June: Reading Prizeworthy Non-Fiction
4 memoirs and 1 historical biography. Take a summer reading adventure w/me!
Dear readers,
I really enjoy narrative non-fiction and tend to purchase about 60/40 ratio of fiction to non-fiction in any given month. But as the old adage goes, my eyes are bigger than my stomach. I probably read in about an 80/20 ratio, meaning I’ve got a lot of unread non-fiction piling up. When the Pulitizer prize winners were announced last month, I realized the fiction finalists were not even really on my radar. But I already owned unread copies of several of the books in the non-fiction categories, including all three finalists for memoir/autobiography. This month’s provocation makes those the heart of the list.
You’ll also find a memoir released last month that I expect will be on next year’s award lists, and an upcoming June release of a buzzy memoir that’s a little lighter providing some summery variety to round the list out.
Also coming up this month: I really loved reading shorter works of fiction in response to my May provocation. For that, I distilled a much longer list down to just five selections and I have FOMO about the ones I didn’t focus on. For those of you who might be looking for some breezier works of fiction to jolt you out of a reading slump or to fill in gaps between longer or heavier reads this summer, I’m working on offering that longer list as a guide.
One question: would you want to receive it as a pdf or would a much longer newsletter post, formatted like these monthly provocations but with 25-30 links, be preferred? If you might be interested in this, please let me know which you’d find more usable.
Below, I’ll also extend an invitation to join me in the National Book Awards 75th Anniversary Summer Reading Adventure. Let me know if you’re interested in the comments!
In order of their release, here are the prize-worthy works of non-fiction I’ll be talking about on The Booktender this month:
I’m Mostly Here to Enjoy Myself: One Woman’s Pursuit of Pleasure in Paris
Glynnis MacNicol
Penguin Life
Jun 11, 2024 | 288 pages
Personal Memoir, Feminism
If like me you’re trying to use your library more, get your hold request in for this June release now as this will be one of the more popular memoirs of the summer. I’m looking forward to taking this one on vacation with me. I’ll be in the woods, applying bug spray and lunch to my progeny daily. It will be nice to be reminded that this was my choice as I cheer on a peer whose own life choices mean her pleasure can come first. And with that, I just convinced myself to pre-order it. Bookshop: 1 Abra’s Budget: 0.
Knife: Meditations After an Attempted Murder
Salman Rushdie
Random House
Apr 16, 2024 | 224 pages
Personal Memoir, Survival, Literary Figures
From the book jacket: “During those empty sleepless nights, I thought a lot about The Knife as an idea. A knife was a tool, and acquired meaning from the use we made of it. Language, too, was a knife. It could cut open the world and reveal its meaning.” It’s been hard as a book person to avoid the coverage of this national bestseller, so in some ways I feel like I’ve already read it. Nevertheless, I look forward to absorbing Rushdie’s own language as he fights back against his attacker with the tool he wields best. It’s sure to be an awards contender next year, so by reading it now I also reduce the chances I’ll be making this same kind of list next June.
The Best Minds: A Story of Friendship, Madness and the Tragedy of Good Intentions
Jonathan Rosen
Penguin Books
Apr 16, 2024 (Paperback) | 576 pages
Personal Memoir, Mental Health, Murder
Jonathan Rosen explores his best childhood friend Michael Laudor’s trajectory from diagnosis of schizophrenia, graduation from Yale Law School, selling film rights to his story to Ron Howard, and subsequent psychiatric institutionalization after murdering his fiancée, Carrie Costello. I’m highly selective about exposing myself to true crime and narratives of violence against women and girls. An excerpt from the book in an issue of The Atlantic caught my attention for its tender treatment of the friendship between the author and Laudor, which made me think this investigation might balance the harrowing nature of the crime wtih a deeper understanding of how such a thing could happen.
Liliana’s Invincible Summer: A Sister’s Search for Justice
Cristina Rivera Garza
Hogarth Press
Mar 12, 2024 (Paperback) | 320 pages
Memoir, Grief, Women’s Studies, Public Policy
Twenty-nine years, three months and two days after her sister Liliana was murdered by a possessive boyfriend, the author requests the criminal file from Mexican authorities. Rivera Garza reports on her experience of seeking justice for the crime and considering broad social constructs that continue to normalize gender-based violence throughout Mexico and the world. But the most touching parts of this book document her sister’s life through notebooks, interviews and other artifacts from the summer of 1990 when Liliana traveled, thought and loved more freely than ever before.
Country of the Blind: A Memoir at the End of Sight
Andrew Leland
Penguin Press
Jul 18, 2023 | 368 pages
Personal Memoir, People with Disabilities
This memoir traces Leland’s gradual transition from sighted life to blindness as a result of retinitis pigmentosa. It’s part memoir and part historical and cultural investigation as he learns about blindness, blind culture, he renegotiates his relationships with his family, himself and the world around him. In his blurb, Dave Eggers says Leland “gently sings about” his becoming blind and that sounds both beautiful and challenging to me.
Master, Slave, Husband, Wife: An Epic Journey from Slavery to Freedom
Ilyon Woo
37 Ink
Jan 17, 2023 | 416 pages
Civil War Period, African American
This book shared the Pulitzer for Biography with King: A Life by Jonathan Eig. I usually only read biographies of literary figures, but this one ended up on so many “Best of 2023” lists that I ended up buying the hardcover. I’ve seen others on Substack post about this book as if it were a novel, so I’m looking forward to letting myself be absorbed in the story of Ellen and William Craft’s three dramatic journeys to secure their freedom from enslavers.
Another Adventure
To celebrate 75 years of the National Book Awards, the National Book Foundation has announced a Summer Reading Adventure. The list offers a choose-your-own-adventure approach to summer reading just for fun, including listening to an audio book and reading outdoors among the items. If attending a National Book Awards ceremony has ever been on your bucket list, you can complete the full (easy! fun!) challenge and submit your entry to possibly win airfare, hotel and two tickets.
Let me know in the comments if you’re interested in completing this together— I’ll start a Friday thread to check in about our progress. Saying “yes” and participating even once means you can already check off the item “Connect with fellow book lovers” from your list!
Staying cool
In this heat, I’ve been making a hibiscus cooler regularly. Steep the flowers (ask for jamaica at your local Mexican grocer), add mint simple syrup and lime to taste. Pour over ice and shake, with or without a shot of clear alcohol.
The posts about books in this list
In Case You Missed It
Stay cool,
Abra
I have been interested in ‘Liliana’s Invincible Summer’ for a while so I’ll be interested to hear what u think! It’s been everywhere since it won the prize!!
Ack! I tried to re-open the poll and it erased everyone's votes. it was 60-40 in favor of the post over the pdf at the time. Please keep voting if you're interested in the short reads guide and feel free to let me know the pros and cons in the comments here if you'd like.