Books of 2020
As promised last year, I only read 29 books in 2020. With most of my reading done in the first half of the year, I don’t really remember much. I suppose that means I really enjoyed these books:
The Orphan Master’s Son by Adam Johnson
He closed his eyes and listened to her demand. There was something pure and beautiful about it. If only more people in life said, This is what I must have.
The Most Fun We Ever Had by Claire Lombardo
The thing Liza admired about her parents’ generation was that they didn’t seem to think very much. They just did things because those things looked a certain way and looking a certain way was half the battle. You reached a certain age and you found a semiattractive, living, breathing man, and you went through the motions even if he was boring or mean or a sociopath, and you stuck it out to the bitter end. And this was not the most romantic notion but she liked the stubbornness of it, the simplicity, the security.
Coronavirus and Christ by John Piper
The object of hope is future. The experience of hope is present. And that present experience is powerful. Hope is power. Present power. Hope keeps people from killing themselves -- now. It helps people get out of bed and go to work -- now. It gives meaning to daily life, even locked-down, quarantined, stay-at-home life -- now. It liberates from the selfishness of fear and greed -- now. It empowers love and risk taking and sacrifice -- now.
A Long Petal of the Sea by Isabel Allende
After thirty-eight hours without eating or sleeping, trying to give water to an adolescent dying in his arms, something gave way in Victor’s chest. My heart is broken, he told himself. It was at that moment he understood the profound meaning of that common phrase: he thought he heard the sound of glass breaking and felt that the essence of his being was pouring out until he was empty, with no memory of the past, no awareness of the present, no hope for the future. He concluded this must be what it was like to bleed to death, like so many men he had been unable to help. There was too much pain, too much that was despicable in this war between brothers; defeat had to be better than to continue killing and dying.
The Nickel Boys by Colson Whitehead
I used to think out there is out there and then once you’re in here, you’re in here. That everybody in Nickel was different because of what being here does to you. Spencer and them, too—maybe out there in the free world, they’re good people. Smiling. Nice to their kids.” His mouth squinched up, like he was sucking on a rotten tooth. “But now that I been out and I been brought back, I know there’s nothing in here that changes people. In here and out there are the same, but in here no one has to act fake anymore.”
The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane by Kate DiCamillo
“What does he do?” Martin asked Abilene on their second day at sea. He pointed at Edward who was sitting on a deck chair with his long legs stretched in front of him. “He doesn’t do anything,” said Abilene. “Does he wind up somewhere?” asked Amos. “No,” said Abilene, “he does not wind up.” “What’s the point of him then?” said Martin. “The point is that he is Edward,” said Abilene.
And here’s a list of books I started in 2020 but never finished, not (all) because they were bad, I just discovered BTS in August. I intend to finish the bolded ones in 2021.
The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck by Mark Manson
Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 by Cho Nam-Joo
A Very Punchable Face by Colin Jost
Transcendent Kingdom by Yaa Gyasi
The Magical Language of Others by EJ Ko
The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes by Suzanne Collins
The Girl with the Louding Voice by Abi Dare
The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh Nguyen
How to be an Antiracist by Ibram X Kendi
The New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander
How to Do Nothing by Jenny Odell
Beautiful Boy by David Sheff
Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout
The Answer Is...:Reflections on My Life by Alex Trebek
Here’s to a new year of reading!
