A Book List

A Book List

The house was dark so I had to turn on a light.

I started to flit about. Engaging myself in making a list. In no particular order, but with great urgency.

flit

n.

1. A fluttering or darting movement.

2. Informal An empty-headed, silly, often erratic person.

Source: The Free Dictionary

A shelf, here. A bedside table, there.

Book after book. It seemed like many at first. Many, it was not. Not as many as I would have liked.

And I know why.

Anne Sexton, A Biography

by Diane Wood Middlebrook

I read about Anne at night before drifting off to sleep. A deep book, thick with tiny words and psychosis. It droned on and on. It was a struggle, but I couldn't look away.

But I was pulled from the depths of literary tragedy when a new friend (Julie of Kitchen Culinaire) sent me not one, but two books. I remember the morning I was handed the package by the office mailman. I looked at the return address. Canada! I turned around in my cubicle, my back to the outside world and quietly opened the envelope.

Inside...

Tin Fish Gourmet, Great Seafood from Cupboard to Table

by Barbara-jo McIntosh

A thin volume filled with simple recipes starring tinned fish. I read it from cover to cover. A first for me, reading a cookbook straight through.

Cooking for Me and Sometimes You, A Parisian Romance with Recipes

by Barbara-jo McIntosh

It wasn't just the first paragraph that drew me into this second thin volume. It was the entire package. The ribbon bookmark, the fabric cover. It had the smell of summer's past to it. Trips to the library. I got lost immediately. And soon I was fully engulfed by the day to day quiet adventure of Barbara-jo in Paris.

Julie had hit the nail on the head. Not once, but twice.

After that, for the most part, it was a Parisian summer of sorts.

The Elegance of the Hedgehog

by Muriel Barbery

Lunch in Paris, A Love Story with Recipes

by Elizabeth Bard

The Paris Wife

by Paula McLain

And because I'm a sucker for a good food memoir, I threw one of those into the mix as well.

Home Cooking, A Writer in the Kitchen

by Laurie Colwin

But I like to keep things interesting and diverse. Or, at least I like to try.

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks

by Rebecca Skloot

The Unabridged Journals of Sylvia Plath

Edited by Karen V. Kukil

The Summer Book

by Tove Jansson

And that's the list. The short of it anyway.

I wonder what you read over the summer.