My Favorite Books from 5, 10, and 15 Years Ago
A literary walk down memory lane
I was thinking about what I wanted this week’s newsletter to be about, so I was scrolling through my Goodreads shelves to get some inspiration. I’ve been tracking my reading there since 2009, and as I looked at some of those older shelves, I decided I wanted to look back at some of my favorite reads from the past.
Today, I’m sharing some beloved books from five, 10, and 15 years ago. Some of these titles are all-time favorites that regular readers will have heard me talk about, while others are being mentioned on Literary Merit for the first time. (Aren’t you so excited?) By putting together this post, I was reminded of some wonderful memories and inspired to reread some of these gems.
As always, all books are linked to Bookshop.org, where your purchases support the indie bookstore of your choice and my work on this newsletter.
All book descriptions are from NoveList.
5 Years Ago
In 2020, the world faced the COVID-19 pandemic, which changed everything. Many lost their lives, their loved ones, and their sense of safety. 2020 also saw the murder of George Floyd, which led to increased conversations about race, police brutality, and white supremacy. Since I was home so much in 2020, you’d think I would have read more than ever, but reading was difficult for me during that time. My mind was elsewhere, filled with fear, uncertainty, and disappointment. Still, I managed to read some wonderful things, many of which reflect the cultural moment and my delicate headspace.
Good Talk: A Memoir in Conversations by Mira Jacob: An intimate graphic memoir about American identity as it has shaped the author's interracial family in the aftermath of the 2016 elections.
Why I love this book: Good Talk was the book that showed me how much I really can like the graphic novel format. Before, I had only read a couple of titles, but through Jacob’s story, I learned I liked graphic memoirs and have read many more since then. Good Talk is engaging, beautifully illustrated, and, unfortunately, still relevant.
Here for It: Or, How to Save Your Soul in America by R. Eric Thomas: A humorist and playwright provides a heartfelt and humorous memoir-in-essays about growing up seeing the world differently, finding unexpected hope and every awkward, extraordinary stumble along the way.
Why I love this book: I love to laugh, but I don’t laugh out loud all that often while reading. One of the exceptions to that is when I read R. Eric Thomas. He’s hilarious and full of witty pop culture references that I enjoy. As funny as Thomas can be, he’s also a wonderful serious writer, such as when he talks about a friend he lost or the difficulty of finding your place in the world.
How to Be an Antiracist by Ibram X. Kendi: From the National Book Award-winning author comes a bracingly original approach to understanding and uprooting racism and inequality in our society—and in ourselves. Ibram X. Kendi’s concept of antiracism reenergizes and reshapes the conversation about racial justice in America—but even more fundamentally, points us toward liberating new ways of thinking about ourselves and each other.
Why I love this book: I read this book on my own shortly after its publication. I learned a lot from that first reading, but I got even more out of the text when I reread it with a group of colleagues on an equity committee I was part of at the time. This book is the right balance of challenging and inspiring. Kendi’s thoughts on place and belonging were especially powerful for me as I thought about how I could do a better job making school libraries a safe space for all students.
My Dark Vanessa by Kate Elizabeth Russell: Asked to help defend an older high-school English teacher with whom she had an affair at age 15, Vanessa struggles to choose between her romantic teen illusions and harrowing adult perceptions.
Why I love this book: I just wrote about how much I enjoy campus novels, but the setting isn’t the only reason I love this book. My Dark Vanessa is a tender and smart look at the stories we tell ourselves and how we have to reconsider some of those stories as we age.
Such a Fun Age by Kiley Reid: A story about race and privilege is centered around a young Black babysitter, her well-intentioned employer, and a surprising connection that threatens to undo them both.
Why I love this book: I appreciate books with well-developed characters, and that’s what I got with Such a Fun Age. The two women at the heart of this story—a white and wealthy influencer and a young Black woman barely making it—are both crafted with precision and care.
Transcendent Kingdom by Yaa Gyasi: A novel about faith, science, religion, and family that tells the deeply moving portrait of a family of Ghanaian immigrants ravaged by depression and addiction and grief, narrated by a fifth year candidate in neuroscience at Stanford school of medicine studying the neural circuits of reward seeking behavior in mice.
Why I love this book: Yaa Gyasi’s debut novel, Homegoing, is a beloved favorite, so I wondered how she could deliver something as good for her sophomore effort. I needn’t have worried. The way Gyasi weaves together the different themes of this novel is brilliant. Transcendent Kingdom is a sad novel, but it’s also a triumph that showcases Gyasi’s impressive skills.
10 Years Ago
In 2015, I was a capital-A Adult. I was working two jobs, settling into my identity, and started caring about grown-up things, like flu shots and supermarket sales on milk. Exciting! I read some of my all-time favorite books in 2015. 28-year-old Andrea made some good picks that soon-to-be 38-year-old Andrea still stands behind.
Gilead by Marilynne Robinson: As the Reverend John Ames approaches the hour of his own death, he writes a letter to his son chronicling three previous generations of his family, a story that stretches back to the Civil War and reveals uncomfortable family secrets.
Why I love this book: When I was around five or six, I had a children’s Bible, and I remember highlighting almost the entire book of Matthew. I did something similar when I read Gilead. It seems like every other sentence is underlined. There’s an abundance of wisdom in this book that offers readers much to think about, long after the final sentence.
Go Tell It on the Mountain by James Baldwin: While his family struggles with guilt, bitterness, and spiritual issues, John Grimes experiences a religious conversion in the Temple of the Fire Baptised.
Why I love this book: This was my first James Baldwin book, and as I read it, I kept finding myself amazed at the writing. Baldwin’s prose is some of the finest I’ve read. The structure of this book is also interesting as it’s set on one day, but features flashbacks to different eras and places. If you haven’t read any Baldwin yet, why not start where I did with his first novel, Go Tell It on the Mountain?
Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri: In nine stories imbued with the sensual details of Indian culture, Lahiri charts the emotional journeys of characters seeking love beyond the barriers of nations and generations. This short fiction collection blends elements of Indian traditions with the complexities of American culture in such tales as "A Temporary Matter," in which a young Indian-American couple confronts their grief over the loss of a child, while their Boston neighborhood copes with a nightly blackout.
Why I love this book: A good short story is like a great snapshot that perfectly captures something important about a person or place, and Jhumpa Lahiri writes good short stories. When I read this collection, I hadn’t read much, if any, fiction about Indian culture. I loved learning more about people who are different from me, but Lahiri is also great at showing what connects us all, regardless of borders.
Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides: Calliope's friendship with a classmate and her sense of identity are compromised by the adolescent discovery that she is intersex, a situation with roots in her grandparents’ desperate struggle for survival in the 1920s.
Why I love this book: One of the reasons I like reading is that I like being transported to another time and place. That’s one of the reasons I enjoy epic family dramas like Middlesex. I found myself completely absorbed in this family and the highs and lows they faced over the decades.
The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro: Stevens, an aging butler dedicated to the dignity of his profession, takes to the road to convince Ms. Bent—a now-married former housekeeper—to resume her duties at Darlington Hall. As Stevens journeys, he reflects on their prior acquaintance; his memories reveal Stevens’ deeply personal desires, and how he has rewritten events to maintain his ideal image of service and discretion.
Why I love this book: Last year, I wrote about my love of quiet books, and The Remains of the Day is an excellent example. This is a perfectly crafted story that shows off Kazuo Ishiguro’s skill as a writer. This one is at the top of my reread list.
This Is the Story of a Happy Marriage by Ann Patchett: Inviting readers into her personal life, the New York Times best-selling author of State of Wonder and Bel Canto shares the stories of the people, places, ideals, and art to which she has remained indelibly committed.
Why I love this book: One of the reasons I love this book is the format in which I consumed it. I listened to this essay collection, and I still remember driving home from work one night with this playing in the car, and thinking how nice it was to have Ann Patchett reading to me and telling me stories about her life.
15 Years Ago
In 2010, I graduated from college. A couple of the titles mentioned here were assigned to me in my senior year, and a couple of other selections are classics I wanted to read on my own as a good English major. College opened my eyes to many new ideas and gave me more confidence about who I am and what I believe. Since I majored in English and minored in history, I read hundreds and hundreds of pages a week in school, and while I certainly didn’t love all of it, I’m grateful for many of the writers and ideas that were introduced to me.
The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger: After leaving prep school, Holden Caulfield spends three days on his own in New York City.
Why I love this book: This title was never assigned to me in high school or college, but I remember thinking that I needed to read it. I’m thankful I listened to that urge because I enjoyed this story a great deal. Holden is a character who feels very much alive and real, even all these years after Catcher came into the world.
Faith Unraveled: How a Girl Who Knew All the Answers Learned to Ask Questions by Rachel Held Evans: Having grown up in a town famous for its commitment to conservative fundamentalism, Rachel Held Evans nearly loses her faith when rehearsed answers to tough questions aren't enough to satisfy her growing doubts about Christianity. Evolving in Monkey Town (this book’s original title) is a story of spiritual survival that challenges readers to reassess their approach to Christianity in the context of a postmodern environment, where knowing all the answers isn't as important as truly asking the questions.
Why I love this book: When I first heard about this book, I couldn’t get my hands on it fast enough. My early 20s saw many shifts in my thinking about God, faith, and religion, and this book was like a lighthouse in the darkness. Rachel wasn’t afraid to ask the hard questions out loud, and I’m grateful for her example. She died suddenly in 2019, and her absence still breaks my heart.
Norwegian Wood by Haruki Murakami: Toru Watanabe, a quiet and preternaturally serious young college student in Tokyo, is devoted to Naoko, a beautiful and introspective young woman, but their mutual passion is marked by the tragic death of their best friend years before. Toru begins to adapt to campus life and the loneliness and isolation he faces there, but Naoko finds the pressures and responsibilities of life unbearable. As she retreats further into her own world, Toru finds himself reaching out to others and drawn to a fiercely independent and sexually liberated young woman.
Why I love this book: Several of the classes I took in college were about East Asian history. Through those classes, I realized how much I liked Japanese fiction. I grabbed Haruki Murakami’s novel The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle and loved it, so I wanted to read more of his work. Honestly, I don’t recall much about the plot of Norwegian Wood, just that I thought upon finishing it, “Well, that wasn’t nearly as weird as Wind-Up Bird.”
On the Road by Jack Kerouac: On the Road is a thinly fictionalized autobiography, filled with a cast made of Kerouac's real-life friends, lover, and fellow travelers. Narrated by Sal Paradise, one of Kerouac's alter-egos, On the Road is a cross-country bohemian odyssey that not only influenced writing in the years since its 1957 publication but penetrated into the deepest level of American thought and culture.
Why I love this book: Like The Catcher in the Rye, this is another novel I felt I needed to read. I was fascinated by the Beat Generation at the time I picked up On the Road, and part of that intrigue is why I enjoyed this novel as much as I did. I’m a sucker for a good road trip story, and I liked seeing ways in which this book influenced stories that came after it.
Radical Feminism: A Documentary Reader edited by Barbara A. Crow: Comprised of pivotal documents written by U.S. radical feminists in the 1960s and 1970s, Radical Feminism combines both unpublished and previously published manifestos, position papers, minutes of meetings, and newsletters essential to an understanding of radical feminism.
Why I love this book: In my senior year of college, I took a course called Theories and Fictions of the Women’s Movement. I loved it. That was the class where I was first introduced to writers such as Audre Lorde and Betty Friedan. I appreciate this anthology from a literary perspective, but I also appreciate it from a historical perspective because of the insights these primary sources give us about the second wave of feminism.
Stoner by John Williams: Recounts the life of a Missouri farm boy-turned-English professor who deals with an unstable wife, an affair, and his own emotions.
Why I love this book: A former colleague told me about Stoner and was insistent that I’d love it. He was right. Some have called Stoner a perfect novel, and that’s exactly what I thought when I finished it. It does exactly what I want a novel to do, and that’s to give me an inside look at someone’s perfectly imperfect life. Stoner remains an all-time favorite.
The Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Anne Brontë: A nineteenth-century novel depicts the unhappy marriage of Helen Graham and her drunken husband, realistically portraying the devastating impact of alcoholism.
Why I love this book: This book was a pleasant surprise. I was assigned this text in my Victorian Literature class, and I wasn’t excited about it. It didn’t sound interesting, but it didn’t take long for me to realize my assumptions were incorrect. I ended up loving this epistolary novel and wish Anne got as much praise as her sisters Charlotte and Emily.
A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan: Working side-by-side for a record label, former punk rocker Bennie Salazar and the passionate Sasha hide illicit secrets from one another while interacting with a motley assortment of equally troubled people from 1970s San Francisco to the post-war future.
Why I love this book: I remember reading most of this book in a downtown coffee shop. I’d never read anything else like it and was delighted by Jennifer Egan’s creativity, especially in the chapter meant to look like a PowerPoint presentation. I had a lot of fun reading A Visit from the Goon Squad, and that’s a nice memory.
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I’d love to hear your thoughts on my favorites. Do any of yours overlap with mine? What are some of the pivotal reads from your recent past? Share in the comments.
Very few people ever mention The Tenant of Wildfell Hall but it is such a good book! Ahead of its time in a way.
Andrea, this was so fun to read. Good Talk was my gateway into graphic novels and I haven’t looked back! I too enjoyed quite a few of these and My Dark Vanessa and Middlesex are particularly memorable to me.