Reading Wrap Up: January 2021

Welcome to the January edition of My Reading Wrap Up – the first for 2021!

In case you missed December’s reading wrap up, or my best books of 2020, check them out now! 

One of my goals for January was to read every single day. And I think I’ve done it! To be honest, I stopped tracking about two weeks in – I’ve never been great with resolutions. But with my new devotion to audiobooks, I think I do manage to read every day, usually while I’m out walking Ellie. I hope to make more time for dedicated reading, on the couch with my ebook and a candle, in February.

The biggest theme of my reading in January was definitely missing travel. I’ve missed travel since the moment we left Prague three months early (with 24 hours’ notice!) and returned to Vancouver. But I’ve been really struggling with lockdown life in the last month. I am just craving something new and cannot wait until it’s safe enough to jump on a plane. Heck, I can’t wait until it’s safe enough for me to meet a friend at a coffee shop!

Just a little nit-picky note: The first two books below I finished reading in December, just not in time for my December reading wrap up post. And since I’m writing this before the end of January, I’ll probably have a January read or two on my February wrap up. Not that anyone is keeping track except for me!

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Chop Suey Nation by Ann Hui

Memoir/food, 288 pages, published 2019

“Even more so than food, Chinese restaurants are defined by the families that run them.”

I absolutely loved this food-centred memoir by Ann Hui. Ann is a Canadian-born Chinese journalist who spends a summer driving across Canada and eating at small town chop suey restaurants. Along the way, she learns more about the culture of these restaurants, Chinese history in Canada and her father’s own history coming to Canada and working in restaurants.

This book felt like home to me. Right from the first chapter I had a huge smile on my face as I heard names of places and dishes that sounded familiar. As a Chinese-Canadian, I really identified with this book and once again felt the power of own voices in reading. In Canada, we don’t often talk about racism, particularly anti-Asian or anti-Chinese racism, but we really do have an awful history and it was so interesting to learn about. Highly recommend this one!

TW: cancer, death, racism, poverty

Rating: 4.25/5

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What We Don’t Talk About When We Talk About Fat by Aubrey Gordon

Essays (body justice), 216 pages, published 2020

“While body positivity seems to be everywhere, it doesn’t appear to be changing our deeply held, deeply harmful beliefs about fatness and fat people.”

As Aubrey Gordon (also known as Your Fat Friend on social media) explains at the top of the book, this isn’t a book about body positivity and learning to love yourself. This is a book about body justice and the very real injustices fat people endure for simply existing in fat bodies. I think this book is a must-read for people of all body types. The facts that Aubrey shares, many of which I’ve heard her share on podcasts and social media, are mind-blowing. Aubrey weaves together evidence with personal stories to demonstrate how fat people are hired less often, make less money, and seen as guilty in court cases more often than their thin counterparts. She shares that 95-98% of dieters gain back the weight in five years, meaning that diets do not work! And she clearly explains how fat shaming not only doesn’t work to change someone’s size but actually results in negative health impacts for fat people.

As a person in a larger body, I found this book to be both comforting and infuriating at the same time. My heart went out to Aubrey and other people who experience the type of cruelty that she has. But I was comforted by the facts she shared and the truth that was on her side. I also enjoyed the time she spent laying out exactly what a world without weight stigma and anti-fatness would look like, and how we get there.

Aubrey does touch on how race, sexual orientation and gender (including the trans experience) impact fat experiences and weight stigma. I think the book would have benefited from more nuanced conversations, especially where race is concerned, but understand that isn’t Aubrey’s lived experience. The book did feel more dry in the last half than the first half, but I still think it’s a very important and worthwhile read.

TW: anti-fatness, abuse, weight stigma, weight-based violence & cruelty

Rating: 4/5

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The Switch by Beth O’Leary

Contemporary romance, 330 pages, published 2020

“I stare at the dog treats and take a brief moment to wonder what the hell I’m doing with my life right now, and then – because those thoughts rarely lead to anything fruitful, and it’s a bit late to change this plan – I make a cup of tea.”

I really enjoyed this book about a granddaughter and grandmother who decide to swap homes and lives, the granddaughter taking over Neighbourhood Watch meetings in a sleepy town of retired folks and the grandmother trying out online dating in London. I thought the premise was really fun and the writing was great, without being too cheesy or too literary. This is a dual perspective book, with the grandmother and granddaughter trading off chapters. I sometimes struggle with books with multiple narrators as I feel drawn more to one over the others. At first, I was more interested in the grandma’s story, but soon I became invested in both. I was equally excited at the start of each chapter to see where the story was going.

This book does have a lot of characters, which can be hard to keep track of. I suggest reading it without taking big breaks or else you’ll lose track of who everyone is.

TW: death, cancer, infidelity, domestic abuse

Rating: 4.25/5

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Survival of the Thickest by Michelle Buteau

Memoir, 320 pages, published 2020

“‘Are you sitting down?’ he asked. ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘It’s my favorite thing to do.'”

Michelle Buteau is a stand-up comedian and actress, who you likely know from every other movie on Netflix. In this memoir, Michelle shares hilarious stories from her childhood, career and move into stand-up, relationships, and journey into motherhood. This is definitely one of those books that you want to listen to on audio as Michelle herself reads it. And she puts a lot of herself into it! I can see how some of her jokes would have fallen flat or felt repetitive on the page. But on audio, I really enjoyed it.

This book is mostly silly, with lots of references to Michelle’s “big tits and freckles.” But there are also some serious moments too, such as Michelle’s experience working in media during 9/11 and her extremely heartbreaking and vulnerable journey to motherhood. I appreciated that this book was both fun and serious, making me laugh and cry in different chapters. I also liked how Michelle weaved in her interracial background and culture, interracial marriage, body positivity and pop culture references throughout. An enjoyable listen!

TW: infertility, racism, homophobia

Rating: 4/5

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Finding Freedom by Omid Scobie & Carolyn Durand

Biography, 354 pages, published 2020

“Almost immediately they were almost obsessed with each other. It was as if Harry was in a trance.”

Finding Freedom is the story of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle, as told by two journalists who have worked with the royal family for years. There’s speculation that Harry and Meghan were involved in the book, and it’s certainly a very positive story about them. But the company line is that this book is unauthorized and based on interviews and observations by those close to the couple.

I’ve been a fan of the royal family from a distance for many years. I don’t follow their lives closely but I enjoy seeing photos of them, tuning into the big wedding events and checking out their annual Christmas cards. So for me, this book was very engaging. I liked hearing the “full” story and learning lots of details behind the headlines.

At certain points, this book felt very intrusive. Considering what a hard time Harry and Meghan had with the media, certain parts of this book made me feel icky. At other points, it felt like the authors were taking big leaps, such as when they would describe what the couple was feeling in private moments. And yet at other times, it felt like the authors were simply reading from a Wikipedia page, filling in details for no other reason that to prove they did their research.

Overall, if you’re moderately interested in the royals, I think you’d enjoy this one. I certainly did!

TW: racism

Rating: 3.75/5

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Garlic and Sapphires by Ruth Reichl

Food memoir, 334 pages, published 2005

“Restaurants free us from our mundane reality; that is part of their charm.”

In Garlic and Sapphires, we hear about Ruth Reichl’s time as the restaurant critic for the New York Times from 1993-1999. I was so excited to read this book as I really enjoyed one of Ruth’s other books, Save Me the Plums, about her time as the Editor in Chief of Gourmet (I even included it in my list of 12 memoirs you must read). Unfortunately, I was very let down by this book.

Part of the problem is just how out of touch this book is. It’s hard to read about 1993 in 2021. It’s also hard to read about the privileged life of a New York Times restaurant critic during a global pandemic and racial reckoning. I found myself constantly rolling my eyes when Ruth had to deal with the impossible tasks of finding a new wig to wear, choosing a dining companion to take to a fancy restaurant or walking around Brooklyn when she couldn’t possibly go into the office.

In Save Me the Plums, Ruth is charming, groundbreaking and root-able. In Garlic and Sapphires, she’s out of touch and unrelatable. I did enjoy some of the storytelling and got pleasantly lost in some of the food descriptions. But other parts I skimmed over and I found the review process and new characters she created to get a bit tedious. It felt repetitive.

Overall, I didn’t love this book and was looking forward to it ending. However, I did come in with very high expectations. If you’re a big foodie or spent time in New York in the 90’s, I think you’d enjoy this one. But I highly recommend you check out Save Me the Plums instead!

TW: cancer, death

Rating: 3.25/5

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Four Seasons in Rome by Anthony Doerr

Travel memoir, 210 pages, published 2007

“A good journal entry ought be a love letter to the world. Leave home, leave the country, leave the familiar. Only then can routine experience—buying bread, eating vegetables, even saying hello—become new all over again.”

I think this might be the first book I’ve ever finished in one sitting. I listened to this on audio and it was the perfect accompaniment to a night of baking for this very travel-sick person!

Four Seasons in Rome is the memoir of a man who moves to Rome on a one-year writing fellowship and brings along his wife and infant twin sons. As someone who dreams of spending a year in Europe with future children while getting paid to write a book, this story is my dream! I absolutely loved hearing about daily life in Rome. I could picture some of the scenes the author mentioned from my own past travels to Italy. I also loved hearing stories about his children and parenting in a foreign country. His love for them was so evident.

At times, the narration got away from me. I found some passages about long-ago dead painters or writers, or the types of trees in the neighbourhood, to be kind of dull. I also wish the family had done more travelling around Italy or Europe, as I think that would have made for better stories. But I can’t blame them for not wanting to travel too far with teething twins!

Rating: 3.75/5

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At Home in the World by Tsh Oxenreider

Travel memoir, 288 pages, published 2017

“You don’t have to delay familial commitment out of fear that a ringed finger means no more fun in European bars or on African safaris… Giving birth to new life doesn’t mean the death of your passport.”

Once again I’ve reached for a travel memoir. Can you tell I’m desperate to go on a trip again?

This book follows Tsh, her husband Kyle, and their three children on a nine month trip around the world. As someone who aspires to do that one day, I was hooked from the get go. But I was really pulled in upon hearing the opening chapter. Tsh explains how marriage and children don’t have to stand in the way of your wanderlust dreams. She shares how she loves to travel, but is also an introverted homebody. Finally, Tsh talks about the how her “existence is heavy with midlife expectations….the air is thick with the conviction that there’s no reason to be unhappy.” Every single point she brought up in this opening resonated with me and is exactly how I feel about travel and life.

The meat of the book is the Oxenreider family’s journey around the world – from China, through Southeast Asia and Australia, over to Africa, up through Europe, and ending in London before returning to the United States. Some parts, particularly in the middle, were a bit dull. But overall I was engaged while following their journey. I liked that Tsh spent time talking about not only what her family was doing but her own personal journey and her marriage throughout the year.

There is quite a bit of religion/spirituality in this book. It’s not heavy handed in a way of trying to convert, but it does get brought up a lot and is clearly a big part of Tsh’s life. There’s also a section where the family goes to Ethiopia to visit a child they’ve been sponsoring, which had some white saviour vibes to it. Neither the Christianity nor the white saviourism were as bad as I had been expecting, and they didn’t take much away from my overall enjoyment of the book.

Rating: 4/5

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For The Love of Europe by Rick Steves

Travel, 425 pages, published 2019

“Travel is rich with learning opportunities, and the ultimate sourvenir is a broader perspective.”

January was certainly the month when my deep wanderlust spilled over into my reading. I found myself seeking out travel books that allowed me to escape while trapped indoors during another lockdown. Colin and I had listened to some Rick Steves self-guided walking tours while in Italy, so when I saw this book on my library app I was immediately drawn to it.

I enjoyed this book. Rick is a great storyteller and does a wonderful job of sharing his travel stories all across Europe. Certain areas held my attention more than others. At the beginning, I was taking notes for future trips and picturing myself in the places Rick was describing. But towards the end, my attention began to wane; this book could have been 100 pages shorter. It’s the kind of book that is easy to tune out of (or skim over, if you read a paper/ebook version). But overall, it was still enjoyable and has me plotting my next trip back to Europe (when it’s safe to do so).

PS: If you watch Rick Steves’ travel show, you’ll see quite a bit of crossover between this book and his show. I had tuned in for an episode of the show on the running of the bulls and then happened to listen to a chapter of the book about the same topic and heard almost identical stories.

Rating: 3.5/5

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Best book of the month

So usually my favourite or “best” book of the month is just the book I rated the highest. But this year, I think I’m going to start picking the book that was the most memorable or meaningful to me, even if I didn’t rate it so high for whatever reason.

So for January, my favourite book was At Home in the World by Tsh Oxenreider. The opening chapter of this book, about not giving up on travel just because you’re married or have kids, totally spoke to me. And the journey of a family travelling the world for a year was exactly the escapism I needed this month. I would happily read 10 more family travel books!

I was going to pick Chop Suey Nation by Ann Hui instead, as it really was a phenomenal read. But since I technically finished that book in December, I thought I’d pick an actual 2021 read for my January fave.

Annual reading stats update

Let’s get started with my 2021 reading stats! Reminder that two of the books from above were finished in December 2020, which is why I have nine books above and only seven in my 2021 stats.

• Total number of books read: 7 books
• Total number of pages read: 2261 pages
• Fiction vs non-fiction: 1 fiction & 6 non-fiction
• Male vs female authors: 3 male & 5 female (one book had two authors)
• Diversifying my reading: Of the 8 authors I’ve read this year, two are BIPOC and zero are LGBTQ+. Not off to the best start with diversifying my reading!

 

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