Bookshelf
Since 2005, I’ve been keeping a list of every book and film I consume in entirety. Because how scary is it to not remember the last book you read? It’s also hard to recommend that Spanish film where the dead mother comes back and everyone mistakenly assumes she’s a ghost and Penelope Cruz is all “Yowza!”, when you don’t know the name of it.
I resolved to read at least 52 books a year starting in 2006 and have been doing so ever since. Why? Because I ride the subway a lot and can only stare at other passengers or listen to music for so long.
My yearly reading goal keeps my brain agile, open, inspired, confused… It’s a daily investment in myself that I can carry inside and share as I see fit.
Here’s my bookshelf for 2010 - I add books and films as I finish them. Why yes, you can email me to share a recommendation or make fun of my taste.
See 2009’s bookshelf.
Books:
1. Note to Self: 30 Women on Hardship, Humiliation, Heartbreak, and Overcoming It All edited by Andrea Buchanan
2. I Love You, Let’s Meet: Adventures in Online Dating by Virginia Vitzthum
3. A Short Guide to a Happy Life by Anna Quindlen
4. Sag Harbor by Colson Whitehead
5. I Love You, I Hate You, I’m Hungry: A Collection of Cartoons by Bruce Eric Kaplan
6. Impossible Motherhood: Testimony of an Abortion Addict by Irene Vilar
7. Dear Old Love: Anonymous Notes to Former Crushes, Sweethearts, Husbands, Wives, & Ones That Got Away by Andy Selsberg
8. Mixed: My Life in Black and White by Angela Nissel
9. Awkward by Ariel Schrag
10. Definition by Ariel Schrag
11. The New York Regional Mormon Singles Halloween Dance: A Memoir by Elna Baker
12. Potential by Ariel Schrag
13. Likewise by Ariel Schrag
14. Don’t Stop Believin’: How Karaoke Conquered the World and Changed My Life by Brian Raftery
15. Naked: Black Women Bare All About Their Skin, Hair, Hips, Lips, and Other Parts edited by Ayana Byrd and Akiba Solomon
16. What the Dog Saw: And Other Adventures by Malcolm Gladwell
17. This Is Where I Leave You by Jonathan Tropper
18. The Happiness Project Or, Why I Spent a Year Trying to Sing in the Morning, Clean My Closets, Fight Right, Read Aristotle, and Generally Have More Fun by Gretchen Rubin
19. August: Osage County by Tracy Letts
20. Julie and Julia: My Year of Cooking Dangerously by Julie Powell
21. The City Out My Window: 63 Views on New York by Matteo Pericoli
22. I LEGO N.Y. by Christoph Niemann
23. Cake Wrecks: When Professional Cakes Go Hilariously Wrong by Jen Yates
24. The Ask by Sam Lipsyte
25. Speak of the Devil by Gilbert Hernandez
26. Food Rules: An Eater’s Manual by Michael Pollan
27. The Man of My Dreams by Curtis Sittenfeld
28. The Bedwetter: Stories of Courage, Redemption, and Pee by Sarah Silverman
29. Newspaper Blackout by Austin Kleon
30. Maybe Baby: 28 Writers Tell the Truth About Skepticism, Infertility, Baby Lust, Childlessness, Ambivalence, and How They Made the Biggest Decision of Their Lives edited by Lori Leibovich
31. My First New York: Early Adventures in the Big City (As Remembered by Actors, Artists, Athletes, Chefs, Comedians, Filmmakers, Mayors, Models, Moguls, Porn Stars, Rockers, Writers, and Others) by New York Magazine
32. A Robert McCloskey Collection by Robert McCloskey
33. The Red Balloon by Albert Lamorisse
34. Why Is My Mother Getting a Tattoo?: And Other Questions I Wish I Never Had to Ask by Jancee Dunn
35. Random Family: Love, Drugs, Trouble, and Coming of Age in the Bronx by Adrian Nicole LeBlanc
36. If You Have to Cry, Go Outside: And Other Things Your Mother Never Told You by Kelly Cutrone
37. Love, Loss, and What I Wore by Ilene Beckerman
38. Moresukine: Uploaded Weekly from Tokyo by Dirk Schwieger
39. Zeitoun by Dave Eggers
40. Blankets by Craig Thompson
Films:
1. Reverse
2. Six Degrees of Separation
3. The Peretzniks
4. Closer
5. Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner
6. (500) Days of Summer
7. A Streetcar Named Desire
8. The Good Guy
9. New York, I Love You
10. Beyonce: Live at Wembley
11. An Education
12. Harakiri
13. What’s Eating Gilbert Grape
14. A Serious Man
15. A Complete History of My Sexual Failures
16. Chloe
17. Funny People
18. The Wiz
19. Exit Through the Gift Shop
20. Everyone Else
21. Friends with Money
22. When Marry Met Sally
23. Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?
24. Good Hair
25. Sex and the City 2
26. Beeswax
27. Celebrity
28. Paper Heart
29. Sunshine Cleaning
30. I Love You, Man
31. Crooklyn
32. Jungle Fever
33. The Kids Are All Right
34. Fargo
35. The Blind Side
36. Up in the Air
37. She’s Gotta Have It
