3/5 stars The Tattooist of Auschwitz, by Heather Morris (2018) This is a work of historical fiction, based on interviews Morris did with Lale Sokolov, a Slovakian Jew who spent two and a half years in the WWII concentration camps of Auschwitz-Birkenau. An educated man, Lale spoke many languages and was able to use this to his advantage in the camps, where becoming "useful" to the guards could save your life. Lale was assigned the task of tattooing the numbers on prisoners' ar

4/5 stars London Falling: A Mysterious Death in a Gilded City and a Family's Search for Truth, by Patrick Radden Keefe (2026) Keefe is so good at making non-fiction digestible and compelling. I previously read and really enjoyed Say Nothing and, about a month ago, Rogues: True Stories of Grifters, Killers, Rebels and Crooks. London Falling is Keefe's most recent book, and chronicles the mysterious death of a young man in London. You know I love a true crime story, so I was so

3/5 stars Rogues: True Stories of Grifters, Killers, Rebels and Crooks, by Patrick Radden Keefe (2022) I read Keefe's Say Nothing: A True Story of Murder & Memory in Northern Ireland in 2020 for my book club, and really enjoyed his long-form journalism. Coming from someone who, at the time anyway, had read very little non-fiction, Keefe combines insightful and well-researched story-telling with a writing style that is compelling and narrative. In Rogues, Keefe has curated 12

1/5 stars The Secret Rooms: A True Story of a Haunted Castle, a Plotting Duchess, & a Family Secret, by Catherine Bailey (2012) False...

3/5 stars Butts: A Backstory, by Heather Radke (2022) Not my words but an apt, brief description - this book melds "history, personal...

9/11/23 - 22 years later (Each section below has 100 words. This is part of a practice I've been trying to maintain of writing 100 words...

3/5 stars Let Me Go, by Helga Schneider (2001) TW: Anti-Semitism, and graphic descriptions of Holocaust camps, including medical...

5/5 stars Barracoon: The Story of the Last "Black Cargo," by Zora Neale Hurston (2018) Barracoon tells the story of Olualo Kossula, also...

5/5 stars Deaf Republic, by Ilya Kaminsky (2019) This past weekend I was fortunate enough to attend two of RIT/NTID's Big Read events,...

TW: Gun violence in schools March 30, 2023 – morning free-write It never ends. It never ends. There’s a secret door to a secret room with...

For the past year I've been working with a designer and 19 artistic friends to create a book: Are We There Yet? An Illustrated Journey of...

3/5 stars Under the Banner of Heaven: A Story of Violent Faith, by Jon Krakauer (2003) I recently visited Salt Lake City (SLC), Utah for...

3/5 stars Nowhere Boy, by Katherine Marsh (2018) This should be required reading for all middle grade students (middle school, or higher...

4/5 stars They Called Us Enemy, by George Takei, Justin Eisinger & Steven Scott, illustrated by Harmony Becker (2019) In this graphic...

3/5 stars The Prison Diary of Ho Chi Minh, by Ho Chi Minh (1943) Translated from the Vietnamese by Aileen Palmer My mom is going through...

3/5 stars Twelve Years a Slave, by Solomon Northup (1853) This is the true story of one man's experience of slavery in the South, as a...

4/5 stars The Five: The Untold Lives of the Women Killed by Jack the Ripper, by Hallie Rubenhold (2019) It sounds morbid, but it's not....

4/5 stars The Yellow House, by Sarah M. Broom (2019) I finished this book about two weeks ago, but have been putting off writing about it...

4/5 stars The Color of Law: A Forgotten History of How Our Government Segregated America, by Richard Rothstein (2017) In The Color of...

In light of the past weekend's unrest, and the past month's events, and the past centuries of systemic racism, I wanted to write a bit...