January in Review — Lit Chat, Vol. 15
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Hi friends,
January was a long, hard month, but there were a few bright spots, including a bunch of really great book events (Jami Attenberg! Kaveh Akbar!), comedy shows, time with friends, and absconding to Florida for some much-needed sunshine.
And of course, the books. In a month where most of my well-intentioned goals for the new year went swiftly out the window in record time, at least my reading stayed mostly consistent. Books are always a lifeline for me in the winter, but this year, they’ve felt especially necessary. If you have any good winter escapist recs, I would love to hear them.
Moving right along, we’ve got a full slate this month! If you’d prefer to get this post sent directly to your inbox, consider subscribing to my Substack below.
THE FOUNDATION:
Mad Honey — Jodi Picoult and Jennifer Finney Boylan
I’m not really a Jodi Picoult fan, but this book did prompt one of the most thoughtful book club discussions we’ve had in a long time. Picoult and Boylan largely split the writing for Mad Honey, with Boylan writing the perspective of Lily, a high school senior who tragically dies, and Picoult writing Olivia, a single mother whose son is put on trial for his girlfriend’s death. I preferred Lily’s chapters and appreciated that they were authored by someone with a particularly relevant lived experience, but I didn’t love that the plot ended up hinging on a surprise revelation that made way for a lot of topical spoon-feeding. That said, if there are readers who genuinely learn something about other people’s identities and experiences from this page-turner, then it’s achieving what it sets out to do.
Days at the Morisaki Bookshop — Satoshi Yagisawa, translated by Eric Ozawa
One of my reading goals for the year is to read more in translation, and this one was a fun start! After a bad breakup, Takako quits her life in the city to fulfill my personal dream of living and working in her uncle’s secondhand bookshop in Jimbocho, Tokyo, a neighborhood known for its many used bookshops. Once she’s back on her feet, she finds she has the opportunity to help her uncle do the same when his estranged wife reappears out of the blue. This gentle, heartwarming little book left me with a newfound interest in Tokyo’s secondhand bookshop scene and a whole reading list of translated Japanese literature, courtesy of the translator’s note at the end.
Iron Flame — Rebecca Yarros
The silver lining of an otherwise unsuccessful trip to the DMV in December was discovering that I had somehow been delivered a “skip-the-line” copy of this Fourth Wing sequel on Libby (did anyone else know this existed??). In this one, we’re back with Violet for her second year in the Riders Quadrant, but she’s struggling to hide the truth about what’s really threatening Navarre’s borders from her friends. When she finally caves, the story opens up at last to a world beyond Basgiath, with a host of new characters, folklore, and secrets to be uncovered—and kept. Supposedly this is only book #2 of 5, and judging by the ending, I’d say readers will need to strap in tight for the rest of the series. (TV adaptation when???)
SOLID SUPPORTS:
Minor Detail — Adania Shibli, translated by Elisabeth Jaquette
(CW: rape)
Another book in translation, this time from Palestinian author Adania Shibli. Coming in at just over a hundred pages, the first half of this book follows an Israeli officer in the aftermath of the Nakba in 1949, tasked with eradicating the last of the Arabs in the newly occupied territory. Over the course of these raids, the officers capture, rape, and kill a young Palestinian girl. Years later, a woman living in occupied Palestine reads of the incident and is consumed by the desire to learn more from the girl’s perspective.
This brief, haunting narrative is especially poignant when you consider that it was published in 2017, years before this latest chapter of horrific violence in the region but a product of the same conflict that has been ongoing for over seventy years. The book’s foundation is one of violence and eradication, so it’s unsurprising that the painstaking efforts of the second half to recover any personal details resembling truth are ultimately unsuccessful. There are no easy answers here, no closure, and no justice. How can answers be found when there is no one left to keep them, much less find them? This dilemma is once again unfolding in real-time, so if you haven’t written to your senators in a while about supporting a ceasefire, now would be a great time.
Trespasses — Louise Kennedy
Oh, how I love my Irish lit, depressing as it may be. Set in Belfast at the height of The Troubles, Trespasses follows Cushla, a young Catholic primary school teacher who begins an affair with an older, married Protestant barrister. I don’t usually go in for affair storylines, but for me, the romance took a backseat to the other alluring personalities that filled Cushla’s world: the eccentric regulars at her brother’s pub, the world-weary first-graders in her class, her sharp-tongued, alcoholic mother who misses absolutely nothing.
Kennedy brings this community to life in vivid color with smart, witty dialogue and a stark awareness of the boundaries drawn between themselves and the city around them, contrasting their would-be quiet lives with the persistent violence that is quite literally on their doorstep. The book is a study not merely of political conflict, but of internal and interpersonal conflict as well. All of this pushes Cushla to consider just how much she wants to ask from the life she’s been given—and whether it’s enough. I was surprised by how much I wound up enjoying the end of this one, and I’m looking forward to reading Kennedy’s short story collection, The End of the World Is a Cul de Sac, as well.
THE TIPPY TOP:
The Book of (More) Delights — Ross Gay
This book is as delightful as its title, made even more so by the author’s joyful audiobook narration. Though I haven’t read its predecessor, The Book of Delights, I believe this follow-up uses much the same format as a collection of daily musings on things the author finds delightful. The delights cover everything from hiking misadventures to gardening, gnomes, beloved family members, aging, basketball, trucks, angels, and many tender observations about the small routines and intimacies that make life precious.
About midway through the book, Gay comes to the realization that the delights are doubling as gratitudes, that they are a way of looking at the world with love and thankfulness for the gift of being able to experience them. As I listened to each delight while walking around my neighborhood, I found myself looking for—and finding—things to be grateful for in the vein of delights: the somehow as-yet unfrozen koi pond on the corner of my block; strangers who smile at you on the street in a wholesome, non-creepy way; the legion of Brooklyn Heights dogs in coats and booties; and the unexpected relief of walking out the front door and finding it warmer outside than expected.
These delights were a much-needed ray of sunshine in an otherwise tough, gray month. Being able to start my reading year off with these words of gratitude, and with the opportunity to use them as a lens for finding joy in my own life, was nothing short of a gift.
That’s all for January! I’m very excited about my February reading because the BPL gods have smiled on me (see below photo), so it’s safe to say I am BUSY for the foreseeable future (but also always down to chat in all the usual places).
Until next time, happy reading!
❤ Catherine
Catherine Thoms 