Recent Reads, Cozy Winter Edition

For me, few things in life are better than an engrossing book, especially in winter when my body nudges me towards more rest.

Give me a fuzzy blanket (that I can quickly discard in case of a hot flash power surge), a piping hot bevvy, my noise cancelling headphones to drown out the children, and I’m a happy girl.

_{Photo by OurWhisky Foundation on Unsplash}

Here are a few books I’ve read recently.

But before I get to that, I’d like to suggest something to my fellow bibliophiles.

It’s ok to quit a book.

(Gasp!)

I said what I said.

The year I turned 38, I decided that I was done reading a book to the end just because … why did I do that exactly?!

Hi, my name is Carrie. I’m a recovering good girl perfectionist people pleaser.

That year, I made a vow that if a book didn’t grab me by the throat by page 38, I had permission to toss it aside. There are too many good books in the world to waste time on books I wasn’t enthralled with.

Here’s another thing.

It’s a Secret of Adulthood: just because something is fun for someone else doesn’t mean it’s fun for you, and vice versa.

Gretchen Rubin

Just because someone you admire loves a book, that doesn’t mean you will too.

I abandoned two books recommended to me by my favorite person on the internet. But clearly our tastes in reading material don’t match. And that’s ok.

Now on to my recent reads. I loved all of these books, which is why I’m telling you about them. I’ve recently learned that my tendency to infodump is an autistic sign. I’m neurospicy, which essplains a lot. These are the things you find out when your daughter is both a Psych major and on the ASD spectrum.

_{Note: this is a reader-supported site that contains affiliate links, including Amazon associates links, meaning if you click through and make a purchase, I earn a small commission. Thank you!}

Maid: Hard Work, Low Pay, and a Mother’s Will to Survive by Stephanie Land

I adore this book. And I relate to the author in so many ways. This is my second time reading Maid. I wanted to re-read it because the sequel, Class, had just been released, and I wanted to refresh my memory.

I also re-watched the Netflix series with my daughters. It’s important to me that they be able to recognize the subtle signs of emotional abuse.

Class: A Memoir of Motherhood, Hunger, and Higher Education by Stephanie Land

The sequel didn’t disappoint! Maid left us hanging. What happened to Stephanie and Maddie after she went to Montana?!

This quote struck me:

Long-term financial planning is for people who aren’t living in poverty. I didn’t have the time or the energy to calculate how much debt I was in or how much interest I paid every month or how much interest I would pay on my student loans for decades into the future. All I cared about was a continued ability to feed, clothe and house my kid.

Stephanie Land, Class

Girl, don’t I know it. I also remember, as the author did, what it’s like to be hungry while pregnant. To have no money for groceries when the pantry is bare. To navigate the logistics and shame of W.I. C. vouchers while enduring mind-numbing fatigue and morning sickness.

The Nordic Theory of Everything: In Search of a Better Life by Anu Partanen

Wow did this book piss me off. I can’t stop talking about it.

The author, Anu, lived in Finland then moved to the USA, and back to her homeland once she had kids. Because everything is better for parents in Scandinavia. Everything.

“It was all part of a way of doing things in the United States that, as I would gradually realize, forced you to be constantly on guard, constantly worried that whatever amount of money you had or earned would never be enough, and constantly anxious about navigating the complex and mysterious fine print thrown at you from every direction by corporations that had somehow managed to evade even the bare minimum of sensible protections for consumers.”

Anu Partanen

This book put the final nail in the coffin. Here lies (the myth of) American Exceptionalism. Rest in peace. When Anu says “the United States remains astonishingly backward compared to almost all other advanced Western countries”, she is truth telling.

Lady Tan’s Circle of Women: A Novel by Lisa See

This book combines one of my micro-obessions, midwifery, with a new genre I’m discovering: Asian-American history. It’s inspired by the true story of a female 15th century Chinese doctor, one of only a handful of women who contributed to the vast body of literature in Traditional Chinese Medicine.

If polygamy, intrigue, women’s issues and history are your thing, you’d love this book.

The Inflamed Mind: A Radical New Approach to Depression by Edward Bullmore

This book frustrated me because it painstakingly explains the problem without giving a good solution. The author is a University of Cambridge professor of psychiatry who posits that depression is caused by inflammation in the body.

He insists that there are dozens of human studies and hundreds of animal studies that lead to this conclusion. And this is not new news. Yet we have no treatments for the most common mental illness in the world other than anti-depressants, and those perform only marginally better than placebo and come with life-disrupting side effects.

Tiny Habits: The Small Changes That Change Everything by B.J. Fogg

I’ve already read this book, but decided to re-read it because I snagged the ebook when it went on sale for 1.99. I fell in love with B.J. Fogg’s work years ago. It’s literally been life-changing for me.

If you want to make some real change in your life and have felt defeated by other approaches to habit change, read it. I promise you won’t look at goals the same way ever again.

A Walk in the Woods: Rediscovering America on the Appalachian Trail by Bill Bryson

I’ve held a loose fascination with long-distance hikers ever since I read Wild by Cheryl Strayed. This book was charming and an enjoyable, light read. It taught me about the history of the Appalachian mountains and made me appreciate them in a whole new way.

What have you been reading lately? And is your fire real and crackling or courtesy of YouTube?