- My Friends – Hisham Matar, 2024. Second Monday selection; quotes TBD.
- Comet in Moominland – Tove Jansson, 1946. Hurray, a children’s literature group has started as a splinter from Amherst Book Group! Quotes TBD.
- The Great Displacement: Climate Change and the Next American Migration – Jake Bittle, 2023. Nature/Enviro, quotes TBD.
- Green World: A Tragicomic Memoir of Love & Shakespeare – Michelle Ephraim, 2024. Massachusetts Center for the Book reading challenge prompt: “A book published by a Massachusetts press” (University of Massachusetts Press in this case). I wrote: “All the blurbs say it’s hysterically funny – it didn’t seem that way to me, but I very much enjoyed this memoir of Ephraim making her way in the academy and earning tenure through devotion to The Merchant of Venice.” She’s funnier on The Moth, though!
- In the Frame – Dick Francis, 1976. Re-read, mostly because of revisiting the George Stubbs and other horse paintings at the newly-reopened Yale Center for British Art.
- The Running Man – Stephen King, 1982. Same as Long Walk: there’s a new trailer. I haven’t seen the movie, but enjoyed the re-read and appreciated the prescience.
- Dracula – Bram Stoker, 1897. Great Books selection (re-read); quotes TBD.
- The Family Under the Bridge – Natalie Savage Carlson, 1958. I remember liking this as a kid primarily because of the Garth Williams illustratations, and because it was set in Paris. It doesn’t hold up very well.
- The Girl in a Swing – Richard Adams, 1980. I finally bought an epub version of this (I’ve owned it in paperback for decades) and discovered that it’s a different edition – I knew from Wikipedia that there had been a change but didn’t realize my paperback was the original version. But there must also have been US/UK differences. I’ve read the book so many times that they jumped out to me – maybe a post someday. I see the movie, which I’ve never watched, is on Tubi now. On the list! Although this book is unbelievable in a number of ways, I really love it and re-read every couple of years. I must have missed a few occasions because it’s not listed here after 2006.
- Finn Family Moomintroll – Tove Jansson, 1948. Quotes TBD.
- Watership Down – Richard Adams, 1972. I had to re-read this after Girl in a Swing – one of my all-time favorites that so holds up. I love the epigraphs more and more; one day I might research them all/write them up.
Stories
I suggested these for an Amherst College slow read retreat, which was delightful. We had great discussions about the first two; the Henry James only a few of us talked about, which was fun, but it pales in comparison.
- “How I Became a Vet” – Rivka Galchen, 2023 (this is amazing – I’ve read it four times now and it gets better every time)
- “The Life You Save May Be Your Own” – Flannery O’Connor, 1955
- “The Real Thing” – Henry James, 1892