I’m excited to announce that both of my Meetup groups are back in business! Silent Book Club of Rockville held its first meeting in months on December 6, 2020. The next meeting will be on December 20, 2020. Shut Up & Write! Gaithersburg will be holding its first meeting in months on January 2, 2021. Both groups follow a similar...
Like many people this year, I am having to cut back on spending. This means buying fewer books and relying more on my public library. But my library isn’t the same comfortable place it used to be. . . . So begins my most recent article on the Silent Book Club blog. Read the rest of the article! Is your...
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...
What’s the formula for getting the very best students in the world? Great students are a great thing to have in a democracy, because the democratic process requires an educated populace in order to function well. How can people be expected to research candidates and issues and then make informed decisions, without possessing advanced reading and critical thinking skills? Great...
Hi, friends. How are you holding up? Someone dear to me sent me the following image and gave me permission to share it. (I’d love to give attribution if I could learn where it originated. So if you created this, send me a message, and I’ll give proper attribution.) So here are some great daily quarantine questions for all of...
Are any of you book lovers struggling, as I am, to read the books on your bedside table right now? I’m drawn to the news, to the big topics of the day. I was commiserating with a friend about this, and she spontaneously thought up a list of readings, ranging from centuries ago to the present day, having to do...
Waaaaay back on September 9, 2019, two days before something fell on my head, I wrote a post called How I Learned to Write (Part 1: Was It in College?). At the end of it, I promised to write more on the topic next time. This didn’t happen—actually for various reasons; it wasn’t just due to the concussion. It was...
Speaking of ranters, today I’d like to introduce to you a writer I adore. Like me, she writes a blog for people who like to read, write, and think. Unlike me, she doesn’t restrict her rants to Christmas Day. They come all year round! And if you happen to be a writer, she’s def someone to have on your radar....
The short story “The Woman Destroyed” has quite the breathtaking title, don’t you think? I mean, destroyed is a hardcore word. This is not, apparently, a story about a woman annoyed, a woman thwarted, a woman in a bit of pain, or a woman having a bad day. This is about a woman destroyed. The most relevant synonyms for destroyed...
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...
Strangely enough, I did not take any writing courses in college. Neither my B.A. in English nor my M.Ed. in English required me to take even a single writing course. There was a writing course requirement for all incoming students at the college (of arts and sciences) within the larger university that I attended; but I passed out of it....
The inquisitive one was in the living room, reading. The doorbell rang. The inquisitive one was in the middle of a good part. With a sigh, the inquisitive one set down the book, hopped down the stairs, and opened the door. No one was there. The inquisitive one almost shut the door. But a large van was making motoring noises...
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Books previewed
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
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
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