Tag: Aging

Books, Professional Development

Book 830: 10% Happier – Dan Harris

Geoff W

I honestly had zero expectations going into this book. During the pandemic my employer provided us free access to the 10% Happier app which I took advantage of and have used sporadically (really need to get better at that). I enjoyed both Harris and Joseph Goldstein’s insights on mediation in the various getting started sessions and was curios if there was more out there.

I vaguely knew Harris had written a book, but it was never an OMG I have to read this type book, but when it randomly came across my screen one day I requested it from the library and saved it for a vacation read.

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Books

Book 810: Mrs. Dalloway – Virginia Woolf

Geoff W

This is the third time I’ve read this. I read it first in high school in my teens and HATED it. #obvi

I then read it in my early twenties in an intro to LGBT Literature course and tolerated it. The discussion was the most fascinating part and had a lot more to do with Woolf and her life than the novel itself, although there are plenty of scribbles I have in my copy about the story.

And now in my mid-30s, I won’t say I love it, but I definitely have a new appreciation for Woolf’s mastery of the craft as I re-read it. Some of the notes I scribbled reading it in undergrad definitely helped draw my attention to things and I picked up on a few more that I missed. And this is noting that my timing to read it was 100% wrong. This is NOT a pool book, I definitely fell asleep and got a slight sunburn because it’s a slow-paced dense book.

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ARC, Books, Quotes

Book 302: Stone Mattress – Margaret Atwood

Geoff W

Atwood is an incredible writer and story teller and there’s really not much more that needs to be said, so when I saw her newest collection of short stories I knew I had to request it! I received a copy from the publisher, in return for my honest opinion:

Spectactular.

That would be a little cruel, to leave it just at that even though it would still describe it perfectly. Below, you’ll find a one-to-two sentence review of each of the nine tales and a single quote from each.

On a different note, if you haven’t heard Margaret Atwood is the first author of the future library! This is a project where authors are asked to write a work and it won’t be read for 100 years. This makes me both incredibly happy, as she writes such fantastic speculative/near future fiction, but also sad that I won’t be able to read it! It’s a fascinating project and I could go into it in detail, but really you should just read about The Future Library at The Guardian.

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Book Group, Books

Book 282: Tuck Everlasting – Natalie Babbitt

Geoff W

I first read Tuck Everlasting back in high school before the 2002 film came out as I didn’t want the story ruined by a movie (I was just as stubborn back then). Other than a general sense of wonderment and enjoyment I didn’t remember much about the book outside of the basic storyline. I was very glad this was the chosen book this month as it was super short, read it in one day on my T commute, and watched the 2002 film just before book group.

It’s hard to say what part of the story was the best part as there was something so incredibly simple and yet fantastical/magical in both the story and Babbitt’s writing. I definitely didn’t realize when I first read it that the book was almost 30 years old! Originally published in 1975, it clearly stands the test of time and I thoroughly enjoyed this reread. Babbitt did an amazing job of simplifying and writing about a concept as complex and all-encompassing as immortality

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Books

Book 5: Tales of the Jazz Age – F. Scott Fitzgerald

Geoff W

As much as I wanted to, I could not bring myself to like most of the stories in this book. Fitzgerald has a way with turns of phrases and can set a story better than most, but I cannot get over the fact that all he writes about is, money, alcohol, parties and women. There were a couple of stories that stood out: The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (the reason I read the collection) and “O Russet Witch!” It is interesting to note that both of these are in the section of short stories Fitzgerald calls ‘Fantasies.’ The Lees of Happiness was also a good story, but it is under ‘Unclassified Masterpieces,’ and The Jelly-Bean in the ‘My Last Flappers’ portion. Four out of eleven isn’t too bad, but some of them were just odd.

Aside from the subject matter, the only thing that bothered me about his stories was the way he wrote about the South. It was similar to the way he wrote about cities. It was almost as if he’d not been there, but had this idea of what they were like. His dialogue and colloquialisms seemed real enough, but everything just seemed too caricatured and maybe it was a conscious effort on his part.

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