I Don't Hate It | Just the Recs
Hey there. How great was Amy Woolard's guest post? I mean, whoa. She gave us short stories in the form of Lucia Berlin, she gave us James Salter reading Lydia Davis, she gave us lyric poetry that everyone's talking about but not enough people have read (it won't be enough people until every single person in America has read Claudia Rankine's Citizen and then shared it with everyone else here and abroad), and she gave us a side of Maggie Nelson and topped it all off with Michelle Orange's essay collection This Is Running For Your Life. The full post is available here. You really should experience it in all its glory.
Woolard is a hard act to follow. I worry for my next guest poster. Meanwhile I'm over here on the East Coast tracking Hurricane Joaquin and wondering how many D-cell batteries I should buy to power my iPad in case the electricity goes out, so let's get to it. (You think four? Six?)
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1. Do you like juicy scandals and the history of these United States? Then this recommendation is for you. (Read on even if you think the answer is no.) Paula Uruburu's American Eve is the story of a woman named Evelyn Nesbit, America's first celebrity by modern standards, and a tale of intrigue and murder involving one of the Gilded Age's more famous players, architect Stanford White. It's a perfect book to cozy up with on a gloomy weekend with 97 percent chance of rain 100 percent of the next 48 hours, which is math I can't even do but I know all three of my weather apps are saying don't leave the house.
2. Richard Rodriguez's autobiography Hunger of Memory complicates our understanding of what it means to make it in America. It came out in 1982 and is in its twentieth or so printing. My 2005 Dial Press paperback is dogeared and marked up beyond belief. Rodriguez's 1992 book, Days of Obligation, was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize. Start with Hunger, move on to Days.
3. I saw a list that purported to be the "best people on the internet in 2015," but it didn't include this duo so it's obviously too flawed to take seriously. You know all those DIY crafting and makeup and workout tips so readily available online now thanks to open source and our everybody-gets-a-trophy culture and all that free wifi Starbucks is putting out? Katy and Katie take all of that advice—they do those crazy things the internet recommends—and they film themselves in all their charming hilarity for a series called Just the Tips. For our edification and amusement. Recommended viewing: "Dressing Peaches as Sexy Butts," which at first begs the question WHY IS THIS A THING? but very quickly moves to OHMYGOD I CAN'T THANK YOU ENOUGH FOR DOING THIS; and "DIY Grill," because I LOVE NOT CAMPING and this speaks to me like none other. But really, just go to their site and start bingeing. What the hell else have you got to do? Thanks, Joaquin.
As always, art by the ineffable Jen Deaderick.