“I’m not going to buy any new books until I’ve read the ones I already own.”
- The Unfamiliar: A Queer Motherhood Memoir by Kirsty Logan (2023) A lesbian couple’s journey to parenthood through an unfamiliar landscape. Told compellingly in the 2nd person, which makes it both more and less personal. Thumbs up.
- Random Acts of Optimism by Alison Wells (2023). Superb short fiction collection from one of my favorite authors.
- A Shot to Save the World by Gregory Zuckerman (2021). Non-fic story of the development of the Covid vaccines — yey for scientists being represented as hardworking, ethical and caring.
- Hold on to Your Kids: Why Parents Need to Matter More than Peers by Gordon Neufeld and Gabore Maté (2019), Spotify audiobook. Non-fic. Summary: if your kids hang out with too many other kids (aka “our web-hooked youth”) they’ll turn into disastrous morons who don’t like you and can’t use capital letters. Representative quote, ch19: “Most children are not nice by default, unless they are too insecure to be otherwise.”
- Empire of Pain: The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty by Patrick Radden Keefe (2021). Journalist reflections on the opioid crisis in the US, condemning those who made money from it. Irony on the side: bestseller.
- Elegy For a River: Whiskers, Claws and Conservation’s Last, Wild Hope by Tom Moorhouse (2021). Beautiful book, contains smiles for anyone familiar with fieldwork.
- The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt (2013). Enormous hardback (will comment when finished).
Short fiction
- Short fiction by Eliot Li
image attribution: Yerson Retamal at Pixabay
TM Upchurch 