Patience Bloom says: “Around five a.m. I put on my clothes—noticing my boots are still on—and leave his apartment. The victorious rush of leaving without being asked fuels me. I am such a strong, independent woman who doesn’t need to linger. I can’t waste a second since I have an entire day in which to spread the news of my whorishness. I want to scream across the Île Saint-Louis, I just had my first one-night stand! But I don’t since it’s five in the morning […]
A Gift from a Master Storyteller
The Tender Memoir You Might Not Expect From a Radical Feminist
I hope I will not be criticized for enjoying Bone Black: Memories of Girlhood simply as a childhood memoir of well-known feminist lecturer and author bell hooks. It was surprising to me how sweet and tender her quickly sketched remembrances of her childhood could be, as they were unexpected from someone so admired (and by some reviled) for her outspokenness and advocacy for and about women, especially women of color. Mrs Smith Reads Bone Black by bell hooks
thank you Annie Choi
After my last review (the almost moon) I needed a mindless, surefire win. I read Annie Choi’s previous memoir, Happy Birthday or Whatever, a couple years ago and passed by her memoir, not realizing she had a new book, at Barnes & Nobel after the holidays. Memoirs are probably my favorite style of book, maybe I have voyeuristic tendencies, because I love peeking into peoples lives. And people who write memoirs have way more interesting lives then me. Shut up was a quick and easy […]
“The brain is a monstrous, beautiful mess.”
This is Susannah Cahalan’s story of how she lost her mind for a month. Susannah was a normal, healthy mid-twenties woman living in New York City. She had a great job as a reporter, a wonderful boyfriend, and a network of friends and family. She was described as outgoing and talkative, and seemed to be the life of the party. Then one day in 2009, she slowly slipped into a state of paranoia, developed seizures, and could no longer control her movements or thoughts. She […]
Read ALL THE PAGES!
FROM THE AUTHOR: This is a book I wrote. Because I wrote it, I had to figure out what to put on the back cover to explain what it is. I tried to write a long, third-person summary that would imply how great the book is and also sound vaguely authoritative – like maybe someone who isn’t me wrote it – but I soon discovered that I’m not sneaky enough to pull it off convincingly. So I decided to just make a list of things […]