Counting the Cost by Jill Duggar

Title: Counting the Cost

Author: Jill Duggar

Publisher: Gallery Books 2023

Genre: Romance

Pages: 288

Rating: 3/5 stars

Reading Challenges: 

Jill and Derick knew a normal life wasn’t possible for them. As a star on the popular TLC reality show 19 Kids and Counting, Jill grew up in front of viewers who were fascinated by her family’s way of life. She was the responsible, second daughter of Jim Bob and Michelle’s nineteen kids; always with a baby on her hip and happy to wear the modest ankle-length dresses with throat-high necklines. She didn’t protest the strict model of patriarchy that her family followed, which declares that men are superior, that women are expected to be wives and mothers and are discouraged from attaining a higher education, and that parental authority over their children continues well into adulthood, even once they are married.

But as Jill got older, married Derick, and they embarked on their own lives, the red flags became too obvious to ignore.

For as long as they could, Jill and Derick tried to be obedient family members—they weren’t willing to rock the boat. But now they’re raising a family of their own, and they’re done with the secrets. Thanks to time, tears, therapy, and blessings from God, they have the strength to share their journey. Theirs is a remarkable story of the power of the truth and is a moving example of how to find healing through honesty.

I succumbed to publishing peer pressure and grabbed this one from the library shelves. I ended up pretty disappointed in this read, but wasn’t sure exactly why. Of course, I don’t believe in an higher power, but I don’t think that was my problem. The more I examined my thoughts, I can down to a few aspects that I did not like. The biggest of these is that it feels like Jill has not done enough reflection to see her upbringing clearly. She maintains that her childhood was overall very good. It’s only in the last sections of the book that she questions the authority model for her entire family. But the examination is cursory. I’m not asking her to turn her back on her entire family or faith, but clearly there were a lot of concerning situations and models that she just glosses over. I don’t need details of the abuse she suffered, but she seems to dismiss it throughout most of the book and only brings it up when discussing the financial compensation. Perhaps this book would have more reflection and nuance if it had been written five years in the future. It seems that she is too close to the situation to see clearly right now.

Next up on the TBR pile:

Beautiful Country by Qian Julie Wang

Title: Beautiful Country

Author: Qian Julie Wang

Publisher: Doubleday 2021

Genre: Memoir

Pages: 320

Rating: 3/5 stars

Reading Challenges: 52 Book Club - Refugee

In Chinese, the word for America, Mei Guo, translates directly to “beautiful country.” Yet when seven-year-old Qian arrives in New York City in 1994 full of curiosity, she is overwhelmed by crushing fear and scarcity. In China, Qian’s parents were professors; in America, her family is “illegal” and it will require all the determination and small joys they can muster to survive.

In Chinatown, Qian’s parents labor in sweatshops. Instead of laughing at her jokes, they fight constantly, taking out the stress of their new life on one another. Shunned by her classmates and teachers for her limited English, Qian takes refuge in the library and masters the language through books, coming to think of The Berenstain Bears as her first American friends. And where there is delight to be found, Qian relishes it: her first bite of gloriously greasy pizza, weekly “shopping days,” when Qian finds small treasures in the trash lining Brooklyn’s streets, and a magical Christmas visit to Rockefeller Center—confirmation that the New York City she saw in movies does exist after all.

But then Qian’s headstrong Ma Ma collapses, revealing an illness that she has kept secret for months for fear of the cost and scrutiny of a doctor’s visit. As Ba Ba retreats further inward, Qian has little to hold onto beyond his constant refrain: Whatever happens, say that you were born here, that you’ve always lived here.

Our August choice for book club and it just wasn’t my thing. Very rarely do I really enjoy a memoir/autobiography. They often fall a little flat for me and sometimes become very repetitive. This one started out interesting highlighting a life experience that is very different from my own. But… I found that Wang does not do enough self-reflection and commentary about her early life in America. We see many family members making terrible choices without commentary. Wide swathes of peoples are painted with a large brush, exactly what Wang argues is her own experience. I wanted to see a bit of self-reflection with her own biases and prejudices. We don’t get too much introspection. And then the book just ends. The last chapter does a bit of fast-forwarding to her later life, but it just felt unfinished in my mind.

Next up on the TBR pile:

A Year in the Woods by Torbjørn Ekelund

Title: A Year in the Woods: Twelve Small Journeys into Nature

Author: Torbjørn Ekelund

Publisher: Greystone Books 2021

Genre: Nature Memoir

Pages: 256

Rating: 5/5 stars

Reading Challenges:

As nature becomes ever more precious, we all want to spend more time appreciating it. But time is often hard to come by. And how do we appreciate nature without disruption? In this sensitively-written book, Torbjørn Ekelund, an acclaimed Norwegian nature writer, shares a creative and non-intrusive method for immersing oneself in nature. And the result is nothing short of transformative.

Evoking Henry David Thoreau and the four-season structure of Walden, Ekelundwrites about communing with nature by repeating a small, simple ritual and engaging in quiet reflection. At the start of the book, he hatches a plan: to leave the city after work one day per month, camp near the same tiny pond in the forest, and return to work the next day. He keeps this up for a year.

His ritual is far from rigorous and it is never perfect. One evening, he grows so cold in his tent that he hikes out before daybreak. But as Ekelund inevitably greets the same trees and boulders each month, he appreciates the banality of their sameness alongside their quiet beauty. He wonders how long they have stood silently in this place—and reflects on his own short existence among them.

A Year in the Woods asks us to reconsider our relationship with the natural world. Are we anxious wanderers or mindful observers? Do we honor the seasons or let them pass us by? At once beautifully written, accessible, and engaging, A Year in the Woods is the perfect book for anyone who longs for a deeper connection with their environment, but is realistic about time and ambition.

This book ended up in a big check out stack when I was looking for forest school lessons for coop. Most of the books were geared toward children, but this one was a little different. I finally picked it up and started reading not quite sure what I was going to find inside. Ultimately, I was delighted by this slim memoir focused on Ekelund’s plan to spend 12 days and nights out in nature. Right away, I loved that Ekelund makes it clear that he doesn’t believe that everyone needs or should do what he did. Further, he doesn’t believe that that’s any one way to experience nature. This was a refreshing take contrasted with a ton of books that basically tell the reader that if they don’t spend a majority of their time outside, they have failed as humans. Throughout the twelve chapters, we get Ekelund’s actual experiences, but also meditations on experience nature and human nature. I found myself reading only one chapter a day wanting to let the ideas sit for awhile before adding more. This is a much better book than Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods, stripping out all the problematic takes and focusing on the experience of being in nature. Loved it!

Next up on the TBR pile:

Acid for the Children by Flea

Title: Acid for the Children

Author: Flea

Publisher: Headline 2019

Genre: Memoir

Pages: 390

Rating: 3/5 stars

Reading Challenges: Spring TBR; 52 Book Club - Set in Australia

In Acid for the Children, Flea takes readers on a deeply personal and revealing tour of his formative years, spanning from Australia to the New York City suburbs to, finally, Los Angeles. Through hilarious anecdotes, poetical meditations, and occasional flights of fantasy, Flea deftly chronicles the experiences that forged him as an artist, a musician, and a young man. His dreamy, jazz-inflected prose makes the Los Angeles of the 1970s and 80s come to gritty, glorious life, including the potential for fun, danger, mayhem, or inspiration that lurked around every corner. It is here that young Flea, looking to escape a turbulent home, found family in a community of musicians, artists, and junkies who also lived on the fringe. He spent most of his time partying and committing petty crimes. But it was in music where he found a higher meaning, a place to channel his frustration, loneliness, and love. This left him open to the life-changing moment when he and his best friends, soul brothers, and partners-in-mischief came up with the idea to start their own band, which became the Red Hot Chili Peppers.

Acid for the Children is the debut of a stunning new literary voice, whose prose is as witty, entertaining, and wildly unpredictable as the author himself. It's a tenderly evocative coming-of-age story and a raucous love letter to the power of music and creativity from one of the most renowned musicians of our time.

I was bored. Seriously, I just didn’t get into this book at all and felt apathy every time I needed to pick it up. At times, Flea got very full of his own importance and it spilled out into the text. I just couldn’t get myself interested in this book. Memoir is not my genre, and this one definitely didn’t hit for me at all.

Next up on the TBR pile:

Ducks by Kate Beaton

Title: Ducks: Two Years in the Oil Sands

Author: Kate Beaton

Publisher: Drawn and Quarterly 2022

Genre: Graphic Novel Memoir

Pages: 448

Rating: 4/5 stars

Reading Challenges: Winter TBR; 52 Book Club

Before there was Kate Beaton, New York Times bestselling cartoonist of Hark! A Vagrant, there was Katie Beaton of the Cape Breton Beaton, specifically Mabou, a tight-knit seaside community where the lobster is as abundant as beaches, fiddles, and Gaelic folk songs. With the singular goal of paying off her student loans, Katie heads out west to take advantage of Alberta’s oil rush―part of the long tradition of East Coasters who seek gainful employment elsewhere when they can’t find it in the homeland they love so much. Katie encounters the harsh reality of life in the oil sands, where trauma is an everyday occurrence yet is never discussed.

Beaton’s natural cartooning prowess is on full display as she draws colossal machinery and mammoth vehicles set against a sublime Albertan backdrop of wildlife, northern lights, and boreal forest. Her first full length graphic narrative, Ducks: Two Years in the Oil Sands is an untold story of Canada: a country that prides itself on its egalitarian ethos and natural beauty while simultaneously exploiting both the riches of its land and the humanity of its people.

CW: Sexual harassment, rape

Fascinating look at life on an isolated mining facility in Canada. I have enjoyed Beaton’s comedic takes and was intrigued by this memoir. Be advised that this book details her experiences of sexual harassment and rape while working in the Oil Sands. This is not a comedy. This is a look at her life experiences and a discussion of how isolation can affect a person. I enjoyed some of the questions that jumped into my brain while reading. I will most definitely keep Beaton on a must-read list of authors.

Next up on the TBR pile:

I'm Glad My Mom Died by Jennette McCurdy

Title: I’m Glad My Mom Died

Author: Jennette McCurdy

Publisher: Simon & Schuster 2022

Genre: Memoir

Pages: 304

Rating: 4/5 stars

Reading Challenges:

Jennette McCurdy was six years old when she had her first acting audition. Her mother’s dream was for her only daughter to become a star, and Jennette would do anything to make her mother happy. So she went along with what Mom called “calorie restriction,” eating little and weighing herself five times a day. She endured extensive at-home makeovers while Mom chided, “Your eyelashes are invisible, okay? You think Dakota Fanning doesn’t tint hers?” She was even showered by Mom until age sixteen while sharing her diaries, email, and all her income.

In I’m Glad My Mom Died, Jennette recounts all this in unflinching detail—just as she chronicles what happens when the dream finally comes true. Cast in a new Nickelodeon series called iCarly, she is thrust into fame. Though Mom is ecstatic, emailing fan club moderators and getting on a first-name basis with the paparazzi (“Hi Gale!”), Jennette is riddled with anxiety, shame, and self-loathing, which manifest into eating disorders, addiction, and a series of unhealthy relationships. These issues only get worse when, soon after taking the lead in the iCarly spinoff Sam & Cat alongside Ariana Grande, her mother dies of cancer. Finally, after discovering therapy and quitting acting, Jennette embarks on recovery and decides for the first time in her life what she really wants.

CW: All the warnings! Sexual assault, Disorder eating, Child abuse

This was so tough to read and yet I did laugh at a few parts. McCurdy starts at the beginning to show us what exactly it was like growing up in her family. All the family secrets are laid bare as we struggle to understand how these people could treat a little girl like that. And then things get even worse as she ages. I was absolutely appalled at a few scenes and it was very difficult to read them. But you need to to understand why McCurdy then makes the choices that she does in her late teens and early 20s. Everything makes so much more sense. I was glad to see that she is finally on the road to recovery. But I think I would have like another 5 years or so before she wrote this book. I would have liked to hear a bit more about her recovery before reliving all this trauma.

Next up on the TBR pile:

Garlic and Sapphires by Ruth Reichl

Title: Garlic and Sapphires: The Secret Life of a Critic in Disguise

Author: Ruth Reichl

Publisher: Penguin 2006

Genre: Nonfiction

Pages: 364

Rating: 2/5 stars

Reading Challenges: Unread Shelf; Unread Shelf RC - Food/Cooking

GARLIC AND SAPPHIRES is Ruth Reichl's riotous account of the many disguises she employs to dine anonymously. There is her stint as Molly Hollis, a frumpy blond with manicured nails and an off-beige Armani suit that Ruth takes on when reviewing Le Cirque. The result: her famous double review of the restaurant: first she ate there as Molly; and then as she was coddled and pampered on her visit there as Ruth, New York Times food critic.

What is even more remarkable about Reichl's spy games is that as she takes on these various disguises, she finds herself changed not just superficially, but in character as well. She gives a remarkable account of how one's outer appearance can very much influence one's inner character, expectations, and appetites.

One of my book club selections for September and a book that has languished on my shelf for years. Unfortunately, I think it probably should have stayed there. I really enjoyed Reichl’s Save Me the Plums and hoped I would encounter the same fun and relatable woman in this earlier work about her job as a food critic. Instead, I feel like we get a very out-of-touch upper class woman intent on showing the common people the joy of food who actually shows us just how snobby many people (herself included) are when it comes to food. I am no stranger to good food and really enjoy tasting new flavors and expertly crafted dishes. But I realize that that’s not an everyday reality for most people (even me). Sometimes you just have to eat. Not everyone can be catered to and pay for a $100+ meal for one person. After about the fourth chapter, the book got really repetitively. I just ended dreading having to come back to this book.

Next up on the TBR pile:

Everyone You Hate is Going to Die by Daniel Sloss

Title: Everyone You Hate is Going to Die

Author: Daniel Sloss

Publisher: Knopf 2021

Genre: Memoir; Comedy

Pages: 259

Rating: 3/5 stars

Reading Challenges: Winter TBR

Daniel Sloss's stand-up comedy engages, enrages, offends, unsettles, educates, comforts, and gets audiences roaring with laughter—all at the same time. In his groundbreaking specials, seen on Netflix and HBO, he has brilliantly tackled everything from male toxicity and friendship to love, romance, and marriage—and claims (with the data to back it up) that his on-stage laser-like dissection of relationships has single-handedly caused more than 300 divorces and 120,000 breakups.

Now, in his first book, he picks up where his specials left off, and goes after every conceivable kind of relationship—with one's country (Sloss's is Scotland); with America; with lovers, ex-lovers, ex-lovers who you hate, ex-lovers who hate you; with parents; with best friends (male and female), not-best friends; with children; with siblings; and even with the global pandemic and our own mortality. In Everyone You Hate Is Going to Die, every human connection gets the brutally funny (and unfailingly incisive) Sloss treatment as he illuminates the ways in which all of our relationships are fragile and ridiculous and awful—but also valuable and meaningful and important.

At Christmas, my mother was raving about this one and demanded that I read this one. I had a bit of hesitation as I’m not usually fan of memoirs and comedy, but I thought that I would give it a try. There were funny passages and I did enjoy some the chapters. However, I didn’t love it and wasn’t ever desperate to get back to reading the book. Sloss’s voice swerved to grating at times and the casual arrogance was a bit much. I just didn’t love reading this one. I might enjoy his standup special, but reading the book form was not the best.

Next up on the TBR pile:

How the Word is Passed by Clint Smith

Title: How the Word is Passed: A Reckoning with the History of Slavery Across America

Author: Clint Smith

Publisher: Little, Brown and Company 2021

Genre: U.S. History / Memoir

Pages: 336

Rating: 5/5 stars

Reading Challenges: Winter TBR List

Beginning in his hometown of New Orleans, Clint Smith leads the reader on an unforgettable tour of monuments and landmarks—those that are honest about the past and those that are not—that offer an intergenerational story of how slavery has been central in shaping our nation’s collective history, and ourselves.

It is the story of the Monticello Plantation in Virginia, the estate where Thomas Jefferson wrote letters espousing the urgent need for liberty while enslaving more than four hundred people. It is the story of the Whitney Plantation, one of the only former plantations devoted to preserving the experience of the enslaved people whose lives and work sustained it. It is the story of Angola, a former plantation–turned–maximum-security prison in Louisiana that is filled with Black men who work across the 18,000-acre land for virtually no pay. And it is the story of Blandford Cemetery, the final resting place of tens of thousands of Confederate soldiers.

A deeply researched and transporting exploration of the legacy of slavery and its imprint on centuries of American history, How the Word Is Passed illustrates how some of our country’s most essential stories are hidden in plain view—whether in places we might drive by on our way to work, holidays such as Juneteenth, or entire neighborhoods like downtown Manhattan, where the brutal history of the trade in enslaved men, women, and children has been deeply imprinted.

Informed by scholarship and brought to life by the story of people living today, Smith’s debut work of nonfiction is a landmark of reflection and insight that offers a new understanding of the hopeful role that memory and history can play in making sense of our country and how it has come to be.

Another contender for my Top Books of 2022. This book partly U.S. History, partly memoir has me rethinking everything I know about the history of slavery in America and how it informs our society today. Overall, I knew a lot of the history presented, but I still found myself learning new-to-me facts and situations. But what I really hooked onto was the connection between those stories, how we tell them, and how it affects us today. Smith does a beautiful job showing the reader the connections between those three things and making the reader confront our own skewed perspectives. I found myself reflecting back to what I have been taught, what I taught, and what was missing. I kept thinking about the quote at the end of the book:

“The history of slavery is the history of the United States. It was not peripheral to our founding; it was central to it. This history is in our soil, it is in our policies, and it must, too, be in our memories.” (pg. 289)

I keep coming back to this idea and then reexamining what it meant to examine this history. I loved how Smith put in in an early chapter of the book:

“But there is enormous value in providing young people with the language, the history, and the framework to identify why their society looks the way it does. Understanding that all of this was done not by accident but by design. That did not strip me of agency, it gave agency back to me. I watched these young people share this history, and I dreamed of what it might mean if we could extend these lessons toe very child. How different might our country look if all of us fully understood what has happened here?” (pg. 179)

We need to put our history out into the open, examine it from all sides, and then take lessons from it. We need to learn to be able to move forward in a purposeful way. For my own personal life, I will be thinking about my own past, and my family’s past, and how we have been complicit in the continuation of slavery in America. Smith has so much to teach each one of us about our role in this country. The book and the lessons I learned are going to keep coming back to me for years to come. Such a powerful read.

Next up on the TBR pile:

The Anthropocene Reviewed by John Green

Title: The Anthropocene Reviewed

Author: John Green

Publisher: Dutton 2021

Genre: Memoir

Pages: 304

Rating: 5/5 stars

Reading Challenges: 

The Anthropocene is the current geologic age, in which humans have profoundly reshaped the planet and its biodiversity. In this remarkable symphony of essays adapted and expanded from his groundbreaking podcast, bestselling author John Green reviews different facets of the human-centered planet on a five-star scale—from the QWERTY keyboard and sunsets to Canada geese and Penguins of Madagascar.

Funny, complex, and rich with detail, the reviews chart the contradictions of contemporary humanity. As a species, we are both far too powerful and not nearly powerful enough, a paradox that came into sharp focus as we faced a global pandemic that both separated us and bound us together.

I’m going to start by saying that this book is definitely going onto my Top 10 of the year. It’s just that good! I finally picked this up thinking that I would read an uneven collection of memoir style essays. Sure I love John Green and his writing, but could his collection of essays engage me all the way through? Turns out that they can. From the mundane to the profound, from the serious to the comedic, Green covers a variety of topics that resonantly directly with me and my life. (As a side note, John Green and I have a lot in common, from where have lived {Indiana} to, at times, crippling anxiety. We are only a few years apart {4 to be exact} and connect on so many strange life points.) On the surface, this is a book of reviews for a variety of subjects, events, and ideas. For example, we get to hear all about the importance of Diet Dr Pepper. But embedded in these reviews are life truths expressed and quiet thoughts and emotions said out loud. Much of this book was written during the pandemic and there are many times when Green connects a variety of ideas to the reality of his present in quarantine. I was moved to laughter and tears throughout this collection. And I was forcing into J’s hands at multiple times. Guess it’s time for me to buy my own copy of this one. I give John Green and The Anthropocene Reviewed five stars!

Next up on the TBR pile:

Bad Fat Black Girl by Sesali Bowen

Title: Bad Fat Black Girl: Notes from a Trap Feminist

Author: Sesali Bowen

Publisher: Amistad 2021

Genre: Nonfiction - Memoir

Pages: 272

Rating: 5/5 stars

Reading Challenges: 

Growing up on the south side of Chicago, Sesali Bowen learned early on how to hustle, stay on her toes, and champion other Black women and femmes as she navigated Blackness, queerness, fatness, friendship, poverty, sex work, and self-love. 

Her love of trap music led her to the top of hip-hop journalism, profiling game-changing artists like Megan Thee Stallion, Lizzo, and Janelle Monae. But despite all the beauty, complexity, and general badassery she saw, Bowen found none of that nuance represented in mainstream feminism. Thus, she coined Trap Feminism, a contemporary framework that interrogates where feminism meets today's hip-hop.

Bad Fat Black Girl offers a new, inclusive feminism for the modern world. Weaving together searing personal essay and cultural commentary, Bowen interrogates sexism, fatphobia, and capitalism all within the context of race and hip-hop. In the process, she continues a Black feminist legacy of unmatched sheer determination and creative resilience.

Bad bitches: this one’s for you.

I’m not usually one for memoirs as I find them to be too self-absorbed and also generalizing. I appreciated this volume focusing on intersectional feminism because of Bowen voice and experiences. We get something very different from the white lady feminism common on Women’s Studies bookshelves. I really dove into her experience and the ways that her life has informed her view of feminism. This was such a great “window” book for me. I cannot understand Bowen’s experience, but I could learn from her stories and her critiques. Definitely a must read for any feminist.

Next up on the TBR pile:

World Travel by Anthony Bourdain and Laurie Woolever

Title: World Travel: An Irreverent Guide

Author: Anthony Bourdain and Laurie Woolever

Publisher: Ecco 2021

Genre: Travel Memoir

Pages: 480

Rating: 3/5 stars

Reading Challenges: Modern Mrs. Darcy; Summer TBR

Anthony Bourdain saw more of the world than nearly anyone. His travels took him from the hidden pockets of his hometown of New York to a tribal longhouse in Borneo, from cosmopolitan Buenos Aires, Paris, and Shanghai to Tanzania’s utter beauty and the stunning desert solitude of Oman’s Empty Quarter—and many places beyond.

In World Travel, a life of experience is collected into an entertaining, practical, fun and frank travel guide that gives readers an introduction to some of his favorite places—in his own words. Featuring essential advice on how to get there, what to eat, where to stay and, in some cases, what to avoid, World Travel provides essential context that will help readers further appreciate the reasons why Bourdain found a place enchanting and memorable.

Supplementing Bourdain’s words are a handful of essays by friends, colleagues, and family that tell even deeper stories about a place, including sardonic accounts of traveling with Bourdain by his brother, Christopher; a guide to Chicago’s best cheap eats by legendary music producer Steve Albini, and more. Additionally, each chapter includes illustrations by Wesley Allsbrook.

For veteran travelers, armchair enthusiasts, and those in between, World Travel offers a chance to experience the world like Anthony Bourdain.

I picked this up because Anne Bogel chose it for the Summer Reading Guide. I was intrigued by the prospect of reading the last work from Anthony Bourdain. Unfortunately the idea of this book far outweighed the actual execution of this book. The book is part travel guide and part rumination on the soul of countries. I enjoyed the ruminations. I enjoyed the essays written by those who new Bourdain. I just didn’t enjoy the parts that were more akin to a travel guide. Overall, the book really just made me want to watch No Reservations or Parts Unknown again.

Next up on the TBR pile:

Wintering by Katherine May

Title: Wintering: The Power of Rest and Retreat in Difficult Times

Author: Katherine May

Publisher: Riverhead Books 2020

Genre: Nonfiction

Pages: 255

Rating: 5/5 stars

Reading Challenges: Seasonal TBR

Sometimes you slip through the cracks: unforeseen circumstances like an abrupt illness, the death of a loved one, a break up, or a job loss can derail a life. These periods of dislocation can be lonely and unexpected. For May, her husband fell ill, her son stopped attending school, and her own medical issues led her to leave a demanding job. Wintering explores how she not only endured this painful time, but embraced the singular opportunities it offered.

A moving personal narrative shot through with lessons from literature, mythology, and the natural world, May's story offers instruction on the transformative power of rest and retreat. Illumination emerges from many sources: solstice celebrations and dormice hibernation, C.S. Lewis and Sylvia Plath, swimming in icy waters and sailing arctic seas.

Ultimately Wintering invites us to change how we relate to our own fallow times. May models an active acceptance of sadness and finds nourishment in deep retreat, joy in the hushed beauty of winter, and encouragement in understanding life as cyclical, not linear. A secular mystic, May forms a guiding philosophy for transforming the hardships that arise before the ushering in of a new season.

I am a bit speechless about this book. I expected to zip through it and write it off as another memoir/self-help style book that I did not enjoy. Instead, I read the introduction and was absolutely floored by how much I was connecting with the author’s philosophy of life. But I also didn’t want to speed through it. I ended a chapter every few days to allow myself to really sit with the messages. At about the fourth chapter or so, I declared that I needed to own this book. As a 39 year old woman, I feel like I’m hitting of lot of the rough patches in life that May dealt with. I can definitely place myself in her shoes and contemplate how to move forward. I’m definitely experiencing a wintering season in my own life. The book may have been written pre-pandemic, but it’s exactly right for right now. The copy I read is from the library’s and will be returned this week. But I will be ordering my own copy and soon. I want to read the sections along with the calendar. As the book really starts in September, I have a few weeks to acquire my own copy. This is a contender for my Top 10 books of the year.

Next up on the TBR pile:

Broken by Jenny Lawson

Title: Broken (in the best possible-way)

Author: Jenny Lawson

Publisher: Henry Holt 2021

Genre: Nonfiction

Pages: 304

Rating: 5/5 stars

Reading Challenges: Seasonal TBR; Modern Mrs. Darcy Summer Reading Guide

As Jenny Lawson’s hundreds of thousands of fans know, she suffers from depression. In Broken, Jenny brings readers along on her mental and physical health journey, offering heartbreaking and hilarious anecdotes along the way.

With people experiencing anxiety and depression now more than ever, Jenny humanizes what we all face in an all-too-real way, reassuring us that we’re not alone and making us laugh while doing it. From the business ideas that she wants to pitch to Shark Tank to the reason why Jenny can never go back to the post office, Broken leaves nothing to the imagination in the most satisfying way. And of course, Jenny’s long-suffering husband Victor―the Ricky to Jenny’s Lucille Ball―is present throughout.

I love Jenny Lawson so much. She can make me laugh hysterically one minute and have be sobbing the next minute. True story: J told me that I couldn’t read this book in bed because I was shaking the bed too much with my laughter. Lawson is just as absurd as she has been in the previous books. The funny chapters balance out the very tough chapters dealing with life’s struggles. After reading this one from the library, I have to buy this one for my own shelves. I am still thinking about so many of the life lessons that I was reminded of throughout the chapters. So incredibly good.

Next up on the TBR pile:

Buy Yourself the Fucking Lilies by Tara Schuster

Title: Buy Yourself the Fucking Lilies: And Other Rituals to Fix Your Life, from Someone Who's Been There

Author: Tara Schuster

Publisher: Dial Press Trade 2020

Genre: Nonfiction - Self-help, Memoir

Pages: 352

Rating: 3/5 stars

Reading Challenges: Seasonal TBR

By the time she was in her late twenties, Tara Schuster was a rising TV executive who had worked for The Daily Show with Jon Stewart and helped launch Key & Peele to viral superstardom. By all appearances, she had mastered being a grown-up. But beneath that veneer of success, she was a chronically anxious, self-medicating mess. No one knew that her road to adulthood had been paved with depression, anxiety, and shame, owing in large part to her minimally parented upbringing. She realized she’d hit rock bottom when she drunk-dialed her therapist pleading for help.

Buy Yourself the F*cking Lilies is the story of Tara’s path to re-parenting herself and becoming a “ninja of self-love.” Through simple, daily rituals, Tara transformed her mind, body, and relationships, and shows how to

• fake gratitude until you actually feel gratitude
• excavate your emotional wounds and heal them with kindness
• identify your self-limiting beliefs, kick them to the curb, and start living a life you choose
• silence your inner frenemy and shield yourself from self-criticism
• carve out time each morning to start your day empowered, inspired, and ready to rule
• create a life you truly, totally f*cking LOVE

This is the book Tara wished someone had given her and it is the book many of us desperately need: a candid, hysterical, addictively readable, practical guide to growing up (no matter where you are in life) and learning to love yourself in a non-throw-up-in-your-mouth-it’s-so-cheesy way.

Hmmmm… this book is not for me, but I don’t think it’s necessarily a bad book. I just didn’t get a lot out of the life lessons included in the chapters.

Next up on the TBR pile:

Know My Name by Chanel Miller

Title: Know My Name

Author: Chanel Miller

Publisher: Penguin Books 2020

Genre: Nonfiction

Pages: 384

Rating: 5/5 stars

Reading Challenges:

She was known to the world as Emily Doe when she stunned millions with a letter. Brock Turner had been sentenced to just six months in county jail after he was found sexually assaulting her on Stanford's campus. Her victim impact statement was posted on BuzzFeed, where it instantly went viral--viewed by eleven million people within four days, it was translated globally and read on the floor of Congress; it inspired changes in California law and the recall of the judge in the case. Thousands wrote to say that she had given them the courage to share their own experiences of assault for the first time.

Now she reclaims her identity to tell her story of trauma, transcendence, and the power of words. It was the perfect case, in many ways--there were eyewitnesses, Turner ran away, physical evidence was immediately secured. But her struggles with isolation and shame during the aftermath and the trial reveal the oppression victims face in even the best-case scenarios. Her story illuminates a culture biased to protect perpetrators, indicts a criminal justice system designed to fail the most vulnerable, and, ultimately, shines with the courage required to move through suffering and live a full and beautiful life.

This was such a difficult book to read, but it was so incredibly good. The chapters are a very detailed account of Miller’s experience. I ended up finishing the book but had to take a break after each chapter. I wasn’t quite that surprised by anything that happened her to her, but it still make me absolutely full of rage.

Next up on the TBR pile:

Solutions and Other Problems by Allie Brosh

Title: Solutions and Other Problems

Author: Allie Brosh

Publisher: Gallery Books 2020

Genre: Graphic novel; Memoir

Pages: 518

Rating:  4/5 stars

Reading Challenges: Winter TBR

Solutions and Other Problems includes humorous stories from Allie Brosh’s childhood; the adventures of her very bad animals; merciless dissection of her own character flaws; incisive essays on grief, loneliness, and powerlessness; as well as reflections on the absurdity of modern life.

Another lovely collection of stories from Allie Brosh’s life. There were a few stories that I really connected with, some other ones were really funny, and some were a bit strange (in that they didn’t seem to have a point). Like all collections of stories, I don’t love all of them equally. But, I might say that really did choke up during her story about her sister. I was not expecting that turn and it really threw me for a loop. Overall an enjoyable collection of comics from a very complicated person.

Next up on the TBR pile:

Shrill by Lindy West

Title: Shrill: Notes from a Loud Woman

Author: Lindy West

Publisher: Hachette Books 2016

Genre: Nonfiction

Pages: 272

Rating: 4/5 stars

Reading Challenges: 

Coming of age in a culture that demands women be as small, quiet, and compliant as possible--like a porcelain dove that will also have sex with you--writer and humorist Lindy West quickly discovered that she was anything but.

From a painfully shy childhood in which she tried, unsuccessfully, to hide her big body and even bigger opinions; to her public war with stand-up comedians over rape jokes; to her struggle to convince herself, and then the world, that fat people have value; to her accidental activism and never-ending battle royale with Internet trolls, Lindy narrates her life with a blend of humor and pathos that manages to make a trip to the abortion clinic funny and wring tears out of a story about diarrhea.

With inimitable good humor, vulnerability, and boundless charm, Lindy boldly shares how to survive in a world where not all stories are created equal and not all bodies are treated with equal respect, and how to weather hatred, loneliness, harassment, and loss, and walk away laughing. Shrill provocatively dissects what it means to become self-aware the hard way, to go from wanting to be silent and invisible to earning a living defending the silenced in all caps.

One of my book clubs picked West’s newer book, The Witches are Coming, as our July selection. But on eof the members said that we should read her first book before if we could. SO I grabbed it from the library and started reading. Overall, I really enjoyed this collection of essays focused on identity and sexism. I really enjoyed West’s voice throughout the stories. Often I was laughing and then crying, all in the same 5 pages. There are some really powerful messages in this collection. My issue with most essay collections, is that the message started to become repetitive when reading them all in a row. I think i prefer collections where there are multiple authors writing about a topic. Still a good read.

Next up on the TBR pile:

A Homemade Life by Molly Wizenberg

Title: A Homemade Life: Stories and Recipes from My Kitchen Table

Author: Molly Wizenberg

Publisher: Simon & Schuster 2010

Genre: Nonfiction - Cooking; Memoir

Pages: 352

Rating: 3/5 stars

Reading Challenges: Library; MMD Previous

In A Homemade Life: Stories and Recipes from My Kitchen Table, Molly Wizenberg recounts a life with the kitchen at its center. From her mother's pound cake, a staple of summer picnics during her childhood in Oklahoma, to the eggs she cooked for her father during the weeks before his death, food and memories are intimately entwined. You won't be able to decide whether to curl up and sink into the story or to head straight to the market to fill your basket with ingredients for Cider-Glazed Salmon and Pistachio Cake with Honeyed Apricots.

Once again, I’m reminded that I don’t really like memoirs. I always go into them thinking that I will enjoy hearing about someone’s life, only to come away with a “meh” feeling about most of them. I thought this one might be different with the focus on food and recipes. I still didn’t really care about her life. I was intrigued by some of the recipes, but many of them feel very mundane. I would rather just pick up a cookbook and attempt the recipes. Not a bad book, just definitely not for me.

Next up on the TBR pile:

A Walk in the Woods by Bill Bryson

Title: A Walk in the Woods: Rediscovering America on the Appalachian Trail

Author: Bill Bryson

Publisher: Broadway Books 2010

Genre: Nonfiction - Travel Memoir

Pages: 397

Rating: 4/5 stars

Reading Challenges: UnRead Shelf Project

Back in America after twenty years in Britain, Bill Bryson decided to reacquaint himself with his native country by walking the 2,100-mile Appalachian Trail, which stretches from Georgia to Maine. The AT offers an astonishing landscape of silent forests and sparkling lakes—and to a writer with the comic genius of Bill Bryson, it also provides endless opportunities to witness the majestic silliness of his fellow human beings.

For a start there's the gloriously out-of-shape Stephen Katz, a buddy from Iowa along for the walk. Despite Katz's overwhelming desire to find cozy restaurants, he and Bryson eventually settle into their stride, and while on the trail they meet a bizarre assortment of hilarious characters. But A Walk in the Woods is more than just a laugh-out-loud hike. Bryson's acute eye is a wise witness to this beautiful but fragile trail, and as he tells its fascinating history, he makes a moving plea for the conservation of America's last great wilderness. An adventure, a comedy, and a celebration, A Walk in the Woods has become a modern classic of travel literature.

Our book club selection for May. We really wanted to get away from historical fiction specifically WWII historical fiction. This definitely delivered on that point. Instead of historical narrative, we get Bryson’s account of his attempt to walk the Appalachian Trail. At times I found Bryson and his various hiking companions to be insufferable but at least he can acknowledge that fact. I kept having flashbacks to reading Wild by Cheryl Strayed and how much I hated that book. I finally pinpointed that one of my issues with Strayed was her philosophy of life. Many times it cam across as “everyone should do this to live a fulfilled life.” I just didn’t get that from Bryson at all. He had more of an attitude of “I got this idea of walking the trail, I attempted it, I had some thoughts about my own life, but you do you.” In the end, I found that I really enjoyed this book and need to add some of his other books to my TBR list.

Next up on the TBR pile: