Staff Picks from the Green Table: Charlotte
Literati manager and bookseller Charlotte hand-picks essential summer reads
Each month, a different Literati Bookstore staff member curates a table of favorite reads and recommendations. For June, manager and bookseller Charlotte Bruell selected nine essential titles.
The Fifth Season, by N.K. Jemisin
Even after sitting with this book, and thinking about it for quite a while, I still don’t quite know what to say, other than that fiction (and scifi/fantasy) exist to give us books like this. The Fifth Season follows three narrators who are each on their own journey, both emotional and physical, while the world around them, a place called The Stillness, threatens to end. Jemisin ties the narrators’ stories together with a surpirsing twist that adds dimension and meaning to a story that will probably make you want to start the next book immediately.
Pachinko, by Min Jin Lee
I read part of this book while I was sick, and had a formative and intense fever dream about it. I woke up confused about where (and when) I was, and deeply concerned about the fate of one of Min Jin Lee’s characters. In Pachinko, Lee sweeps us along with a family of Korean immigrants living in pre- and post-war Japan. Lee shows us a community whose history is rooted in stark racism, and stems, as generations pass, into a liminal void of Other; not quite outsider, not quite native. Here is a story of a family endeavoring to keep itself together. Lee writes with palpable emotion and beauty. This is a novel in a class all its’ own.
Anne of Green Gables, by L.M. Montgomery
I think this is a great book to read if you’re feeling a little lonely or a little sad. If you’ve never read Anne of Green Gables, you’re in for a wonder. Anne, a feisty, opinionated, and imaginative child is sort of accidentally adopted by Marilla and Matthew — a pair of elderly siblings that need help managing their farm on Prince Edward Island. The three of them grow to become this beautifully special family, full of admiration and affection for one another, and Montgomery’s writing is heart-clutchingly wonderful. Like I said, and excellent choice if you’re feeling a little blue, or if you just want a dose of goodness.
Wild Magic, by Tamora Pierce
I try to spend some time with one of Tamora Pierce’s books about once a year, because I love them, and because her books make me feel as excited and wonder-filled as I did when I first read them. In this one, Daine, left with only her pony Cloud, after her village is destroyed by bandits, manages to get a job with Onua, a horse trader, as they both work to bring a herd to the Capital City. Daine has a serious knack with animals — it’s wild magic, a gift that allows her to converse with animals. Pierce connects her readers to her fantastical worlds by depicting characters who are respectful of nature and each other, and who stay with you long after you finish the last page. This is a book that will help reconnect you with that kidwho used to read for hours, and loved to get lost in a good story.
Poulets & Legumes, by Jacques Pepin
Jacques Pepin taught me how to cook! I was, for a period of my life, obsessed with watching reruns of his shows on youtube. There’s a particular video of him showing the most efficient way to mince garlic, and I’d watch with awe and study his technique. All this to say that this wonderful and brilliant chef has collected all of his favorite, accessible recipes for chicken ad vegetables into this sweet little book. Oh! And he painted all of the illustrations himself. I know I’ll be making staples from this book for years to come.
The Golden Compass: His Dark Materials, by Philip Pullman
I recently revisited this series from my youth, and it was TRULY even better than I remembered. In this first book, Lyra Belacqua, a child raised by academics in Oxford, races head first into an adventure that spans universes, and changes, or arguably, fulfills, the course of her life. Pullman shows us the absolute horrors a human mind can create when guided by institutions that rely on blind faith, and alternately, the beauty of decisions made when informed by logic and love. I urge you to read this book (and then the other two!) if you have not already.
Autumn, by Ali Smith
I think Ali Smith might be made of magic. This book moves; it dances to the arc of characters’ recollected memories, it glides over penned autumn winds, it rises and falls with sleep-filled breaths. Autumn tells the story of two friends, Elisabeth and George, who form a singularly special friendship when elementary-aged Elisabeth and her mother move in next door to George, an old (in his eighties) musician, full of passion for art from the sixties. In her typical non-linear style, Smith narrates a fifty-year chunk of time in Britain, focusing especially on the juxtaposition of the then (empowered artists, hope-filled futures), and the now (horrifying nationalism, self-imposed isolation). Smith will leave you clinging to the last page.
Kitchen, Banana Yoshimoto
If you’re looking for something to remind you of the beauty in the world, read this! The first time I read Kitchen was after a good friend recommended it with, “this is the perfect thing to read if you’re going through any sort of big change,” and it truly was. This sweet little book (it’s actually two novellas) follows a young woman, Mikage, and the mother and son she stays with after her grandmother passes away. Yoshimoto captures a grief that is serenely beautiful, and adds a gentle quirkiness that will settle itself comfortably inside you. This is a truly special book, definitely the best recommendation I’ve ever gotten.
The Chronology of Water: A Memoir, by Lydia Yuknavitch
You will open this book like any other, but it will open you too, drawing out dormant tears of your own that have collected in a pool in the middle of your chest. Yuknavitch is a glimmering rarity- a woman who’s life has been etched into water- and she treads through her past as it trickles through these pages. She writes of her abusive childhood, swimming triumphs, sorrowful early adulthood, alcoholic relationships, and sexual presence with a beauty that held me in its’ radiance for days. The ebb and swell of this memoir is a wonder. It will leave you changed; gently, quietly, but powerfully.
