observing her grandparents’ strong, decades-long relationship, Mucha decided to spend some time trying to figure out how love works. She interviewed strangers from all over the world in order to better understand love’s common themes, and she presents their stories alongside related scientific studies. You’ll find sections on dating, love at first sight, monogamy, cheating and how people heal from lost love. 

How to Date Men When You Hate Men
By Blythe Roberson

Do you struggle to connect with men in the midst of our inescapably patriarchal society? Well, Blythe Roberson, New Yorker contributor and researcher for “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert,” definitely has her fair share of complaints. In her hilarious and relatable How to Date Men When You Hate Men, the 27-year-old chronicles her many false starts (like many Millennials, she’s never had a boyfriend in the traditional sense), rants about rape culture, parses her “type,” offers her own thoughts on the complicated dance of defining the relationship, champions the pleasures of being single and more. It’s a very funny read from someone who has many thoughts on love but never claims to be an expert.

Eight Dates: Essential Conversations for a Lifetime of Love
By John Gottman & Julie Schwartz Gottman

John and Julie Gottman know that a strong and healthy relationship is built on the small, everyday gestures and moments of intentional connection. So they’re burning a candle for one of the most overlooked aspects of modern relationships: date night. “Make dedicated, non-negotiable time for each other a priority, and never stop being curious about your partner,” they write in the introduction to Eight Dates. If you’re really looking to see some results, then this is the book for you—the Gottmans’ ideas are based on hard data and proven studies. Although the dates all focus on different topics of conversation, they apply to any relationship, young or old.

You Always Change the Love of Your Life (for Another Love or Another Life)
By Amalia Andrade

If you’ve ever gone through a breakup, you probably know that you’ll get the same pat advice over and over again. Looking for a new, more hands-on approach to processing your feelings and dealing with heartbreak? Chilean-born author and illustrator Amalia Andrade’s You Always Change the Love of Your Life blends charming, down-to-earth advice with cheeky cartoons, illustrations, journal prompts, soul-warming recipes, playlists and more.

 

This article was originally published in the February 2019 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

We all should be so lucky to find love—in family and friends as well as in romantic partners. These six new books fit into anyone’s life, regardless of relationship status. 

How to be Loved: A Memoir of Lifesaving Friendship
By Eva Hagberg…

NonfictionSocial ScienceMemoirLGBTQ+

Joy and love, resilience and strength

Feature by Liz Clayton Scofield

Queer communities can find healing through the sharing of stories, creating a web of common experiences that remind us that we are not alone.

These four books contain narratives of triumph, loss, trauma and healing, with optimism toward liberation and new understandings of gender, desire, sexuality, love and family. These stories are accessible and relatable even as they reveal how identity is far more complicated than what social rules or cultural expectations determine it to be. Encompassing a range of emotions and experiences, they declare that queer stories don’t have to end in tragedy, but can reign triumphant despite struggle. Pain and trauma are not glossed over, but also within these tales are the joys and love that are so often threaded into queer experiences.

Acclaimed essayist and editor-in-chief of the literary journal No Tokens T Kira Madden shares a story of incredible resilience in Long Live the Tribe of Fatherless Girls. In her debut memoir, Madden beautifully chronicles her journey to find herself while reckoning with the trauma, abuse and addiction that have surrounded her and emering with a deeper understanding of her experiences. Madden captures the complexities of loving those who wound you deeply, as well as the healing that is possible within those relationships. Through Madden’s achingly raw and honest prose, the extreme privilege she experienced in Boca Raton, Florida, the deep and complex bonds she finds in her adolescent friendships, the transformation of her relationships with her parents in addiction recovery and her queer awakening all become relatable, regardless of how far removed they are from the reader’s own experience. Within this necessary book, Madden weaves together an utterly human paean to belonging, to healing, and to loving and being loved.

Trans activist, writer and performer Jacob Tobia’s debut memoir, Sissy: A Coming-of-Gender Story, refreshingly defies the typical trans narrative (“I was born in the wrong body, did these things to transition and now live as a boy/girl/etc.”). In their fabulous, fierce voice, Tobia tells their story of coming out as genderqueer. In adolescence, they found themselves falling into society’s familiar and static categories of what is assigned at birth or assumed (“gay” or “male”), but as Tobia came of age, they looked past the binary and began a fluid, exciting exploration of gender. Tobia’s story unfolds in the South, and they contend with their relationships with both family and religion. In particular, Tobia’s relationship with their father and with their childhood church evolve throughout the book, and these growing pains are detailed honestly but hopefully. Tobia is strong and confident (even calling themselves out as arrogant), and as a result of their strength, drive and overachieving nature, they have established themselves as a highly visible trans activist. What many may realize after reading Sissy is that expectations of gender affect not only those who identify outside the binary but also everyone who ascribes to it. There are creative and imaginative possibilities available to everyone through liberation from strict, patriarchal expectations.

By the end of the prologue of The Bold World: A Memoir of Family and Transformation, I was already in tears, overwhelmed by entrepreneur, social activist and former magazine ad executive Jodie Patterson’s empathy, acceptance and willingness to listen to her child, Penelope, when he reveals to her at 3 years old, “Mama, I’m not a girl. I’m a boy.” Patterson travels to Georgia to take a break, to heal, to figure out where to go from there, but even in her exhaustion, she wholly accepts Penelope as her son. Patterson begins the story in her own youth, as a quiet young black girl growing up in a wealthy family on New York’s Upper West Side, coming into her own strength and power as a black woman—in her words, becoming a “badass.” Patterson’s memoir is highly recommended for any parent raising a transgender or gender-nonconforming child. Her struggle is not with her transgender child but rather with a world that may not accept him as readily as she does. 

Robyn Ryle’s She/He/They/Me: For the Sisters, Misters, and Binary Resisters is a choose-your-own-adventure-style book that explores the intersections of identities and how gender impacts every aspect of our lives. There are over 100 ways you can read this book, with paths that lead readers into different societies throughout history. The journey, and the myriad options in how to move through it, reveal how gender affects every aspect of our culture and our experiences in love, sex, careers and more. Ryle empathetically explores the complications and intersections of gender, hopefully illuminating otherwise invisible structures in pursuit of new conceptions of power and being. She/He/They/Me is a recommended read for anyone living in a body in this world.

Queer communities can find healing through the sharing of stories, creating a web of common experiences that remind us that we are not alone.

These four books contain narratives of triumph, loss, trauma and healing, with optimism toward liberation and new understandings of…

NonfictionFictionMilitary HistoryMemoirComing of Age

Book Clubs: March 2019

Feature by Julie Hale

The Friend by Sigrid Nunez
TOP PICK
Winner of the National Book Award for Fiction, Sigrid Nunez’s The Friend focuses on the powerful connection between a grieving woman and her dog. The unnamed female narrator inherits Apollo, a 180-pound Great Dane, from a late professor friend who committed suicide. As she comes to grips with her friend’s death, the narrator finds herself increasingly concerned for Apollo, who is also clearly mourning his owner. Because pets aren’t allowed in her apartment building, the narrator refuses to leave him alone for extended stretches of time. Although her concern for him keeps her at home—and causes her friends to question her emotional well-being—the relationship revitalizes both woman and dog. Nunez delivers a compassionate, sharply realized study of one woman’s experience with grief, and she does so without lapsing into sentimentality. The Friend is an unforgettable exploration of loss, healing and canine love.

That Kind of Mother by Rumaan Alam
Affluent white couple Rebecca and Christopher decide to adopt the infant son of their late nanny, Priscilla, who was black. Alam’s portrayal of the fraught nature of contemporary race relations rings true in this empathetic novel.

Eat the Apple by Matt Young
In his debut memoir, Young uses a wide range of narrative tones and techniques to tell the story of his years as a Marine, and how unprepared he was for the horrors that awaited him in Iraq.

Aetherial Worlds by Tatyana Tolstaya
Fantasy and reality intermingle in these compelling short stories, which have earned Tolstaya comparisons to Gogol and Chekhov.

The Map of Salt and Stars by Jennifer Zeynab Joukhadar
Nour’s family relocates to Syria when her father dies, but war forces them into exile. Her story is linked with that of a 12th-century girl who also fled her home in this powerful novel of the refugee experience.

The best new paperback releases for book clubs.
NonfictionMemoir

Well Read: Love of language

Feature by Robert Weibezahl

The Comma Queen confesses her passion for everything Greek—language, history, landscape and culture—which was born out of her love for words.

Mary Norris, whose memoir of her years as a copy editor at The New Yorker (Between You & Me) was a surprise bestseller, reveals her nearly 40-year devotion to all things Hellenic in her captivating Greek to Me: Adventures of the Comma Queen.

Inspired by an unlikely moment—seeing Sean Connery’s cameo as Agamemnon in the movie Time Bandits—and spurred on by her boss and mentor in The New Yorker’s copy department, Norris took advantage of the magazine’s generous tuition reimbursement policy for “work-related courses” and enrolled in modern Greek at New York University. A new (well, in fact, ancient) world was unleashed for her. Before long, she was studying ancient Greek and deciphering classical texts. She found herself performing original-language versions of Elektra and The Trojan Women as a “mature” student with the Barnard Columbia Ancient Drama Group (and soliciting character advice from Katharine Hepburn). She immersed herself in the arcane language as best she could, fascinated by its foundational alphabet and the ways Greek survives in so much of modern English.

Most significantly, she went to Greece when she could, exploring the mainland’s many corners and its islands’ many charms. Daring to travel alone to even the most far-flung locales often proved to be an eyebrow-raising heresy in the patriarchal, tradition-centric country, but Norris persisted. Her adventures took her to places few tourists go, to nationally divided Cyprus (birthplace of Aphrodite) and to remote Kardamyli, where the English travel writer Patrick Leigh Fermor—whom she calls her literary father—lived and wrote.

While Norris has a keen eye, zeroing in on the peculiarities and beauties of her beloved Greece, her always witty and self-aware narrative tends less toward the descriptive than to the country’s indelible psychic charms. At every turn, the past inextricably intertwines with the present as Norris seeks the origins of ancient Greek culture, rooted in both perceptible landscape and intangible myths. Nostalgia, from the Greek neomai, to return home, “may mean a yearning for a place,” Norris ponders, “but it is also a yearning for a time when you were in that place and therefore for the you of the past.” 

Norris’ inviting book thrives on the writer’s unabashed enthusiasm to learn, to immerse herself in the new and to find clues to her own past in the newly discovered. “I knew a lot of Greek, but I wouldn’t say I spoke Greek or call myself a classicist,” she admits. “I was more in love with the language than it was with me. . . . I had not mastered the language, ancient or modern, but I got glimpses of its genius, its patterns, the way it husbanded the alphabet, stretching those twenty-four letters to record everything anyone could ever want to say.”

The Comma Queen confesses her passion for everything Greek—language, history, landscape and culture—which was born out of her love for words.

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