Books of the Month – January 2012

I just loved Just My Type, a thoroughly enjoyable romp through fonts and typefaces.

I also liked two family stories:

• The Boy in the Moon, the true and heartbreaking story of a severely handicapped boy and his dad’s quest to take care of him.
• We The Animals, a tight, harsh novel about three boys growing up with flawed parents, but parents who love them very much

and finally I recommend Poor Economics, a clinical look at how poor people behave with their finances — just like not-so-poor people, it turns out, minus the cushion of cash in the bank, which means any mistake can be fatal.

Books of the Month – December 2011

You all knew that 1Q84 was going to make it to this month’s list, since I already named it my book of the year, and potentially of the decade!Yes, it’s 900 pages long, yes, it’s fantasy, yes, it’s translated — and I loved it anyway.

The Buddha in the Attic is another favorite, with its delicate, evocative stories of Japanese picture brides in California.

I also liked Blood, Bones & Butter, an unconventional chef’s memoir, and Love and Shame and Love, a family saga that reads like a memoir.

Books of the Month – November 2011

This month, I loved

– The Family Fang, with its oddball set of characters and twisting plot

and I also liked
– Maphead, an entertaining look at geography and those who love it maybe a little too much
– Turn of Mind, a chilling tale of murder together with a stunning portrait of an Alzheimer’s victim
– Willpower, a fun but learned discussion of self-discipline and why it’s so hard to resist chocolate (or your favorite treat) when tired or upset

Books of the Month – October 2011

This month, I loved:

• Mice, a delightful, unpretentious little British mystery where murder becomes redemption
• Wendy and the Lost Boys, the sad biography of a complicated, lonely woman who seemed to be all success and fun
• Incognito, a celebration of our unconscious, or why our conscious, hard-working brain is not the star of the show

So I have terrible taste

I did not care for Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf’s book and now she went and won herself a Nobel Peace Prize… How indelicate of me!

At least Stephanie Meyer did not win the Nobel Prize for literature. That would really bum me out.

Books of the Month – September 2011

It’s always a little difficult to choose books for the Books of the Month post,often simply because there are many good ones and surprisingly often because I simply forget the ones I read early in the month…  Having refreshed my own memory by re-reading earlier posts, I recommend these four:

• The beekeeper’s Lament, a delightful story of bees and the bee industry
• The Big Roads, the story of the interstate system and its nerdy engineers
• How bad are bananas? , a serious but funny reference on the carbon footprint of bananas, paper, and other common objects
• The Believing Brain, an exploration of why we are wired to believe, for better and for worse

 

 

Books of the Month – July 2011

I guess I’ve been in a vacation mood this summer…  as I realize I simply forgot to post the “Books of the Month” for July…  and that’s not because the July reading list was disappointing. I found several gems including

• Little Bee, the stunningly told story of a Nigerian would-be refugee in the UK (don’t be put off by the grim subject matter, the first chapter is just about perfect)

• The Sorcerer’s Apprentice, a behind-the-scenes look at El Bulli and the apprentices that make its fussy food possible

• Art and Madness, a sobering memoir of life as a wife who should have a brilliant career of her own but cannot because it’s the sixties

• The London Train, a clever novel of fatherhood

Books of the Month – August 2011

The harvest his month was not good, hence the plethora of half-stars I used to try to distinguish the boring from the mediocre from the really bad…  I will try not to use so many half-stars in the future; they are confusing and wishy-washy.

And with that, only three books of the month, each a little imperfect.

My favorite of the three is Spacesuit, which tells the story of how the heroic outfits of the Apollo astronauts were designed and made by the Playtex Corporation — and I think would be better if it stayed with that story without aiming to place it in too ambitious a context.

The other two are

• My New American Life, a light-hearted and lightweight story of an Albanian nanny with secrets. Good summertime reading.
• A Bittersweet Season, a surprisingly successful, if messy memoir cum advice on how to take care of aging relatives. The personal story is what grabbed me.

Happy reading!

Books of the Month – June 2011

I read a lot of bad books this month, it seems — but the good ones were really good! Limiting myself to 4, once again, I recommend two uplifting books and two more somber ones:

•  Triumph of the City – an upbeat, well-researched look at why cities work a lot better than we may think
• Getting Better – another upbeat but grounded assessment of the state of the world that does not shrink from exposing problems but also points out undeniable improvements in health and well-being just about everywhere
• Other People’s Money – a novel about the financial crisis, in which the guilty bankers live happily ever after, more or less
• Please Look After Mom – a melancholic story of a mom who sacrifices herself for her family but doesn’t get recognized for it, until it’s too late

Books of the Month – April 2011

It’s always interesting for me to look back and revisit the books I read over a month’s time. Some I barely remember — and not always the worst of the lot either!

This month, there’s one book I highly, highly recommend: You Know When the Men are Gone, a wonderful series of interconnected stories about an army base during Iraq deployments.

And here are three more I liked:

• The Pluto Files, the true story about how Pluto lost its status as a planet
• The Girl in a Green Raincoat, an unpretentious but accomplished mystery