Holiday Gift Guide
Wondering what to give your reading bestie this year? Here are 5 titles to inspire you to read together in 2021!
Adapting to the pandemic has pushed us to find new ways to stay in contact. Lately, I’ve ditched Zoom and picked up the phone to call friends. As a 90s kid, I don’t think I will ever be able to let go of my phone introduction, “Hi, this is Jackie,” but it’s now a joke and a great way to start the call, by laughing. Over the course of the fall and winter seasons, I’ve adjusted to staying home more and curling up with a book. So quite naturally, I blab about what I have been reading. This has led me to buying books as gifts or sending a book I read to a friend by mail.
In efforts to make this holiday season a little easier for you, here is a list of five books my friends have heard me talk about nonstop!
The Other Americans, Laila Lalami
For Mystery Readers
While out celebrating with her roommate, Nora Guerraoui learns her father has died in a sudden hit-and-run. On instinct, Nora drives immediately home to the Mojave Desert in California, to find her mother shocked by the news. Something within Nora keeps her to believe her father’s death was more than a tragic accident. During her stay at her childhood home, this lingering question brings old and new acquaintances into Nora’s life to reveal how her father died.
I raced through reading this book! Laila Lalami crafted a page-turning mystery, while adding in a love story and striking observations on contemporary America.
Luster, Raven Leilani
For Creatives and Young People Everywhere
From the very first pages, Raven Leilani introduces our protagonist, Edie, a young Black woman working in the publishing industry. Edie reminds me of a friend or roommate from another life. Like any twenty-something, Edie takes chances and makes rash decisions, longing to be seen by the world.
The novel opens with Edie at work, messaging a mysterious man online having fully clothed sex. We learn this man is Eric, a white forty-something married man who lives in the New York City suburbs. He is in an open-marriage, with rules hand-written by his wife, Rebecca. You might think Edie would dislike Rebecca, but it’s so much more complicated than that.
This novel explores female friendships, being Black in America and allowing creativity (art) in your life, among so many relatable and raw themes. Leilani’s words sing on the page, a refrain young people everywhere can relate or recognize as true.
This Is What America Looks Like, Ilhan Omar
For Advocates
At twelve years old, Omar and her family were granted refugee status in the United States. In arriving in New York City, she pointed out to her father all of the trash on the street, everywhere. Her father told her, “This isn’t our America. We’ll get our America.”
From local to national politics, Omar continues to push the progressive agenda, advocating her beliefs, in search of inclusive policy.
Read this book to be inspired and to keep political momentum. If you’re like me, you will be amazed, cry and cheer on Congresswoman Omar every single page.
Normal People: The Scripts, Sally Rooney, Alice Birch and Mark O'Rowe
For TV and Film Critics
This spring, we fell in love with Connell and Marianne, played onscreen by Paul Mescal and Daisy Edgar-Jones. Although book lovers may have already read the novel the TV series was based on, Faber and Faber have published Normal People: The Scripts for fans to revisit the story.
To all my friends, I don’t own this book yet, but my birthday and Christmas are both in December. Wink. Wink.
Severance, Ling Ma
For SciFi Fans
This year shares similarities with Ling Ma’s imagined world in Severance: a global pandemic, clinging to normalcy and our ingrained routines. I want to preface that I read this book in between lockdowns, in denial of a second lockdown in Paris. I would encourage readers to pick up this book when Coronavirus does not seem so dire. This book is one of my all-time favorites, but it’s like watching a sad movie: you have to be in the right mood.
Candace Chen moved to New York City after graduation, lost at the beginning of her career. She starts a job at a publishing production firm, in the Bibles division. Five years pass, Candace earning promotions and creditability at work. Then, Shen Fever arrives…
Shifting between past and present, Ling Ma reveals Candace’s story with just enough details to keep readers hooked.