Before I share my summer reads, an opportunity for writers:
✨ My friend Janelle Hardy is once again hosting a special summit this fall. Mark your calendars for Dirty, Messy, Alive: an Embodied Memoir-Writing Workshop Series starting on September 26th! There will be sessions on human design for writers, intuitive outlining, writing about family, and more. I’m excited to attend myself! Hope you can join. ✨
Now, onto the books!
I read quite a bit this season, but I also let a lot go. This becomes necessary when a stack of eight library holds arrive at the same time, which is a habit I’m realizing might need to change. More about that once I decide how to proceed! Until then, here’s a look at what’s been on my nightstand.
Back to back, without realizing it, I read two island tales told by young-ish narrators. In WHALE FALL by Elizabeth O’Conner, a whale washes up on the shore of a remote island off the coast of Wales. When British ethnographers arrive on the cusp of the second world war, 18-year-old Manod becomes their translator and dreams of what might lie beyond the home she’s never left. In THE SADDEST GIRL ON THE BEACH by Heather Frese, 19-year-old Charlotte drops out of school after her father’s death and moves to the Outer Banks of North Carolina to work at the inn owned by the parents of her childhood best friend. Both books are told in compressed timelines (four months and one year, respectively) and bring the natural world to life in vivid ways.
Then I read two memoirs, also back to back, also exploring similar themes including grief, suicide, and family. Ten years before Nina St. Pierre was born, her mother and a friend lit themselves on fire. LOVE IS A BURNING THING is her attempt to put the pieces of her tumultuous childhood together through both the story of her mother, and herself. It explores the history of transcendental meditation and new age spirituality—of which her mother was a devotee—as well as the schizophrenia Nina suspects influenced her mother’s behavior. If you’re a writer struggling to tell stories that are not entirely your own, you might be interested in the author’s note, sharing: “Like the story it tells, its construction is an imperfect collage. A record of what I don’t know as much as of what I do.” This is a story with multiple fires (literally), and the four stages of a fire—ignition, growth, free burn, and decay—form the structure (and core metaphor) of this heartfelt book.
“For something that looks like chaos, fire is quite ordered. If you learn to read it, you can even predict what it might do. As a room burns, it seeks to equalize its own temperature. Walls and even furnishings absorb the heat, and as they heat up, they create off-gases. There’s an inflection point at which so much gas is built up that every flammable surface spontaneously combusts.”
In GRIEF IS FOR PEOPLE by Sloane Crosley, we begin shortly after the author’s apartment is robbed. This could easily be one story. But then a good friend of hers takes their own life, and the memoir becomes an exploration of both losses, weaving the suspense of seeking out her stolen jewelry alongside a portrait of her friendship filled with questions that may never have answers.
Since I’m thinking of adding slow to my 2025 word of the year shortlist, Cal Newport’s latest, SLOW PRODUCTIVITY, felt appropriate. This book tells us what we already know: we’re overworked, overwhelmed, and unnaturally busy. To put it in perspective, the majority of human history supported hunter/gather and agricultural lifestyles that were in tune with the seasons. Remnants from the industrial revolution (like 40-hour workweeks originally designed to reduce the physical fatigue of factory work) are relatively new in the grand scheme of history, which is one reason it continues to feel unnatural to us. His solution is a three-part practice of doing less, working at a natural pace, and obsessing over quality. This book is primarily targeted to knowledge workers so not everything feels relevant to the writer’s life, but there are still some nuggets to chew on.
Finally, Sara B. Franklin’s THE EDITOR: HOW PUBLISHING LEGEND JUDITH JONES SHAPED CULTURE IN AMERICA might be my favorite read of the summer. I was so engrossed! Judith Jones was the editor behind an impressive array of writers including Julia Child, John Updike, and Anne Tyler, and had a knack for cultivating lasting relationships with her authors. She stumbled into her role at Knopf during a wartime internship, and was essentially self-taught, relying on sharp instincts throughout her career. She also kept an eye on what she wanted and worked within her constraints to achieve it.
“Judith spent the mornings fulfilling her Doubleday duties, and afternoons for work of her own. She took advantage of the office’s phone line and typewriter, and helped herself to the ready supply of ink and paper to conduct her own correspondence.”
This was while living in Paris and working as the secretary of a Doubleday editor who took long, leisurely lunches. It reminds me of my “writing in the margins” method, or in this case we might call it “building an imprint in the margins?” The title needs work, but the point is that Judith wanted to have her own list and champion the books her bosses passed on. THE EDITOR is dripping with details about how Judith spent her days, what she cooked, what she struggled with, and brings her to life so vividly that I looked forward to reading every night.
Until next time,
Nicole
P.S. Working on a memoir? Don’t miss Dirty, Messy, Alive: an Embodied Memoir-Writing Workshop Series from September 26-29, 2024. You’ll explore memoir-writing from start to finish with 25+ teachers to guide you.
I love that you gave a shout out to Love is a Burning Thing - I was in a writing group with Nina many years ago, where I got to hear bits and pieces of her fiercely vulnerable and powerful writing in the book's beginnings.