Reader

Like so much else, the way I read has changed.  I used to spend hours at a time lost in stories.  Now reading often feels like stealing time.  Still, I read before bed every night.  I read if I have to sit in traffic, wait at the doctor or dentist or for my kids to finish up activities.  I stand at the stove and let dinner burn (too often) with a book in my hand.  And sometimes, when there’s a book that demands it, I’ll let the world fall away until I’ve gobbled it up.  This business of making book lists is a hard game; the list gets unwieldy pretty fast.

Books in my Zombie Apocalypse Backpack:

• State of Wonder by Anne Patchett
• Salvage the Bones by Jesmyn Ward
• All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr
• The Forsyte Saga by John Galsworthy
• Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
• Germinal by Emile Zola
• East of Eden by John Steinbeck
• The Song of the Lark by Willa Cather
• Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry
• The Stand by Stephen King
• The Color Purple by Alice Walker

Books That Teach Me How To Tell a Story:

• Little Black Book of Stories by A.S. Byatt
• The Signature of All Things by Elizabeth Gilbert
• The Memory Wall by Anthony Doerr
• The New Valley by Josh Weil
• Winter’s Bone by Daniel Woodrell
• The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy
• The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck
• Prodigal Summer by Barbara Kingsolver
• Empire Falls by Richard Russo
• Away by Amy Bloom
• Plainsong by Kent Haruf
• Dept. of Speculation by Jenny Offill

Books in My Car:

• Astrophysics for People in a Hurry by Neil DeGrasse Tyson
• Untangled: Guiding Teenage Girls through the Seven Transitions Into Adulthood by Lisa DaMour
• Tenth of December by George Saunders

Books My Kids Swear By:

• The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah
• The Book Thief by Markus Zusak
• The Stand by Stephen King
• The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
• True Grit by Charles Portis
• All Harry Potter Books by J.K. Rowling, though Number 5 is best

Books on Writing:

• Ron Carlson Writes a Story by Ron Carlson
• The Writing Life by Annie Dillard
• Thinking About Memoir by Abigail Thomas
• This Won’t Take But a Minute, Honey by Steve Almond
• On Writing by Stephen King
• The Writer’s Journey by Christopher Vogler
• Steering the Craft by Ursula LeGuin