Kristen's Bookshelf

For my Virtual Bookshelf, I decided to rip off pay homage to Quentin Blake's illustration of Roald Dahl's Matilda. It seems fitting since I am a PhD candidate in Children's Literature and writing a dissertation on representations of gifted children in literature. My Matilda-esque self is reading Toni Morrison's Beloved, JK Rowling's Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Neil Gaiman's American Gods, Marilynne Robinson's Gilead, M.T. Anderson's Feed, Anne Lamott's Small Victories, Kristin Cashore's Fire, and Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale. 

1. Beloved

I chose Beloved from the class readings because I learn more from this text each time I teach it. When I read it in undergrad, I focused most of my attention on whether or not the character of Beloved was an actual human, a supernatural figure, or a metaphor, and I did not pause to appreciate the beauty of the language in small passages or understand the larger message on healing from trauma. Now, having taught it three times, each time I reread it I notice more depth to Morrison's narrative of healing through self-compassion, touch, and spiritual renewal. Further, one of the reasons I read is to understand concepts like history, community, and nation through new lenses and perspectives, and this is something Beloved offers me. Beloved invites me to reconsider our nation's history and present moment, and I think that makes it a valuable text.

2. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

I have a lot to say about the Harry Potter series: it was a big part of my adolescence, so much so that my mom worried that I was trying to become an actual witch. I think the whole series is genius and lovely in all the right ways. It is probably the reason I added English as a major in undergrad and was the subject of many of my term papers, but I singled out Deathly Hallows because I think that one, more than any of the others, speaks to this question of why we read. One of the reasons that we seek out literature is to gain a better understanding of what it means to be a human, and this means coming to terms with our own mortality. Deathly Hallows grapples with this question in a way that feels authentic, which is so important in literature for adolescents. 

3. Fire

Sometimes when you study a subject for a living, you can start to lose the joy that drew you to the subject in the first place, or at least this is something I've experienced. The more critical theories, cultural contexts, literary arguments I was exposed to, the more critical my reading became. Suddenly, books that I used to enjoy seemed trite, cliche, sexist, etc. etc. etc. Fire restored my ability to find joy in a genre that I used to love but was giving me some trouble because of its frequently sexist, racist, and cliched plot conventions. Kristin Cashore's Fire trilogy gave me heroines I could root for and gave those heroines endings that that didn't tame or contain them. Whenever anyone asks me for a book recommendation, this is where I start. Fire is feminist, inclusive, and stacked with well-developed characters and compelling plots. Sometimes we just want to read for a sense of escape or adventure, and Fire is one of my all-time favorite reads for this purpose. 

4. Gilead

Over the last few years, I have gotten into Marilynne Robinson's books. I describe Robinson's works as both American pastoral and spiritual memoir. Before Gilead, I was not much of a fan of slow reading, though I did love Far From the Madding Crowd and Anna Karenina, both of which were slow, leisurely reads for me. But Robinson does not even employ normal chapter breaks in Gilead, so the whole book felt like one long conversation, and I would alternate between days of reading two pages at a time and days of reading fifty pages in one sitting. The lack of chapter breaks allowed me to determine my reading pace, and in doing so I discovered the power of Robinson's language. She masters and manipulates a sentence like no other author I've read. I read her books as much for her syntax and prose as I do for the character development and story, which isn't true for most of my reading. I also love her Gilead trilogy because it explores all of those big topics that draw us to literature--love, family, death, spirituality, and home. 

5. The Handmaid's Tale

Everything Margaret Atwood writes is brilliant. She's a genius at combining beautiful and poignant language with terrifying visions, and every horror that she imagines seems both possible and familiar, which makes them even more terrifying. I love Oryx and Crake, but The Handmaid's Tale feels too pertinent to the present moment in American history to be ignored. Atwood is so good because she imagines something horrifying--women forced into reproductive servitude--but she uses realities of our world to construct this result. Nationalism, religious fundamentalism, misogyny, greed, and global warfare cause the men of Gilead (not the same Gilead as Robinson's) to come up with the idea of handmaids. We can recognize these forces in our own society, which makes us feel all the more uneasy about the handmaids' plights. I thought the Hulu adaptation was excellent, but I also recommend reading the book. The Handmaid's Tale is a book I read to stay vigilant (constant vigilance!) in my present historical moment even as I am horrified by future dystopian visions. Relatedly, I also recommend Alias Grace on Netflix, which is the next Atwood book I plan to read. 

Finally, I can't stop myself from saying something about the ones I didn't highlight in my five choices. I included American Gods because it opened my eyes to the ways in which America's heritage as a nation of immigrants enriches our national mythologies and lends itself to powerful storytelling. I also think Neil Gaiman is one of our most talented living writers. I included Small Victories because I find Anne Lamott's combination of humor, curmudgeonly attitude, and grace to be very helpful when I am feeling down. And I think Feed is one of the best YA books, one which truly speaks to the logical consequences of our current way of life. The opening line of the book is one of my favorites: "We went to the moon to have fun, but the moon turned out to completely suck." How can you not keep reading?