Stacked-Up Book Thoughts: Reading in January

What an amazing weekend: I was unable to march (no marches in my area), but I was glued to the TV and thrilled and chilled by the UNBELIEVABLE turnout around the world (even Antarctica) for the Woman's March.

I was pretty much locked onto the coverage on Saturday. So, although I didn't work much this weekend, I didn't get a lot of reading in either. I was overwhelmed by the crowds and the speeches. The support from our friends in other countries was beyond moving. Thank you to all who participated on their feet and in their hearts.

I'm Reading Nonfiction

• Krazy: George Herriman, a Life in Black and White by Michael Tisserand (Harper) I've been enjoying the well-written and well-researched biography of George Herriman, one of the nation's earliest cartoonists. I have a copy of the book in audio, but I'm glad went for print because of the photographs and many reproductions of Herriman's work. It's a long book, and I'm reading it in 50-page chunks.
• A Square Meal: A Culinary History of the Great Depression by Jane Ziegelman and Andrew Coe (Harper): My current audiobook is a look a food and nutrition trends from World War I to World War II in America. This examination of how we as a nation did and did not take care of those in need is particularly relevant in today's political atmosphere. Nicely read by Susan Eriksen.

What's New on My eReader

I had a few library holds come in and accepted a few ARCs. Here are two middle grade books and three food books I hope to get to very soon.

• The Ethan I Was Before by Ali Standish (HarperCollins): A young boy moves from Boston to small-town Georgia in the aftermath of a family tragedy.
• The Someday Birds by Sally J. Pla and Julie McLaughli (HarperCollins): A boy adjusts to the new reality after his father returns, injured, from Afghanistan.
• In Winter's Kitchen by Beth Dooley (Milkweed): An Easterner discovers life in the upper Midwest doesn't mean giving up good food and good cooking.
• Packed! by Becky Alexander and Michelle Lake (Penguin Random House): Hoping to pick up some new ideas for packed (and at-home) lunches.
• Food52: Mighty Salads (Ten Speed Press): Main dish salads for lunch and dinner.

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Best Adult Books from 2013

It's time for my best-of 2013 lists! I will post four this year. Yesterday was all about audiobooks, today is adult books, tomorrow is food and cookbooks, and Monday is middle grade and young adult. Enjoy!

A note on my selections: Although I liked and was moved by many books this year, these are the ones that have stuck with me, that I still talk about, that I pushed on highly recommended to my friends and family, and that I gave as presents. Books are presented alphabetically by title; links lead to my reviews or thoughts.

• Kent Haruf's Benediction (Random House / Knopf), fiction, western
• Larry Watson's Let Him Go (Milkweed Editions), fiction, western Top read of the year
• Jo Baker's Longbourn (Random House / Knopf), historical fiction, Pride & Prejudice
• Philip Caputo's The Longest Road (Macmillan / Henry Holt), nonfiction, travel, social commentary

• Beth Hoffman's Looking for Me (Viking / Pamela Dorman), fiction, southern
• Sharon Short's My One Square Inch of Alaska (Penguin / Plume), fiction
• Paul Lynch's Red Sky in Morning (Hachette Book Group / Little, Brown), historical fiction
• Jess Walter's We Live in Water (HarperCollins / Harper Perennial), short stories

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Review: Let Him Go by Larry Watson

Larry Watson has a way of stripping a story to its essence without sacrificing either beauty or emotion. His latest novel, Let Him Go, is a story of families, of mothers and sons, and of the unpredictability of human behavior,

In the bleak fall of 1951, Margaret Blackledge, still grieving over the death of her grown son, James, is almost done in when her daughter-in-law marries a man of questionable reputation and leaves town, taking her young boy with her. Margaret cannot bear the loss of her last living link with James and sets off across North Dakota, accompanied by her husband, to bring their grandson home.

In his signature spare style, Watson tells us of the confrontation between two families, as worn and battered as their native northern Plains, who are pushed to the limits in their unwavering need to hold on their own. Watson's unerring observations and well-tuned pacing are brilliantly showcased in this stunning and shocking story of what we can and cannot live with.

On the northern Plains:

The sun has dropped low enough to bring up the colors in the prairie grasses, the shades of lavender and gold that can't be seen at any other moment of the day and that incline most travelers through this landscape to silence. Gospel hour indeed. (p. 30, uncorrected proof)

On the boy:

A four-year-old has so little past, and he remembers almost none of it, neither the father he once had nor the house where he once lived. But he can feel absences--and feel them as sensation, like a texture that was once at his fingers every day but now is gone and no matter how he gropes or reaches his hand he cannot touch what's no longer there. (p. 115, uncorrected proof)

Let Him Go was my pick for the September "Bloggers Recommend" newsletter, is an Indie Next pick, and has earned many starred reviews. It will likely be my top read of 2013.

Milkweed Editions, 2013
ISBN-13: 9781571311023
Source: Review (see review policy)
Copyright © cbl for Beth Fish Reads, all rights reserved (see review policy).

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