Books of my life
I came across a phrase recently that stayed with me: “book of my life.” I’m pretty sure I heard it on the Book Talk, Etc. podcast. It means a book that isn’t just great or entertaining or interesting, but all that and more: a book that stays with you, that settles into your brain and rewires things for you.
I like this distinction as a category within 5-star books because some books are great, and then some books are my books: books that I’ll scream about if anyone mentions them; books that I’ll reread in perpetuity. Part of reading extensively is curating, and this is the (nonexhaustive) list of a few of the books that are in my permanent collection.
Such a Fun Age by Kiley Reid
Kiley Reid is one of the funniest, most incisive writers I’ve ever read, and I love the way she handles big topics in this book – race, motherhood, guilt, trauma – with deftness and humor. Really, though, the thing that stayed with me most about this book was the way it dignified childcare. I found Reid’s investigation of Emira’s job as a nanny to be so thoughtful and true: the ways that white collar professionals look down on anything related to kids; how essential and life-giving kids can be; and how funny and alive your days are when you’re spending them with kids. I’m not a nanny, but teaching is subject to a lot of the same projections, I think, and this book helped me sift through some of my own preconceptions.
The Idiot by Elif Batuman
God, I love Elif Batuman. I saw her speak once at an author event during grad school, and she was just like I expected her to be: so funny, so weird, and so smart. I’ve read this book at least three or four times. The book-of-my-life quality of this book has to do with the voice of the narrator. The way that Selin observes the world around her is so naively strange, and, like Such a Fun Age, so funny in a jarring, innocent way. (Actually, now that I think about it, there’s a definite through line between the two. Maybe I just really like naive or childlike observations? Selin isn’t a kid, exactly, but she’s confused and non-jaded and, like, innocent in a way that parallels Briar’s observations in Such a Fun Age.) If Elif Batuman has 100 fans, I am one of them; if Elif Batuman has one fan, it is I; if she has zero fans, I’m dead, etc.
Our Share of Night by Mariana Enriquez
I heard about this book on a podcast I used to love called Literary Friction (gone but not forgotten). I read it in the window between graduating from graduate school and moving back to New York in a frenzied, focused three-day sprint. The thing that keeps coming back to me about this book is how skillfully, nightmarishly developed the setting and atmosphere are. This story is set in the 60s and 70s in Argentina, and the setting is so alive with strange, chilling details, whether they’re in the remote area where the occult society has their headquarters or the city where the main character and his father live. It’s all incredibly vivid–surreally so, because the book is also about magic and darkness and body horror. (Side note–the body horror in this book is intense and I loved it. It added depth in a haunting, visceral, purposeful way.) I don’t really remember the plot of this story super well–which is true for most books I read, tbh–but I remember the imagery and the setting really specifically and vividly.
Salvage the Bones by Jesmyn Ward
I need to reread this one, but this is a book I was obsessed with in college. I’m pretty sure I managed to write two separate English papers about it. Jesmyn Ward (alongside Elif Batuman, as I’ve already made clear) is everything to me. Her books are unreal: emotional, sharp, weird, magical. This one, in particular, stayed with me because I loved the way she twinned her characters with the setting. What I mean by that: the book is about a 15-year-old girl, Esch, whose family is living through a hurricane on the Gulf Shore. Her inner turmoil–the arc of it, the intensity of it–are matched and multiplied by the storm, which I loved. I love setting-as-character, and this one had such an evocative physical and emotional lanscape. Jesmyn Ward forever and ever.
P.S. I’m not finished with it yet, but I have a feeling The Coin by Yasmin Zaher will soon join this list. I’m reading it now and am obsessed with it. More to come.