It’s the time of year to reflect on existential questions and lay out splendid plans to enact the lives we dream of. This makes it the perfect time to talk about books, two of which have been guiding my own thinking these past days: Dreams Under Glass by Anca Szilágyi and A Line in the World by Dorthe Nors. These two very different books took me on a tour of the struggles to make a meaningful life and the complexities of arrival in the place you think you want to be.

Dreams Under Glass

In Szilágyi’s engrossing novel, twenty-something Binnie is grinding through her workdays as an underpaid paralegal at a law firm while living a second life planning Joseph Cornell-inspired artworks in her mind. She gives up a rent-controlled apartment to spend less time commuting to have more for her artwork, but she often struggles to make the commitments to the work itself that would allow her to finish a piece (and thus potentially capitalize on some connections that could turn her fortunes). It was sometimes painful to watch Binnie’s choices, mostly because I’ve been there and the hours we spend on things besides art (hello, Twitter) are easiest to quantify and lament from the outside.

“The hot floor would contain vats of steaming black coffee, a bitter stink of burnt grounds and toner fumes. Wallpapering this floor would be documents from tobacco companies, dizzying red text printed on pink paper. Perhaps here we’d have moaning figures, neckties draped over their shoulders, parched mouths panting at the vats of coffee, unable to drink.” – Anca Szilágyi, Dreams Under Glass

Szilágyi delves deep into Binnie’s ideas, which made the inside of Binnie’s mind the most fascinating part of this book as we experience the visceral details of artworks the world may never see. Binnie draws inspiration from her struggles in a dysfunctional, capitalist workplace and from a well of knowledge about Cornell. In fact, Cornell almost becomes a character in the book as Binnie draws upon his memory while planning how to arrange her squirreled objects and I learned a lot about the artist, despite having taken a lot of art history classes back when I thought visual art was my future.

I won’t reveal the major shift that happens toward the end of this book, only that there is one and that I’ll never think of the color turquoise quite the same way again.

One of the more touching aspects of Dreams Under Glass is Binnie’s relationship to her boyfriend, Gary. Although he seems clueless about her art, he very clearly cares deeply about her. What struck me most was a moment when, after Gary met Binnie’s parents, he gently prods her about her feelings for him and then says, “You make me feel alive.” It’s a tender thought and not one I think I would have appreciated quite the same way five or ten years ago. Maybe not even a year ago, because, like Binnie, I’ve spent a lot of time striving to find inspiration and time to make art. And in the struggle I’ve missed some of the best parts of what surround me every day, like the softness around my husband’s eyes when he brings me yet another cup of tea (when he could be working on his own art).

So while Binnie was finding her way toward art, I was finding my way into a quieter view of what makes a great life. I hope I can find compassion for the Binnie in me along the way.

A Line in the World

“I want to wake beneath a sky that is grey and miserable, but which creates a space of colossal dimensions in a second, when the light comes ashore. A horizon is what I want, and I want solitude. Healthy solitude, and I want intimacy, true intimacy. I no longer want to be anyone but myself.” – Dorthe Nors, A Line in the World

In January 2020, my husband and I were starting a lot of big discussions about how to make the life we want. The theme was being intentional in our choices. Like everyone else, our choices were very quickly limited, but this discussion is once again rising to the surface in a practicable way. Sometimes this means picking the breakfast I want (rather than eating my oatmeal default) and chewing my toast slowly so I can experience and enjoy the last bite of special jam. Sometimes it means going to the beach, because one of the small (but huge) things that makes me feel whole is being near the ocean. This is why I was pretty sure I would love A Line in the World. What I didn’t know is my choice to curl up with this book during a week of sickness and recovery after Christmas would itself be healing.

“But a vacuum is always waiting to be filled with something. In the Wadden Sea, you bring the contents with you, and the contents of a supposedly authentic life can be terrifying.” – Dorthe Nors, A Line in the World

I’ve never read Nors’ fiction, but this collection of essays written during a year traveling the west coast of Denmark (or the east coast of the North Sea) was perfect. She resists a geographic order as these essay explore everything from family history to climate change to Danish surf culture (sometimes all together in a few pages). The writing, masterfully translated by Caroline Waight, seems effortless and I’m giving myself the gift of letting this book be the last I read in 2022. I know I will return to this book again and again but right now I want the feeling of having read it to stretch into a new year, and maybe a new life.

“Surely, to be great is to stand at the northernmost tip of the nation, right at the very top, with a foot in each sea. Can you feel the potential? This is your country, your language. Your limitations. In this moment under your jurisdiction, and only yours.” – Dorthe Nors, A Line in the World

So the struggle continues, in books and in life, and the glory, too, as we embrace the best of the lives we can make. What have you read this year that makes you see where you’ve come from, where you might want to go?

When I say I’ve been in need of an escape lately, I don’t think I’m alone. And while I’ve been reading throughout the pandemic, the main escape for my exhausted brain has been streaming whatever fits in the few minutes between my kid’s bedtime and mine. My husband and I quickly run through the good stuff, so many nights are spent wishing for better as we switch between interfaces (I miss channels, they loaded so much faster), which is to say that it was a huge relief to run into Slow Horses on AppleTV.

I love spy stories and the performances by Gary Oldman, Kristen Scott Thomas, Rosalind Eleazor, Saskia Reeves, Christopher Chung, Jack Lowden, Dustin Demri-Burns and company were outstanding. The writing was so sharp and I really appreciated the fact that this isn’t a story about a group of crackerjack super spies who are besting the world. Instead, this group of “Slow Horses” has found themselves at Slough House because they screwed up. Deeply. That doesn’t mean they are not without their merits, but something about people inching through their days until they face a challenge where they are very much starting from behind suits the world of today. So when I say that unwrapping a Mother’s Day package with the first three books of Mick Herron’s series (on which the show is based) made me feel both seen and loved, you might guess how much.

The trouble was, I couldn’t stop reading the books. That was the intent, of course, of my husband’s ordering them for me, for me to get some time on my own to just recharge. But I don’t think he expected me to get halfway through the first book, Slow Horses, in a bath on that first day. I was glad to have watched the series because the writing was faster than my brain and it took me a little while to fully understand their world, that said, the first book and the first season of the show are nearly identical, though I’m not sorry I experienced both. And the casting of that series is perfect enough that I’ve carried the images of the actors through the books as I’ve read each one.

Truth is, I got so into the series that I read everything I had at hand in the first week. But before I finished the third book another package arrived. My husband had ordered the next three. And so on it went as I raced through every single book, including the accompanying novellas. I got sick one week and spent an entire day reading in bed with the fireplace on during the rainiest spring ever over here. I was reading the books so fast I couldn’t even keep up with my own progress on Goodreads.

Mick Herron Pulls No Punches

As much as the series is one strong continued story line, I’ve loved every book in its own way. I won’t go into details on the stories because I want you to experience them for themselves, but regular, beloved characters die often in this world of intrigue. And sometimes they die ignominiously. There aren’t a lot of rays of sunshine in these books except in the sheer fortitude of these characters going forward to face another day with whatever they have at hand, even if it’s aged technology and a rotting building.

The series is still being written and I appreciated the way that Herron wrote in contemporary events like Brexit, the pandemic, and Jeffrey Epstein without bogging the story too heavily in them. I hope this is something that happens in more books going forward (once we’ve had some time to process anyway), an acknowledgement of some of the heaviness of the last decade as the action of life continues on.

Can A Spy Novel Be Feminist?

The characters are beloved and the characters are awful. Sometimes they are both. One of my favorite depictions is of Roddy Ho, the resident hacker, because Herron does such a brilliant job of inhabiting scenes from Roddy’s stunted (at best) point of view as he cyberstalks women he’s certain are gagging for his love. Spoiler alert, they are not, but the way Herron takes us into his head we understand Roddy better but are not forced to have sympathy for his worldview.

I was jarred when I read the word “tits” in book two or three because the descriptions of the female characters don’t veer into the woman as object trope (thankfully) except when seen from the eyes of specific characters. There are women I fell in love with in these books and women I hated. Mostly they get to be people with good traits and bad. I loved that.

Jackson Lamb, the ostensible caretaker of the whole bunch is easily one of the most offensive characters of the bunch, treating his employees awfully and saying often (“in jest”) things that should not be said. Even he gets complicated, though, as he will go to the ends of the earth for his “Joes” (at least when the threat is coming from outside the office). Gary Oldman was especially beautifully cast in this role.

The Pacing of Slow Horses is Exceptional

One of the tricks Herron employs exceedingly well is constructing the books almost entirely out of very short scenes (one to two pages) that end with small cliff hangers. Each scene is then followed by one from a different point of view that ends with another cliff hanger. The writing and reading feel breathless (in a good way) as a result, and it’s hard to put the books down. Even at bedtime.

A careful reading will show, too, that the cliff hangers are not always what they seem and it’s worth reading as slowly as you can to see exactly what Herron wrote, not what he’s led you to want to read into it.

What Made Me Sad About These Books

There was only one thing that I regretted when reading these books—that my Baba and Djiedo weren’t alive to share them with. My shelves are filled with their old books (see that Bob Hope lingering in the back of the photo above?), and their mystery and spy novels are especially cherished. These Slough House novels are books I very much would have sent to them to share. But I’ve sent them to my dad for Father’s Day instead. The first three anyway, and if he loves them as much as I did then maybe I’ll keep sending them until he’s all caught up. Because the best part of a good book is sharing it.

If you try out the Slough House books, drop me a line and let me know what you think.

When I last wrote about my pandemic experience in December, I was ready for transition. I was thinking about the after, even though we were very much still in the middle. I needed the hope, then, to get through to a time when this might be over. Now that my husband and I are both fully vaccinated (and I believe our son could be before the end of the year), I’m ready to pause for a bit and evaluate where we came from and think critically about where we need to go next.

Who I Was Before

In the middle of a random conversation the other day, I blurted out “remember elevators?” Many things have disappeared from our individual lives this past year as we shrank them to survive. One of the things I set aside was my love of the paranormal. I had quite enough fear in my life as it was, thank you. I knew I was starting to regain bits of my former sense of life when I reached for Victor LaValle’s The Changeling, which both terrified and invigorated me. I took that liveliness and ran with it to read two more spooky books.

Never Have I Ever by Isabel Yap

This collection of eerie short stories quickly became one of my most recommended books. I loved it so much I sent a copy to a friend (another way I’m trying to re-engage with life this year). Yap’s stories span parts of Asia and the U.S. and carry with them bits of lore from all over. They are surprising, smart, and delightfully creepy. Because I work in tech, I hardly ever read fiction about tech life, but the way Yap wove together magic with an insider’s view on this subculture in “A Spell for Foolish Hearts” was insightful and wicked and very much worth the read.

I Remember You by Yrsa Sigurðardóttir

I have not finished this book yet, but it is one of the scariest things I’ve read in a long, long time. A true ghost story, I Remember You is also something that’s formed a new habit for my family: my husband reads a few pages some nights after I go to bed, I catch up in the mornings I wake too early, and our son questions us relentlessly about it over breakfast. I love the book. I love the sharing. I hope we get to do this forever.

How I Am Changing

Wake. Play. Eat. Work. Eat. Play. Work. Cook. Eat. Rest. Sleep.

This is my routine; the way the days blend together; the way time has stopped. I am often so tired during the “rest” portion of my day that I don’t fully comprehend what I’m reading until I’m far into a book—something I was definitely guilty of when reading Bird Summons.

Bird Summons by Leila Aboulela

I bought the book in the minutes following my second vaccination as part of a gleeful armload of treasure acquired during my first visit to a bookstore in over a year. It tells the story of three Muslim women in Scotland on a journey to visit the grave of the first western woman to take a pilgrimage to Mecca. Each of the women is beautifully drawn both in their individual struggles and in the ways they push and pull against one another.

I loved the book immensely even before I realized they had somehow become mired in an in-between place where supernatural elements are converging to help them work through the circular paths they are each trapped in. In ordinary times, this would make for an interesting story. In the now, it’s a poignant reminder that we make our lives and we have the chance to emerge from this bubble into a new, better future.

In the Dream House by Carmen Maria Machado

Speaking of patterns and being doomed to repeat history we haven’t learned from, In the Dream House was not at all what I expected from a memoir of abuse, but it might be the book I need to help me work through some patterns I’d like to shed. Machado’s writing is gorgeous, always, and the book is a tender recounting of a relationship that felt like love, for a time.

The combination of her vulnerability on the page with her willingness to experiment with form allowed me to sink deep into her story. For example, what better way is there to immerse a reader in the trap of the cycle of abuse than a choose your own adventure that always ends in the same place?

Like pregnancy, this time of confinement has led me to look deeply at the relationships in my life and what I do and do not want to carry forward. Machado reminded me that what feels familiar is not always the same as what feels good. And I’m grateful.

What I Must Not Forget

It has been easy in this daily routine to forget what life was like before. And yet we have to make a life after. Two books are helping me remember what’s important to me to carry forward.

Over Sea, Under Stone by Susan Cooper

My son entered a spooky place sometime during the pandemic where he latched on to Scooby-Doo and began asking for more. Although he’s only five, I thought he might be ready for The Dark is Rising series, one of my favorites from childhood. And I was right. I’ve loved every night we’ve cuddled late past bedtime reading just one more page. Over Sea, Under Stone taught me something important, too. As Jane, Barney and Simon crept up to the attic to explore the treasures of the Grey House, I found myself on an adventure with my son. And I remembered what that felt like. How essential adventure used to be to my sense of being, even when I was actively resisting it.

It will be a long time, yet, I think before we hop on a plane to discover another continent, but it will be longer still before I forget the shock of remembering that I almost abandoned something I once held so dear. Our stretches are small as we ease back into life—a Mother’s Day picnic in the park—but they are stretches still.

Dialogues with Rising Tides by Kelli Russell Agodon

I am a writer. This is a through line of my life that I have had to fight for. It is also what carries me forward in the hardest times (like the past year). I often look to Agodon as a model—a successful poet and publisher who lives on the side of the water I dream of. Dialogues with Rising Tides reminded me that her writing is also something I can learn from. I particularly enjoy the breadth of her voice, the way she embraces the quotidian “we’re replacing our cabinet knobs / because we can’t change the world,” casual wit “the apocalypse always shows up / uninvited with a half-eaten bag of chips,” deep insights “She tells me the reason I wake up / screaming is because / no one ever dealt with that pain,” and artful imagery “This is postpartum with suicide corsages.” I don’t always re-read poetry books (the way I should), but I will be re-reading this one.

“Now the only language I speak / is seascape” – Kelli Russell Agodon, Dialogues with Rising Tides

The Work Ahead

While it can feel like the world ended when the pandemic hit, COVID was merely one more travesty in a world where we are not living as we should. Or at least as I hope we can. When I’m actually past the “using all the energy I have for sheer survival,” I want to to more to make a brighter tomorrow for my son and his entire generation. These books are giving me ideas on how to start.

Nicotine by Nell Zink

Nell Zink is the best writer of my generation. She captures the essence of what makes us tick (for better or worse) as individuals and as a society and she’s not afraid to call bullshit when necessary. I was sucked into Nicotine by the descriptions of Penny trying to support her father through hospice and death while the rest of her family found anything else to do. What held me, though, was the nuanced descriptions of the squatters Penny encounters in her grandparents’ former home and the ways that Zink allows her characters to break past the labels we might want to place on them.

I did not fully appreciate what was happening in my city during the WTO riots while I was in college (I was mostly concerned with my hard-working partner being able to get home in the chaos) and I have derided some of the anarchist marches here since. But that does not mean that I believe in capitalism as the answer for our future. Zink made me look more deeply at myself and the values I hold. And she made me think about the future I want to build (all in the guise of a wildly entertaining story).

Undrowned: Black Feminist Lessons from Marine Mammals by Alexis Pauline Gumbs

Speaking of a post-capitalist life…this book is a gorgeous look at what life would look like if we embraced love and humanity as our underlying values, and it’s filled with reminders of the damage we do to ourselves and our planet every day we do not. The ideas lap like ocean tides against loving descriptions of sea life we don’t look at closely enough.

When I first encountered an essay from this book in Boston Review, I dared hope of a world where we could use nuanced discussion, intuition, love and science to make a better future for our planet and ourselves. The full book is a great place to start. Read it.

“We can trust cycles older than our species. We can do this between-work with grace and surrender. With patience and bravery. With all of who we are. And what made us will reclaim us as soon as the tide.” – Alexis Pauline Gumbs, Undrowned.