Some years my reading list is more structured and thematically tied than others, some years (particularly when I’m actively researching and writing), my list of recreational reads is embarrassingly thin. This gap year between finishing my first book and starting all-in on my second, I drifted toward whatever whim suited me, though in looking back, I see the patterns of my obsessions making their mark.
The prospect of Ryan Murphy’s Feud: Capote vs. The Swans compelled me to pick up Capote’s posthumously published Answered Prayers, the unfinished, scandal-making collection of stories that sparked all the society drama. I’ve been strongly drawn to New York stories, as well as anything from or set in the ‘50s, ‘60s, and ‘70s for as long as I can remember. I’m constantly asking “where is my time machine,” which my therapist views as a form of dissociation but I think is a completely normal response to our present day nightmare. At any rate, Answered Prayers checked both boxes (New York vibes, time machine longing) and delivered a heaping dose of escapism in delicious, frothy form. In the same category of delightfully catty New York society scandal, I relished in reading Edith Wharton’s The House of Mirth. Wharton’s prose is so vibrant, funny, and feels incredibly fresh today. Trying to tell myself it’s because Wharton is simply that good and not that we’re, uh, presently in a repeat of the Gilded Age ourselves.
Another of my favorite genres of any art form is “I’m always mad at my one sister.” Maybe this is because I’m the oldest of three sisters, so it’s easy for me to relate to, or maybe it’s simply because the dynamic of sister relationships has consistently presented material ripe for dramatization for centuries but still feels ripe for exploration. I gobbled up Alexandra Tanner’s Worry, a terrifically funny and original entry to the form, with manic glee. I laughed out loud, gasped at how real the sisters’ conversations (and particularly their arguments) were, and texted far too many photos of paragraphs to my sisters with the (very older sister-core) order “YOU MUST READ THIS IMMEDIATELY.” I stretched out this tales-of-bitchy-sisters kick by finally reading, and loving, the copies of Meg Wolitzer’s This Is My Life (a warm, funny, and bittersweet hug of a book) and Delia Ephron’s Hanging Up (wickedly funny, deeply relatable) that had been sitting on my shelves for years.
I tend to gravitate toward books with complicated women at the center. This summer, I picked up Joyce Maynard’s Count the Ways, hoping to read before beginning her latest, its (standalone) follow-up How the Light Gets In, and ended up tearing through in 24 hours. Both books reminded me of dialogue in Greta Gerwig’s Little Women about whether or not literature about “domestic struggles and joys” was important. Maynard’s decades-sprawling novels confirm that these seemingly ordinary moments of family life are just as worthy of being written about as seriously as anything else. After reading both, I felt compelled to re-read her memoir At Home in the World for the first time in more than decade. It’s no surprise I could appreciate it better at 33 than at 21, but its stunning commitment to honesty left me in awe for a long time.
Hollywood history is obviously one of my primary interests; I can’t resist reading works about how the art I love was made, how we’ve arrived at our present moment, and what I can learn from better understanding the lives of groundbreaking, rule-defying artists I love. The Path to Paradise: A Francis Ford Coppola Story (so immersive, fascinating, and thrillingly page-turning, you sometimes forget you’re reading non-fiction) from Sam Wasson, whose work I revere, and Barbra Streisand’s epic Barbra (gloriously stuffed full of minute details, written by a yapper for a yapper, even better in audio form) both delivered insights and entertainment in equal form.
As the year draws to a close, I’m back where I started it: once more picking up The Power Broker by Robert Caro, swearing I will finish it this go—I truly love it so much it’s a wonder I haven’t yet—while knowing I will inevitably set it down after another couple hundred pages again to read something else that catches my eye. It is not the book’s fault by any means; my attention span is shot. Maybe I’ll be able to fix it in 2025.
