What I read in June
June's online and offline reading recs. Including: Miranda July, Katherine Brabon, and Rachel Cusk.
Hello!
Books
All Fours, by Miranda July
I mentioned last month that I was partway through this and now that I’ve finished, I loved it so much I’ll be recommending it to anyone who asks me for a book recommendation for a long time. I’m probably going to buy it in physical form so I can reread it with post-it notes. (I read a Netgalley arc, which I reviewed too quickly and I think I woefully undersold it because I was still reeling.)
All Fours starts off being about a woman, a semi-famous artist, who is about to set off on a cross-country solo drive to New York. Except instead of taking the trip she’s planned out, she stays at a motel twenty minutes away from her house, husband, and child, instead.
It goes on to explore how she goes about exploding her life in pursuit of something *more* and it’s an absolutely beautiful, moving portrayal of trying to pin down a life that feels creative and honest. It’s about ageing, and heteronormativity, and the institution of marriage, and I loved loved loved it.
Body Friend, by Katherine Brabon
I waited weeks for this to come in at the library - it was a popular pick because it was on the Stella Prize shortlist. A woman is recovering from an operation on her hip, and part of her recovery is physio sessions at a rehab pool. During her recovery, she meets Frida and Sylvia, both of whom are living with similar chronic conditions. As seasons pass, the woman leans on one friendship over the other; Frida’s commitment to the pool and to keeping her body moving, or Sylvia’s insistence on rest and recuperation.
It’s a slow novel, sometimes frustratingly so, and there was a point when I thought that there might be a big revelation, but this is absolutely a no plot just vibes novel, more focused on small moments than big reveals. I enjoyed it and I’ve thought about it a lot since I finished reading it, but I’d have loved it to delve just slightly deeper.
Parade, by Rachel Cusk
I read a scathing review of this from the NYT, which
sent me, and it said that the writing was “repellently pretentious,” but if we’re not reading Rachel Cusk for exactly that, what are we reading her for? I liked it!There was a lot of reading this month, so, I also read: Misrecognition, by Madison Newbound (I read this for The Skinny’s July issue, so my review of it will be up there soon - I wish I liked it more than I did…), Bluets, by Maggie Nelson (and as it turns out, almost everyone I know had tickets to the play), and I’m partway through Scaffolding, by Lauren Elkin (I grabbed Art Monsters when it was on the Kindle sale too).
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Online reads
I could recommend everything
writes, but I really enjoyed this piece on research as leisure activity.I’d also say that pretty much every writer, essayist, “cultural critic,” etc—especially someone who’s writing more as a vocation than a profession—has research as their leisure activity. What they do for pleasure (reading books, seeing films, listening to music) shades naturally and inevitably into what they want to write about, and the things they consume for leisure end up incorporated into some written work.
I think that by now, everyone has read why everyone wants to be the internet’s librarian, but in case you haven’t, it’s excellent.
Our boxes are finally arriving, so I’m very excited to dig through my much-missed tbr and pull out some goodies that have been waiting for a looooong time.
What did you read this month?
Terri-Jane x
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