The Places That Scare You: A Guide to Fearlessness in Difficult Times by Pema Chodron
For nearly a decade I have practiced mindfulness every morning which includes a brief reading from the Pocket Pema. She combines a gritty tone with a deep understanding of human frailty. She gets trauma and how it can be transformed. ‘The Places that Scare You’…
Piers Plowman by William Langland
I’m not sure what possessed me to buy this book. Maybe it was mentioned in something I read regarding the Canterbury Tales. I don’t remember. It’s a Norton’s critical edition which means the pages feel nice and there is almost as much exegesis as there…
Pictures at a Revolution: Five Movies and the Birth of the New Hollywood by Mark Harris
I was in the second grade when the films profiled in this book came out yet so strong was film culture at that time that I’m sure I heard about ‘The Graduate’, ‘Bonnie & Clyde,’ ‘The Heat of the Night’ and ‘Guess Whose Coming to…
The Perfect Wagnerite by George Bernard Shaw
In preparation for the Niblung’s Ring Cycle that I’ll be seeing in a few weeks, I read Shaw’s commentary on the Operas. It displays his vigorous no bullshit take on this great work of art. I wasn’t blown away by his insights but I enjoyed…
Pastoralia by George Saunders
I read a reference to George Saunders’ Pastoralia as being the ‘go-to’ model for short story writers. I hadn’t heard of the collection and as a Saunders fan, I immediately bought it. Now having read ‘CivilWarLand in Bad Decline,’ Tenth of December’ and this one,…
Paris 1919: Six Months that Changed the World by Margaret MacMillan
“Paris 1919” took me quickly to unconsciousness. But reading it before bedtime meant I didn’t finish it for nearly two months! I’m not saying it was bad but it wasn’t a page-turner. I thought it would be more about the dynamics of the Conference itself…
Overground Railroad: The Green Book Roots of Black Travel in America by Candace A. Taylor
I bought this book before a Minneapolis cop suffocated George Floyd and triggered the most significant national outcry about the treatment of African Americans in America in many years. At first I was uncertain about how this atrocity would bring such long overdue change. White…
Our Mutual Friend by Charles Dickens
Critical consensus wasn’t kind to this novel when it came out. Recently our yawning global inequality has made the economic concerns of ‘Our Mutual Friend’ require a reconsideration. My verdict is that they had it right at the time. This novel feels like Dickens by…
On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous by Ocean Vuong
When I look back on COVID times I will be thankful for my autodidactic efforts to integrate poetry into my reading life. And poetry is also infiltrating my fiction writing life as well. I’ve begun exploring tools, conceits and expressions I’m picking up from my…
News of the World by Philip Levine
When I was in high school in Fresno one of our teachers brought Philip Levine to give a poetry reading. Our high school thought of poetry as elitist nonsense. Now the English teacher who brought Levine probably felt more strongly about poetry than did the…
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