The month of Valentine’s Day should also include love for books, and I’m looking at some reading memoirs this month that explore the authors’ love. Please make suggestions for other reads if you have any.
The Possessed by Elif Batuman
Personal History by Roo Borson
The Child That Books Built by Francis Spufford
Nothing Remains the Same by Wendy Lesser
Reading in Bed by Steven Gilbar
On Rereading by Patricia Meyer Spacks
There’s Leslie Shimotakahara’s recent memoir, The Reading List. Also, Anne Fadiman edited a wonderful collection called Rereadings (FSG, 2006) where “17 writers revisit books they love.” (I love the one you mentioned by Lesser!)
What about The Yellow-Lighted Bookshop, by Lewis Buzbee? Or those by Nicholas Basbanes? Maybe Howard’s End is on the Landing: A Year of Reading from Home, by Susan Hill, or those by Anne Fadiman…
Thanks, Steph. Buzbee and Hill I have both reviewed here. Anne Fadiman is the muse of this blog, and her books I have not managed to review because all I can do is gush. I get quite evangelical about Ex Libris. And Basbanes, who I discovered through Fadiman, sits on my tbr shelf, languishing. Maybe I should start with the shortest one first? They are such door stops, and I just haven’t made the time for them.