Booklovers everywhere: we have a serious problem. Fortunately, we also have a serious solution. Let’s delve into the complex process of getting excellent books into the hands of the eager readers of your local community, including you. We booklovers have multiple options for buying books. The choice between Amazon, Barnes & Noble, independent bookstores, and other options is fraught with...
I In a play I saw recently, the heroine first appears onstage wearing a red dress . . . with her head bowed and turned away, due to social anxiety. The contrast is striking. There’s something about a red dress that shouts, “Look at me!” To see one on a young woman who so plainly wants to be invisible is...
Where did I hear of Penelope Fitzgerald? I can’t remember, but I believe I read about her recently. It’s a subtle feeling, one I can’t substantiate. I could, I suppose, spend hours paging through my precarious stacks of magazines. There’s also the finger-snapping quickness of the Internet—which informs me that some 30 New Yorker articles in the past couple decades...
The inquisitive one noticed someone cute on the dating site. They went on not one, but two dates! On the first date, they met at a Greek restaurant. They had so much fun talking at the restaurant that they decided to go out for coffee afterward. A while later, they hugged good night and made jokes as they waved goodbye!...
I’m excited to announce the second contest of this blog! Enter by 11:59 p.m. on Friday, March 15 to win exciting prizes! As many of you know, I have spent the past 15 years writing, editing, and polishing two books, and I’d love to get them published. But I need your help. One of the best ways you can help...
There was some kind of trouble with the horses. I knew this because part one of the novel is called “Trouble with the Horses.” Indeed, by the time I had finished reading the first two pages, I had learned quite a lot—considering the limited number of words there—about certain troubles involving certain horses. And then, to underscore what I had...
I recently discovered a very cool chain of restaurants that are also bookstores in Washington, D.C. While in the city for another reason, I popped into one of the locations to check it out. As promised, the entrance of the restaurant was a little bookshop! Delighted, I began to scan the book titles, pick out a few of them, and...
I know, I know—we were in the middle of a series of posts about Émile Zola’s The Ladies’ Paradise, but I’d like to hit pause on that to share some exciting news with you all: I have acquired my first byline! So, apologies, but you will have to live in suspense as regards the nineteenth-century novel I was previewing—it’s a...
Thanks to Masterpiece on PBS, I recently discovered and read an incredibly good novel. Written and set approximately 150 years ago, in the late 1800s, the book is about—as far as I can tell—Amazon.com. But let me explain. I was browsing through my local brick-and-mortar book store, which fortunately still existed at that moment in time, for that was where...
Here is a strange and, when you think about it, disturbing fact about our culture: Girls are more often, and more openly, encouraged to do “boy things” than boys are to do “girl things.” Can it be a good thing—for our personal relationships and for society—for females to grow up with an awareness of and appreciation for males, without the...
So many of us spend so much time consuming media about national and international politics, and yet it’s often difficult to apply the abstract concepts and faraway events we hear and read about to the concrete details and local happenings of our personal lives. But then, sometimes things get personal. While browsing through my fave local indie bookstore, I noticed...
So I did it—just couldn’t help it!—I judged a book by its cover and title and nothing else. An ad in a magazine caught my eye. The cover was a bold splash of color, which on closer inspection turned out to be face paint on a face. The title was Perfect Me: Beauty as an Ethical Ideal. I was intrigued....
I stepped to the checkout counter with six books. Five of them were hard-hitting: critically acclaimed fiction, nonfiction on scientific and philosophical themes, and a classic masterpiece. The sixth was a fun beach read: a cinematographic page-turner. The young woman behind the counter snatched the sixth book and looked up at me, face aglow. “This is such a good book!”...
Load more posts
Search this blog
Posts by category
- Book Previews (215)
- Guest Posts (3)
- Incidental Musings (96)
- News & Events (41)
- Photography Friday (15)
- Tales (59)
Books previewed
Lucky Jim Kingsley Amis
Projections Karl Deisseroth
The Indian Lawyer James Welch
Atomic Habits James Clear
The History of Philosophy A. C. Grayling
Dusk, Night, Dawn Anne Lamott
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? Philip K. Dick
Nothing to See Here Kevin Wilson
Change Damon Centola
Homeland Elegies Ayad Akhtar
Becoming Attached Robert Karen
Piranesi Susanna Clarke
Don Quixote Miguel de Cervantes
Solitary Albert Woodfox
Girl, Woman, Other Bernardine Evaristo
Enlightenment by Trial and Error Jay Michaelson
Death in Her Hands Ottessa Moshfegh
The Cooking Gene Michael W. Twitty
The First Bad Man Miranda July
Upheaval Jared Diamond
A Journal of the Plague Year Daniel Defoe
Creatures Crissy Van Meter
Indelicacy Amina Cain
Say What You Mean Oren Jay Sofer
Habits of a Happy Brain Loretta Graziano Breuning
Bad Behavior, This Is Pleasure Mary Gaitskill
The Brother Gardeners Andrea Wulf
Severance Ling Ma
How to Be an Antiracist Ibram X. Kendi
The Museum of Modern Love Heather Rose
Why I Write George Orwell
The Woman Destroyed Simone de Beauvoir
Educated Tara Westover
The Gift Hafiz
The Collected Schizophrenias Esmé Weijun Wang
Your Duck Is My Duck Deborah Eisenberg
Sapiens Yuval Noah Harari
Milkman Anna Burns
Under the Banner of Heaven Jon Krakauer
Waiting for Bojangles Olivier Bourdeaut
A Mind Unraveled Kurt Eichenwald
Eugénie Grandet Honoré de Balzac
The Body Keeps the Score Bessel van der Kolk, M.D.
The Bookshop Penelope Fitzgerald
Digital Minimalism Cal Newport
The Sisters Brothers Patrick deWitt
Dare to Lead Brené Brown
My Year of Rest and Relaxation Ottessa Moshfegh
Almost Everything Anne Lamott
Born to Run Christopher McDougall, Bruce Springsteen
The Ladies’ Paradise Émile Zola
The World Beyond Your Head Matthew B. Crawford
All the Birds, Singing Evie Wyld
Barracoon Zora Neale Hurston
Dandelion Wine Ray Bradbury
JavaScript & jQuery Jon Duckett
Home Fire Kamila Shamsie
The Weather Detective Peter Wohlleben
Play It As It Lays Joan Didion
The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck Mark Manson
Convenience Store Woman Sayaka Murata
Perfect Me Heather Widdows
Sorry to Disrupt the Peace Patty Yumi Cottrell
Why Buddhism Is True Robert Wright
What Is Real? Adam Becker
Kudos Rachel Cusk
The Days of Abandonment Elena Ferrante
F*cked Corinne Fisher & Krystyna Hutchinson
Searching for Stars on an Island in Maine Alan Lightman
Wide Sargasso Sea Jean Rhys
Infinite Jest David Foster Wallace
A Room of One’s Own Virginia Woolf
Projections Karl Deisseroth
The Indian Lawyer James Welch
Atomic Habits James Clear
The History of Philosophy A. C. Grayling
Dusk, Night, Dawn Anne Lamott
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? Philip K. Dick
Nothing to See Here Kevin Wilson
Change Damon Centola
Homeland Elegies Ayad Akhtar
Becoming Attached Robert Karen
Piranesi Susanna Clarke
Don Quixote Miguel de Cervantes
Solitary Albert Woodfox
Girl, Woman, Other Bernardine Evaristo
Enlightenment by Trial and Error Jay Michaelson
Death in Her Hands Ottessa Moshfegh
The Cooking Gene Michael W. Twitty
The First Bad Man Miranda July
Upheaval Jared Diamond
A Journal of the Plague Year Daniel Defoe
Creatures Crissy Van Meter
Indelicacy Amina Cain
Say What You Mean Oren Jay Sofer
Habits of a Happy Brain Loretta Graziano Breuning
Bad Behavior, This Is Pleasure Mary Gaitskill
The Brother Gardeners Andrea Wulf
Severance Ling Ma
How to Be an Antiracist Ibram X. Kendi
The Museum of Modern Love Heather Rose
Why I Write George Orwell
The Woman Destroyed Simone de Beauvoir
Educated Tara Westover
The Gift Hafiz
The Collected Schizophrenias Esmé Weijun Wang
Your Duck Is My Duck Deborah Eisenberg
Sapiens Yuval Noah Harari
Milkman Anna Burns
Under the Banner of Heaven Jon Krakauer
Waiting for Bojangles Olivier Bourdeaut
A Mind Unraveled Kurt Eichenwald
Eugénie Grandet Honoré de Balzac
The Body Keeps the Score Bessel van der Kolk, M.D.
The Bookshop Penelope Fitzgerald
Digital Minimalism Cal Newport
The Sisters Brothers Patrick deWitt
Dare to Lead Brené Brown
My Year of Rest and Relaxation Ottessa Moshfegh
Almost Everything Anne Lamott
Born to Run Christopher McDougall, Bruce Springsteen
The Ladies’ Paradise Émile Zola
The World Beyond Your Head Matthew B. Crawford
All the Birds, Singing Evie Wyld
Barracoon Zora Neale Hurston
Dandelion Wine Ray Bradbury
JavaScript & jQuery Jon Duckett
Home Fire Kamila Shamsie
The Weather Detective Peter Wohlleben
Play It As It Lays Joan Didion
The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck Mark Manson
Convenience Store Woman Sayaka Murata
Perfect Me Heather Widdows
Sorry to Disrupt the Peace Patty Yumi Cottrell
Why Buddhism Is True Robert Wright
What Is Real? Adam Becker
Kudos Rachel Cusk
The Days of Abandonment Elena Ferrante
F*cked Corinne Fisher & Krystyna Hutchinson
Searching for Stars on an Island in Maine Alan Lightman
Wide Sargasso Sea Jean Rhys
Infinite Jest David Foster Wallace
A Room of One’s Own Virginia Woolf
Get the newsletter
This blog is about seeking wisdom through books and elsewhere. Subscribe to engage with some of the greatest books and ideas of the present and past.
Most frequent tags
anxiety
art
blogs
books
bookstores
brains
children
comedy
communication
concussions
coronavirus
dating
doctors
drugs
family
food
Fridays
friends
health
history
Internet
literature
love
mental health
music
novels
philosophy
phones
photography
poetry
politics
psychology
publishing
reading
running
science
self
society
the inquisitive one
truth
wisdom
women
work
writers
writing
Posts by month
- October 2021
- September 2021
- August 2021
- July 2021
- June 2021
- April 2021
- March 2021
- February 2021
- January 2021
- December 2020
- November 2020
- October 2020
- September 2020
- August 2020
- June 2020
- May 2020
- April 2020
- March 2020
- February 2020
- January 2020
- December 2019
- September 2019
- August 2019
- July 2019
- June 2019
- May 2019
- April 2019
- March 2019
- February 2019
- January 2019
- December 2018
- November 2018
- October 2018
- September 2018
- August 2018
- July 2018
- June 2018
- May 2018
- April 2018
