Best senses of 2016...
Fiction of the Year:
"That's the horror, the most awful thing: to have a child the world wants to destroy and know that you're helpless to help him. Nothing worse than that. Nothing worse." — Matt Ruff, Lovecraft Country — my review here
Also, I read a number of excellent novels toward the end of the year and am still soaking in their goodness:
Nonfiction Books of the Year:
"You should eat more fruits and vegetables as if your life depended on it, because maybe it does." — How Not to Die, Dr. Michael Greger, nutritionfacts.org — my book review
"It is these undeniable qualities of human love and compassion and self-sacrifice that give me hope for the future...we fight, we kill. But we are also capable of the most noble, generous, and heroic behavior." — Jane Goodall, Reason for Hope: A Spiritual Journey
"What I could see was that writing and reading and praying and paying attention to sunrises and sunsets might somehow save me." — Ann Hedreen, Her Beautiful Brain, therestlessnest
“There could be a powerful international women's rights movement if only philanthropists would donate as much to real women as to paintings and sculptures of women.” ― Nicholas D. Kristof, Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity for Women Worldwide
"Most of us would say, if asked, that we live in a capitalist society, but vast amounts of how we live our everyday lives—our interactions with and commitment to family lives, friendships, avocations, membership in social, spiritual, and political organizations—are in essence noncapitalist or even anticapitalist, full of things we do for free, out of love, and on principle." — Rebecca Solnit, Hope in the Dark: Untold Histories, Wild Possibilities — more about this in my article "Three Things I Loved This Month That Give Me Great Hope"
Fiction of the Year:
"That's the horror, the most awful thing: to have a child the world wants to destroy and know that you're helpless to help him. Nothing worse than that. Nothing worse." — Matt Ruff, Lovecraft Country — my review here
Also, I read a number of excellent novels toward the end of the year and am still soaking in their goodness:
- Arcadia, Lauren Groff
- Hag-Seed and The Heart Goes Last, Margaret Atwood, age 77 and she gets better and better
- Memoirs of a Polar Bear, Yoko Tawada
- Too Like the Lightening, Ada Palmer
Nonfiction Books of the Year:
"You should eat more fruits and vegetables as if your life depended on it, because maybe it does." — How Not to Die, Dr. Michael Greger, nutritionfacts.org — my book review
"It is these undeniable qualities of human love and compassion and self-sacrifice that give me hope for the future...we fight, we kill. But we are also capable of the most noble, generous, and heroic behavior." — Jane Goodall, Reason for Hope: A Spiritual Journey
"What I could see was that writing and reading and praying and paying attention to sunrises and sunsets might somehow save me." — Ann Hedreen, Her Beautiful Brain, therestlessnest
“There could be a powerful international women's rights movement if only philanthropists would donate as much to real women as to paintings and sculptures of women.” ― Nicholas D. Kristof, Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity for Women Worldwide
"Most of us would say, if asked, that we live in a capitalist society, but vast amounts of how we live our everyday lives—our interactions with and commitment to family lives, friendships, avocations, membership in social, spiritual, and political organizations—are in essence noncapitalist or even anticapitalist, full of things we do for free, out of love, and on principle." — Rebecca Solnit, Hope in the Dark: Untold Histories, Wild Possibilities — more about this in my article "Three Things I Loved This Month That Give Me Great Hope"
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