Thriftwood: A Personal History of Scouting by Alice Wickenden
great memoir about youth and scouting
Tag: memoir
Dear Senthuran by Akwaeke Emezi
a very american-feeling memoir about being rich and successful and a literal god?
James Baldwin: Collected Essays (Library of America, 1998)
james baldwin is great; vaccines are also great
Four Repeater Books (two I recommend)
two excellent books, two not excellent books
This Red Line Goes Straight to Your Heart by Madhur Anand
a blog about a book (yes i do still do these)
Blue Nights by Joan Didion
very little on the book, lots of rage at the slow quietening of June’s global protest movement
The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion
reading the best of books in the worst of times
The Years by Annie Ernaux
cracking under lockdown and stunning books
Happening by Annie Ernaux
feeling sad so read a sad book on abortion
Ushant by Conrad Aiken
a sub-mediocre memoir
Found Diary Entry from April 17th, 2010
bizarre note to self from 2010
I Am, I Am, I Am by Maggie O’Farrell
near death experiences in a bad blog post
My Friend Dahmer by Derf Backderf
a dark, engaging, affecting read
Negroland: A Memoir by Margo Jefferson
Finally, a book about race that makes me angry at myself
Dark Chapter by Winnie M Li
An important new novel about sexual assault. Long post.
Extravagant Stranger: A Memoir by Daniel Roy Connelly
A book that describes itself as “Ian Fleming meets Rimbaud”
Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic by Alison Bechdel
this is not a test, it’s a memoir
The Last Holiday: A Memoir by Gil Scott-Heron
The ‘Godfather of Rap’ offers a rose-tinted memoir.
Specimen Days by Walt Whitman
The life and memories of Walt Whitman, focusing on war and nature.
Eating Animals by Jonathan Safran Foer
In America alone, 281 pounds of pig shit is produced for every one person per year. I don’t know if that’s a lot as I don’t know what a pound is.
The Shepherd’s Life: A Tale of the Lake District by James Rebanks
Living in the city is bad for the soul
From Russia With Love by Ian Fleming
This is my first blog post in a while, and even then it’s still happening a little earlier than expected.Continue Reading
Recovery by John Berryman
Long before James Frey was breaking Oprah Winfrey’s fragile heart by fictionalising his time in addiction therapy and the behaviourContinue Reading
But You Did Not Come Back by Marceline Loridan-Ivens
I haven’t cried this much at a book in a while. I haven’t cried this much at a non-fiction bookContinue Reading
How I Escaped My Certain Fate by Stewart Lee
During the Summer I crossed a line in the sand I scratched out a long time ago and, accepting mortality andContinue Reading
Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi
Iran. Who knows much about it? We’ve all seen Argo, we’ve all heard of nuclear weapons, we’re all aware thatContinue Reading
Malcolm Lowry: Psalms and Songs (edited by Margerie Lowry
Psalms and Songs is an odd book, a collection of short stories by Malcolm Lowry (some previously published, others unfinished),Continue Reading
Lonesome Traveler by Jack Kerouac
Last Summer, whilst twatpacking* around the Mediterranean, Tunisair lost my backpack between Casablanca and Tunis. Though it contained nothing ofContinue Reading
The thing about life is that one day you’ll be dead by David Shields
David Shields’ The thing about life is that one day you’ll be dead manages to be simultaneously heart-breakingly depressing whilstContinue Reading
Father and Son by Edmund Gosse
Hurray! I read a book at an adult speed for the first time in weeks, and this one I thoughtContinue Reading
Working the Room by Geoff Dyer
As often happens with essay collections (particularly ones read for the writer’s personality rather than his or her topics), WorkingContinue Reading
A Million Little Pieces by James Frey
This is a book I’ve read a lot about. It is referred to repeatedly in both Ben Yagoda’s Memoir: AContinue Reading
Love’s Work by Gillian Rose
A few weeks ago, I was recommended this short memoir by a customer in the bar I work in. Obnoxiously,Continue Reading
If This Is A Man and The Truce by Primo Levi
Primo Levi was a chemist, young (younger than I am now), when he was rounded up by the anti-Semitic ItalianContinue Reading
Goodbye To All That by Robert Graves
I have never read I, Claudius. I have never read The White Goddess, my favourite writer’s* favourite book. I have also neverContinue Reading
Speak, Memory by Vladimir Nabokov
I haven’t read a huge amount of Vladimir Nabokov’s novels, only the very obvious one and probably the second mostContinue Reading
Another Great Day At Sea by Geoff Dyer
Geoff Dyer is one of my favourite writers, despite two of the books of his I’ve read being pretty mediocre. TheContinue Reading
Boyhood Island: My Struggle Book Three by Karl Ove Knausgaard
Karl Ove Knausgaard is one of my favourite writers. It would probably be fair to say that he is one of (inContinue Reading
Memoir: A History by Ben Yagoda
This will probably be my last blog for a while, as I have a couple of essays to write over theContinue Reading
Green Hills of Africa by Ernest Hemingway
Ernest Hemingway was one of the first writers I ever truly loved. When I was an undergraduate, many years ago,Continue Reading
Confessions by Saint Augustine of Hippo
I have to leave the house in under ten minutes, so this’ll be a quick one. As another addition inContinue Reading
Confessions of an English Opium-Eater by Thomas de Quincey
Thomas de Quincey’s Confessions of an English Opium-Eater is basically a mediocre 19th century Trainspotting, but without the funny, sad or exciting bitsContinue Reading
Giving Up The Ghost by Hilary Mantel
Hilary Mantel’s 2003 memoir, Giving Up The Ghost, far preceded her arrival as the “Best Writer in Britain”, but it isContinue Reading
The Rings of Saturn by W. G. Sebald
W. G. Sebald’s The Rings of Saturn is one of the strangest books I have read it a while. It isContinue Reading
Take Me Home by Jonathan Taylor
So I’ve read another memoir by a British academic, but this one isn’t the “Books Conquers All” disappointment of LornaContinue Reading
A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers
I really really liked this. That’s what I’m going to open with, because everything of any wit or interest IContinue Reading
Reality Hunger by David Shields
David Shields’ Reality Hunger is a non-fiction book about the fictional and the unreal being dead to contemporary creativity. ItContinue Reading
This Boy’s Life by Tobias Wolff
This is the third memoir about “growing up” in the second half of the 20th-century I’ve read in a rowContinue Reading
Sectioned: A Life Interrupted by John O’Donoghue
Sectioned: A Life Interrupted is a recent memoir by John O’Donoghue, a man who spent his teens and twentiesContinue Reading
Triumph Of The Now 