Richard W. Brown February 11, 2022
Confident Jan

Second COVID Vaccine

Estimated reading time: 0 minutes, 42 seconds

Celebrate JanA year ago, Jan and I got our second COVID vaccine. Little did we know that she would test positive for the coronavirus five days later.

The first week of January had been the best week for Jan since she was diagnosed. We both thought she was cancer-free.

She wanted to be vaccinated soon to feel safe seeing family and friends. She was approved for the vaccine.

The following week, she became weaker by the day. We both remained optimistic.

After the second dose, she was exhausted. Both of us presumed it was a reaction to the vaccine.

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When We Cease to Understand the World

Read: September 2024

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When We Cease to Understand the World

by Benjamín Labatut

Today, I began reading When We Cease to Understand the World by Benjamín Labatut, translated by Adrian Nathan West. This book, listed on The New York Times 100 Best Books of the 21st Century, promises to be thought-provoking as it delves into the intricate connections between scientific and mathematical discovery, madness, and destruction.

In a world where scientific advancements often involve ethical dilemmas and societal implications, this book offers a unique perspective on the lives of scientists who have shaped our understanding of the world. Fritz Haber, Alexander Grothendieck, Werner Heisenberg, and Erwin Schrödinger are some of the luminaries whose troubled lives Benjamín Labatut deeply explores in his fictional examination. Labatut shows how these scientists and thinkers grappled with profound questions of existence, experiencing strokes of unparalleled genius, alienating friends and lovers, and descending into isolation and insanity. Their discoveries, some of which significantly improved human life, while others led to chaos and unimaginable suffering, continue to shape our world.

With a breakneck pace and a wealth of disturbing detail, Labatut uses fiction’s imaginative resources to tell the stories of the scientists and mathematicians who expanded our notions of the possible.

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Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow: A Novel

Read: July 2024

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Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow: A Novel

by Gabrielle Zevin

I delved into the pages of “Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow: A Novel” by Gabrielle Zevin. The narrative unfolds the lives of Sam and Sadie, two college friends who evolve into creative partners in video game design. Their journey is a tapestry of fame, joy, tragedy, duplicity, and a form of immortality, all woven into a unique love story that captivated me like no other.

This love story uniquely portrays the challenges and triumphs of a relationship in the context of their shared creative endeavors.

On a bitter-cold day in December of his junior year at Harvard, Sam Masur exits a subway car and sees Sadie Green amid the hordes of people waiting on the platform. He calls her name. For a moment, she pretends she hasn’t heard him, but then, she turns, and a game begins: a legendary collaboration that will launch them to stardom.

These friends, who have been close since childhood, take bold steps, borrow money, and seek favors. Even before they graduate from college, they have birthed their first blockbuster, Ichigo. In a blink, the world is at their feet. Sam and Sadie, not yet twenty-five, are shining with brilliance, success, and wealth. But these attributes can’t shield them from their emotional rollercoaster of creative aspirations and the heartbreaks that come with it.

Spanning thirty years, from Cambridge, Massachusetts, to Venice Beach, California, and lands in between and far beyond, Gabrielle Zevin‘s Tomorrow, Tomorrow, and Tomorrow provides a profound exploration of the diverse nature of identity, disability, failure, the redemptive possibilities in play, and above all, our deep-seated need to connect: to be loved and to love. It’s a journey that will make you reflect on your life and relationships.

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!

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Everything's Fine

Read: June 2023

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Everything’s Fine

by Cecilia Rabess

I started reading Everything’s Fine by Cecilia Rabess today, a stunning debut introducing a talented new author. However, I found it easier to decide to read it after reading in the New York Times that some reviewers on Goodreads criticized the book’s premise without reading it. It’s unfair to criticize something after experiencing it first-hand.

On Jess’s first day at Goldman Sachs, she’s disappointed to learn that she’ll be working with Josh, a white conservative she used to argue with in college. Josh enjoys playing devil’s advocate and can be challenging to deal with.

But when Jess realizes she’s the only Black woman on the team and is being overlooked, Josh offers his support in imperfect but meaningful ways. As they develop an unlikely friendship with undeniable chemistry, it eventually becomes an electrifying romance that shocks them both.

Despite their differences, their attraction brings them together, and Jess starts to question whether happiness is more important than being right. However, as the cultural and political landscape shifts in 2016, Jess, who is just discovering herself, must decide what she’s willing to compromise for love and if everything is excellent. This poignant and sharp novel by Cecilia Rabess asks if they will and if they should.

The Jan Lilien Education Fund sponsors ongoing sustainability and environmental awareness programs. Gifts made this month; I will match dollar-for-dollar. All donations are tax-deductible.

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Table for Two: Fictions

Read: April 2024

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Table for Two: Fictions

by Amor Towles

Today, I began reading Amor Towles‘s “Table for Two: Fictions.” As a fan of his previous work, “A Gentleman in Moscow,” I was excited to delve into some of his shorter fiction. The book contains six stories from New York City and a novella from Golden Age Hollywood. Table for Two is another captivating addition to Towles’s collection of stylish and transporting fiction written with his signature wit, humor, and sophistication.

The New York stories, set primarily in the year 2000, explore the profound consequences that can result from fleeting encounters and the intricate dynamics of compromise that underpin modern marriages. These narratives are sure to evoke strong emotions and leave a lasting impression.

In the novel “Rules of Civility,” the resilient Evelyn Ross departs from New York City in September 1938, intending to return to her home in Indiana. However, as her train reaches Chicago, where her parents eagerly await her, she spontaneously decides to extend her journey to Los Angeles. “Eve in Hollywood,” narrated from seven different perspectives, reveals how Eve forges a new path for herself and others in a gripping noirish tale that traverses the movie sets, bungalows, and dive bars of Los Angeles.

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Where Reasons End

Read: June 2025

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Where Reasons End

by Yiyun Li

Yiyun Li, grappling with life’s deepest sorrows, invites readers into a poignant conversation between a mother and child in a timeless world.  Where Reasons End, composed in the aftermath of the loss of her son, ventures into the liminal space between life and death. Here, mother and child engage in conversations untethered from past images and narratives, a profoundly moving portrayal of the love and complexity of their relationship.

The narrator of Where Reasons End shares a profound insight, saying, “I clung to one delusion with all my might: We once gave Nikolai a life of flesh and blood; and I’m recreating it, this time through words.” This emotional journey of recreating a life through words is a central theme that resonates throughout the novel.

With a unique blend of originality, precision, and poise, Where Reasons End immerses readers in a world of intimacy, inescapable pain, and fierce love. The novel’s emotional impact is profound, leaving a lasting impression on those who delve into its pages.

Yiyun Li, a prolific author, has penned six works of fiction—Must I Go, Where Reasons End, Kinder Than Solitude, A Thousand Years of Good Prayers, The Vagrants, and Gold Boy, Emerald Girl—and the memoir Dear Friend, from My Life I Write to You in Your Life.

Her literary prowess has been recognized with numerous awards, including a PEN/Hemingway Award, a PEN/Jean Stein Book Award, a MacArthur Foundation fellowship, and a Windham-Campbell Prize.

She was also featured in The New Yorker’s 20 Under 40 fiction issue. Her work, which has been published in The New Yorker, A Public Space, The Best American Short Stories, and The O. Henry Prize Stories, among other publications, is a testament to her literary excellence.

Currently, she imparts her knowledge at Princeton University and resides in Princeton, New Jersey.

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!

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Love Forms

Read: August 2025

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Love Forms: A Novel

by Claire Adam

Love Forms, a novel by Claire Adam that is longlisted for the 2025 Booker Prize, is a profoundly moving story about a woman’s journey of self-discovery. This novel stands out with its unique exploration of a mother’s life, emphasizing the enduring bonds of love, family, and home. The protagonist’s search for the daughter she gave up for adoption at sixteen challenges her to reconsider every life decision she has made.

For much of her life, Dawn has felt as if something is missing. Now, at the age of fifty-eight, with a divorce behind her and her two grown-up sons busy with their own lives, she should be trying to settle into a new future for herself. But she keeps returning to the past and to the secret she’s kept all these years. At just sixteen, Dawn found herself pregnant, and—as was common in Trinidad back then—her parents sent her away to have the baby and give her up for adoption.

More than forty years later, Dawn yearns to reconnect with her lost daughter. But tracking down her child is not as easy as she had thought. It’s an emotional journey that leads Dawn to retrace her steps—from Trinidad to Venezuela and then to London—and to question not only that fateful decision she’d made as a teenager but every turn in the road of her life since.

Claire Adam‘s debut novel, Golden Child, was published by Sarah Jessica Parker’s SJP for Hogarth. It was listed as one of the BBC’s “100 Novels That Shaped Our World” and was awarded the Barnes & Noble Discover Prize, the Desmond Elliott Prize, the Authors’ Club Best First Novel Award, and the McKitterick Prize. She was born and raised in Trinidad and Tobago. She studied physics at Brown University and later received an MA in creative writing at Goldsmiths, University of London. Adam lives in London.

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!

Don’t miss out on an exceptional opportunity! Enjoy a limited-time offer of 20% off your next book purchase at Bookshop.org!

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