At first I wasn‘t so sure, but I very much enjoyed this charming story about a rather clever and articulate giant Pacific Octopus, and a motley collection of lonely characters trying to sort out questions about their past. It‘s a sweet page turner.

I very much enjoyed this interwoven tale of the history of ice cream and the author‘s obsession in tasting and understanding the world of ice cream. I somehow connected years ago with Amy on social media which is why I was sad to recently learn from her husband‘s posts that she had passed away. I only wish I had gotten to her book sooner. It‘s a lovely tale well told.

Olivetti is marketed as a children‘s book and I get why, but it‘s a delightful read for anyone who loves typewriters, a bit of adventure, and the stories we tell. A boy‘s mother is missing. Her Olivetti was the last one to see her before she disappeared.

This sweet murder mystery follows a grandmother-mother-daughter trio as they try to solve a California coastal whodunnit. For me, the compelling part of it all are the family dynamics and not so much the final solution. And now I want to go on the Elkhorn Slough Safari (not in the book, but definitely a real boat tour!).

As his new book hits stores, I‘ve finally gotten around to reading There There. I enjoyed the book for its structure - first person multiple POV. Plus, it takes place in Oakland and so it‘s always interesting to read stories that take place in my own neck of the woods.

The only hikes I ever do are day hikes which end with a hot shower, but I love compelling stories of outback adventures, and this book did not disappoint. Traveling 4,000 miles on foot, by canoe, on skis, and in a raft… the author and her husband travel across the Pacific coast and Arctic lands and sea. It‘s a beautiful story of stunning vistas, natural dangers, birds, bears, caribou, and her experience of sharing the journey with her husband.

I liked Oh, William! so much that I went back to read this book, which came first. I don‘t feel like I read them out of order. It didn‘t really matter. It‘s a quiet book. It‘s not so much about plot as it is about family and the unspoken issues families navigate as they try to come to terms with themselves, each other, and their shared histories.

I‘ve particparticipated in 1000WordsofSummer a few times because I appreciate the camaraderie of the writing community. If you missed the social media collective experience, this really is the next best thing. If you‘re struggling with a writing project and wish you had an author friend who might offer a bit of wisdom, insight, and encouragement, you‘ll want this book on your desk.

I loved this book! It‘s funny and clever. Kathleen‘s marriage falls apart (not so funny!) and when she moves to a cute and quaint beach town to start a new chapter in her life she discovers that everything is NOT as she expected. Kathleen shares her candid insights about town gossip, beach town life, and friendships in a cantankerous and humorous style. In the end it‘s the story of housing, bad neighbors, zoning regulations, and second chances.

the blurbs say this book is funny. I didn‘t find it funny at all. But there is something about her voice and journey that I found compelling. Her marriage is over and she struggles at being single. I did find the self deprecating insights about dating, work, relationships, friendships, and family both totally depressing and insightful to the very real heartaches of a younger generation.
P.S. does that make me sound ridiculously old?! Probably.

Really well written. Engaging and fast paced chapters. But, dang, this story is depressing. A prolific art thief, an addict really, and a crime spree that eventually ended but so much of the art was damaged or destroyed. I knew a lot of this story from newspaper reports, but this absorbing story definitely fleshes it out in a riveting story of the most prolific art thief of all time.

I wish I could remember where I heard about this book. Anyway, I gulped it down. I wanted to read it because of the structure - it‘s told like an interview- but I loved it because the poignant voice of the protagonist waxes honestly and eloquently about a hard but full life. There is tragedy, and heartache, but in the end it‘s a beautiful tale of community and resilience.

Patchett so effortlessly toggles between timelines and characters. The voice and pace somehow reminds me a bit of Elizabeth Strout‘s own Lucy Barton. It a story of family, what it means to be happy, and young love. It‘s about looking backwards, retracing our steps, and understanding how our choices shape us and the stories we tell.

A family memoir and investigative journalism about Chagas, the kissing bug disease that eventually caused the death of the author‘s aunt. Kind of a two for one book. The first half is the family history. In the second portion, Hernandez writes of other patients, doctors, epidemiologist, and how the lack of information in the US medical system about the parasite and disease disproportionately impacts the Latinx community

I‘m not an opera aficionado, but I do love stories about art, hope, and resilience, and this story has all of that - a messed up childhood, a volatile home life, and a few people who believed in a boy who didn‘t even really know he liked to sing.
Ironically (at least to me) is that this is an ARC and I see that this book was published in September 2016 - the same month and year Chasing Portraits was published.

Yes, a memoir, but really more a collection of all his best stories. And he is an engaging storyteller. My biggest takeaway… make the best of all your opportunities, even the ones that seem less than compelling.

Both a memoir and sort of how-to story of how a grassroots movement to enact gun safety legislation has made an impact at the local, state, and federal level. Quick read with great personal stories, words of wisdom about running a sprawling volunteer organization, and a lot of upbeat notes about accomplishments and how we can all contribute to seeing the change we crave.

I have never listened to the WTF Podcast. I picked up this book because I love interviews and I love the idea of a collection of interview snippets. Every chapter is a different topic - parenting, childhood, mental health - and a wide range of guests wax poetic about their successes, failures, and dreams. There‘s a lot of solid hard won wisdom in these pages.

BUZZ was a re-read. While reading ADHD: What Everyone Needs to Know, I felt sort of amazed about how much of it my family has navigated. The challenges and suggestions the book addresses brought up memories of therapies tried, special camps, meetings with “professionals.” Sigh. It‘s been (and continues to be) a journey. And BUZZ is interesting the second time around because I‘m in a better space with my own son and so had some useful perspective.

Humor writer Wendi Aarons, whose work appears frequently in The New Yorker and McSweeney's, takes a look at aging and of life after 50.
I‘m a Gen Xer, roughly the same age as the author and I think that played into the moments where I enjoyed her brand of humor. The story underneath the humor? A memoir of self-acceptance, second chances, and celebrating the weird, wild, and wonderfully whacky moments in life.

So clever. A book about writers, the publishing industry, jealousy, and secrets. A story within a story about a book, the literary world, and cultural appropriation. Total page turner.

This “boots on the ground,” story of a female firefighter‘s experiences is eye opening and compelling. The writing is very much in the moment and incredibly candid. She offers a mix of awe and responsibility along with a heavy dose of scandal, trash talking, and dark humor. I didn‘t love the structure of the storytelling. At times I felt a bit lost, but her life at the firehouse and beyond, it‘s the real deal.

I picked this up because I love memoirs and I‘d heard good things about the book. I may be Gen X but I‘m not much of a Nirvana fan and I had to Google Foo Fighters to recognize their music. That said, these stories are interesting and I‘m glad I read the book but I think this book is best for Grohl‘s fans. I missed a lot of the musical references and wish the photos had been labeled because the only person I recognized was Kurt Cobain.

A novel from Michael Ondaatje (The English Patient) that‘s meant to be a lyrical mystery of family, adventure, and intrigue. With the end of World War II as the backdrop, Nathaniel Williams, and his sister, Rachel, learn that their parents are bound for newly liberated Singapore and then life becomes increasingly odd. A female spy story, yet nothing really happens and yet you‘re left wondering how everything happens and it is all connected.

Rising housing prices and homelessness… everyone has an opinion and few have solutions that everyone loves. Dougherty explores the political and personal in this journalistic telling of the crisis. The central premise: We need more housing, but how we get there, well, there are lots of conflicting opinions.

Peskin, a clinical neurologist, writes about how the molecules that make our brains work can also hijack our brain (and nervous systems). Written as a blend of science and case studies, Peskin traces the history of the disease, the scientific thinking, and the impact of the unruly molecules on patients (and their families). I loved the human interest stories and I confess to not always understanding the science.

I‘ve watched a docfilm short and heard several interviews with Jason Reynolds, but this is the first of his books that I‘ve read. A YA story of home struggles, school difficulties, and a track coach who is there to inspire, motivate, and dispense love to kids in need of all of his wisdom and the team camaraderie he provides these young kids trying to find their way in the world.

A memoir, yes. But a poem, too. Short stanzas interspersed with vignettes. I appreciate her instinct to lay forth the messiness of it all and her dexterity with language. It‘s the story of a divorce, and an ode to the power of finding beauty in sorrow. It makes me believe there are spaces in which grief can be beautiful.

A beautiful (and sad!) story of friendship and the importance of celebrating each other. Sometimes the friends we make in our 20s are the ones that understand us the best. In the Celebrants, Rowley visits a lifetime of hopes, dreams, and transitions and the ways we shape and are shaped by friendship.

It could be easy to hate the Stockton family, they‘re the characters at the center of this tale of multi generational wealth, wills, trusts, and prenups, but I very much enjoyed it. Jackson‘s characters are more complicated than you might expect and although they are “high net worth Wasp buccaneers of New York real estate,” (NYT) there‘s something hopeful about their collective trajectory. Certainly a fun summer read.

When Michelle Dowd was 7, her family moved to a campsite of sorts in Angeles National Forest. Leased by her grandfather, who claimed to be a Christian prophet who would live to be 500 (surprise? He doesn‘t) the apocalyptic cult had patriarchal rules and a religious doomsday mentality. It‘s vaguely reminiscent of Tara Westover‘s memoir, Educated,” but it‘s rhythm and ending feel different.

An astonishing story of her plunge into madness and the lifesaving diagnosis that almost didn‘t happen. If you‘re a fan of medical stories, be sure to add this to your pile.

Braitman digs into her early experiences with loss to investigate and understand the ways in which grief shaped her. I found the first half page mesmerizing and I hurried through the second half to see how she‘d end the book. The author is both relatable in many ways but also intimidating in her accomplishments. If you enjoy memoirs that explore the ways in which loss gives us wisdom, add this on to your to be read list!

Kirsten Milliken (psychologist and ADHD coach) writes from personal experience as someone who has ADHD and who works as a clinical psychologist. Her prescription is to go play and gamify life. My son already does a lot of these things and some of them don‘t interest him, but Milliken offers a lot of great ideas about how to live with, manage, and harness play to find meaningful, positive, and rewarding ways to live with ADHD.

This is very much the story of a poem - how it came to be written, what experiences compelled Zapruder to write and share his poetry. The first half of the book is the part I love the most - he‘s so lyrically honest about how his poetic instincts helped him navigate his son‘s diagnosis with autism. It‘s in those vulnerable moments on the page that I felt most connected to this interwoven literary journey of life, language, and parenting.

My first Sy Montgomery book was Soul of an Octopus, which I loved. I hoped this book, a much earlier one, might have some similarities, and it does. It‘s the story of Christopher, an extraordinary pig and the community that fed him, loved him, and were so very grateful for the ways in which he touched their lives.

I‘ve never seen iCarly and I knew nothing about McCurdy‘s acting career, but I found the storytelling about family, child actors, and eating disorders to be a compelling read. I can only imagine how hard it must have been to put so many of these experiences and emotions on the written page.

A fun romcom. Did you like Book Lovers? It‘s in the same camp. A fun, quick, pretty predictable storyline (small town girl meets Hollywood guy, their love is real but, well, things don‘t quite go as planned…). It‘s a fun rainy day read.

A heart wrenching and beautiful story of friendship and community. Delia and Ernest meet as teens at a church supported conversion therapy camp. That horrific experience both scarred and bonded them for life, despite going their own ways and losing track of each other. The book is told through their present day lives, flashbacks, basketball, and poetry. Fast paced, and compelling, this (at times) chilling story is told with grace and compassion.

I‘m sharing this one while I‘m only halfway through. I don‘t love the subtitle, but I do love their Instagram account and I wish I‘d had this book years ago (it‘s a pretty new release). It‘s “in the trenches” advice from a woman who has ADHD, her real world struggles, her partner‘s gentle insights, and their willingness to be so honest about it all while having a sense of humor.

A carnival, a night of debauchery, social clubs, global warming, a mysterious errand, alchemy, and friendship. I think it‘s sort of a cross between an apocalyptic story, science fiction, and magic. Lots of beautiful descriptions and suspenseful moments. Totally outside my usual reading genre which is probably while I‘ll be thinking about all the twists and turns for quite some time.

My third Taylor Jenkins Reid book. A quick read even though I don‘t play tennis and really don‘t understand the game. I loved Daisy Jones and the Six. I thought the Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo was clever. This felt a bit predictable to me, but sometimes that‘s just the kind of reading break you need and crave.

Dad spent his career as a ship salvage engineer rescuing ships gone aground or sunk beneath the waves. Perhaps as a consequence, the story of the cargo has always intrigued me…what happens when it falls overboard? Adrift is a cross between a beautiful coffee table book, short essays, and fun facts about the things that wash up on our shores. It‘s about ocean currents, consumerism, plastic, and beachcomber finds.

So much chaos in this fun novel about disasters, houseguests, divorce, social media, and deadlines. Fun characters and a supporting cast that steals the limelight - it‘s witty and bighearted.

Forget the noun, do the verb.
More from the author and artist who wrote Steal Like an Artist. Simple (but often overlooked) observations about finding inspiration and staying true to your artistic dreams. A good book to pickup if you feel stuck and are hoping for some ideas to help you get unstuck in your creative endeavors.

What a delightful story of youthful bravado, family, immigration, and place. 18 year old Shelley has big dreams and not a lot of great prospects. We fall in love with him for his clever outlook, optimism, and belief that the Chinese Groove will be good to him.

I loved this book - the voice, the journey, the adventure of it all. I don‘t knit but found all of the story so accessible and relatable. Its a story of a knitting project, but it‘s also very much about community, the climate, fast fashion, the ways technologies change fashion, women‘s rights, and the meaning of home.

Just some 60 or so pages left for me to finish up In the Time of Our History. It‘s a multigenerational story of love, loss, what it means to be part of an immigrant family, and the ways in which traditions both pull us together and wedge us apart.

A memoir in essays with lots of really rich insights.
In some ways it reminds me of I Am, I Am, I Am by Maggie O'Farrell. A series of almost completely insane stories that shaped her life while giving the reader smart, funny, and courageous insights into experiences that clearly jolted her own life in frequently difficult ways.

Not exactly a graphic novel. More of a memoir, and personal essay (but with illustrations) about what it means to experience loneliness, along with an exploration of the science of what it means to be alone, feel alone, and what our private and public selves lose and gain when we find ourselves isolated from others. NPR said, “…perhaps the most important thing it accomplishes is telling everyone that they aren't alone in their loneliness..”