Book Grab Bag: An Immense World and Other Musings
Book salad for #112
Picture it: your intrepid newsletterperson sits down in her office, at her ergonomic chair, everything designed for serene writing conditions (no, it’s on the couch curled up in a spine-curling shape with the NBA playoffs blaring in the background) and consults her editorial staff (the cat), saying, “Team (still, just the one cat), the world is our oyster! Should we write about an engrossing and enlightening non-fiction book? Tell the people about a bunch of book candy? Briefly wax poetic about a literary legend?”
Team: “Why not all of the above?” (“meow”)
Listen. One must take the feelings of one’s colleagues into account. It’s called leadership. So this week, you’re getting a little bit of everything. A big book salad! And like a big salad, it will either come together as a perfect spring meal, or you’ll wish you had more of the good toppings and less absurd frisee for god’s sake, I SEE YOU bulking up your salads, restaurants, don’t get cute. OK, let’s do this.
Please let me know your thoughts on this unruly book potpourri format. Or just say hi.
Scientific Non-Fiction That Reads Like a Book Instead of a Dissertation
So if I ever meet Ed Yong*, first I will let him know that he has a lot to answer for regarding his Pulitzer Prize-winning but extremely alarming coverage of COVID which did the absolute most of all the pandemic coverage to scare the bejesus out of me and rudely continues to do so. Second I will say “also I loved An Immense World and you seem very funny, actually.” I probably won’t say a third thing as I assume at that point he will be politely edging away and scanning wildly for security.
Anyway, An Immense World leverages his training as a scientist and his vocation as a writer to create a deeply enjoyable, fascinating book exploring the way that creatures in the natural world, from whales to the smallest insects, perceive and navigate the world. It attempts to bring the worlds of so many other creatures to life, particularly in ways we can’t imagine like ultraviolet vision, electromagnetic navigation, and ultrasonic hearing.
It’s a rigorous science book (like, you’re reading a lot about rods and cones and receptor cells) but joyfully wondrous, funny and chatty (don’t skip any footnotes), and extremely accessible. I kept bothering my sweetheart by exclaiming “DID YOU KNOW [this wild thing]**?” It brings our spectacular, fragile, and awe-inspiring world into a new light, and it made my change my behavior. A good one!
Despite not including any lambs to my recollection, this is an even tempered science book that earns three lambs on the Gentle Lamb Emotional Diagnosis scale.
A Roundup of Cute and Forgettable Books!
Look, either that descriptor will help you decide you don’t want to read these books because you want something more memorable, or you do want to read these books because sometimes you want book candy! Who can say? I’m but your humble book navigationista. What you do with this information is out of my hands.
Ms. Demeanor - Elinor Lipman is a fun, fizzy writer. This novel about a women under house arrest in her NYC apartment, who meets another resident under house arrest, is a playful little romp in the style of Only Murders in the Building (though admittedly not quite as clever). There is a lot that begs credulity and it was rather hastily concluded but - cute.
Marrying the Ketchups - I know a LOT of people who LOVED this book about three generations of a Chicago restaurant-owning family. I thought it was fine. Funny in moments. Messy and human. Didn’t particularly love anyone but that’s okay. Probably if you worked in the service industry you’d like it.
Meredith, Alone - This was actually pretty fresh and moving. It’s about a woman who has not left her house for three years, when some new friends and her long-estranged sister come back into her world. The novel addresses some sensitive subjects in ways that are both quite emotional but also quite hopeful. “Cute” might actually be too glib a word for this - let’s go with “Sweet.”
Can I Get an Amen Up in Here for Judy Blume?
If you were an (American?) child of a particular generation, it’s almost certain that Judy Blume was one of your first reading experiences where you felt deeply understood, you felt reflected, you felt respected, you felt loved. In my esteem, she should be in the pantheon of Great Authors but of course her genre and likely her gender (especially in her most prolific years) has probably diminished her in the eyes of Serious Authors.
I was reminded of her greatness in her New York Times “By The Book” column this week, wherein she speaks like a normal person about a range of books instead of just flexing intellectually about the “Important Books” she’s reading; advocates against book banning and for bookstores; and generally seems like the apogee of Good Eggs. So check it out, and then share Judy Blume books with the kids in your life or support her independent Key West bookstore, Books & Books. She gets an invite to my Fantasy Dinner Party.***
A Few Bonus Random Notes
If none of these suggestions are up your alley - please 1. check the archive for so many other options and 2. come back next week for who knows what books! Certainly not I!
All links go to Bookshop.org, which - like Judy Blume - supports indie bookstores. See/buy most of my past suggestions HERE.
If you like this newsletter, I’d be deeply grateful if you told a friend or shared it! We love all kinds here!
*Meeting Ed Yong is not as far-fetched as it sounds, because he’ll be speaking at the incredible Sun Valley Writers’ Conference in July alongside so many other luminaries including Patrick Radden Keefe, Curtis Sittenfeld, Hernan Diaz, Sarah Thankam Mathews. And I’m attending! It sells out in like four seconds but you can watch a lot of it online and maybe you’ll catch me cornering an unsuspecting Ed.
**Did you think that zebra stripes were for camouflage? APPARENTLY lions can’t even see those colors and zebras probably look like gray horses to them. But the stripes likely mess up the landings of the biting flies that are dangerous to zebras. THANKS ED YONG!
*** Current fantasy dinner party lineup: Diane Sawyer. Julia Child. Jim Henson. And now, I guess Judy Blume. I’ve disinvited Diane von Furstenburg because honestly? I think she’d be a bit of a conversation hog.