Read and Dream: My Book Life

Just Kids Review

Title: Just Kids
Author: Patti Smith
Publisher: Ecco

Blurb: In Just Kids, Patti Smith's first book of prose, the legendary American artist offers a never-before-seen glimpse of her remarkable relationship with photographer Robert Mapplethorpe in the epochal days of New York City and the Chelsea Hotel in the late sixties and seventies. An honest and moving story of youth and friendship, Smith brings the same unique, lyrical quality to Just Kids as she has to the rest of her formidable body of work--from her influential 1975 album Horses to her visual art and poetry.

Me: The most stunning, inspiring, sincere memoir I've read.

Title: Mornings in Jenin
Author: Susan Abulhawa
Publisher: Bloomsbury

Blurb: Forcibly removed from the ancient village of Ein Hod by the newly formed state of Israel in 1948, the Abulhejas are moved into the Jenin refugee camp. There, exiled from his beloved olive groves, the family patriarch languishes of a broken heart, his eldest son fathers a family and falls victim to an Israeli bullet, and his grandchildren struggle against tragedy toward freedom, peace, and home. This is the Palestinian story, told as never before, through four generations of a single family.

Me: Such an important story for our world today, but the writing doesn't do the story justice.

Title: Open City
Author: Teju Cole
Publisher: Random House

Blurb: Along the streets of Manhattan, a young Nigerian doctor doing his residency wanders aimlessly. The walks meet a need for Julius: they are a release from the tightly regulated mental environment of work, and they give him the opportunity to process his relationships, his recent breakup with his girlfriend, his present, his past.

But it is not only a physical landscape he covers; Julius crisscrosses social territory as well, encountering people from different cultures and classes who will provide insight on his journey—which takes him to Brussels, to the Nigeria of his youth, and into the most unrecognizable facets of his own soul.

Me: A recommended read from my AMAZING English teacher...but not sure how to feel about it. Nothing like I've read before, that's for sure.

Title: A Lucky Man
Author: Jamel Brinkley
Publisher: Graywolf Press

Blurb: In the nine expansive, searching stories of A Lucky Man, fathers and sons attempt to salvage relationships with friends and family members and confront mistakes made in the past. An imaginative young boy from the Bronx goes swimming with his group from day camp at a backyard pool in the suburbs, and faces the effects of power and privilege in ways he can barely grasp. A teen intent on proving himself a man through the all-night revel of J’Ouvert can’t help but look out for his impressionable younger brother. A pair of college boys on the prowl follow two girls home from a party and have to own the uncomfortable truth of their desires.

Jamel Brinkley’s stories, in a debut that announces the arrival of a significant new voice, reflect the tenderness and vulnerability of black men and boys whose hopes sometimes betray them, especially in a world shaped by race, gender, and class―where luck may be the greatest fiction of all.

Me: This is the first short story collection I've savored and adored (and possibly the first that I made it all the way through). It's delicate but unapologetic and so incredibly written.

I'm 12 years late to the party and buzz surrounding this book and probably 15-20 years under the target age. In fact, if I hadn't heard so much about Elizabeth Gilbert and then hadn't seen this book at a used book store for a dollar, I wouldn't have picked it up at least for another decade, or maybe never. So why did I read it? And what'd I get out of it? Why am I bothering to talk about it here?

Hey! After I've been gone for what seems like a while, I just wanted to update you on this summer and everything that's happened. It's been a busy month or so, and I truly feel so lucky to say that I've been able to make so many new friends and memories.

Title: The Sun Also Rises
Author: Ernest Hemingway
Genre: Classic

Blurb: The quintessential novel of the Lost Generation, The Sun Also Rises is one of Ernest Hemingway's masterpieces and a classic example of his spare but powerful writing style. A poignant look at the disillusionment and angst of the post-World War I generation, the novel introduces two of Hemingway's most unforgettable characters: Jake Barnes and Lady Brett Ashley. The story follows the flamboyant Brett and the hapless Jake as they journey from the wild nightlife of 1920s Paris to the brutal bullfighting rings of Spain with a motley group of expatriates. It is an age of moral bankruptcy, spiritual dissolution, unrealized love, and vanishing illusions. First published in 1926, The Sun Also Rises helped to establish Hemingway as one of the greatest writers of the twentieth century.

Me: Maybe the first Hemingway I truly enjoyed. Brisk, unapologetic, and surprisingly meaningful.