memoir

Paper Girl

Leave a comment

by Beth Macy
First sentence: “It was June 2023, and Silas James had just graduated from Urbana High School, forty-one years after I wore that same insignia.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Release date: October 7, 2025
Review copy pilfered from the ARC shelves at the bookstore.
Content: There is swearing, including multiple f-bombs, and mention of sexual abuse. It will be in the Biography section of the bookstore.

When Beth Macy graduated from Urbana High School in 1982, she was able to go to a four-year college on a Pell Grant, since she came from a poor household. She used it as her ticket out, moving first to Georgia and then to Virginia. But, 40 years later, as divisions in her family and between her high school friends grew, she returned to find out why the graduation rate dropped, the addiction rate soared, and it’s harder than ever to get out of the poverty people find themselves in.

It’s a good story, as Macy recounts her troubled childhood with an alcoholic father, interspersing that with the stories of some of the students and people she met over the course of the year and a half she researched this book. She talked to many of the kids she went to school with, trying to understand where they were coming from politically, even as she found them on ever-widening divides. She explores the ways in which poverty makes life challenging and the ways that trauma continues to affect people. She is staunchly anti-Republican, detailing all the ways the Republican party hurts the people it claims to help, but she is not pro-Democrat, faulting them for not reaching out to the poor working class in order to help. It’s a challenging read at times, but it’s a good one: Macy is a good writer, and she has empathy for the people she’s writing about.

It’s an excellent, and important, book.

It Rhymes With Takei

Leave a comment

by George Takei, Harmony Becker, Steven Scott, and Justin Eisinger
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Content: There is homophobia and mention of gay sex. It’s in the Graphic Novel section of the bookstore.

In his previous memoir, They Called Us Enemy, Takei wrote about his time in the internment camps during World War II, but didn’t really elaborate on the rest of his life. In this book, Takei does just that. It picks up when he first realizes that he was gay, when he was about 10 years old, and works his way through the years until the present day. There is a lot about his activism, and the guilt and shame he felt staying in the closet for so long. But, he feared being too different – his family was already put in a camp for being different once – and it was a different time. He was just doing the best he could with what he knew at the time. He made good friends on Star Trek, people who stood beside him later in life, and he eventually became more comfortable with his identity as he got older. The most truly heartbreaking thing was that his brother shunned him when he finally came out to them, but he still has a relationship with his brother’s kids.

It’s a good book – Takei has a good team for this (it’s the same team that did They Called Us Enemy) – one that captures the conflicted and complicated life of one man. It’s perfect for those who are fans of Takei, but it also puts the whole LGBTQ movement in the context of one person’s life.

I really enjoyed it.

Audiobook: Food for Thought

Leave a comment

by Alton Brown
Read by the author
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Or listen at Libro.fm
Content: I don’t think he swears, but if he does it’s mild swearing and not very often. It’s in the Food Reference section of the bookstore.

I have been fond of Alton Brown for years. I use a handful of his recipes and he came and did an event at the store and was entertaining and not a dick to me (he’s kind of persona-non-grata at the store for reasons):

Goodness, we were young.

Anyway, I picked up a galley of his book, but C stole it from me and read it and really enjoyed it. So, when it showed up on audio, with him reading it, of course I had to listen. It’s a series of small essays, “thoughts” if you will, ranging from his childhood to his career as a food host (not a chef, never a chef), to his thoughts on food in movies and Food Network. It’s a slight read/listen, but it’s entertaining, he’s a smart person and a good writer, and a lot of fun. Which, honestly: what more do you want out of a food book?

Nothing, honestly. (And yes, I may, eventually, try his roast chicken “recipe” he includes.)

It’s Only Drowning

Leave a comment

by David Litt
First sentence: “Matthew Kappler is my brother-in-law, and we’re very different, and one of the biggest differences between us is that if I lived like him I would die.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Review copy provided by the publisher.
Release date: June 24, 2025
Content: There is swearing, including multiple f-bombs. It will be in the Sports section of the bookstore.

David Litt is a former Obama speech writer, author, and all-around politics wonk. He and his wife, who is a congressional aide, split their time in DC and are the sort of liberals you probably think they are. Which means, he doesn’t really get along with his wife’s brother, Matt, an non-voter, Joe Rogan-loving, anti-vaxxer. But, when COVID-19 hit, and he was stuck in pandemic lockdown, he realized he needed to find something new to do. So, he picked Matt’s favorite sport: surfing. At the ripe age of 35, David decided to pick up the sport, and then made a goal to be good enough to surf the North Shore of Hawaii in a little over a year.

This book is that journey.

And what a journey. I learned a lot about surfing – especially Jersey shore surfing – enough to have a lot of respect for anyone who not only tries it, but does it successfully. I love how Litt writes about the sport, making it accessible enough to those of us who have never even attempted it. I loved the way he writes about the ocean, both it’s power and it’s beauty. I loved learning about the culture surrounding surfing, and appreciated that Litt was honest enough to admit that he felt he was on the outside. I also liked that Litt didn’t downplay his ambitions with surfing and developing a relationship with his brother-in-law. It’s heartfelt and honest, and I love it for that.

An excellent memoir.

What I Ate In One Year

Leave a comment

by Stanley Tucci
First sentence: “I never dream about food.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Release date: October 15, 2024
ARC pilfered from the shelves at work.
Content: There is some swearing, including quite a few f-bombs, though he often censors himself. It’s in the Biography section of the bookstore.

This one has a simple enough premise: every single day (mostly) of 2023, Tucci wrote about what he ate. He missed a few days, he summed up a few days, but for the most part, he did it. He also writes about the things connected to food: shopping, cooking, and interacting with friends and family. He also writes about the pleasure he has with eating and cooking and sitting down with people he cares about to have a meal.

And the book is glorious. Truly.

In something so mundane as recording what he ate, Tucci finds something interesting to say, about food, about life and living, about companionship and friendship, and about how food connects us and makes the world grander. It’s truly a delight to sit with the actor over the course of the year. I adored the book. I’m glad he includes recipes, I’m glad he decided to do something so simple as this. And honestly: Tucci has become one of my all-time favorite food writers. (Reading it often made me want to go cook and eat.)

I adored this one.

Audiobook: The Mango Tree

Leave a comment

by Annabelle Tometitch
Read by the author
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Or listen at Libro.fm
Content: There is a depiction of abuse by a parent, talk of suicide, and swearing, including multiple f-bombs. It’s in the Biography section of the bookstore.

Annabelle Tomtetich’s mom, an immigrant from the Philippines, was arrested for firing a BB gun at a person who was trying to steal her mangoes from the mango tree in her front yard. To understand how she came to this point Tometich takes us through her (not her mother’s) childhood, the relationship she had with her mother, and possibly most importantly, how she views the relationship her mother had with the world around her. It’s a fascinating story, one that I think a lot of children of immigrants will recognize, but it’s also a story of grief and heartache, of anxiety and compulsion, and of coming to terms with life in southwest Florida. 

This was a delightful memoir. I related to the 70s childhood of no phones and hanging out with friends, though I didn’t have an over-protective Philippine mom. I appreciated the way Tomtetich tied everything together – from her father’s death when she was 9, through her obsessive need for approval, and her discovery of her love of writing and food, to her up-and-down relationship with her mother. I feel that Tometitch did an excellent job as a narrator as well.

My only regret was that it was less food-y than I was hoping it would be, but that’s just a minor quibble. It’s an excellent book to listen to.  

Audiobook: Leslie F**king Jones

Leave a comment

by Leslie Jones
Read by the author
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Or listen at Libro.fm
Content: This is sweary. SO very sweary. Like, I don’t know how many sentences didn’t have the f-bomb. (Plus 10 uses of the n-word, but that’s her prerogative.) It’s in the humor section of the bookstore.

I tell so many people that the best way to read a celebrity memoir is to listen to it on audio. I’ve even gone as far as to say that I actively won’t read a memoir if the author doesn’t read it. (Case in point: I have yet to read Elton John’s memoir, even though I have a copy of it on my shelf downstairs. He doesn’t read the audiobook.) I don’t know why I put Leslie Jones’s memoir on hold at the library (it was a good two months between when I put the hold and when it came in; I no longer remember it), but I have to admit I was curious about the book.

Friends: this audiobook is NOT the book. Well, it’s loosely the book. But you will get an entirely different experience listening to it than reading it. See, Jones says “Chapter X” and then just takes off. Like pretty literally. It’s a 16-hour audiobook for a less-than-300-page book. This is not a criticism. Once I realized that she was riffing on the book, taking the chapters and just going with the flow, telling you her story, I got into the groove of the insanity and enjoyed myself. (At a certain point, when she said “Hey, I like what I wrote here, let me read it” I pretty much figured that if I wasn’t willing to change my expectations about this book, I needed to get off the train. Reader: I stayed on the whole way.)

She’s had a hard life, but she is one of the most positive people I’ve read about. She laughs at herself, her past mistakes, she has Thoughts about pretty much everything, she doesn’t take any crap from anyone, and she knows her worth. It’s pretty amazing. I appreciated her vulnerability, her laugh, her story. So, yeah: not at all what I expected from an audiobook, but definitely worth my time to finish it.

Mexikid

Leave a comment

by Pedro Martín
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Review copy pilfered from the ARC shelves at work.
Content: There is some bullying and teasing by siblings, and talk of death. It’s in the Middle-Grade Graphic Novel section of the bookstore.

Pedro is one of nine children, the son of immigrant parents – he and his younger siblings were born in the US; his parents and older siblings immigrated from Mexico – which makes him, a “Mexikid”. Not really Mexican enough, but also not really American enough. And then, one Christmas break, Pedro’s family drives back to their hometown to fetch his abuelito and bring him back to live with them. It’s a life-changing trip, not only because of the adventures Pedro has but because of the things he learns about his family.

I thought this was a lot of fun! I loved how Martin portrayed his boisterous, big family; you could tell that family is super important to him. Sure, the siblings fought and teased, but there was genuine affection there. And I liked how he brought in his family history while relating the events of the trip they took. It was entertaining, funny, and thoroughly enjoyable to read about this particular time in history. I liked the art – and the ways Martin used the art to tell his story.

Highly recommended.

Audiobook: Making It So

Leave a comment

by Patrick Stewart
Read by the author
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Or listen at Libro.fm
Content: There is some swearing, including multiple f-bombs. It’s in the Film section of the bookstore.

If you’ve been reading this blog for any length of time (or if you’ve known me for any time), you probably know that I have a weakness for celebrity memoirs. Not all of them – I never did read I’m Glad My Mother is Dead – but of some celebrities who I have a passing interest in, I’m there. Especially if they read the memoir themselves. Which, of course, Sir Patrick does. 

This follows his life, from his childhood in Yorkshire through his time in regional theaters to the Royal Shakespeare Company, and finally landing as Captain Jean-Luc Picard and Charles Xavier in television and films. He’s pretty open and blunt about his shortcomings and faults and the ups and downs of his career and his marriages. He was a delightful person to spend 18 hours with – you can tell he is a storyteller at heart. I think he believes in the power of telling a story, which is one of the things that drew him to acting, and that definitely shows. 

It’s not the best memoir I’ve ever read, but it’s a solid read (and a good listen; he’s an excellent narrator, which is no surprise), and I enjoyed the time I spent listening to it. 

Sunshine

Leave a comment

by Jarrett J. Korsoczka
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Content: There are sick kids and talk of death. It’s in the Graphic Novel section of the bookstore.

In the companion to Hey Kiddo, Krosoczka depicts his experiences with Camp Sunshine, a place for sick kids – many of them terminally ill – and their families to go to get away from hospitals and being sick. Krosoczka volunteered for a week when he was 16, and he didn’t know what to expect when he first got there but ended up meeting incredible people and having his life changed for the better.

It was a touching and sweet graphic novel. I loved how Krosoczka depicted not only the other kids volunteering but also the kids and their families. He hits the highlights of the week he volunteered, and followed some of the relationships he kept afterward. It’s a good reminder that getting outside yourself and volunteering to help others is important. And it’s a good book.