what i’m reading
right now
as of January 2025
The White Book, Han Kang
Clandestinity, Antonio Moresco
books i’ve read so far in 2025
Autobiography of Red, Anne Carson
Camera Lucida, Roland Barthes
A Mountain to the North, a Lake to the South, Paths to the West, a River to the East, László Krasznahorkai
Caroline’s excellent recommendation
Mild Vertigo, Mieko Kawakami
These Precious Days, Ann Patchett
books i read in 2024
Russian Gothic, Aleksandr Skorobogatov translated by Ilona Yazhbin Chavasse
The Collected Songs of Cold Mountain, Han Shan
The Master's Tools Will Never Dismantle the Master's House, Audre Lorde
An Apprenticeship or The Book of Pleasures, Clarice Lispector
Raised by Wolves: Fifty Poets on Fifty Poems, A Graywolf Anthology
Le doute de Cézanne, Maurice Merleau-Ponty
french practice
The Physics of Sorrow, Georgi Gospodinov translated by Angela Rodel
a surprising favorite for this year
baby’s first Bulgarian lit
Bluets, Maggie Nelson
Eye Level: Poems, Jenny Xie
Blue Iris: Poems and Essays, Mary Oliver
The Garden of Forking Paths, Jorge Luis Borges
Faves: The Book of Sand, The Circular Ruins, Forking Paths
Of Dog and Walls, Yuko Tsushima
Upstream: Selected Essays, Mary Oliver
Some Are Always Hungry, Jihyun Yun (Poetry)
What Are Children For?: On Ambivalence and Choice by Anastasia Berg, Rachel Wiseman
still unclear what they are for
might need to have a few to fully know
Innocent Erendira and Other Stories by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Essays, E.B. White
deeply underrated essay collection
Death in Venice, Thomas Mann
A Mathematician’s Lament, Paul Lockhart (Brad’s rec)
Read this if you took any standardized math class in the United States. Become enchanted. Fall deeply in love with math again.
Stay True, Hua Hsu
Giovanni’s Room, James Baldwin (thanks Abhishek!)
books i read in 2023
Nausea, Jean-Paul Sartre
Steppenwolf, Herman Hesse
Passion Simple, Annie Ernaux
Strange Beasts of China, Yan Ge (gift from Rachel)
A Moveable Feast, Ernest Hemingway
First Love, Ivan Turgenev
The Secret History, Donna Tartt
Babel and Yellowface (meh), RF Kuang
Still Pictures, Janet Malcom (RIP)
On Women, Susan Sontag
Station Eleven, Emily St. John Mandel
The Rabbit Hutch, Tess Gunty
The Art of Loving by Erich Fromm
And a whole slew of running-related books, with varying degrees of usefulness. I’m not a huge fan of the running memoir, mostly because it devolves into self-aggrandizement pretty quickly.
North, Scott & Jenny Jurek
The Rise of the Ultra Runners, Adharanand Finn
Finding Ultra, Rich Roll
Eat & Run, Scott Jurek
Training for the Uphill Athlete, Steve House
well-researched and incredibly useful
Endure, Alex Hutchinson
books i read in 2022
Favorite fiction:
The Nickel Boys by Colson Whitehead
2666 by Roberto Bolaño, translated by Natasha Wimmer
Damnation Spring by Ash Davidson
Favorite nonfiction:
Entangled Life by Merlin Sheldrake
Eating to Extinction by Dan Saladino
On Photography by Susan Sontag
Favorite short story collections:
Flowers of Mold by Ha Seong-nan (Oct. 4)
Blockchain Chicken Farm by Xiaowei Wang (June 28)
Favorite reread:
Pilgrim at Tinker Creek by Annie Dillard
In reverse chronological order:
Letters to a Young Poet by Rilke (Nov. 11)
Cold Enough for Snow by Jessica Au (Nov. 11)
Three Brothers by Yan Lianke (Nov. 9)
Reborn: Journals and Notebooks (1947-1963) by Susan Sontag (Nov. 6)
Pedro Paramo by Juan Rulfo (Nov. 2)
haunting short read
2666 by Roberto Bolaño, translated by Natasha Wimmer (Oct. 25)
a behemoth, a masterpiece, my favorite parts were 1, 3, 5
On Photography by Susan Sontag (Oct. 12)
thoughts here
Bluebeard’s First Wife by Ha Seong-nan (Oct. 11)
Flowers of Mold by Ha Seong-nan (Oct. 4)
What I Talk About When I Talk About Running by Haruki Murakami (Oct. 3)
The Vegetarian by Han Kang (Sep. 29)
The Metamorphosis by Kafka, (Sep. 28)
Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 by Cho Nam-Joo (Sept. 27)
Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler (Sept. 27)
birthday gift from Bella! :) She texted me beforehand to make sure I hadn’t read it already, which was so thoughtful
Blood Sisters by Kim Yideum, translated by Ji yoon Lee (Sept. 11)
Beasts of a Little Land by Juhea Kim (Sept. 5)
The Secret Life of Groceries: The Dark Miracle of the American Supermarket by Benjamin Lorr (Aug. 14)
fascinating! a good “double-feature” read with Eating to Extinction.
Fiona and Jane by Jean Chen Ho (Aug. 9)
(1/6) wish I liked this more but it was deeply unsatisfying and surface-level read.
The Night Watchman by Louise Erdrich (Aug. 7)
2021 Pulitzer Prize for fiction
The Land of Big Numbers by Te-Ping Chen (July 28)
yet another short story collection out of mainland China, double-feature with Blockchain Chicken Farm
Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin (July 24)
Beautiful Country: A Memoir by Qian Julie Wang (July 20)
The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath (July 18)
Blockchain Chicken Farm by Xiaowei Wang (June 28)
The Love Songs of W.E.B. Du Bois by Honorée Fanonne Jeffers (June 28)
a tapestry of grief and joy woven through the voices of generations of black women
Pilgrim at Tinker Creek by Annie Dillard
reread this for the first time since high school, back when I openly detested it. I’ve changed so much since then.
God, it’s truly lovely.
Mutual Aid by Dean Spade (June 13)
Eating to Extinction by Dan Saladino (June 8)
highly recommend this book to anybody who 1. cares about the sustainability and diversity of our global food network or 2. eats food
Cultish: The Language of Fanaticism by Amanda Montell (May)
college theatre was, in fact, a cult
The Autobiography of Malcolm X by Malcolm X and Alex Haley (May)
I Like to Watch: Arguing My Way Through the TV Revolution by Emily Nussbaum (May)
Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (April)
The Nickel Boys by Colson Whitehead (April)
one of the few books where I truly didn’t see the ending coming
The House of Spirits by Isabel Allende (April)
The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy (March)
Damnation Spring by Ash Davidson (March)
this made my heart ache so badly I curled up on the couch for an hour afterwards, in a state of denial and fury
Emma by Jane Austen
felt frivolous on reread but this line still resonates HARD
“if I loved you less, I might be able to talk about it more”
Sourcery by Terry Pratchett
A Passage North by Anuk Arudpragasam
I see reflections of my own former relationships in this book.
Entangled Life: How Fungi Make Our Worlds, Change Our Minds & Shape Our Futures by Merlin Sheldrake
what a perfect name for a mycologist
Bewilderment by Richard Powers
Slightly let down by this one. High expectations from reading The Overstory; disappointed by the rushed ending. Still, contains moments of exquisite beauty.
Equal Rites by Terry Pratchett
Heroes: The Greek Myths Reimagined by Stephen Fry
The Light Fantastic by Terry Pratchett
The Colour of Magic by Terry Pratchett
books I’m going to read next
(the real list is much longer but I’d love to stop overwhelming myself so I’ll keep it short here)
when i sing, mountains dance by irene solà
translated from Catalan, this book is fizzing with magical realism and mushrooms. It caught my eye in Powell’s, I read a few pages, I brought it home.
Work Won’t Love You Back by Sarah Jaffe
recommended by a few friends
books i’m tabling for now
Love Novel, Ivana Sajko translated by Mima Simic
The Burning Plain, Juan Rulfo translated by Douglas Weatherford
Golden Age by Wang Xiaobo (book club with Rachel)
i left this at home unfortunately
My Year of Rest and Relaxation by Ottessa Moshfegh
Charlie Chan Is Dead: An Anthology of Contemporary Asian American Fiction
The Committed by Viet Thanh Nguyen
Milkman by Anna Burns
not much has happened yet — halfway through, holding a half-breath and unsure of whether it’s a sigh or a shout.
I am a Strange Loop by Douglas Hofstadter
really witty but takes a while to get through
How to Hide an Empire by Daniel Immerwahr
Mostly Dead Things by Kristen Arnett