Where is your nonfiction section please.
I love history that digs into something that was absolutely massive during its day and now is essentially unknown and forgotten. It always makes me wonder what the same things will be from our era. Sarah Horowitz's The Red Widow: The Scandal that Shook Paris and the Woman Behind it All (September 6, Sourcebooks) does... Continue Reading →
Every once in awhile I go on a spree of visiting my old home of France in my mind by reading a bunch of books about it. I did this over the summer again by finally picking up Peter Mayle's A Year in Provence, the book that kicked off the trend in recent decades of... Continue Reading →
It's August, which means: Women in Translation Month! Head over to that link to learn more about Meytal Radzinski's project to emphasize literature written by women and translated into English, a vastly underrepresented genre (books published in English translations by female authors account for less than 30% of translated literature every year). There are also... Continue Reading →
Eking in at the veeeery last minute, I've compiled my new release favorites of 2021. Let's dive in! Unsurprisingly, nothing surpassed Elissa Washuta's White Magic for me. This memoir-in-essays is like nothing I've ever read before, although I've come across a lot of memoirs that attempt similar things less successfully. This uses a blend of... Continue Reading →
I've disappointed myself massively this year in terms of one of my favorite book events, Women in Translation Month. The wonderful Rachel@PaceAmoreLibri introduced me to this event and initiative a few years ago and I absolutely love it. Books published in English translations by female authors account for less than 31% of translated literature every... Continue Reading →
Is there anything I love more than a best-of list? Maybe, but when a year's half-over and it's time to recap favorites, I can't think of anything better. Here are my favorites of the year's new nonfiction so far. The Soul of a Woman, by Isabel Allende - Allende's short but mighty powerful memoir (in... Continue Reading →
My Place at the Table: A Recipe for a Delicious Life in Paris, by Alexander Lobrano It feels like it’s been way too long since I read a good foodoir, and especially one about France. They can be so pretentious for some reason. My Place at the Table, on the other hand, is such a... Continue Reading →
Book review: The Ravine, by Wendy Lower & Those Who Forget, by Geraldine Schwarz In her new book The Ravine: A Family, a Photograph, a Holocaust Massacre Revealed, Wendy Lower, a historian with extensive work around the Holocaust, is put onto an intriguing research journey: Lower encountered an extremely rare photograph depicting the murder of... Continue Reading →
I think I look forward more to putting together my list of backlist favorites each year than the new releases. What was better for you this year -- new releases or older nonfiction? Borrowed Finery, by Paula Fox - Children's novelist Fox's memoir is brilliant, especially for memoir that's non-linear and kind of hazy in... Continue Reading →
How's your reading for Women in Translation Month? I haven't actually read anything new in translation yet this month, but I can recommend three fantastic memoirs by women in translation that I've read recently. Underground in Berlin: A Young Woman's Extraordinary Tale of Survival in the Heart of Nazi Germany, by Marie Jalowicz Simon, translated... Continue Reading →
It's August, which means: Women in Translation month! This is far and away my favorite literary event of the year. Meytal Radzinski of Bibliobio began this initiative in 2014, which serves to increase awareness of and engagement with translated works written by women. Female-authored books comprise only around 30% of those translated into English each... Continue Reading →
Let Them Eat Pancakes, by Craig Carlson (Amazon) In his first memoir, the delightful Pancakes in Paris, Californian Craig Carlson details his life-changing journey of opening "my diner in a foreign country, with a foreign language, which also happened to be the culinary capital of the world." It made for an entertaining, sarcastic but heartwarming... Continue Reading →
What's Nonfiction? 