When I was three years old, as I was told, and I may have some of the details wrong here, but this is my recollection of what I was told—my family was at a crossroads. We were living in the D.C. area. My dad was launching his career and got two good job offers. One was near a famous, glamorous...
Happy Valentine’s Day!! Today is the day when we get closer to our loved ones, share our most special bonds, and rejoice in love, romance, and companionship! So snuggle up to your . . . What’s that? You don’t have a special someone to snuggle up to? Well then, snuggle up to your heritage. Or your friends. Or your family....
Perhaps there is someone in your life with exquisitely refined literary taste. Perhaps this well-read (and certainly well-bred) specimen of homo sapiens is a beloved member of your circle of family and friends. Perhaps this intimately familiar relative or friend with belletristic tastes is on your holiday gift list; and perhaps you have not yet found the perfect gift to...
According to the Encyclopedia of Mental Disorders, involuntary hospitalization “is an extremely controversial course of action.” In her 2019 book The Collected Schizophrenias, Esmé Weijun Wang steps into this controversy. She presents arguments from both sides. And she offers a unique perspective on the issue, having been involuntarily hospitalized herself, three times. On the pro side of the debate, sometimes...
Hello, fellow residents of our beautiful planet! I am writing this blog post from a cute Danish cafe in London. Here is a photo I took from my seat in the cafe. If you know me at least a bit, and if you look closely at the photo, you may be able to guess my favorite part of it. However,...
Honoré de Balzac’s novel Eugénie Grandet seems to imply that, contrary to popular belief, money can buy happiness! One of the main characters in the novel, Monsieur Grandet, glows with happiness upon learning of the multiplication of his funds, and when beholding his piles of gold. He even, upon receiving especially good news concerning his accounts, literally sings and dances....
One of the great things about the book The Body Keeps the Score, by Bessel van der Kolk, M.D., is that it is written for laypeople and practitioners alike. No matter whether you’re the one lying on the couch, so to speak, or the one with the credentials, the book contains massive amounts of research-based insights. One point that Dr....
Have you ever lived in a home with a fire alarm that was too sensitive? It creates quite the scene! You’re innocently boiling water on the stovetop, when the merest thread of smoke happens to emanate from the burner. You don’t notice it. You can’t see it. You can’t smell it. Your husband across the room can’t smell it. Not...
It has happened every time. While each of Brené Brown’s books builds upon her earlier ones, and much information is repeated, each successive volume has brought me a great new gift. Each has brought me old gifts: reminders of the secrets I learned previously and perhaps lost sight of, or left unintegrated into my current life. And they bring me...
It’s always interesting when you read something that corresponds so germanely to something that is happening in real life. I was recently talking to a wise friend of mine, who pointed out that every family has issues—even, or especially, the ones that seem perfect. No one should feel that their family is exceptionally messed up in comparison with other families,...
I would like to discuss with you a modern problem, one that has the potential to strain relationships, upset family members, destroy old friendships, prevent new friendships, and restrict opportunities of all kinds. All this, you say? Yes, the potential for all this, I say. What is this potentially destructive modern problem? you ask. Let me explain through a story,...
Do you know the Norman Rockwell painting called Freedom from Want? It’s the one where an elderly white couple is placing a cooked turkey on a not-too-elaborately set table, at which sit their smiling children and grandchildren. It a gorgeous painting, with a lovely sentiment behind it. Isn’t it wonderful, the painting seems to ask, to live in a country...
My brother and his family recently moved to my area, which has been a wondrous and unexpected blessing. For the first time in my adult life, I am living near relatives. There’s a part of me that wants to say, “Go away—you’re encroaching on my territory!” but that’s my self-destructive side. I am not used to having family nearby; I...
It’s natural to focus on the first-person narrator of a novel; but if we learn almost nothing about her, how can we? Yet when she’s the central character and the only one present in all scenes and not just in passing—how can we not see her as the focus? On the other hand, how can we focus on the many...
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Books previewed
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
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
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