Reader's Place: February 2020
It’s all about love this month: love of another, of self, of country.
My Love Story : A Memoir, by Tina Turner. 2018.
Summary: Tina Turner—the long-reigning queen of rock & roll and living legend—sets the record straight about her illustrious career and complicated personal life in this eye-opening and compelling memoir. From her early years in Nutbush, Tennessee to her rise to fame alongside Ike Turner to her phenomenal success in the 1980s and beyond, Tina candidly examines her personal history, from her darkest hours to her happiest moments and everything in between. My Love Story is an explosive and inspiring story of a woman who dared to break any barriers put in her way. Emphatically showcasing Tina’s signature blend of strength, energy, heart, and soul, this is a gorgeously wrought memoir as enthralling and moving as any of her greatest hits.
Frankissstein : A Love Story, by Jeanette Winterson. 2019.
Summary: "Lake Geneva, 1816. Nineteen-year-old Mary Shelley is inspired to write a story about a scientist who creates a new life-form. In Brexit Britain, a young transgender doctor called Ry is falling in love with Victor Stein, a celebrated professor leading the public debate around AI and carrying out some experiments of his own in a vast underground network of tunnels. Meanwhile, Ron Lord, just divorced and living with his mom again, is set to make his fortune launching a new generation of sex dolls for lonely men everywhere. Across the Atlantic, in Phoenix, Arizona, a cryogenics facility houses dozens of bodies of men and women who are medically and legally dead... but waiting to return to life. What will happen when homo sapiens is no longer the smartest being on the planet? In fiercely intelligent prose, Jeanette Winterson shows us how much closer we are to that future than we realize. Funny and furious, bold and clear-sighted, Frankissstein is a love story about life itself"
Love Thy Neighbor : A Muslim Doctor's Struggle For Home In Rural America, by Ayaz Virji. 2019.
Summary: In 2013, Ayaz Virji left a comfortable job at an East Coast hospital and moved to a town of 1,400 in Minnesota, feeling called to address the shortage of doctors in rural America. But in 2016, this decision was tested when the reliably blue, working-class county swung for Donald Trump. Virji watched in horror as his children faced anti-Muslim remarks at school and some of his most loyal patients began questioning whether he belonged in the community. Virji wanted out. But in 2017, just as he was lining up a job in Dubai, a local pastor invited him to speak at her church and address misconceptions about what Muslims practice and believe. That invitation has grown into a well-attended lecture series that has changed hearts and minds across the state, while giving Virji a new vocation that he never would have expected. In Love Thy Neighbor, Virji relates this story in a gripping, unforgettable narrative that shows the human consequences of our toxic politics, the power of faith and personal conviction, and the potential for a renewal of understanding in America's heartland.
A Politics Of Love : A Handbook For A New American Revolution, by Marianne Williamson. 2019.
Summary: In this stirring call to arms, the activist, spiritual leader, and New York Times bestselling author of the classic Return to Love confronts the cancerous politics of fear and divisiveness threatening the United States today, urging all spiritually aware Americans to return to—and act out of—our deepest value: love.
Modern Love : True Stories of Love, Loss, and Redemption. 2019.
Summary: "50 Irresistible True Accounts of Love in the Twenty-first Century. A young woman wryly describes a relationship that races from start to finish almost entirely via text messages. A Casanova is jilted after an idyllic three weeks and learns the hard way that the woman is, well, just not that into him. An overweight woman in a sexless marriage wrestles with the rules of desire. A young man recounts the high-wire act of sharing the woman he loves with both her husband and another boyfriend. A female sergeant in the Missouri National Guard, fresh from Iraq, tells what she is not supposed to tell about the woman she is not allowed to love. These are just a few of the people whose stories are included in Modern Love, a collection of the fifty most revealing, funny, stirring essays from the New York Times's popular "Modern Love" column. Editor Daniel Jones has arranged these tales to capture the ebb and flow of relationships, from seeking love and tying the knot to having children and finding love that endures. (Cynics and melancholics can skip right to the section on splitting up.) Taken together, these essays show through a modern lens how love drives, haunts, and enriches us. For anyone who's loved, lost, stalked an ex, or made a lasting connection, and for the voyeur in all of us, Modern Love is the perfect match.
Tough Love : My Story Of The Things Worth Fighting For, by Susan E. Rice. 2019.
Summary: "Recalling pivotal moments from her dynamic career on the front lines of American diplomacy and foreign policy, Susan E. Rice -- National Security Advisor to President Barack Obama and U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations -- delivers an inspiring account of a life in service to family and country"-- Provided by publisher.
Compiled by Ina Rimpau