reads on my radar: the disco tour edition!
Believe me when I say that half-day Fridays are still ALL ABOUT WORK. I just arrived home from errands, and I have a screenplay treatment to revise, a book to read, clothes to dryclean/wash, a house to clean, a pet to fondle, emails to write, a newsletter to finally (finally!) compose, snaps to take, clothes to photograph/measure & post on ebay, and the list simply DOES NOT QUIT. However, toffee-nut coffee in tow (I told you I’d be addicted), I can’t help but gush about the choice reads that have landed in my lap. These are the books that are on my radar and me being the book pusher that I am, I encourage you to head to your nearest library, website or independent bookstore and get to reading!
Little Brown doesn’t send me books all that often, so I learned of Elizabeth McCracken’s memoir from Rachel Kramer Bussel’s twitter gush. I was fond of McCracken’s tale of misfits (The Giant’s House), so I was intrigued to learn more about her latest, An Exact Replica of a Figment of My Imagination. A highly personal and tragic story of motherhood and loss, An Exact Replica is McCracken’s story of a successful, itinerant novelist who falls in love, gets married, moves to France, gets pregnant…and then suddenly loses her child during the last month of her pregnancy. This remarkably brave book is what the author calls “…the happiest story in the world with the saddest ending.” Her meditation of love and grief is inspiring. It’s a slim book and I’m midway through and loving it.
If you don’t recall me prattling on about Curtis Sittenfeld’s compulsively readable and terrifically conceived, , please join me in pre-order heaven. I’ll admit that I am the last person to say anything kind about the Bush administration, yet this sympathetic and honest look at a first wife who closely resembles Laura Bush — an opinionated, articulate and bold woman — who happens to be married to (and deeply in love with) an inept, bull-headed president, made me reconsider just how complicated people, and love, are.
Other Worthy Reads: Glenda Burgess’s very moving memoir, The Geography of Love, Jasmine Becket-Griffith’s haunting representation of gothic art in Gothic Art Now, Sana Krasikov’s debut story-collection, One More Year, and Courtney Summer’s wonderful debut, .
August 22nd, 2008 at 9:47 pm
Aw, yay! And also–much luck conquering the To-Do List!
August 23rd, 2008 at 8:31 am
Thanks, Courtney! Half-way there. xoxox