Category: Memoir
+ Memoir, Non-Fiction, Reviews
Forty Autumns
Forty Autumns: A Family’s Story of Courage and Survival on Both Sides of the Berlin Wall by Nina Willner In this illuminating and deeply moving memoir, a former American military intelligence officer goes beyond traditional Cold War espionage tales to tell the true story of her family—of five women separated by the Iron Curtain for more than forty years, and their miraculous reunion after … Read More Forty Autumns
+ Memoir, Non-Fiction, Reviews
Maybe You Should Talk to Someone
Maybe You Should Talk to Someone by Lori Gottlieb One day, Lori Gottlieb is a therapist who helps patients in her Los Angeles practice. The next, a crisis causes her world to come crashing down. Enter Wendell, the quirky but seasoned therapist in whose office she suddenly lands. With his balding head, cardigan, and khakis, he seems to have come straight from Therapist Central … Read More Maybe You Should Talk to Someone
+ Memoir, Non-Fiction, Reviews
No Regrets: Adventuring Through Life
No Regrets: Adventuring Through Life by Linda McDermott No Regrets is the story of how one woman travels all seven continents in an effort to grow from the small, Midwestern beliefs with which she’d been raised. Linda leads the reader through an inspirational memoir including adventures that once seemed out of reach—from washing elephants in Nepal to working (twice) in Antarctica—all the while learning … Read More No Regrets: Adventuring Through Life
2018 in Review
It should come as no surprised to anyone who’s been paying attention that this year was incredibly BUSY! If you needed a marker to go by though, I read less than half as much as I did in 2017. I made my Goodreads goal, but only after I adjust it a time or two or six. Apologies in advance for a pretty boring book … Read More 2018 in Review

Summer at Tiffany
Summer of Tiffany by Marjorie Hart Do you remember the best summer of your life? New York City, 1945. Marjorie Jacobson and her best friend, Marty Garrett, arrive fresh from the Kappa house at the University of Iowa hoping to find summer positions as shopgirls. Turned away from the top department stores, they miraculously find jobs as pages at Tiffany & Co., becoming the … Read More Summer at Tiffany

+ Memoir
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
By Maya Angelou Sent by their mother to live with their devout, self-sufficient grandmother in a small Southern town, Maya and her brother, Bailey, endure the ache of abandonment and the prejudice of the local “powhitetrash.” At eight years old and back at her mother’s side in St. Louis, Maya is attacked by a man many times her age—and has to live with the … Read More I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
One Writer’s Beginnings
By Eudora Welty Eudora Welty was born in 1909 in Jackson, Mississippi. In a “continuous thread of revelation” she sketches her autobiography and tells us how her family and her surroundings contributed to the shaping not only of her personality but of her writing. Homely and commonplace sights, sounds, and objects resonate with the emotions of recollection: the striking clocks, the Victrola, her orphaned … Read More One Writer’s Beginnings
The Woman Warrior
By Maxine Hong Kingston A Chinese American woman tells of the Chinese myths, family stories and events of her California childhood that have shaped her identity. I’ve always felt like books from certain cultures have certain flavors, that seem to be a product of the culture and language itself, rather than individual authors. Spanish and Chinese stories I’ve noticed exhibit this the most. This … Read More The Woman Warrior
The Glass Castle
The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls Jeannette Walls grew up with parents whose ideals and stubborn nonconformity were both their curse and their salvation. Rex and Rose Mary Walls had four children. In the beginning, they lived like nomads, moving among Southwest desert towns, camping in the mountains. Rex was a charismatic, brilliant man who, when sober, captured his children’s imagination, teaching them physics, … Read More The Glass Castle