We’re halfway through November and suddenly, it feels like winter out there. Here’s what I have been reading:
The Secrets We Kept, Lara Prescott
Everyone’s been talking about this new novel – inspired by the CIA’s real-life campaign to distribute Doctor Zhivago in the USSR. I liked the multiple points of view, especially the typists who spoke in second person plural, and the plot was intriguing. But the ending(s) fell flat for me.
The Carrying, Ada Limón
My friend Roxani recommended Limón’s poetry (I’d discovered one of her poems last spring). These poems are often sad and difficult, but shot through with flashes of light. I keep coming back to the one about goldfinches.
Come As You Are: The Surprising New Science That Will Transform Your Sex Life, Emily Nagoski
This book was all over the Internet when it came out a few years ago – but this fall was the right time for me to read it. I’ve absorbed a lot of myths about sexuality (my own and other people’s), and this is a frank, informative, fascinating guide to so many facets of women’s sexuality. Nagoski is straightforward, smart and often funny, and her research is illuminating and validating. I especially loved the stories about real women.
The Mistletoe Matchmaker, Felicity Hayes-McCoy
Christmas is coming in Finfarran, in western Ireland, and the townspeople are gearing up for family dinners and a holiday festival. Cassie Fitzgerald, visiting from Canada, makes new friends and connects with her grandparents, and the characters from Hayes-McCoy’s previous Finfarran novels have their own struggles. Light, witty and sweet.
The Lost Art of Keeping Secrets, Eva Rice
I fell in love with this charming novel back in my Oxford days, and it was time for a reread. I’ve been savoring it slowly and was utterly beguiled, as always, by the story of Penelope, her friends Charlotte and Harry, pop music and family and love in 1950s England. So wonderful.
Lovely War, Julie Berry
This book starts in a Manhattan hotel room, where Aphrodite – on trial for infidelity – spins a tale of two pairs of young lovers during World War I, to her skeptical audience (Hephaestus and Ares). Vivid, heartbreaking, often witty, and full of wonderful characters. I loved it. Recommended by Anne.
The Education of an Idealist, Samantha Power
Power, a former UN ambassador, cabinet official and war correspondent, is a fascinating figure. (She’s also a faculty member at my former workplace, HKS – we don’t know each other, but our worlds overlap.) This memoir is a compelling, thoughtful, honest account of her life and career, and the challenges she faced in government. I loved her voice and couldn’t stop reading (which was handy in almost meeting the library deadline).
Most links (not affiliate links) are to my favorite local bookstore, Brookline Booksmith.
What are you reading?
cakes, tea and dreams 
I bought Come As You Are last year and have yet to read it. I think I’ve been hesitant to dive in, even though I think it will be illuminating and helpful, because of whatever baggage (nothing traumatic but baggage nonetheless) I may come up against while reading it. Your review is encouraging.
Oh, I HEAR you. I hesitated to buy it, then it sat on my nightstand for weeks before I finally dove in. And then it took me two months to get through (partly because it’s substantive and fascinating – partly because of my own baggage). It’s well worth it.
Looks like a good few weeks of reading! I enjoyed “The Secrets We Kept,” as you know, although I could have done without the Olga storyline. It felt like a book and I kept waiting for the DC plot and the Russia plot to intersect, and they really didn’t. I agree with you that the endings were a bit flat – to me, they seemed rushed. I want to read “Come As You Are” – I read “Burnout” earlier this year and thought it was incredible.
Edit, sorry, the Olga story like felt like ANOTHER book. Typing before tea is not recommended.
Yes, Burnout is definitely on my list!
I’m so glad you picked up Come As You Are! I want everyone to read it.
Yes, it is SO good.
Wasn’t Lovely War, well, lovely? I enjoyed it so much and it was so creative, fresh and unusual.
It really was! I loved the characters, and Aphrodite’s voice.
I just finished City of Girls by Elizabeth Gilbert and I loved it!
So good!