What I've Read: Summer 2020
I may not have been as productive or creative or (insert unrealistic goal that we all unnecessarily set for ourselves here) during quarantine, but damn - I read a lot. There were definitely days where I succumbed to the doom-scrolling and barely cracked a page…but most of the time, I tore through books at a near-crazed pace. I guess it was kind of like I needed an escape or something. Hm, I wonder what from?
Putting together this list, I realized that this crop of eleven books could be grouped around a few different, but complementary, themes. Each, in a way, reflected the times we are all going through. It’s interesting what I gravitated toward, but each book really helped me in a particular way. Maybe one will help you, too.
Times have been...tough. The pandemic, as we all have realized, was not the great equalizer. But it has been a shared experience, and that experience has been hard. So I’m going to start with two books that felt like the world’s biggest literary hug. Well-written, approachable reads that are simple, but mighty. And I promise, will leave you feeling a little better about humanity.
The House in the Cerulean Sea by T.J. Kune
This gem is nothing less than a pure serotonin boost to the brain. I’ve been recommending this book to pretty much everyone - friends and strangers alike. The basic premise surrounds a group of magical orphans who have been deemed too dangerous or too strange to live among ‘normal’ society, and are quarantined off at an orphanage on little island. Linus, a 40-year old case-worker from The Department of Magical Youth, is tasked with ensuring that all is in order at the orphanage, and well, this book is about what he finds there. I guess it’s a bit like an adult fairy tale, and who doesn’t need a dose of magic these days? This is an incredibly heart-warming and funny story (so witty! I laughed out loud so many times!), that also manages to confront deeper issues like prejudice, abandonment and fearing what we don’t understand. I also got all the feels from a storyline about a tiny button. If you read it, you’ll know what I mean. It’s the perfect escape.
The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Ann Schaffer
I was just starting this book when I published my last book blog post, and I described it as a novel that “gave me a warm, sun-on-my-face feeling.” Once I finished it, it was more like a “how can I immediately book passage to Guernsey, because all of these characters need to be real” type of feeling. It’s a book about the German occupation of the European Channel Islands during WWII, told entirely through a series of letters and telegrams. Of course, that description completely leaves out how full and rich this story really is. But maybe that’s because you just have to read it and be charmed, too. Raunaq rarely reads my book suggestions (rude!), but he sailed through this one and loved it as much as I did. And - it’s a book about people who love books. Need I say more?
Things have also been pretty turbulent. But in a way that, hopefully, will spark a seismic shift. There is a lot of learning, and more importantly, unlearning, we all need to do regarding systemic racism, white supremacy and the experiences of BIPOC. Reading is, for me, one of the best places to start.
Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates
I read this book a few years ago, and just recently re-read (or more accurately, I listened). It’s one of those books that will dig right up under your skin, or stick with you like a tiny rock in your shoe. Once you read it, you won’t be able to walk through life without knowing it’s there. Ta-Nehisi Coates is one of the most powerful authors of this generation, and this book - a letter to his teenage son - is a raw, challenging look at life for Black Americans, and specifically, how the exploitation of black bodies is an intrinsic part of this country’s past and present. What I most appreciate about this book is that it is not unrealistically optimistic. It’s honestly bleak. It is intensely-personal. It’s a deeply-lived experience, and it doesn’t promise any solutions. And it’s an important work that needs to be read by every single American. When you do read this - and you should - consider the audio book. It’s powerful in both forms, but the audiobook is read by Coates himself, and there are some passages so powerful and so moving that they would literally stop me in my tracks while I was listening.
Stamped from the Beginning by Ibram X. Kendi
This book flipped how I viewed racism on its head. For me, I always viewed racism as something that started from ignorance and hate, and then manifested itself in racist ideas, policies and discrimination. But Kendi’s argument is that it is the opposite: racial discrimination led to racist ideas which led to ignorance and hate. Racist policies beget racist ideas, and bigotry is the outcome, not the origin. Whoa. And second, he frames the racist debate as having three, not two, sides: there are the segregationists (basically, racists), the antiracists (those who actively reject racism), and the assimilationists (an interesting combination of the two). Assimilationists believe that the races are biologically equal, and were created equal, but that blacks have also become behaviorally unequal and need to “catch up” to white people. It’s within these two frameworks that Kendi takes us through the whole of American history, using a familiar cast of characters (like Thomas Jefferson, W.E.B. DuBois, and Angela Davis) to reevaluate how we got to where we are today.
The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett
Two light-skinned black twin sisters whose lives take wildly divergent paths, as one sister realized that she can “pass” as white and constructs an entire new identity for herself. Stella disappears into her new life as a white woman, while her twin, Desiree, does not. It follows their parallel yet opposite trajectories from the 1950s, switching perspectives between their personal experiences and the experiences of their daughters. Racial identity is the core of the story, but it’s layered with so many other aspects of identity - how we perceive ourselves and how others perceive us. The plot is engrossing, the writing richly detailed, but it’s the way the author deals with this subject matter that makes it so freshly relevant to today’s conversations. Excellent, excellent, excellent.
So You Wanna Talk About Race by Ijeoma Oluo
This is a great primer to racism, and the many, many different ways it manifests itself in the world. Oluo writes about complex topics clearly and cleanly, using plenty of personal experiences as examples. Each chapter covers a different topic, like white privilege, cultural appropriation, micro-aggressions, intersectionality, the school to prison pipeline, etc, that really breaks down this big concept of systemic racism. It’s not too heavy on psychology or law or history, and focuses on everyday, real-life interactions. And while each of the chapters covers an issue that you could easily read a whole book about (and there are wonderful books about allll of these topics), I found this book to be a very succinct and approachable introduction to understanding and discussing race and racial justice. If you are white or white-passing, be prepared to be uncomfortable.
Many of us have also been stuck recently (as in, the world’s been completely closed off). So here are three books that can transport you to different places around the world - specifically Turkey, Korea and Chile. Bonus! They are all about the lives of fierce women, too.
10 Minutes and 38 Seconds in this Strange World by Elif Shafak
First, this deserves an award for best book title (really, how can you not be intrigued?). It comes from the fact that after you die, your brain stays active for about 10 minutes. This is a story is about a sex worker named Tequila Leila - well, more accurately, Tequila Leila’s memories, because the book begins after she is murdered in Istanbul and thrown in a dumpster. Sounds dark, I know, but stick with me. She recounts different memories of her life, from birth up until the night she is killed. There’s a different memory for every minute passed, and her life is reconstructed for us through her slowly dying brain. The writing is emotive and sensual: it’s full of vivid details of the smells, tastes, sounds, textures, of Leila’s environment. But most of all, it's the story for all of those who live on the margins of the world - those who find themselves on the hidden backstreets of cities like Istanbul - and gives them the dignity and humanity they deserve.
The Island of Sea Women by Lisa See
The haenyeo are the iconic, deep-sea freediving women from the Korean island of Jeju. They can hold their breath for three minutes and swim for hours in freezing cold water, harvesting shellfish and sea life. Historically, haenyeo formed a rare type of matriarchal community on Jeju, with the women taking on the dangerous physical work and acting as the main breadwinners, while the men stayed at home to care for the children. Some women literally give birth on boat, in between dives. So, yes - the haenyeo are BAD. ASS. WOMEN. This novel follows the lives two haenyeo friends throughout the history of Korea - the Japanese occupation, World War II, the Korean War, and the division and reunification of the country. It’s incredibly well-researched, and a really beautiful story about friendship, grief, and forgiveness. I learned so much about Korean history, and even more about these fierce female divers.
The House of the Spirits by Isabel Allende
I cannot explain how I made it through 34 years of life without having read anything by Isabel Allende. I can’t. There is no excuse. So now my life is in two parts: before Isabel, and after. But anyway - I’m so glad I finally picked up this book. It’s the sweeping, multigenerational story of a Latin American family. It’s woven with magical realism (of course!), humor, political unrest, violence, fate, furies - everything. It’s never specifically mentioned, but the book closely follows the history of Chile throughout the 1900s, ending with the coup and vicious military dictatorship of Pinochet. It really captured the struggle and spirit of Latin America. Allende hooked me, reeled me in. I alternated between rushing through the book and forcing myself to slow down and savor every word. It’s a classic for a reason. I loved it.
And finally, I think we’ve all found some rejuvenation and revitalization from the outdoors. I know I have. One of these books is a fast-moving tale of wilderness survival; the other describes the slow-moving disaster of climate change - but both are a beautiful ode to the natural world, to which we owe so much.
The River by Peter Heller
Peter Heller is one of my favorite evocative authors. He has such a talent for capturing the intense, and sometimes savage, beauty of both human nature and the nature world. The River is no exception. It’s about two best friends, Jack and Wynn, who are on a canoe camping trip in the Canadian wilderness quickly turns dangerous. This is probably the most beautiful story about a fateful backcountry adventure that I’ve ever read. It has a fast-moving plotline (there’s white-water rapids, a growing forest fire, a potential murderer on the loose, and so on), but there are lots of meditative and descriptive passages that keep it from becoming too quick of a page-turner (and I mean this in a good way!) Occasionally, I got a bit lost when when Heller would get really detailed with describing the camping gear (enthusiastic canoer and fisher I am not), but I didn’t feel like that took away from the narrative. This book is a bit like a poetic Deliverance meets Call of the Wild. If that sounds like your kind of thing, I think you’ll really enjoy this one!
The Uninhabitable Earth: Life After Warming by David Wallace-Wells
The book begins like this: “It is worse, much worse, than you think.” So I’ll tell you right now - this is not going to be the most uplifting book on this list. Wallace pulls no punches, and writes in excruciating (yet lyrical) detail of the forthcoming global consequences of humanity’s decisions. I never knew that writing about the end of the world could be done so eloquently, though. But about ⅔ through, Wallace unexpectedly pauses to say “If you have made it this far, you are a brave reader.” It’s true, because what he spells out is terrifying. It’s terrifyingly informative, and terrifying because it is informative. There is some hope and optimism at the end - even though I have to be honest, I felt much more hopeful in the world’s capacity to make short-term sacrifices for long-term benefits at the beginning of this pandemic (not so much now). But I think this quote sums up the ultimate choice: “If we allow global warming to proceed, and to punish us with all the ferocity we have fed it, it will be because we have chosen that punishment—collectively walking down a path of suicide. If we avert it, it will be because we have chosen to walk a different path, and endure.” Thanks to my Dad for the recommendation on this one!
There you have it. Eleven books in four themes to sum up the last three months.
Stay safe, wash your hands, wear a mask, and be kind to each other. And let me know what you are reading these days!
