Last week I finished:
I am in love with the 75th edition cover of Zora Neale Hurston's Their Wyes Were Watching God. Sometimes covers are enough to make you try a book. I went with audio on this one, because I thought the regional dialect would be better on audio. Ruby Dee does the narration, and it is superb. This book fell out of favor for a time due to its portrayal of blacks and for the Southern black dialogue, but it's now been "rediscovered." While listening, I had to constantly remind myself that this is an old book (first published in 1937), and that all of the themes present here that I've read about countless times since were new when this was published. There was violence (domestic and otherwise), drunkenness, prejudice within the black community due to skin color, etc. It felt very familiar. The story here is slim, it just follows Janie as she attaches herself (she calls it marriage, but I don't think she ever dissolves her first marriage when she runs off with another man) to three men with varying degrees of success. All of the characters are foolish and some are downright caricatures of blacks. It was kind of uncomfortable to listen to. Some of the writing, though, was beautiful. I'm not quite sure what I'm supposed to come away from the book thinking, though, and honestly, it's not a book I'd ever return to. My rating: 3 stars. 
Sometimes I listen to a book on audio just to have a book going. My expectations are generally low; I just want to be entertained. But every now and then one of those books really stands out, and Year of No Clutter was one of those. I enjoyed it so much I plan to buy the paper version to re-read sometime. I've been reading quite a bit lately about clutter and getting rid of it. This book goes a step further and examines our relationship with our things, which I just love to read about. This is the memoir of a woman who spends a year (actually, more) clearing out her "hell room," the room in her house that has been collecting her clutter for years. I found myself in Eve Schaub's descriptions of self and stuff over and over. She's a little OCD and has the need to keep a complete record of her life and surround herself with it. (Uh, yeah, that's me to a T.) And yet, she wants a clean and orderly home with only things that she loves (yup again). For folks like us, using Marie Kondo's "sparks joy" method of clearing things away just doesn't work. It all sparks joy--why else would we have it in our homes! It's the amount of joy and the space it takes that we need help dealing with. Schaub is a quirky gal, and some folks who don't identify with her stuff issues would think she needs a bit of psychological help, but I got her. It made me a little uncomfortable having my stuff issues out there in the open, but I also found it very comforting to know I'm not alone in my struggles. I especially appreciate how much time she spends making sure her things get to the right hands. So many clutter books (written by people who don't have clutter issues) tell you to put things in the trash. I just can throw away perfectly good things, nor can I donate valuable things, and that makes getting rid of things even harder. Schaub goes to great lengths to make sure her things go to folks who will treasure them. So, I loved this book and found it very useful. Others may not, depending on where they are on the "owing stuff spectrum." My rating: 4 stars. P. S. I don't have, nor have ever had, a hell room, just for your information.
Since this is the third time I've read Gretchen Rubin's The Happiness Project, I don't feel like writing a full review. I will say that I meant to read her second happiness book, Happier at Home, but my Kindle conspired against me and I ended up in the wrong book. (We'll just pretend it was not human error.) This is the book of Rubin's yearlong look at happiness and her very specific goals to become happier. What fascinates me most about the book--every time I read it--is how someone with such a logical mind and personality as Rubin takes on such a nebulous idea as happiness. If I wasn't kind of the same way when approaching things, I can't imagine enjoying the book. But since I, too, have the kind of mind that tries to quantify things like happiness (in my case, perhaps, spirituality), I find it captivating. If you haven't read this modern classic, maybe you should. It's definitely an old friend for me. My rating: 4 stars.
I've been excited to crack Ted Kooser's newest book of poems, Kindest Regards, since I found out about it last fall (it came out in May). Kooser is one of those quiet, gentle poets whose poetry is friendly and approachable. It's perhaps a bit simpler than Billy Collins's or Max Garland's, but it's on a par. I've enjoyed it in the past, and I certainly enjoyed this collection of selected an new poems. This book is the perfect length for such a collection; at about 250 pages, it's just long enough to get a good feel for the poet and his style, but it's not so long that you get bored by themes or tone. I highly recommend this one to anyone looking for good, current American poetry. My rating: 4 stars.
This week I'm reading:
I fumbled around a bit choosing my next book but finally settled on Ted Kennedy's memoir, True Compass, which was published in 2009, the year he passed on. Though a long book, it's warm and wonderful and doesn't bog down (at least so far).
My next audiobook:
My hold on Tangerine finally came in! I hope it was worth the wait!
No comments:
Post a Comment