10 books I loved this year, in no particular order:
Gregory Boyle, Barking to the Choir: The Power of Radical Kinship
A vital book in these polarized times. Boyle’s stories about his work with gang members in rehabilitation sing with joy and awe.
Emma Cline, The Girls
This book was sexy and gritty and earnest and deeply unsettling. I loved Cline’s deft use of language.
Molly Wizenberg, Delancey: A Man, a Woman, a Restaurant, a Marriage
Intimate and easy, Wizenberg’s writing always nudges me to realize what food is really about: connection and love and nourishment.
Bryan Stevenson, Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption
An important look at the dysfunction and discrimination in the American justice system. Stevenson’s work is making a difference for those on the margins.
George Saunders, Lincoln in the Bardo
The gorgeous writing in this short novel is Saunders at his best and most human. A lovely, strange, and daring take on a moment in history.
Pope Francis, Laudato Si’: On Care for Our Common Home
The title of this encyclical has become my favorite catchphrase. Walking a block to recycle my cardboard? Laudato Si’! An important message from a compassionate world leader.
Ruth Ozeki, A Tale for the Time Being
This book made me want to be alone on some drippy, green part of the coastal Pacific Northwest. Or in Japan again.
Yaa Gyasi, Homegoing
This heartbreaking novel opened up Black history, weaving two branches of a family tree until they’re interlocked and yet continents apart.
Tanner Colby, Some of My Best Friends Are Black: The Strange Story of Integration in America
Colby studies systemic racism in real estate, the workplace, education, and church. He makes me want to spend more time east of Troost.
Stephanie Danler, Sweetbitter
I gobbled this book down in a few days. It’s a messy, sexy, smoky romp through New York’s restaurant industry.
I escaped through books a lot in 2017. Here are ten more books I read and liked:
- Roxane Gay, Difficult Women
- Paul Harding, Tinkers
- Christoph Niemann, Sunday Sketching
- Elena Ferrante, Those Who Leave and Those Who Stay
- Kelsey Crowe and Emily McDowell, There Is No Good Card for This: What To Say and Do When Life Is Scary, Awful, and Unfair to People You Love
- Courtney Martin, The New Better Off: Reinventing the American Dream
- Roxane Gay, Hunger: A Memoir of (My) Body
- Julia Fierro, The Gypsy Moth Summer
- Ariel Levy, The Rules Do Not Apply: A Memoir
- Edan Lepucki, Woman No. 17