“How’s that book you’re reading,” I ask Ed, my husband.
Ed learned how to speed read in a one-room school, and is always reading a book.
“Ok.”
“It’s good?”
“Not necessarily.”
“Then why are you reading it,” I ask.
“I don’t know? ‘Cuz I bought it.”
“You’re a generous reader,” I say.
That’s me, Ana the Ungenerous Reader.
I say that a lot in my book club, in my writing group critiquing my fellow writers. If a story doesn’t grip me by the end of page one, at the very least by the end of the first chapter, it ends up on the bookshelf in the unread section waiting for library donation, or on the nightstand by my bed collecting dust. You know that pile? Maybe you’re reading your pile? I suppose I ought to use the library more. Borrow books and bring them back if they end up by the bed. But, I can’t. Because if I’m gripped on page one, or somewhere in chapter one, invariably I reach for a pen, underline or make a note in the margin, and dog-ear the page. I cherish my dog-eared books.
Dog-earing and making notes in margins is how I learn from other authors as a writer. I read for great dialog, descriptions and descriptor names, color name usage, you name it, I’m scouring the page. And more than that, I’m looking for myself in another author’s writing. Things I can relate to regardless of whether it’s a memoir or a novel. I think we all read for that.
It’s called reading for the universal.
The books I’m recommending today touched me in a myriad of ways. Two, (My Ántonia and Hourglass—Time, Memory, Marriage) I’ve read more than two or three times. I hope you enjoy these books, and that they touch you as well. Enjoy!
Fiction
Isabel Allende—Maya’s Notebook
What fascinated me about this book was how Isabel Allende got into the head of a nineteen-year-old. But why would I think for a moment that Allende couldn’t master that?
Maya, a grieving, rebellious character goes on quite a romp to find herself. I could barely put down this book that begins in San Francisco and ends on a remote island in Chile. Maya the protagonist is headstrong, audacious, and her grandmother and I just want to shake sense into her. But Maya has to find that sense on her own. This book is also a thriller—a race from bad guys. You’ll be rooting for Maya—beginning to end.
Willa Cather—My Ántonia
For years, I have touted this book as my all-time favorite. It’s actually been years since I’ve read it, but this year I suggested it for my book club because of its centenary publication. As I began reading it again—cover to cover—it felt like a different book than I had read before. Probably because I was in high school the first time I read it. And a young adult when I read it a second time. As I read Jim Burton’s (the protagonist’s) descriptions of the Nebraska prairie, still waving in the wind when Cather wrote My Ántonia, it dawned on me why I find myself telling people that I love the Nebraska topography. Cather’s prairie descriptions must have seared themselves into my psyche. And as I continued to read on, meeting the independent women in her book who went on to have careers and not to marry, I wondered if these fictional women—women Cather must have known in real life, as she fictionalized people she knew—had somehow influenced my early life as a career woman, choosing not to marry until later in life. And lastly, I found it fascinating how the plight of and discrimination towards immigrants described by Cather hasn’t budged one iota since the time she wrote. My Ántonia, still my favorite, is a timeless book that should be taught in schools, and is meant to be read over and over again.
Ruth Ozeki–A Tale for the Time Being
OMG! I loved this book so much, I got lost in its reality. You’ll have to read it to figure out what I mean by that. Dog-eared, notes in so many margins, no time to count them. Several years ago, I saw Ozeki interviewed at Kepler’s in Menlo Park, California, and she discussed writing this book. Fascinating. Can’t remember everything she talked about. But, the writer character in the book is loosely based upon herself. But it is fiction. And the writer-protagonist finds a lunch box washed upon the beach of the island where she lives. It’s a story about searching—for things, people, and self. I could barely put this book down to live my own life. This book still haunts me, in a good way. I look forward to reading it again.
Memoir
Maria Bello—Love is Love, Questioning the Labels We Give Ourselves
I stumbled upon this book because one of the chapters was published in the NYT Modern Love column. Perhaps you read it, or know Maria Bello as an actress? That’s how I first knew her. She now plays a psychologist on NCIS and I love her character as much as I love her book.
Infected by a parasite she contracted in Haiti, Maria falls ill, and while recuperating she reads through old journals that cause her to question herself. Those questions became this book. I suppose I began reading it because of the structure of the book. Each chapter, a question, is basically a stand-alone essay. But together the chapters braid a book of her life that I found fascinating. Many of Bello’s questions caused me to question myself. Of course, you can just read the book and enjoy it. Love is Love is funny, evocative, and a thoughtful read.
Dani Shapiro—Hourglass, Time, Memory, Marriage
If you know me, you know I love and have studied with author Dani Shapiro. I’m waiting with bated breath for her next memoir. Last summer, I woke one morning remembering she was in Minneapolis that night giving a reading for her recently-published memoir, Hourglass, at Mager & Quinn bookstore. A three-hour drive from Ames, I pondered for a minute. Two hundred and sixteen miles isn’t too far for me to drive to see Shapiro. I’ve read Hourglass two times now. What I love about this book is how Dani structured it. It’s a mosaic of stories about memory, love, life, and motherhood. If you are reading for a definitive thread, then maybe you won’t like it. But for me, my mind works that way, and so does yours if you think about it. Hourglass is a gem—a wonderfully insightful and tender read that reaches into the depths of what it is to be human.
