I Read A Lot. Here Are 10 Books You Should Add to Your TBR Shelf
I’ve always loved to read. Around eighth grade, I started to read much more deeply and widely, to try to make sense of a world around me that, at that time in my life, was confusing and filled with pain.
In high school, I read to fill the void I felt around friendships and relationships. I would get lost in the shelves of my local library and would often swipe books from my high school’s library, to avoid interacting with the nosy librarians. I started reading on planes, trains, and buses and have spent hundreds of hours pursuing the shelves of local bookstores, in the variety of places I’ve both traveled to and called home.
I am naturally a fast reader, but through this focus on reading, I’ve become even faster; even impatient. It’s difficult for many books to capture my attention, which I’m sure in part is to blame on the changing patterns in social media consumption. Regardless, I wanted to share some recommendations of books I’ve read recently that have been incredibly captivating, engrossing, and endearing, that I think you should read, too.
The book everyone is talking about right now. I actually read it as an advanced reader copy, so I was ahead of the curve when I finished it in one sitting in January. It’s being described as a “cautionary tale” about depending on and trusting a man financially, but I think that’s a take based on where society is at right now with gendered power dynamics, money, and divorce. Belle Burden is also just a fantastic writer who wrote a really gripping memoir.
Secure: The Revolutionary Guide to Creating a Secure Life by Amir Levine, MD
This is a book about applied attachment theory that offers a different framework than I’ve seen before in this line of literature. Instead of looking at your attachment style as fixed, it helps the reader to understand how to work towards security, as well as how Western ideas about attachment influence the psychological take on this subject (and how that varies from other societies views). It also offers a model that anyone can use in any relational framework to foster a secure environment for themselves and encourages the reader to deprioritize relationships that aren’t what it calls CARRP (consistent, available, reliable, responsive, and predictable) and teaches you how to do this without cultivating avoidance, while also maintaining warmth.
I don’t agree with every single take and there are some strategies that felt a bit black and white, but overall this is an excellent read I think any person could benefit from.
The Wage Standard: What’s Wrong in the Labor Market and How to Fix It
A new release that offers a well-researched, deeply thought framework for understanding wage stagnation, employment, and the labor market. You’ll learn a lot and gain a lot of insight into the monoposony power that corporate consolidation has created and the pressure that has resulted in for workers.
I used to be a fan of Lena Dunhum, until she wrote about what many consider to be sexually abusing her sibling in her first memoir in 2014. Since then, I’ve come to view her as a complex, misunderstood, yet exhausting, person. This memoir is no different; it’s chaotic, it’s verbose, and vapid, but Lena is nothing if not a great writer.
How a Little Becomes A Lot: Small Changes for a More Meaningful Life by Eric Zimmer
Written by a former addict, this book is filled with advice, practical solutions, behavioral science, and mindfulness techniques that are designed to help you create sustainable change in your life. It turns common wisdom on its head and reframes willpower through the lens of neuroscience, giving you ways to work with your brain rather than against it.
Desire: The Longings Inside Us and the New Science of How we Love, Heal, and Grow by Jay Stringer
This book works at the intersection of psychology, science, and spirituality. Rather than being looked at as untamed wanting, Stringer challenges the reader to see that desire is about longings that are beneath the surface. He identifies what he calls the five core desires, that are based on his research: wholeness, intimacy, growth, meaning, and pleasure. He approaches the subject of desire from a holistic, grounded, and scientifically informed place, rather than one of judgement.
This book will teach you how to approach your desires with curiosity and compassion. It really offered me a new way of looking at wanting that was extremely beneficial. There is also a companion workbook that is a great tool to use alongside as you read
The Practice of Attention: Cultivating Presence in a Distracted World by Cody Cook-Parrott
I think it’s safe to say we all suffer from a short attention span these days. I’ve been trying to cultivate more focus, presence, and mindfulness, which lead me to pick up this book. The author deleted her Instagram, despite having 80k followers, using the practices she writers about. You’ll learn from her how to conduct an Attention Audit, to understand where your attention and focus are going, as well as where they are lacking.
I was really inspired by her framing of this issue, viewing it as an opportunity to create rituals and bring more space, time, and room for hobbies, creativity, and play, rather than trying to maximize your productivity, which is often the way that this issue is framed.
I read this book for a new local bookclub I joined. I enjoyed this novel much more than anticipated. This book follows protagonist Nora Seed, a woman suffering from depression after a series of bad decisions has led her to feel hopeless. She tries to commit suicide, but instead ends up in a version of purgatory called the Midnight Library, where she finds Mrs. Elm, her elementary shool librarian. The library contains millions of books, each one with possible version of her life, if she had made different decisions. It’s a take on multiverse theory that leads Nora to explore different possible lives, in an attempt to find the happiest one.
This was a great story and also one that caused me to reflect a lot about my personal decisions, the power of our choices, and the impact our seemingly inconsequential dilemmas have.
Restoring Your Historic House by Scott T Hanson
If you own a historic home, this is a must-read. Meticulously researched, it offers a comprehensive guide to just about any type of home renovation you may be undertaking and offers the unique care and guidance needed to preserve the integrity of your home’s history that most DIY guides don’t provide. Even better, this book will teach you how to preserve the details of your home’s character, as well as how to blend this with the need for modern function and convenience.
Honest Motherhood: On Losing My Mind and Finding Myself by Libby Ward
Author Libby Ward peels back the facade of motherhood as it is constructed in today’s culture, revealing with honesty and raw emotion the difficulties of parenting. She tells her own story of becoming a mother and losing herself in the perfectionism, overwork, exhaustion, and people pleasing that is often demanded of women with children. I love how she blends her own experience with a larger sociological analysis of how the culture of motherhood influences our perceptions of parenting. She also examines this on the micro level, offering commentary on how our own childhoods and parents shape how we parent. Ward isn’t afraid to speak about the difficulties and demands of mothering, bypassing the pressure placed on mothers to only speak positivity about parenting and to never ask for help, instead letting the hardships live in silence.
This book offers a rich commentary on the societal pressures faced by mothers, as well as her own journey towards understanding herself.