Fave Books

When I started coaching, I was shocked to hear my successful, often Type A, clients tell me that they couldn't seem to read books anymore. They'd occasionally manage to read a trade journal or maybe a business book, but reading for sheer pleasure seemed impossible. They just couldn't slow their brains down long enough to read for fun.

I can't imagine not reading novels, memoirs, success books, any good literature I can get my hands on. And I love when other books nuts give me recommendations. I regularly trade books and reading lists with my friends Sharon, Martha, Rosemary and my son Zack (who is a voracious reader with tastes far more mature than his 16 years would suggest.)

So here's my recent list. I hope there's something here that speaks to you!

The White Tiger is the debut novel by Indian author Aravind Adiga. It was first published in 2008 and wonthe Man Booker Prize in the same year. A sort of Slumdog Millionaire set among the rural poor and the dog-eat-dog entrepreneurial class, it's a contrast between India's rise as a modern global economy and the working class.

Game Change: Obama and the Clintons, McCain and Palin, and the Race of a Lifetime is a book by political journalists John Heilemann and Mark Halperin about the 2008 United States presidential election. It's a searing account of the Obama-McCain presidential race. Based on interviews with more than 300 people involved in the campaign, the book skewers nearly everyone involved - from doddering McCain to shrew-like Elizabeth Edward to nut job Sarah Palin. Only Michelle Obama, through her somewhat conspicuous absence comes off like a rational adult. Amazing behind the scenes close-up of the rigors of politics.

Middlesex is the absolutely staggering Pulitizer Prize-winning novel by Jeffrey Eugenides published in 2002. Tackling a difficult subject - the life of a hermaphrodite - and spanning nearly one hundred years, the story is touching, humane and totally absorbing. Following a Greek family's tragic genetic and familial history, the story starts in Greece then travels to modern-day Detroit, tracing the hero/heroine's disturbing life.

The Help, by Kathryn Stockett, was published in 2009. The story follows the lives of three African-American maids working in white households in Jackson, Mississippi just as the civil rights movements was igniting. Stockett says the page-turner took her five years to write, was rejected by 45 literary agents, then became an international bestseller that was published in 35 countries in 3 languages.

Unaccustomed Earth is a collection of short stories written by Jhumpha Lahiri, who won a Pulitzer Prize for another story collection, Interpreter of Maladies. With elegance and deftness, Lahiri straddles the chasm between upper class Indians and their American-born or Americanized children. She has incredible skill at changing voice among her complex, nuanced and multi-dimensional characters.

What Looks Like Crazy on an Ordinary Day is a surprisingly funny story about an African American woman coming to terms with being pronounced HIV-positive. Written by playwright/novelist Pearl Cleagle, protagonist Ava has given up her high-flying life as an Atlanta hairdresser and come home to her rural hometown before moving onto San Francisco. What she finds there leads up to the final line of the book, which also happens to be its title.

Perennial Favorites