Raw reads for a raw year

More time for reading was a small source of light in a dark year. These are some of the books I enjoyed. The first in each section is my favorite. You’ll find some commentary, added where it might be enriching. Other books need nothing more written about them.

Fiction

McGlue, by Ottessa Moshfegh: Haunting in its rawness, pathos, and acuity for turns of phrase. McGlue makes you pause to shake the rum-induced delirium from your head. The best writers tap into a subconsciousness that they themselves don’t quite understand. It seems that’s precisely what Moshfgeh did in this compact masterpiece.

The Crossing, by Cormac McCarthy: At once vast and claustrophobic, McCarthy lures you into the southwest on the tracks of a wolf. You know it won’t end well, but you go anyway. My favorite McCarthy novel is usually the last one I read, but this one keeps stalking around my skull -- not just because of its scope and desolation, but because of the softness that floats under its outward brutality and turmoil.

All The Pretty Horses, by Cormac McCarthy

To Have and Have Not, by Ernest Hemingway

Alas, Babylon, by Pat Frank: The bomb drops. And then what? Then the real story begins. At 11, this was my education on the Cold War and mutually assured destruction. I revisited it this year, hoping it was half as good as I remembered it, and was pleasantly surprised. I finished it on the eve of the election as a form of mental preparation for what I believed could be -- and may still be -- ahead. Maybe you should do the same.

Tropic of Cancer, by Henry Miller

A Christmas Carol, by Charles Dickens

The Red Badge of Courage, by Stephen Crane

Musashi, by Eiji Yoshikawa

The River, by Peter Heller

Strange Love, by Fred Waitzkin: This one you’ll have to wait to read, but you’ll love it.

Lord Jim, by Joseph Conrad

Heart of Darkness, by Joseph Conrad

The Children of the Sea, by Joseph Conrad. Jess Row writes about this Conrad novella in his recent literary criticism, White Fights. Row describes a writer’s workshop at which he listened to Robert Stone read the often-lauded forward to this book, which is a treatise on the power of literary impressionism. He describes Stone, practically on the verge of tears, reading: “A work that aspires, however humbly, to the condition of art should carry its justification in every line.” Conrad’s novella was published in 1897 as The Nigger of the Narcissus in Europe. The title was changed for American publication, not because it’s offensive, but because the publisher thought nobody would read a novella about a black man. There’s an undeniable tension in this novel’s history, in the writer’s workshop Row describes, and in these pixels. Conrad, writing about race in the 19th century. Weepy Stone, in the 20th, failing to acknowledge the slur in the title. What has changed in America, between the publication of The Children of the Sea and Stone’s Dog Soldiers? How different are our attitudes and understanding of race and racism? What damage have we created by ignoring this tension?

The Barracks Thief, by Tobias Wolff

Frankenstein, by Mary Shelley

The Turn of the Screw, by Henry James

Notes from Underground, by Fyodor Dostoevsky: Bitterness in a bitter year. Across the country, bitter, spiteful men and women with justice and revenge fantasies, longing for a time that never existed. What makes Dostoevsky a force is the time he spends in the shadows. Novels with similar ambitions fall apart because their protagonists are strawmen. But Dostoevsky knows these characters intimately because he has reconciled their inseparability from himself. Do you know the parts of yourself that whisper the same justice and revenge fantasies? Do you know the parts of yourself that deny your capacity for violence, prejudice, and destruction?

The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, Mark Twain

Non-fiction

Consider This, by Chuck Palahniuk: A blue collar MFA in creative writing. Consider This underscores the necessity of telling stories simply, capturing human experience and language as it is and as it’s spoken. Palahniuk articulates everything Fred Waitzkin has taught me, but in his own way: Remove all artifice. Remove all sentimentality. Be ruthless to yourself. Let action and words carry the day, not thought.

Into The Wild, by Jon Krakauer

Let’s Go (So We Can Get Back), by Jeff Tweedy: Maybe the most salient lesson from this book is that you have to stoke your own creative fire. Nobody is going to do it for you. Tend to that fire daily, and maybe something magical will happen.

The Last Marlin, by Fred Waitzkin: I’ve learned a great deal about writing from my work and conversations with Fred. This memoir was also a masterclass. He doesn’t think of memoir as photographic depictions of events and people, but rather abstractions of both that reveal some greater truth. It reminds me a great deal of his mother, Stella Waitzkin’s, artwork.

Heavy, by Kiese Laymon. I watched this discussion between Laymon and Imani Perry in the aftermath of the killing of George Floyd, and picked up this memoir afterward. I don’t think I’ve encountered a more courageous and precise writer than Laymon, who looks unflinchingly within and without.

Daily Rituals, by Mason Currey: Great for any creative struggling to find their rhythm. Learn how other famous creatives learned to tend their inner fire.

The Lion Tracker’s Guide to Life, by Boyd Varty: An essential read for creatives, or anyone struggling to follow a path in life that calls to them.

Green Hills of Africa, by Ernest Hemingway: I read this in Paris, Belgium, Finland, Holland, and on trains and planes in between, all before the world shut down. I even did some rabbit hunting in the Arctic Circle between chapters. It’s not my favorite from Hem, but it highlights his unparalleled ability to sample reality to create something truer than truth. And I’ll remember where I was, what I was doing, and more important, whom I was with while reading.

The Book of Five Rings, by Miyamoto Musashi: A must-read for any serious martial artist. You can apply these principles of combat and swordsmanship to just about anything.

The Unfettered Mind, by Takuan Sōhō: It’s a book about swordsmanship written by a Buddhist monk. It’s also a book about every aspect of human performance, about flow. The unfettered mind does not stop, but moves with the unfolding moment.

The Revenant, by Michael Punke

White Fragility, by Robin Diangelo

Ordinary Men, by Christopher R. Browning

Range, by David Epstein

Billion Dollar Burger, by Chase Purdy

Stealing Fire, by Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal

Contagious, by Jonah Berger

What did you enjoy reading this year? What did I miss? Let me know in the comments.