Five months ago today, the love of my life died.
She was and always will be the light of my life!
This video speaks to her dedication, passion, and commitment! She was a true Humanitarian!
The best decision I ever made was to marry Jan.
Being her husband has always been the highest honor of my life.
I love her more than ever and miss her so very much. Love never dies! It grows stronger every day!
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by Betsy Lerner
Today, I dove into Betsy Lerner‘s debut novel, “Shred Sisters.” Lerner is also known for her acclaimed work, “The Bridge Ladies.” This gripping story beautifully unravels the intricate tapestry of family bonds, mental illness, and the tumultuous relationship between two sisters. It’s compelling enough to have earned a spot on the longlist for the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize.
The tagline resonates deeply: “No one will love or hurt you more than a sister.” When one family member is unstable, the entire family feels the impact. Enter the Shreds. Olivia, the sister in the spotlight, finds her once-stunning confidence becoming erratic and unpredictable, causing chaos in her wake. Her younger sister, Amy, is cautious and studious, believing in facts, proof, and empirical evidence. Yet none of that can explain what’s happening to Ollie, whose physical beauty and charisma hide the mental illness that will ultimately disrupt Amy’s carefully constructed life.
As Amy ages, she strives to find her place—first in academics, then in New York publishing, and through a series of troubled relationships. With every step she takes, she encounters Ollie, who unpredictably slips in and out of the Shred family’s life. Despite the challenges threatening their sibling bond, Amy and Ollie cannot escape or deny the unbreakable sisterly connection that ties them together.
“Shred Sisters” is an intimate and bittersweet story that explores the complexities of sisterhood, mental health, loss, and love over two decades. In the end, Amy learns a valuable lesson on her journey to self-acceptance: no one will love or hurt you more than a sister. I can’t wait to see where this emotional journey takes me!
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by Emma Pattee
Today, I began reading “Tilt: A Novel” by Emma Pattee. Set over a single day, this electrifying debut novel features a potent new literary voice, according to Vogue. It follows one woman’s journey through a transformed city as she grapples with the weight of her past and holds fervent hope for the future. Tilt is a gripping narrative about our disappointments and desires, exploring the lengths we will go to for the people we love.
You and I were safe last night. Your father and I fought in the kitchen, but it felt like another universe.
Annie is nine months pregnant and shopping for a crib at IKEA when a massive earthquake strikes Portland, Oregon. She finds herself navigating a chaotic city without a way to reach her husband, a phone, or money.
As she goes through Portland’s wreckage, Annie encounters human desperation and kindness: strangers offering help, a riot at a grocery store, and an unexpected friendship with a young mother. Throughout her journey, Annie reflects on her struggling marriage, unsatisfying career, and anxiety about becoming a mother. Determined to change her life, she needs to make it home.
Emma Pattee is a climate journalist and fiction writer. Her work has been published in The Atlantic, The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Guardian, and elsewhere. She lives in Oregon.
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by Stefan Zweig
“Chess Story,” also known as “The Royal Game,” is the final work of Austrian author Stefan Zweig. He completed it while in exile in Brazil and sent it to his American publisher just days before his suicide in 1942. This story is unique as it is the only one in which Zweig directly examines Nazism, portraying it through his characteristic focus on psychological themes.
The narrative follows travelers aboard a ship bound for Buenos Aires, where they encounter an arrogant, unfriendly world chess champion. Attempting to challenge him, they find themselves thoroughly defeated. However, a mysterious passenger steps forward to offer them advice, dramatically shifting their fortunes. The story delves into how this enigmatic figure acquired his extraordinary chess skills and the personal toll that it entailed.
This new translation of “Chess Story” highlights the work’s distinctive blend of high suspense and poignant reflection.
Stefan Zweig (1881–1942), novelist, biographer, poet, and translator, was born in Vienna into a wealthy Austrian Jewish family. During the 1930s, he was one of the best-selling writers in Europe and was among the most translated German-language writers before the Second World War. With the rise of Nazism, he moved from Salzburg to London (taking British citizenship), to New York, and finally to Brazil, where he committed suicide with his wife. New York Review Books has published Zweig’s novels The Post-Office Girl and Beware of Pity, as well as the novella Chess Story.
Peter Gay was Director of the Center for Scholars and Writers at the New York Public Library. He wrote Schnitzler’s Century: The Making of Middle-Class Culture, 1815–1914.
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by Kashana Cauley
In “The Payback: A Novel,” Kashana Cauley delivers a witty and incisive examination of race, power, and the everyday struggles we all face. The story follows Jada Williams, who finds herself on the run from the relentless Debt Police. As she grapples with her daunting student loans, she teams up with two quirky coworkers from the mall who offer their unexpected support on a plan to exact revenge by erasing their student loan debt.
With sharp humor and captivating storytelling, Cauley highlights the complex web of financial struggles, making readers laugh while also encouraging thoughtful reflection.
Jada Williams has a talent for judging people by their appearance. From across the mall, she can determine not only someone’s inseam and pant size but also the exact style they need to transform their lives. Unfortunately, she is no longer using this superpower as a wardrobe designer for Hollywood stars; instead, she is earning minimum wage plus commission at the Glendale mall.
When Jada is fired yet again, she must outrun the newly instated Debt Police, who are pursuing her relentlessly. However, Jada, like any great antihero, isn’t going to wait for the authorities to come after her. With the help of two other debt-burdened coworkers at the mall, she devises a plan for revenge. Together, the three women formulate a plan to erase their student loans forever and exact revenge on the system that promised them everything and then tried to take it all back.
The Payback is a razor-sharp and hilarious examination of race, power, and the daily grind, from one of the most original and exciting writers working today.
Kashana Cauley is the author of The Payback and The Survivalists, which was named a best book of 2023 by the BBC, Today, Vogue, and more. Cauley is also a television writer, having worked on The Great North, Pod Save America on HBO, and The Daily Show with Trevor Noah. Her writing has also appeared in The New York Times, The Atlantic, Esquire, Rolling Stone, The New Yorker, and other notable publications. Find out more at KashanaCauley.com.
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by Katie Kitamura
Today, I dove into “Audition” by Katie Kitamura, and I’m already hooked! This gripping novel explores a woman’s journey as she navigates what could be the performance of her lifetime—and perhaps even two. It’s both exhilarating and disorienting, much like a Möbius strip that challenges our understanding of the people we cherish. I can’t wait to see where this story takes me!
The narrative begins with two people meeting for lunch in a Manhattan restaurant. She is an accomplished actress in rehearsals for an upcoming premiere, while he is an attractive, troubled young man—young enough to be her son. What is his relationship to her, and how does she see him?
In this compulsively readable and brilliantly crafted novel, two competing narratives unfold, challenging our understanding of the roles we play in life – whether as partners, parents, creators, or muses – and revealing the truths that each performance conceals, particularly from those who believe they know us best.
Taut and hypnotic, “Audition” showcases Katie Kitamura‘s virtuosic writing at its finest.
Katie Kitamura is the author of four previous novels, most recently A Separation and Intimacies, which was longlisted for the National Book Award and the PEN/Faulkner Award and was a finalist for a Joyce Carol Oates Prize. She is a recipient of the Rome Prize in Literature, a Lannan fellowship, and many other honors, and her work has been translated into twenty-one languages. She teaches in the creative writing program at New York University.
When you purchase a book through one of my links, I earn a small commission that helps support my passion for reading. This contribution allows me to buy even more books to share with you, creating an incredible cycle of discovering great reads together! Your support truly makes a difference!
Enjoy a limited-time offer of 20% off your next book purchase at Bookshop.org!
by Andrea Elliott
Invisible Child: Poverty, Survival & Hope in an American City by Andrea Elliott was a gift from my son Jon. The New York Times selected “Invisible Child” as one of the best books published this year. It is indeed one of the top books on my all-time list.
GoodReads summary provides a good overview,
The riveting, unforgettable story of a girl whose indomitable spirit is tested by homelessness, poverty, and racism in an unequal America—from Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Andrea Elliott of The New York Times
Invisible Child follows eight dramatic years in the life of Dasani Coates, a child with imagination as soaring as the skyscrapers near her Brooklyn homeless shelter. Born at the turn of a new century, Dasani is named for the bottled water that comes to symbolize Brooklyn’s gentrification and the shared aspirations of a divided city. As Dasani grows up, moving with her tight-knit family from shelter to shelter, this story goes back to trace the passage of Dasani’s ancestors from slavery to the Great Migration north. When Dasani comes of age, New York City’s homeless crisis explodes as the chasm deepens between rich and poor.
In the shadows of this new Gilded Age, Dasani must lead her seven siblings through a thicket of problems: hunger, parental drug addiction, violence, housing instability, segregated schools, and the constant monitoring of the child-protection system. When, at age thirteen, Dasani enrolls at a boarding school in Pennsylvania, her loyalties are tested like never before. As she learns to “code switch” between the culture she left behind and the norms of her new town, Dasani starts to feel like a stranger in both places. Ultimately, she faces an impossible question: What if leaving poverty means abandoning the family you love?
By turns heartbreaking and revelatory, provocative and inspiring, Invisible Child tells an astonishing story about the power of resilience, the importance of family, and the cost of inequality. Based on nearly a decade of reporting, this book vividly illuminates some of the most critical issues in contemporary America through the life of one remarkable girl.
Jan and I were involved and knew that child poverty and homelessness needed repair. In addition, Jan lived on Washington Park across from Ft. Greene Park in 1974-75. We knew the neighborhood where much of the book’s story takes place.
Before meeting Jan in 1973, I was both a community/tenant organizer and a youth worker. In the latter role, I made weekly hostel trips for eight to ten young boys from East Williamsburg during 1973. The trips were the first the boys had ever been outside of their neighborhood.
Many of them had imaginations like Dasani. They also had her instinct to fight. One of my first tasks was to check for any weapons.
Decades later, when I would see any of them, now adults, they would ask when we were going on another trip. I wish I had met Jan when I made those trips. She would have helped me improve them and document the impact. If I could re-write history, I would have her join me as the second adult on the hostel trips.
After that summer, it was clear my primary skills were as a community/tenant organizer. Over the next few years, my work focused on creating affordable and supportive housing.
Jan and I did meaningful work that made a difference, yet the need for a permanent solution to the crisis remains. The book highlights the crucial role of resilience, the importance of family, and the cost of inequality. As a nation, we cannot undermine those values by breaking up families, impeding resilience, and maintaining racial and economic inequality.
The current debate in Washington over the Build Back Better legislation needs to focus not on how much we spend but on its impact on children and families.
David Brooks, a conservative commentator, has supported these expenditures for what they can do to address this country’s cultural and economic crisis.
These packages say to the struggling parents and the warehouse workers: I see you. Your work has dignity. You are paving your way. You are at the center of our national vision.
This is how you fortify a compelling moral identity, which is what all of us need if we’re going to be able to look in the mirror with self-respect. This is the cultural transformation that good policy can sometimes achieve. Statecraft is soulcraft.
If you can only read one book this year, this is the one to read. Child poverty, homelessness, and inequality impact all of us. Ending child poverty and homelessness will make us a healthier and more inclusive nation. It is time for a compelling moral call to action!
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