Nonfiction Reading Update

I have really racked up the nonfiction reads over the last couple months and I wanted to share quick mini reviews on all of them. Read through the list of 8 books I have here and let me know if anything catches your eye!

BORN TO RUN by Christopher McDougall – I read this when the quarantine had just started. I wanted to get active and get outdoors to break up the days of working from home. This was an interesting look at running and the history of the Tarahumara people who are natural born runners.

ATOMIC HABITS by James Clear – This was a great short book that was to the point and had some really great tips on building better habits and breaking bad ones. It really stresses that little actions over time have huge results. I highly recommend this one for a boost of motivation.

STILLNESS IS THE KEY by Ryan Holiday – This was okay but I thinK Ego is the Enemy is a better book. It had some nuggets of good wisdom but a lot of stories and quotes that weren’t super interesting to me.

HOW TO CHANGE YOUR MIND by Michael Pollan – This is a very detailed history of the world of psychedelics. I found it fascinating. Although it gets very nuanced at times I still think its worth the read and would recommend it.

THE BABY DECISION by Merle Bombardieri – A detailed and unbiased look at tackling a very important decision. It gives you a lot to think about. Some stuff is obvious other stuff you may have never really considered. It gives you a clearer sense of what is important to you.

THE UPSIDE OF STRESS by Kelly McGonigal – The author of this one is a psychologist that studied stress and how we react to it. So much great information in here that really challenges the way we think about stress. We can’t eliminate stress from our lives so we have to learn how to work with it and that is what McGonigal tries to convey in this book.

CREATIVE CALLING by Chase Jarivs – I really liked this one. It is a great motivating resource for people who want to tap into their creative lives. The author talks a lot about his own experiences to illustrate his points. There are a lot of helpful tips and real talk about how to identify your creative calling and to really stick with it.

YOUR MONEY OR YOUR LIFE by Vicki Robin – This is a must read not only for the money advice but how to live your best life and the mindset to achieve it.

The Royal Abduls by Ramiza Shamoun Koya

This novel follows Amina and her 11 year old nephew Omar who is the son of her brother Mohammed (Mo). Every other chapter is told from either Amina’s or Omar’s perspective. Amina is a scientist and has a fairly cold personality. She is independent, career oriented and isn’t very likable. Amina and Mo are Indian American and come from a Indian Muslim family. Mo married a white woman which results in Omar being quite confused about his identity.

There is not much religious exploration that happens in this book despite the Muslim roots of this family. Amina identifies as Atheist. It is a post 9/11 world and Omar has lots of questions mainly because of the type of comments and reactions he gets from people at school. Amina and his parents are to busy going through their own life challenges to pay much attention to Omar and his curiosity about India. He does his own research and gets in trouble at times from his own exploration. I think this was intentional by the author to represent the reality of many confused biracial or bicultural kids growing up today without much support.

I was happy to see Sikh representation in the book although even this character was confused about his own religious identity. Personally I would have liked the character more if they were embracing there Sikh American identity despite living in a post 9/11 world. I guess I can understand that if you do not feel any connection to a religion why go through the rituals or wear the turban that goes along with it. To each their own.

This book is not without its faults and awkward moments but I appreciate it for what it is, a bicultural family struggling to get by in this crazy world.

*Thank you to the publisher Forest Ave Press for the gifted copy of this book. All opinions are my own.

Journaling

Keepers of private notebooks are a different breed altogether, lonely and resistant rearrangers of things, anxious malcontents, children afflicted apparently at birth with some presentiments of loss. -Joan Didion

Over this quarantine one of the documentaries I watched on Netflix was Joan Didion: The Center Will Not Hold. If you are at all curious about her, like I was, I would recommend it. Have you read anything by her? Her writing is beautiful.

I’ve kept journals over the years. Before journals were even a thing. Now I occasionally jot down things here and there but have yet to keep a nice and tidy bullet journal. One thing I am going to try are morning pages, which consist of 3 pages of stream of consciousness writing first thing in the morning.

The Last Summer of Ada Bloom by Martine Murray

The Last Summer of Ada Bloom by Martine Murray
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

There was a lot I liked about this novel and some things I wanted more from. We follow a family who each have their own struggles. While this tries to be a character driven novel I felt that the second half gets very plot heavy and we lose the character analysis. I wanted more exploration on the topic of male child favoritism and I wanted more analysis on Arnold’s character. Even though Martha was infuriating at times I felt that her character had the most layers as the book progressed. I enjoyed reading this novel despite some of the issues I had. It reminded me in some ways of Commonwealth by Ann Patchett although not as strong.

Thanks to Tin House for the early copy!

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That Hair by Djaimilia Pereira de Almeid

That Hair by Djaimilia Pereira de Almeida
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

“Making peace with ourselves in, I think to myself, like making peace with our ancestry, as though being at ease in our own skin were the consequence of the comfort brought by having a family.”

This was a tiny book that reads like a semi-autobiography of the authors life growing up in Lisbon. The author weaves in the history of her family along side how the people around her react to her hair and how she develops her own feelings about her hair. I resonated with the fact that Mila’s early attitude toward here hair was one of indifference, where it was a such a trivial matter to her until other’s like her white grandmother made comments like, “Tell me, Mila, when are you going to take care of that hair?” I feel that these are the turning points we have in our own thought patterns where we adopt the opinions of others. As if our hair, our skin or bodies are a problem that need to be fixed.

The writing style might not be for everyone but I thought it was a great that the author shared her story in this way.

Thank you to Tin House for the early copy!

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Writers & Lovers by Lily King

Writers & Lovers by Lily King
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Writers & Lovers seemed to give a true glimpse of the life of a typical starving artist. It felt true and genuine to me and I felt myself wanting to know more. The novel is very accurately about writers and lovers and I loved the simplicity and complexity of these things. Here’s is another great novel for fans of slow burn literary fiction! Thanks to Grove Atlantic for the e-ARC. All opinions are my own.

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Days of Distraction by Alexandra Chang

Days of Distraction by Alexandra Chang
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I really enjoyed this debut novel! It had some great commentary on race as it follows an Asian American woman tech writer. There was a huge focus on interracial relationships which I found very interesting and not discussed enough in literary fiction. My only issue was that at times the writing felt choppy because of the insertion of article clippings and research the protagonist was doing. I highly recommend this book for anyone who is into slow literary fiction books with themes of family, love and relationships. Thanks to Ecco books for the e-ARC. All opinions are my own.

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Home Making: A Novel by Lee Matalone

Home making is a quiet literary fiction novel written in a stream of consciousness style. I don’t think this will be for everyone but I appreciate this stylistic choice. There were a lot of passages that I enjoyed. The novel is told from multiple perspectives. The chapters signify who we are following but sometimes it is not always clear to the point where I had to flip back and re-read parts just to make sure I was following the right person. The main character, Chloe, is recently separated from her husband and is living on her own with her dog. She is setting up her home and we follow this theme of home making throughout the book. We also hear from her mother Cybil who is a half Japanese and half French war child. We also hear from Chloe’s best friend Beau who had a complex upbringing in the South. I would have liked to have had both of these character’s explored more because they were much more interesting to me than Chloe. Although this novel is not without its faults I still thought it was a great debut and will be happy to read more from this author.

This book is out on Feb 18, 2020 by Harper Perennial. Thank you to the publisher for an early e-copy of this book. All opinions are my own.

Goodbye, Vitamin by Rachel Khong

Goodbye, Vitamin by Rachel Khong
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This was a fun, quirky and heartfelt story about our main character Ruth who comes back to her childhood home for a year to help out her parents. Her Dad has Alzheimer’s and is going through a difficult time especially in losing his independence. The humor might not be for everyone but I enjoyed it. I loved the California vibes and Asian American perspective. Overall I was very pleased and look forward to more by Rachel Khong.

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A Woman is No Man by Etaf Rum

This is a really important book from an Arab American author. There are so many similarities between Indian and Arab culture that made this book a very compelling read for me. There is a great deal of importance, in both of these cultures, to marry into a “good” family, have children and be a “good” wife and mother. The novel goes into the more extreme aspects of the oppressive nature of being a woman from an Arab family. While these things are not something I have witnessed I know that it is the reality for many people in Arab and Indian cultures. When I started the book I remembering asking myself if this was a YA book but its not. It is categorized as literary fiction although it does not read like one from my experience. In other reviews I’ve seen some people argue that the novel is not nuanced enough and can seem repetitive at times. I agree with these sentiments however with so few novels that tackle this particular story I feel that it was well done and deserves the hype it is getting.