Recent reading
| Number of books read and reviewed each year |
|---|
| 1995* |
(28)
|
| 1996 |
(47)
|
| 1997 |
(74)
|
| 1998 |
(61)
|
| 1999 |
(62)
|
| 2000 |
(27)
|
| 2001 |
(51)
|
| 2002 |
(60)
|
| 2003 |
(37)
|
| 2004 |
(36)
|
| 2005 |
(32)
|
| 2006 |
(46)
|
| 2007 |
(109)
|
| 2008 |
(78)
|
| 2009 |
(65)
|
| 2010 |
(68)
|
| 2011 |
(98)
|
| 2012 |
(129)
|
| 2013 |
(114)
|
| 2014 |
(101)
|
| 2015 |
(88)
|
| 2016 |
(82)
|
| 2017 |
(76)
|
| 2018 |
(67)
|
| 2019 |
(95)
|
| 2020 |
(90)
|
| 2021 |
(85)
|
| 2022 |
(101)
|
| 2023 |
(124)
|
| 2024 |
(155)
|
| 2025 |
(133)
|
| 2026 |
(75)
|
| * Partial year |
[Finished 2 November 2026] Well-written and lucid, providing a good high-level overview of what Kafka buys for implementors of it and pointing out where its strengths and weaknesses lie.
[Finished 31 October 2026] While normally stories of mid-century Irish-American Catholics don’t interest me, I continue to be entranced by Alice McDermott’s writing where even the most mundane events are beautifully written.
[Finished 30 October 2026] Beautifully-written stories, Phillips has a compelling voice in these pieces that caught my attention from the start.
[Finished 27 October 2026] A curious volume, a mix of biography, criticism, history and memoir through the light of Poe’s writing and life. Something that Ogden said in an interview about the book greatly summarized what her project was about when she said that Poe was less about horror than remorse.
[Finished 23 October 2026] I was initially a little skeptical as I began the novel, but I rapidly was sold by the writing and the sprawl of the ideas here. Just a brilliant piece of writing and something that I can easily recommend.
[Finished 21 October 2026] Maugham specifically cites the Journal of Jules Renard as his inspiration to publish this set of observations and quasi-journal entries. Mildly entertaining, although a bit distressing in the level of misogyny on Maugham’s part that it reveals.
[Finished 18 October 2026] A small, charming book tracing an author’s day in her city and a number of places she visits as she reflects on her life.
[Finished 16 October 2026] As much a work of philosophy as literature, I found it dense and a bit impenetrable. Being significantly longer than Homer, it ended up being a slog for me.
[Finished 12 October 2026] As I recall, this book got a fair amount of acclaim when it came out, although reading it, I found myself getting angry with the poor editing that the book got. When the narrator talked about knowing another character’s after-school activity schedule and two pages later says that same character had no after-school activities I had a harder time forgiving the “AP Geometry” of the first chapter or a “dual” for “duel” typo somewhat later. The story overall is interesting and Anam had a great concept, but the execution left a lot to be desired and it could have been a better book.
[Finished 8 October 2026] I heard about this book when the audiobook was released and Eisenberg was interviewed on KCRW’s Bookworm. I’m not much of an audiobook guy though, so I eventually got to around to reading it I found myself delighted with the writing. It’s very much the sort of writing that a woman of her age and background living in New York in the late twentieth century would write, which could be good or bad, but it’s mostly good, and Eisenberg writes with a playwright’s ear for dialog.
Previous reads…