It’s time for #6degrees. Start at the same place as other wonderful readers, add six books, and see where you end up.
This month we begin with Siri Hustvedt’s What I Loved. It’s one of the few books that got five stars from every member of my book group.
Alas, another by Siri Hustvedt – The Blazing World – got a universal thumbs down from my book group. From memory, no one managed to finish it…
In the same category was The Finkler Question by Howard Jacobson.
It’s not the only Booker Prize winner that I couldn’t finish – the other was A Brief History of Seven Killings by Marlon James (I’m comforted by the fact that Karen at Booker Talk had the same experience with both books).
I bought Brief History for my husband the Christmas before it won the Booker. Even though he rarely reads for pleasure, I buy him a book each year, to keep his hand in if someone asks what he is reading 😉 Last Christmas I bought him Patrick Radden Keefe’s Say Nothing (and promptly read it myself).
Say Nothing is undoubtedly one of the best narrative nonfiction books I’ve ever read, so I jumped at the chance to hear Keefe speak (via Zoom – thanks COVID!). He was in conversation with David Grann about the art of writing true crime. Obviously I immediately bought Grann’s book, Killers of the Flower Moon.
Killers of the Flower Moon focuses on the Osage Indian Nation in Oklahoma. My reading of books about Indigenous Americans has been very limited, with the last one being Terese Marie Mailhot’s memoir, Heart Berries.
Books I loved, books I couldn’t finish and books I haven’t yet read – where will other chains go? Link up below or post your link in the comments section.
Next month (August 1, 2020), we’ll begin with a niche non-fiction book that you probably haven’t read but has a COVID-timely title – How To Do Nothing by Jenny Odell.
