I didn't know of Lynne Tillman until I watched her discussion with Craig Mod as part of the book tour promoting Things Become Other Things. After hearing Craig's glowing recommendation of Lynne as a writer, I ended up with Mothercare on my to-be-read list. (I need to get better at logging where these recommendations come from…)

Mothercare's subtitle, "On Obligation, Love, Death, and Ambivalence", is not subtle and for good reason. In around 160 pages, the hard reality of moving from adult to adult caregiver to a parent is laid bare in a blend of understated to vivid stories. I was struck by how deftly Lynne integrated childhood recollections about her family dynamics into the account of how her mother so quickly moved toward dependence on family and caretakers and the following decade.

I found this book to be pointed, potent, and so very timely. While my parents have not suddenly changed, as they age there are fits-and-starts toward an unpredictable, but fully predictable, crisis. As a family, we know there will be surprises and hard challenges ahead. This book, with its very humanizing depiction, helps prepare not for the tiny, technical, tactical responses but for the broad, emotional, and personal.

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The Alice Network, by Kate Quinn, was quite a turn from the prior several books. A thoroughly adventurous set of protagonists make their own way — one in war and one in escaping the constrictive life of a "proper girl". The two main characters are visited in alternating chapters, and across a time gap of around thirty years, as their paths eventually intertwine. The character development is strong, the sense of place in history is even stronger, in this story set in the time of the Great War (1914-1918) and post-World War II (1947-1949).

This book was recommended to me by my sister Kelly and is in the to-be-read pile of my sister Kartika. I had to put this book down multiple times to breathe, steady myself, and confront discomfort from some of the very visceral scenes. I couldn't recommend this book to young readers, but I heartily recommend it for older readers who seek adventure, complex situations, and historical liveliness.

It's been about fifty days since graduation weekend and it's been a wild period. After finishing the last book, my digital "hold" was resolved and I began reading The Jakarta Method (what a fantastically human book). Unfortunately, my reading pace was too slow and the book auto-returned to the library and made it to the next eager reader. I was about half-way through, so I'll end up having to acquire another copy to finish off. Very impressed by the book so far. 

I had heard about Dame Jacinda Ardern's book-talk at a local theater through Explain Boston to Me (a podcast by a Philadelphia native who has moved to the greater Boston area). While the tickets were expensive, I snagged two and really enjoyed being surrounded by happy people who all shared admiration of Dame Ardern's approach to leadership and connection. Her memoir, A Different Kind of Power, is so well structured and displays her empathy so well. 

This morning, I completed, in a blur of tears, The Emperor of Gladness by Ocean Vuong. This book is an exploration of empathy (interesting recurring theme), aging, age, dementia, war, and the chosen family. The novel, set in Connecticut (an interesting link to Craig Mod's Things Become Other Things), follows a more standard narrative structure than Vuong's striking On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous, but is imbued with such care for language, for people, and for story that I feel it overcomes the form. 

In writing this mini recap, I've found I completed the following four out of ten:

• States of Emergency
• Things Become Other Things
• A Different Kind of Power
• The Emperor of Gladness

Two are very nouveau literary, one a classic memoir, and a more experimental memoir. I think what's next will be far more run-of-the-mill.

As I approached graduation, I felt like I'd be somewhat aimless during the summer — perhaps to an extreme — so I came up with the goal of reading around ten books this summer. Over the past couple of years, I've indulged in book buying and my physical "to be read" pile is now substantial. There are at least two books I've started and put on pause due to school and work.

This is my first full weekend post-graduation. I'm reading Chris Knapp's "States of Emergency", published by Unnamed Press. The book is challenging, set in a charged time, full of overtly literary language, and evokes a malaise that's hard to describe.

I've been running a simple tech stack on some personal/shared servers with friends for years, but got out of the discipline of blogging as I fell headlong into my undergraduate and then graduate studies. Now, with the changes in routines, I may have more capacity to write more!

On Sunday, five of us housemates went to Piper Mountain Christmas Trees in Newburgh to find a tree (and get out of the house). It was a perfect tree hunting day — the air was crisp and the sky was clear.

The tree was picked in short order and stuffed neatly into the bed of the pickup. The trip home, via backgrounds in Newburgh, was more interesting than the Christmas tree hunt. Newburgh, at least where we were, had fantastic, well paved roads. The evidence of mixed money and poverty was abundant. Perhaps it’s naive, but it seemed like only in Maine could there be such a clear contrast between living situations within a thousand feet.

When we returned home, the tree was ready for its new home in the foyer.