Great Holiday Reads

Barbara: As the time for holiday downtime is fast upon us (no matter what you celebrate, most of us get to at least enjoy the off-hours), I thought I’d offer up some of my favourite reads from this year.

My daughter recommended this one and it is awesome: The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz. It is fast-paced, intensely vivid, and often heartbreaking. Tragedy and curses lace the story, sort of like a hip, modern-day 100 Years of Solitude. But there is an undeniably beating heart at its core. The end took my breath away. And it won the Pulitzer Prize in 2008, so how’s that for a recommendation?

The Devil in the White City by Erik Larson is probably on lots of people’s lists right now. It’s a biography of the World’s Fair in 1893 Chicago, but with the intertwined stories of one of the worst serial killers in American history and the epic efforts of big city dreamers and schemers, it reads very much like page-turning fiction. Larson does write a bit melodramatically at times, but that doesn’t detract from a really satisfying read.

Like the above book, Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston was on my Book Club list this year. And it is a remarkable, amazing, poignant, brave, and singular story. Written in 1937 when women’s lit was still trying to be taken seriously, never mind that by African American women, this book captures time and place like few others I’ve read. She uses dialect through much of the book, which can be hard to read at first, but this only gets you closer and deeper into her visceral experience. It is so captivating, a great timeless read by any standard.


Any good holiday books on your shelf???