Top Ten Tuesday: Authors I'd Be Grateful To See New Work From

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly linkup of book bloggers hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl! With Thanksgiving just a few days away, this week is a thankful-themed freebie! So here are ten authors I'd be very thankful to read new work from.

Allie Brosh: Like what seems like the entire internet, I loved her Hyberbole and a Half blog, which got made into a hysterically funny book. There was a sequel planned, but it got cancelled. Brosh seems to have stopped writing, and what I've been able to find makes it seem like her life has changed quite a bit and maybe she's in a better place without sharing her work with the internet. But I miss her and would love to see new work if it was the right choice for her!

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie: Americanah, which I loved, came out in 2013. She's published some essays in the meantime, but I want more fiction!

Elif Batuman: The Idiot was a very promising debut novel, and Batuman's voice is one I'd love to read more of, so I hope a follow-up is coming soon!

Michael Chabon: I'm still catching up on his back catalog, but his last novel was 2016's Moonglow, which I very much liked, so I'm curious to see what he publishes next!

Alexander Chee: I loved The Queen of the Night and while I have his other novel, Edinburgh, waiting on my shelves to be read (and he did just publish a nonfiction book last year), I would love to read another work of fiction from him!

Libby Cudmore: I so enjoyed reading The Big Rewind, I'm ready for her next one!

Jeffrey Eugenides: He releases work at the speed of a snail but it's so good when he does and I'm just waiting for more!

Gillian Flynn: Gone Girl was incredible, but she hasn't published a novel since that one in 2012! It's been almost ten years, so I am looking forward to reading the next one as soon as it appears!

George R.R. Martin: GIVE ME THE WINDS OF WINTER NOW PLEASE AND THANK YOU!

Kazuo Ishiguro: His Nobel Prize was well-deserved on the strength of Remains of the Day alone it was such a masterpiece. I'll be honest that his most recent, The Buried Giant, was more miss than hit from me, but he always has interesting ideas and I am eagerly awaiting new work!

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Top Ten Tuesday: Authors I'd Be Grateful To See New Work From

Top Ten Tuesday: Authors I’d Love To Go To A Reading For

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly linkup of book bloggers hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl! This week's topic is technically authors I'd like to meet, but honestly, I'm not sure what I would say to most authors besides "I love your work". That's what I said to Jeffrey Eugenides when I met him a reading/book signing in college! Since I've already met him, here are ten other authors I'd like to go to a reading for!

Charlaine Harris: I love her Southern Vampire Mysteries and she seems like someone who'd be super fun to hear talk about her work!

Chimamanda Ngozie Adichie: She's amazing and having seen her TED talk makes me feel like she'd be amazing to see do a reading!

Neil Gaiman: I always pick up his own readings of his works when I'm buying audiobooks, because he's got a fantastic voice. Seeing him in person doing it would be incredible!

Tamora Pierce: Her Wild Magic series was something I absolutely loved growing up, and I've love to hear her talk about the amazing female heroines she created.

Phillip Pullman: I love His Dark Materials so much, and having listened to him narrate the stories on audio makes me think listening to him read his work in person would be fantastic.

Garth Nix: The Old Kingdom series is one of my favorites, and knowing that Nix has an Australian accent to make the reading even more fun!

Katherine Arden: The Winternight books are some of my favorites I've read in the past few years, and I would just about explode with excitement if she came anywhere near where I am to support the last one coming out in a couple months.

John U. Bacon: This is a pretty specific "me" pick, but Bacon writes a lot about Michigan football and I love Michigan football.

Jeffrey Toobin: His non-fiction work around the judicial system is so well-done and interesting and I think a reading from him would be just fascinating.

Joan Didion: She's not young anymore, but the documentary that came out about her last year shows she's still very sharp and it would be amazing to see her actually read her own words.

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Top Ten Tuesday: Authors I’d Love To Go To A Reading For

Book 117: Americanah

"Ifemulu showed her the cover of the novel. She did not want to start a conversation. Especially not with Kelsey. She recognized in Kelsey the nationalism of liberal Americans who copiously criticized America but did not like you to do so; they expected you to be silent and grateful, and always reminded you of how much better than wherever you had come from America was."

Dates read: January 10-14, 2017

Rating: 10/10

Every so often, a thread pops up on Reddit asking people who've come to the United States from elsewhere what surprised them most about this country when they got here. The answers are usually fairly similar: our obsession with germs and our "personal space", our loudness, how big the country really actually is, tipping. I always enjoy reading these kinds of things because I'm always curious about how what seems very natural to us can seem bizarre to people who grew up elsewhere and I try to keep it in mind when I myself travel elsewhere: what seems odd to me probably seems perfectly normal to them. Just because I think of something as "the way things are" doesn't mean it's the way things are everywhere.

Ifemelu, the Nigerian-born-and-raised protagonist of Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's Americanah, experiences this kind of cultural whiplash twice: once, when she transfers from her university in Nigeria to a small college in Pennsylvania and then the second time, fifteen years later when she decides to return to Lagos. That Ifemelu is black and only really experiences what it's like to be black in a predominantly white world once she gets to the United States, as well as the gap between African-Americans and Africans in America inspires her to start a blog about race, which becomes a major source of income for her and helps earn her a fellowship at Princeton. Once the fellowship is over, she shuts down her blog, leaves her longtime boyfriend, and prepares to go back to Nigeria.

She's nervous about going back, not so much because she doesn't have anything lined up there but because it means she'll be back in the same place as Obinze, the man she loved in high school and college but is no longer in touch with. Adichie uses one of my favorite framing devices to structure her novel: she begins with Ifemelu just before she leaves the US, shows us how she got there through flashbacks, and then proceeds forward. I love getting some information but not all of it right up front: it makes me intensely curious to find out how the situation we first encountered came to be. I hate mystery-style books where all the "answers" are backloaded...it makes the rest of the book feel like it's treading water before the payoff at the end. Those just leave me annoyed by the time I get to the end, but unwrapping the narrative layers one by one keeps me hooked. And Americanah had me like a fish on a hook.

Not only is her story structure one that I personally respond well to, but Adichie's writing is absolutely magnificent. I marked what feels like half of the book because she has a such a knack for taking feelings that you have or you recognize and phrasing it in a way that hits you right in the gut because it's so dead on and perfect and you never thought about it like that before. And I loved the way she wrote Ifemelu and Obinze's relationship, from their charmed young love to the reason for their separation and that Adichie isn't afraid to give them new partners, partners they experience happiness with even. There's context and nuance, not just to their relationship, but to their lives. The whole book explores shades of gray, no one is either a saint or a villain. They're people, trying hard and messing up and trying again. I think one of the most important things about reading is its potential to increase empathy, to see people outside of the ones like you as having the same kinds of hopes and dreams and fears as you even if their experiences don't look exactly the same. This book is a beautifully written examplar of that exact principle. It's completely fantastic and I totally loved every second of reading it and I recommend it highly.

One year ago, I was reading: The Bear and the Nightingale

Two years ago, I was reading: The Twentieth Wife

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Book 117: Americanah

Top Ten Tuesday: Authors I'd Love To Meet

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly linkup of book bloggers hosted by The Broke and The Bookish! This week's topic is meeting authors. I've actually only ever met one of my favorite authors...Jeffrey Eugenides came to the University of Michigan campus when I was an undergrad to speak, and I came away with a signed copy of my favorite book to show for it. There are, of course, plenty of other authors I'd love to meet, and here are ten of them!

Charlaine Harris: I loved the Southern Vampire Mysteries, and I've heard her other works are just as delightful. She seems so unpretentious and sweet and I'd love the chance to say hi!

Alison Weir: Once I read my first one of her amazing history books, I promptly went out and acquired a copy of pretty much everything else she's ever written. She ran a school for kids with learning disabilities before she was able to be a full-time writer, which I think is pretty awesome.

Stephen King: I think I've only read one of his novels (The Shining for sure, and I can't remember if I read Carrie at some point?), but from his Twitter and the column he used to do (still does? Is it in EW? I can't remember), he seems fantastic. He did actually come to Reno to do a signing last year...but it was my wedding day, so I was kinda busy.

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie: Americanah was completely amazing, and so is her TED talk, and I just love her.

John U Bacon: If I'd planned my schedule better at Michigan, I could have taken one of his classes, but I've read all of his books and I read his blog and he's smart and funny and insightful and loves Ann Arbor and that's a pretty great combo.

Nick Hornby: His protagonists are usually overgrown man-children, which, snore, but he's such a good writer that I eat it up with a spoon anyways. He's so witty with words, I'd love the chance to actually hear him talk.

Kazuo Ishiguro: I love his delicate, sensitive touch with prose and characters and the chance to listen to him talk about how he does it would be amazing.

George R. R. Martin: I love the Song of Ice and Fire series so much (and I've heard incredible things about the Dunk and Egg books, which I want to read soon!) and his blog is always interesting, and he seems like the type to appreciate people nerding out over his work, right?

Tamora Pierce: As much as I love The Hunger Games, I get annoyed when people make it out like Katniss was the first badass female protagonist in YA. Those of us who grew up with Alanna the Lioness and Daine and her wild magic know better. She's the kind of author whose books I want to share with my own children.

J.K. Rowling: She's a brilliant writer and such a bold social media presence. Getting the chance to tell her how much Harry Potter meant to me in person? I'd consider myself very lucky indeed. 

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Top Ten Tuesday: Authors I'd Love To Meet