Corinne Onetto Book Recommendations & Book Mentions

Corinne Onetto

-1. Elif Batuman "The Idiot: A Novel". I wanted to love this book. I love everything else she's ever written. I love her @longformpodcast interview. But this book just died on me, I couldn't find a purchase in her characters or the story. Made me sad.

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5. Lots of other books on the boiler but these were the ones that I'll remember. Other books I read that were great but unimportant: Less by Andrew Sean Greer, Transcription by Kate Atkinson, The Elephant in the Room by Tommy Tomlinson, and (controversially) Washington Black

Corinne Onetto

4. Anything my N.K. Jemisin. Really basically anything though the Broken Earth trilogy is a favorite. She breaks so many conceived notions about SciFi/Fantasy story telling and creates these incredible, entirely believable worlds. Even if you don't read this genre normally, do.

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I also read, belatedly since it was given to me in 2019, Ocean Vuong's On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous. I think, and this is a weird summary, that it is the most beautiful love story I've ever read. Between a mother and his son, and between a young man and his first lover.

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Corinne Onetto

5. Lots of other books on the boiler but these were the ones that I'll remember. Other books I read that were great but unimportant: Less by Andrew Sean Greer, Transcription by Kate Atkinson, The Elephant in the Room by Tommy Tomlinson, and (controversially) Washington Black

Corinne Onetto

And last but not least, did not enjoy The Overstory by Richard Powers. I tried! A book about a semi-mystical connection between humans and trees based in science? Right up my alley. But the book became so ponderous the longer it went on, so unnecessarily messy. Pity.

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And last recommendation, which was tough to chose, but Hadley Freeman's House of Glass. She weaves a beautiful, tragic story about a family (her family) of exceptional and perfectly normal people caught in the course of unforgiving history. It's a fast read.

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3. Geoff Dyer "The Missing of the Somme". Dyer is one of the best living writers in my humble opinion. He weaves fiction within non-fiction, poetry and history together with lived human lives. And its good to remember the horrors of a war lived long ago.

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-2. Leila Slimani "Chanson Douce" (The Perfect Nanny). She won THE french literary award (Prix Goncourt). I wanted to care more than I did. Maybe because the murder its based on happened in NYC while I lived there, I just preferred reality (strange I know) to this fiction.

Corinne Onetto

Feel like doing another "what I read compendium" (see January 2019). First up: The Friend by Ingrid Nunez. Who thought a book about a dog would be a meditation on death, love, remembrance and friendship? A keeper.