March Reading List

March has been such a weird month. I am so unbelievably fortunate because COVID-19 hasn’t affected my life in a meaningful way. If you are in the same position, I encourage you to please help people and communities in need. We can get through this.

Okay, on to the 10 books I read in March. You would think being stuck at home for about half the month would make me a more productive reader, but that hasn’t been true. It has been easier for me to shut out all the stress and uncertainty by watching the entire true crime catalog on Netflix. But the more I get used to the new normal, the more I have been reading, so we shall see.

1. Mythologies: Definitely not an easy read this one. I read and re-read paragraphs multiple times before I could even distill any meaning. Once it all came together though, this was a great read. The book is a collection of essays that have been translated from French.
   
   “No denunciation without its proper instrument of close analysis,” Roland Barthes wrote in his preface to Mythologies. There is no more proper instrument of analysis of our contemporary myths than this book—one of the most significant works in French theory, and one that has transformed the way readers and philosophers view the world around them.
   
   Most of the cultural references in the book I didn’t know beforehand, but that didn’t hamper my enjoyment of the book. His analysis of myth was truly enlightening.
   
   
2. Such a Fun Age: This book has been trending lately, and I can see why. It hits on hot button topics like race, privilege, and social media. The writing didn’t blow me away but it was exactly what the plot demanded. The story chugs along fairly quickly and I enjoyed this quick read.
   
   
3. The Light We Lost: I felt like this book was pretending to be something it’s not. It tries to go deep, but fails. The relationships portrayed in the book lacked depth, the characters in the book never stopped being mere characters in a book.
   
   
4. Red at the Bone: Reading this book was quite an unexpected experience for me. It was emotional, poignant, and oddly dreamlike. There were parts of the book that I barely even understood but I think that was intentional. This book demands that you feel, that you immerse yourself in the cloudy minds of its protagonists.
   
   
5. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn: This novel isn’t a quick read by any means, but I sped right through it. It fondly reminded me of old favorites like Kane and Abel, but grittier.
   
   
6. The Trial: I don’t know what I can say about Kafka that hasn’t already been said, but the futility of it all reminded me of Camus.
   
   
7. In Order to Live: A North Korean Girl’s Journey to Freedom: Everything you would expect from a book with this title. A gripping read.
   
   
8. On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century: This book was short, sweet and hammers the important points home.
   
   
9. My Promised Land: The Triumph and Tragedy of Israel: A measured take on Israel; right from the events leading up to its creation until present day. I honestly learnt a tremendous amount by reading this book, a lot of history and context packed into a relatively small package.
   
   
10. Reflections on the Revolution In Europe: Immigration, Islam, and the West: This book made for some really uncomfortable reading for me. I don’t know if I would recommend it necessarily, however it does lay out some hard truths that it feels like we must all come to terms with at some point.