Books I Read in March
Okay, so weird month, right? It felt really long, but also I spent most of it away from my normal life, so it was a really long stretch of being out of sorts. I worked for a week, then I went on vacation for a week and I never went back to the office. I've been home ever since.
I actually didn't read a ton. I think I work more now that I'm at home (seriously!) and during my vacation, I only read on the plane rides back and forth. But this month, I read good stuff (and put away the one dumb one). Quality over quantity, you know?
Okay, so this was *the* book last summer. I saw it everywhere and you probably did too. I am a classic sheep, so I was all about getting my hands on it, but you know, from the library, where it's free. It took a hot minute for it to be available.
Listen, I can see why this is some people's thing, but it isn't mine. It's the story of a young woman whose family finds her to be poorly behaved. She is shipped off to her aunt's crumbling theatre in NYC, where she received the usual education. Sex (shocking!), booze, etc. It takes place in the 1940s, I think, and I just found it a little too trite. Anyway, I gave it a good try and moved on after getting through half of it.
Alright, alright, alright. Now we're talking about a good book.
Sue Monk Kidd is just always a hit for me. I like her writing style. She wrote The Secret Life of Bees, which is one of those books I can just re-read a hundred times.
This one tells the fictionalized account of Sarah Grimke. Sarah was a real woman and is known in history of one of the first female abolitionists and also had the audacity to suggest out loud that women can be smart. Raised in Charleston, she was the daughter of a man who thought it was okay to own people, and this book follows Sarah and a handmaid, Handful, whom she was "given" on her 11th birthday. Both women's voices are a delight to read. And both are painful in different ways.
Well written, it does drag on a bit about three-quarters of the way in, and the ending is not quite realistic, but it was an enjoyable read nonetheless.
Best book I read this month. It took me forever, but totally totally worth it.
So, if you don't know (and why would you?), I get reallllllly into something and just binge it. The last two months have been all about Ernest Hemingway after I read The Paris Wife in February. This book is about each of his 4 wives as well as the extramarital stuff he had going on.
Hemingway was a real turd, but he had a taste for interesting women, which makes this book so particularly good. I just wonder why he chased ambitious women, when their career successes drove him mad with jealousy. Guess we'll never know!
I read something interesting recently - something like family wealth generally is spent within 3 generations. I'm not sure that's true, but I wouldn't be so surprised after reading this book.
Remember the Astors? They were super rich because one of 'em came to the US and bought up a bunch of land that would become very profitable. The OG John Jacob Astor owned most of Manhattan. He built a hotel and became a slumlord and by the time he died, he was swimming in cash. He had a few sons, and they had a few sons, and basically everyone in the family is named John Jacob or William Waldorf. It's really hard to keep apart.
This book chronicles things from the OG landing in Baltimore around 1783 to Brooke Astor, the 3rd wife of Vincent Astor who was the son of the JJA that died on the Titanic (you know, the only one you've ever heard of).
There's still a bunch of them running around, especially in England where one William Waldorf literally bought his way into a title, but they're not quite "richest people in world" status anymore because the strange thing about growing up with no concept of the value of a dollar is you tend to spend it, so that's pretty much what happened.
____________________
The world is a wild place these days. What are you reading? Are you reading more or less?
I actually didn't read a ton. I think I work more now that I'm at home (seriously!) and during my vacation, I only read on the plane rides back and forth. But this month, I read good stuff (and put away the one dumb one). Quality over quantity, you know?
1 || CITY OF GIRLS, ELIZABETH GILBERT
FictionOkay, so this was *the* book last summer. I saw it everywhere and you probably did too. I am a classic sheep, so I was all about getting my hands on it, but you know, from the library, where it's free. It took a hot minute for it to be available.
Listen, I can see why this is some people's thing, but it isn't mine. It's the story of a young woman whose family finds her to be poorly behaved. She is shipped off to her aunt's crumbling theatre in NYC, where she received the usual education. Sex (shocking!), booze, etc. It takes place in the 1940s, I think, and I just found it a little too trite. Anyway, I gave it a good try and moved on after getting through half of it.
2 || THE INVENTION OF WINGS, SUE MONK KIDD
Fiction, audio.Alright, alright, alright. Now we're talking about a good book.
Sue Monk Kidd is just always a hit for me. I like her writing style. She wrote The Secret Life of Bees, which is one of those books I can just re-read a hundred times.
This one tells the fictionalized account of Sarah Grimke. Sarah was a real woman and is known in history of one of the first female abolitionists and also had the audacity to suggest out loud that women can be smart. Raised in Charleston, she was the daughter of a man who thought it was okay to own people, and this book follows Sarah and a handmaid, Handful, whom she was "given" on her 11th birthday. Both women's voices are a delight to read. And both are painful in different ways.
Well written, it does drag on a bit about three-quarters of the way in, and the ending is not quite realistic, but it was an enjoyable read nonetheless.
3 || THE HEMINGWAY WOMEN, BERNICE KENT
NonfictionBest book I read this month. It took me forever, but totally totally worth it.
So, if you don't know (and why would you?), I get reallllllly into something and just binge it. The last two months have been all about Ernest Hemingway after I read The Paris Wife in February. This book is about each of his 4 wives as well as the extramarital stuff he had going on.
Hemingway was a real turd, but he had a taste for interesting women, which makes this book so particularly good. I just wonder why he chased ambitious women, when their career successes drove him mad with jealousy. Guess we'll never know!
4 || WHEN THE ASTORS OWNED NEW YORK, JUSTIN KAPLAN
NonfictionI read something interesting recently - something like family wealth generally is spent within 3 generations. I'm not sure that's true, but I wouldn't be so surprised after reading this book.
Remember the Astors? They were super rich because one of 'em came to the US and bought up a bunch of land that would become very profitable. The OG John Jacob Astor owned most of Manhattan. He built a hotel and became a slumlord and by the time he died, he was swimming in cash. He had a few sons, and they had a few sons, and basically everyone in the family is named John Jacob or William Waldorf. It's really hard to keep apart.
This book chronicles things from the OG landing in Baltimore around 1783 to Brooke Astor, the 3rd wife of Vincent Astor who was the son of the JJA that died on the Titanic (you know, the only one you've ever heard of).
There's still a bunch of them running around, especially in England where one William Waldorf literally bought his way into a title, but they're not quite "richest people in world" status anymore because the strange thing about growing up with no concept of the value of a dollar is you tend to spend it, so that's pretty much what happened.
____________________
The world is a wild place these days. What are you reading? Are you reading more or less?
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