Happy one year anniversary, Our Books are Better than We Are! To help me celebrate, I think everyone should leave a comment (here on the blog, not on Facebook!) about the best book they’ve read lately.
My celebratory post on one of the best short story collections I’ve read in about my entire life, Reasons for and Advantages of Breathing by Lydia Peelle, is forthcoming.
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August 13, 2009 at 11:38 pm
Ella
Oh no! My best book lately is Reasons for and Advantages to Breathing also! Of course, since we bought it together…and she is a brilliant literary genius!
Anyway, I’ve also really enjoyed a graphic novel (the first I’ve ever read…) called The Imposter’s Daughter by Laurie Sandell. It’s a fascinating story and reminded me of reading comic books when I was a kid.
August 14, 2009 at 2:07 am
Lindsay
Happy Birthday!
This year I ventured head first into Yoga and Tibetan Buddhism so my reading material has been very focused as you can imagine. I’ve read several enlightening (!) books and they all deserve time and space here but I would single out Lama Christie McNally’s newly released, “The Tibetan Book of Meditation” as the one that both reached my heart as a student and seemed the most practical and usable as a teacher.
Lama Christie is venturing into the territory of bringing female western teachers into the forefront of modern Buddhism (not unlike Pema Chodron) and does so with utter simplicity, compassion and wisdom. Her book is straight forward enough to make a beginner feel like the practice of meditation and ultimately Enlightenment is something they can and should embark on and it’s complex and profound enough to move middle and higher practitioners to deeper levels of an established practice.
She weaves step by step meditations, meditation tips, Buddhist teachings and personal anecdotes throughout the book in a simple and user friendly manner. You feel at once on the path alongside her and the student following the master’s footsteps.
Highly recommended to all those interested in the topic!
To Another Fine Year-
Lindsay
August 14, 2009 at 3:15 am
nicework
Aleksandar Hemon’s “The Lazarus Project.” So good, it sneaks up on you. The way information is revealed (slowly, discreetly), the way the author weaves the multiple, seemingly incongruous threads together to form the whole is expert. By the end of it, I was convinced I was in the hands of a (MacArthur) genius.
August 14, 2009 at 8:01 pm
genevieve
happy anniversary! i love reading your thoughts on everything, but especially books. and because of this blog i’ve read a lot of great stuff this year (including shirley jackson’s we have always lived in the castle, which i loved and would never have thought to pick up on my own).
so lately i’ve been watching a lot of tv and reading only patricia highsmith. who is amazing in her own way but i can’t bring myself to say “strangers on a train” is the best book i’ve read lately. but a couple days ago (perhaps in anticipation of your blog post) i decided i needed something a little more highbrow and picked up faulkner’s “absalom absalom.” i love this book. and the way faulkner writes you’d almost think you were reading a trashy mystery at times because you can’t wait to see how the story will unfold.
August 14, 2009 at 8:53 pm
Lila
THE CORRECTIONS by Jonathan Franzen – painfully real!