I read Jia Tolentino’s Trick Mirror and then immediately read So You Want to Talk About Race by Ijeoma Oluo, because, I guess I don’t want to feel happiness ever again. Let’s start with the book everyone has been telling you to read since the moment it was off the printing presses in 2018: So … More So You Want To Talk About Race by Ijeoma Oluo
Image: Business Insider High-tech military equipment, a flesh eating disease, and ancient curses collide in this unapologetically modern twist on the gentleman-explorer narrative. Most books about white men exploring the jungle harken back to the grainy black-and-white days of Theodore Rosevelt or Queen Victoria but Douglas Preston’s trek in The Lost City of the Monkey … More The Lost City of the Monkey God by Douglas Preston
Morgan Harper is a progressive Democrat running to be the congressperson for Ohio’s 3rd district against incumbent Democrat Joyce Beatty who has been in office since 2012. Obviously, since moving to the 3rd District, I’ve voted for Beatty happily. When you’re up against Goliath, though, sometimes you need a David. Here’s why I’m voting for … More Why I’m Voting for Morgan Harper
Washington Black is one of those books I heard about months ago and has been vaguely on my radar ever since. When I realized I’d be going to the Caribbean in January, I picked up a copy at a local bookstore because I like to read stories that are set in the places I’m visiting … More Washington Black by Esi Edugyan
As the best of 2019 lists began rolling out, Say Nothing by Patrick Radden Keefe was in everyone’s best books of the year lists. I had seen the advanced reader’s copy on our shelf in the library workroom a few months before it was published, but by the size of the tome (nearly 500 pages) … More Say Nothing: A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland by Patrick Radden Keefe
Once Upon A River is a novel of fairy-tale-adjacent historical fiction that manages to skillfully avoid hackneyed genre tropes to deliver a powerful and engaging account of family, community, and the power of storytelling. From the first line of the novel, Setterfield brings you into a world completely consumed by the ebb and flow of … More Once Upon A River by Diane Setterfield
Language is a dangerous thing not only for what is said but often because of what is left out, especially during history lessons. Slavery verses enslavement. The state of being a slave verses the action of making someone a slave. “Slavery” conjures images of black bodies in chains, laboring in cotton fields, and being sold … More Our Words Are Dangerous, Especially When We Don’t Use Them
In literature there is a bias against Romance. There is a pervasive belief amongst readers that a novel, where the driving plot device is a romantic relationship, cannot be considered Literature and is therefore unworthy of critique. Women call books with a busty corseted Queen their “guilty pleasure,” waving their hand in the air as … More The Crawdads Sing of Romance
In a fantasy world where a divorcée from Texas with Mexican-American children wins the 2016 presidential election, the idea that her bisexual son might begin a lasting love affair with the Prince of England doesn’t seem so far-fetched. Casey McQuiston is a masterful storyteller: Red, White, and Royal Blue is pure bodice-ripping romantic fantasy set … More Red, White, and Royal Blue by Casey McQuiston
The electronic sound of a slowly retracting zoom lens buzzed like a chainsaw in a quiet forest. As I flinched at the sound, the bride and groom said, “I do.” The friend sitting next to me in the second pew of the church walks to the pulpit to do a reading. A loud swooshing crack … More The Scourge of Baby Boomers at Unplugged Weddings
The Ohioan 