Zachary’s Comments (group member since Jan 22, 2019)

Zachary’s comments from the CPL's Book a Week Challenge group.

I have been busy this week, reading a graphic novel called The Silence of Our Friends, and starting Strangers in Their Own Land by Arlie Russell Hochschild.

Reflecting on a whole decade--I discovered so many authors and books that it's hard to narrow down. I discovered the Saga graphic novel series, I'll be Gone in the Dark by the late Michelle McNamara, the Song of Ice and Fire series, Ready Player One, and Colson Whitehead. Those are just a few highlights.

I've largely eliminated duds, thanks to the reviews and advice of friends like you all. One that was a dud to me was Hillbilly Elegy by JD Vance.

I've started Pulitzer prize winner Frederick Douglass by David W. Blight and A Dream of Wings by Tom Crouch. This one is about flight pioneers before the Wright brothers and one book I saved from weeding.

I am reading #1 Palaces for the people by Klinenberg and #5 Hold Tight by Harlan Coben.

I'm keeping my goal at 52 this year, because it feels so great to surpass it! I'm also working hard on trimming my to be read pile.

I finished the Adventure of the Christmas Pudding and other stories by Agatha Christie and I am working on the Institute by Stephen King

I'm reading two things: one a local true crime story called The Senator's Son, by Charles Oldham, and the other called Weapons of Math Destruction, How Big Data increases inequality... by Cathy O Neil.

I'm reading Tayari Jones' Leaving Atlanta, her first novel, and I knew nothing about it when I picked it up but the plot is great thus far and the narrative voices of the children protagonists are drawing me in. She is speaking at ODU on October 10th, FYI.

I second Jodie's Steinbeck... reading him in high school was the first required reading I enjoyed. Most importantly and eye opening, I took a Women's Literature class early on in college and that exposed me to Toni Morrison, Kate Chopin, Margaret Atwood and more. I also took a class on short stories, and that required reading Raymond Carver and John Cheever, two of my favorites still today.

every Fall I seem to read a history book. This year it's a fascinating history of Silicon Valley and the tech boom, beginning post WWII, called The Code, by Margaret O'Mara. in the chapters, she also demonstrates the systems and barriers that kept women and minority groups largely excluded from tech culture, while she explains the evolution of the industry and why it developed in a sleepy area of California.

I'm rereading Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neal Hurston. it's a classic of the Harlem Renaissance.

This week and last week I've been reading Where the Crawdads Sing (Delia Owens), and am now reading Calypso (David Sedaris), which I guess fits the theme of an author of sexual orientation not my own. Where the Crawdads Sing was a great vacation read--worthy of the amount of holds it has in the library! Calypso is darkly funny, but perhaps more dark than Sedaris' earlier work.

my next book, Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng.

"Woke up this morning with a terrific urge to lie in bed all day and read. " -Raymond Carver

Bury my heart at Chuck E Cheese's by Sioux author Tiffany Midge (October) Also, the Nickel Boys by Colson Whitehead (July).

yay!

I think so far my favorites are both Harlan Coben books, Run Away and the Stranger.

weirdly enough, I tend to take a lot of nonfiction books on vacation. With fiction, especially suspense fiction--things that might normally fit the definition of beach reads--I get so interested I can't put them down. With nonfiction, I find I can step away if needed to do vacation-type things.

#8 and #2 are the same for me. I'm going to try to read all the Cormac McCarthy Border Trilogy books--a favorite of my Dad's that I've never read, that I bought at the last Friends booksale.