READING LIST

Books I'm Going to Read

- On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft, Stephen King
(I loved this book. It was inspiring to me in many ways and I feel a little more confident in approaching writing a larger piece.)

- A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, Dave Eggers
[I really enjoyed the style of writing in this book, as well as the brutal honesty told by the author.]

- Steps, Jerzy Kosinksi
[Really powerful, and beautifully eerie, short stories. A dark portrait of humanity.]

- Kafka Was the Rage: A Greenwich Village Memoir, Anatole Broyard
[A writer looks back on his time in Greenwich Village just after the end of World War II. A fun little read.]

- Reading Like A Writer, Francine Prose
[A love letter to the pleasures of reading, says USA Today. This really was a lovely read. Prose, an apt name for a writer, goes over the fundamentals of constructing a great story by dissecting bits from her favorite books. The book is 268 pages, but I could have read 2,680 pages. I felt like I was in a strict, supportive writing workshop and I'm sad that it's ended.]

- A Moveable Feast, Ernest Hemingway
[I loved reading about Hemingway's days in Paris as a young man-- listening to him describe his writing techniques and how he creates a schedule and rhythm in his writing, smiling as he spoke of his visits with Gertrude Stein, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Ezra Pound, James Joyce and the other great minds of his time, and feeling sad at the end because he cheated on his wife and wasn't able to experience Paris the same way again. Hemingway wrote Feast toward the end of his life, and you can hear the bitterness and regret in his voice when he said those days of being unknown, poor, and married were the happiest days of his life. Excellent read.]

- American Pastoral, Philip Roth
[A wonderfully sad read about the destruction of a seemingly perfect American family.]

- The Tao of Wu, The RZA [Loved it so much I wrote an entire blog post about it]

- Dinners and Nightmares, Diane di Prima [I read this is college and reread it while traveling back to Philly for Thanksgiving. It's a delightful read.]

- The Alienist, Caleb Carr





Books I Would Recommend

- Between The Acts, Virginia Woolf

- How to Become a Famous Writer Before You're Dead, Ariel Gore

- The Fortress of Solitude, Jonathan Lethem

- American Psycho, Bret Easton Ellis

- Gang Leader For A Day, Sudhir Venkatesh

- Shakespeare: The World as Stage, Bill Bryson

- The Mother Tongue, Bill Bryson

- Fear of Flying, Erica Jong

- The Wu-Tang Manual, The RZA

- Republican Party Reptile, PJ O'Rourke

- Dictee, Theresa Hak Kyung Cha

- Breakfast of Champions, Kurt Vonnegut

- Yoga For People Who Can't Be Bothered To Do It, Geoff Dyer


Are there any books you would recommend? If so, please let me know-- I'd love to add more to my reading list!