Book Recommendations 2024: PT 1 - My Picks
Where would we even be without books?
Good Saturday afternoon before the weekend before Christmas! I am famously one of those people that really goes hard only 10 or so days before the holiday happens (partially because I also love NYE, and my Serbian Christmas is not till January 7th so the festive fun needs to be perfectly positioned to span all that), so this weekend is truly the first moment that things feel *HOLIDAY REAL*
My neighborhood book club had their white elephant exchange last night (perfect timing) and it was delightful - so many gifts supporting our local bookstore, libraries and just each other (so many cozy blankets and cool glassware from Fredericksburg’s abundance of antique malls), and while I am continuing my gift guide resistance with my best-of-2024 listicle resistance (I feel I am firmly entering my “Get off my lawn” internet era), I did think it would be cool/awesome/amazing to celebrate books we loved so much that we couldn’t resist recommending them. To anyone and everyone who’d listen.
Not the best books, or the buzziest books, or whatever - but books you and me and everyone we know SHOULD read. Books we wanted to talk to people about. Books we wanted to give as gifts.
A bunch of you filled out my survey (thank you! to those that didn’t - you have till tonight!) and it filled my heart with general sense of wellbeing and hope - if we’re reading, we’ll be ok, right? RIGHT!
So, without further ado - I’ll use myself as an opener today, and make you the headliner tomorrow, cool?
My top 6 recommended books of 2024 are: (mentioned, respectively in the August newsletter, July newsletter, May and April newsletters)
The Safekeep - Yael Van Der Woulden - This was recommended to me by Sarah Wildman, who is one of the most thoughtful writers and best readers I know, and I cannot recommend it enough to all of you. In 1960s Dutch countryside, a young woman, Isabel, lives a life driven by routine. Her life is turned upside down with arrival of Eva, her brother’s girlfriend, who is brash, messy, and yet also (obviously?) not quite the breezy, blonde party girl she has led him to believe she is. The less you know beyond this the better. But what is worth knowing is that somehow, in under 300 pages, Van Der Wouden manages, to blow every expectation of what a book that starts like this could possibly be about. It is structurally ambitious and one of the most accomplished plotting exercises I’ve ever read. It is emotionally devastating and also simmering with passions that ring incredibly true. It takes sharp turns and overdelivers on any and all clues left for the reader. It is, at its core, about identity in all its shapes and forms, and therefore, despite being incredibly specific, also completely universal. I was breathless by the time it was over.
The Most - Jessica Anthony - I bought this in a bookstore in Palm Springs - because the cover looked amazing, and the premise of a 1950s housewife who goes into a pool one balmy Delaware day in early November and refuses to come out sounded like just the ticket for the type of book I’d want to read in one sitting (preferably in a pool myself). And I was right. But it was also so much more: a meditation on men and women, on relationships, on sport, on the American dream, on secrets and lies, on love. And all that in 144 pages. This deserves to be read much more widely than it currently has legs to do - so lets reach hands across America/Substack/whatever and make it happen? One thing I can promise you: it will set your neighborhood book club on fire.
All Fours - Miranda July - not necessarily because it was the best (though it is getting some great attention in that sense), but because I am a grown woman and I wanted to talk to other grown woment about it. A WHOLE NEWSLETTER was dedicated to it and my emotional journey w/ July over the last 20 years as well.
Strange Sally Diamond - Liz Nugent - “The instagram” sort of conspired for me to read this (first Lisa Jewell said it was her favorite, then Grace Atwood posted about it for like 3 days in a row, and then the AI overlords in charge of my feed decided that I was not allowed to stop seeing it) and that is usually a bad sign because the delivery-on-promise pressure is very high, but this was VERY DARK, VERY TRIGGERING, and sort of a Last House on Needless Street crossed with The Room crossed with Elinor Oliphant is Completely Fine (which I maintain is one of the darkest books about trauma and neurodiversity out there, even if Reese Witherspoon wants you to think it is a comedy) - a great thriller for people who read a lot of thrillers and therefore find it hard to get that adrenaline rush from something truly twisted and shocking. P.S. Runners up for thriller recs were: “God Of The Woods” by Liz Moore & “The Darling Girls” by Sally Hepworth
Martyr! by Kaveh Akbar - In February I wrote “Dead in Long Beach, California” which is a debut novel by a poet (Venita Blackburn) as one of my favorite reads (And this is a book I wish I actually recommended more), and then another debut novel by a poet tops the list too. Kaveh Akbar’s Martyr! is a literary mystery about identity, belonging, heritage, sexuality, war, family, friendship, art and a 1001 things big and small in between and it flexes both language and format in ways that felt refreshing and challenging, but also compulsively readable. A small miracle of a book.
Piglet - Lottie Hazell - OMG, obsessed with this. It is right up there with “Big Swiss” and “Happy Hour” and “The Happy Couple” for me (and you know this is very high praise over here). Piglet, our lead, is a cookbook editor in London, an aspiring upper-middle-class-er, and about to get married to Kit, who is already upper crust-y and sort of blah, but you know, she’s come to be ok with it. Then all hell and betrayal breaks loose two weeks before the wedding and we are spun into a downward spiral of some of the most insanely satisfying food writing I’ve ever read, peppered with a comedy of class manners as only the British can write, and the finale is just FLAWLESSLY executed. I need this made into a movie or TV show starring a slightly younger Phoebe Waller Bridge, much younger Joan Cusack (or alternatively Ayo Edebiri of now - which feels more viable) IMMEDIATELY.
BONUS: “The Happy Couple” by Noaise Dolan and “No One Tells You This” by
are probably up there on the list, and I do anticipate talking about “After Claude” from my November round up A BUNCH at dinner parties for the months to come. Several books I loved but am surprised I didn’t shove into people’s hands more (Venita Blackburn’s already mentioned masterpiece aside) are “Disappearing Earth” by Julia Phillips, “Headshot” by Rita Bulwinkle and “Real Americans” by Rachel Khong - do with this information what you wish.STAY TUNED FOR TOMORROW! WHEN I SHARE YOUR PICKS! (again, a reminder that you still have time till this evening to participate)
