Пересказ: A Reading Retrospective

Источник: https://barbaraoneal.substack.com/p/a-reading-retrospective

Барбара делится своим списком любимых книг, прочитанных за год. Она активный читатель, увлекающийся как художественной, так и нехудожественной литературой.

Любимые художественные произведения

Среди самых любимых книг Барбара выделяет три эпистолярных романа: "Meet Me at the Museum" Энн Янгсон, "Love and Saffron" Ким Фей и "The Correspondent" Вирджинии Эванс. Также она рекомендует "Broken Country" Клэр Лесли Холл, "Heartwood" Эмити Гейдж и "Touch" Олафа Олафссона. Барбара перечитала "The English Patient" и отмечает, что произведение становится всё более впечатляющим с каждым прочтением.

Современная женская проза

Среди современных авторов Барбара восхищается "Wreck" Кэтрин Ньюман, "Heart the Lover" Лили Кинг, "The Lion Women of Tehran" Марджан Камали и другими произведениями женщин-авторов. Она также рекомендует "Crying in H Mart" Мишель Заунер и "Frozen River" Ариэль Лофон.

Нехудожественная литература

Из нехудожественных книг Барбара рекомендует "Four Thousand Weeks" и "Meditations for Mortals" Оливера Бурмана, а также "Co-Intelligence: Living and Working with AI" Итана Молика как отличный обзор современных технологий.

🧾 Транскрипт (формат)

A Reading Retrospective

Источник: https://barbaraoneal.substack.com/p/a-reading-retrospective

I love the end-of-year book lists everyone posts, and thought I’d join in with my favorites. I am a very devoted reader, and by that I don’t mean I’m serious—just insatiable. I read every day, as I’m sure most of you do.

This year, I had a truly astonishing pile of research to do for A Thousand Painted Hours1. The bibliography is three pages long, and I’m going to have to buy a new bookshelf to house them all. These were nonfiction, and some touched me deeply, but that’s not what we’re here for. We are fiction fans, right?

So—fiction. I’m not providing links; my hand is still touchy and that’s too much typing, and I trust you know how to look up books on your favorite sites. This also isn’t anywhere close to an inclusive list. I read about fifty novels, and these recommendations are simply the handful I loved most—the ones that stayed with me, the ones whose covers sparked a little jolt of memory.

First, my top faves. Meet Me at the Museum by Anne Youngson, Love and Saffron by Kim Fay, and the very heady and much-discussed The Correspondent by Virginia Evans. All are epistolary novels, which I adore (in case you haven’t noticed the diaries and letters woven through so many of my own books). If you loved The Correspondent, do find the other two. You’ll be glad.

I loved Broken Country by Clare Leslie Hall, Heartwood by Amity Gage, and Touch by Olaf Olafsson, which is a touching and deeply unusual love story. All three landed solidly in my top ten for the year.

I reread The English Patient and can’t say enough about it. It’s heartbreaking and beautiful and evocative, filled with a kind of deep, sorrowful yearning for lost things that destroys me every time. I admire it more with every read—partly because I grow as a writer and can appreciate the craft more fully, but also because I am a person growing older, and I can feel that particular, piercing longing in ways I could not in my youth.

Another older novel I picked up on a whim and enjoyed was The Best of Everything by Rona Jaffe. She essentially created the “girl in the city” genre, and it holds up remarkably well.

Naturally, I loved many of the titles by women that so many readers celebrated this year. I am an upmarket-fiction reader as well as writer. I loved Wreck by Catherine Newman—she makes me laugh out loud, and I adore how present her cats are. Heart the Lover by Lily King, is a touching love story. The Lion Women of Tehran by Marjan Kamali; The Road to Tender Hearts by Annie Hartnett; Six Days in Bombay by the always excellent Alka Joshi; How to Read a Book by Monica Wood; and Saving Face by Mansi Shah all nourished me in different ways.

A couple of older titles I finally read and enjoyed: Crying in H Mart by Michelle Zauner and Frozen River by Ariel Lawhon.

A bit of nonfiction worth your time: both of Oliver Burkman’s books, Four Thousand Weeks and Meditations for Mortals. I listened to both on audio, and his calm British voice adds a pleasing layer to the message. I also highly recommend Co-Intelligence: Living and Working with AI by Ethan Mollick, an excellent exploration of the ideas behind a technology that’s hurtling toward us (surrounding us!).

There are others, of course. Some books I didn’t love but there’s no reason to talk about those, and I have to stop somewhere.

Did you read any of these books? What were your favorites this year?