I turn 40 tomorrow. To be honest, I feel pretty good about it. My thirties were absolutely bonkers (marriage, baby, moving to a new country), so I’m taking the time to reflect on the decade.
I looked back at my trusty Goodreads, and picked a memorable book from each of the last ten years.
2013 – Doctor Sleep, by Stephen King
I have very vivid memories of listening to this audiobook while traversing across the University of Manchester campus, my workplace at the time. While it very exciting that King had written a sequel to The Shining, the thing I remember most about this book is Rose the Hat, one of the coolest horror villains in recent history.
2014 – We Have Always Lived in the Castle, by Shirley Jackson
It’s hard to imagine a time when this book wasn’t in my life. Back in 2014, it was easy to pick up vintage Shirley Jackson books relatively cheaply, although I lost my original copy of this when I loaned it to a colleague a week before COVID.
Anyway, I remember reading this in one sitting in my apartment in Manchester, and being completely blown away. I related to Mary Katherine Blackwood so deeply, and a few years later I would give my daughter the same name.
2015 – Echoes from the Macabre, by Daphne du Maurier
My gorgeous copy of this collection came from the amazing Friends of the Berkeley Library bookstore, one of the many happy places I found while living in northern California. It was less than a dollar, and has brought me unlimited joy.
All the hits are here – Don’t Look Now, The Birds, The Blue Lenses. But the story that lives with me is The Old Man. The memory of reading this story for the first time in the Livermore Public Library will live with me forever.
2016 – The Handmaid’s Tale, by Margaret Atwood
Unwisely, I read this while I was pregnant.
2017 – The Silent Companions, by Laura Purcell
This is one of the few books that have genuinely scared me (see also The Silent Land by the late, great Graham Joyce). I can’t even remember too many specifics of the plot, just that there are strange figures that move around, and that I genuinely had to stop reading a couple of times. Delicious.
2018 – Ghost Wall, by Sarah Moss
I think I won a copy of this on Goodreads, which never happens. I treasure my lovely ARC. It’s hard to encapsulate what it was like growing up as a girl in the UK, and all the latent (or not) misogyny. Anyway, Ghost Wall is a fantastic book, and Moss writes wonderfully about aspects of life that I cannot adequately articulate. I have revisited this short novel so many times since 2018, and it remains a favorite.
2019 – The Doll’s Alphabet, by Camilla Grudova
I started this in 2018, as Waxy was the first story on my “read a short story every day” adventure. But I didn’t make my way through all the stories until 2019. I think about the story Agata’s Machine very often, but all these stories are weird and amazing. And Grudova has a new collection coming out in a few weeks!
2020 – The Vet’s Daughter, by Barbara Comyns
Barbara Comyns’s novel, Sisters by a River, was listed as one of Grudova’s inspirations for the above collection, and this is what started me on my Comyns journey. When I read The Vet’s Daughter, I got the same sensations as when I first read We Have Always Lived in the Castle. Alice is a wonderful character, and the ending to this novel is just transcendent.
2021 – Beloved, by Toni Morrison
I must have started Beloved three or four times before actually seeing it through. In the back of my mind, I think I realized that it was very important I could focus all my attention on Morrison’s work. Beloved is absolutely terrifying; make no mistake, this is a straight-up horror novel. It may be the best book I’ve ever read.
2022 – I Who Have Never Known Men, by Jacqueline Harpman, translated by Ros Schwartz
You can read my review of this amazing novel here. I urge everyone to pick it up.
2023 – Self Portrait with Nothing, by Aimee Pokwatka
I think about this book at least once a week. It’s such a weird, unique story. Wonderful sci-fi elements, a protagonist with a huge amount of expertise and self-doubt. Clones! Shady art collectors. Polish meats!
Here’s to another decade of amazing books and writers!
California Reading 