What I'm Reading: 'Giovanni's Room' by James Baldwin

I read my first James Baldwin novel (Go Tell it on the Mountain) in late 2013, so for the entirety of #ReadWomen2014, I was anxiously awaiting the opportunity to read more James Baldwin. The events of Ferguson made his writing all the more relevant (unfortunately), and Melville House recently published his last interview, making James Baldwin very top-of-mind for me.

I can't really describe Giovanni's Room without revealing that it disappointed me. The prose is stark and beautiful and it's an intensely rendered love story, BUT -- it's probably the first novel to make me realize how much #ReadWomen2014 has changed me. The fact that there's a few very minor female characters doesn't necessarily bother me; it is, after all, one of the most significant gay novels ever published, so it's not really a book about women. But that said, I just wasn't able to connect with it in the way I expected to, nor in the way that I did with Go Tell it on the Mountain. It's such a brief little book, but it just left me cold in a way I haven't experienced in a long time.

Black History Month for Adults: the Classics

Black History Month is something every elementary school kid becomes familiar with -- along with figures like George Washington Carver (peanuts!). Most adults spend little/no time thinking about African American history, either in the month of February or any other time of year, but we should all view it as a good time to inject our reading with some much-needed diversity. Thus, my picks for great reads to celebrate Black History Month:

The Souls of Black Folk by W.E.B. Du Bois -- Not an easy book, but an important one, and if I can read it, so can you. This is out of copyright too, which means it's very easy to get an audio or e-book version of it.

The Autobiography of Malcolm X -- I read this in junior high, which strikes me as very amusing now. What were my parents thinking? I remember really loving the first half, which chronicles his life as a pimp and a thief in great detail. As an adult, I found much more to appreciate in the political content, so I guess there's something for everyone in this book.

Martin Luther King, Jr.: A Life by Marshall Frady -- Penguin Lives Biographies are terrific, and I have many, many on my shelves, including this one. After you've seen 'Selma,' read this succinct biography and appreciate the fact that MLK Jr. is a much more interesting human that you were ever taught in school.

Go Tell it on the Mountain by James Baldwin -- Every human should read James Baldwin. This is his most essential novel, but it's all good, and he also wrote some terrific essays throughout the Civil Rights movement.

Anything by Toni Morrison -- She is the essential African American authoress and she's a prolific writer, with a new novel coming out this spring. Start with The Bluest Eye, then try Beloved. Song of Solomon is Barack Obama's favorite novel.

This Week in Books I endorse Roxane Gay and Outlander again...

There was a great piece by Michael Harris at Salon about reading and distractions, which everybody should be able to relate to, even the most hardcore readers among us.

Everybody (except me, who hasn't yet read it) has been loving Kate Atkinson's novel Life After Life, and this week it was announced that she's writing a sequel.

Teju Cole is an excellent Nigerian-born novelist who I've endorsed on the blog before (if you loved Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie) and he wrote an essay for The New Yorker on re-reading James Baldwin, another author I really admire. In light of recent events in Ferguson, good writing about race in America is clearly as important as ever.

The #WeNeedDiverseBooks has been gaining a lot of momentum this year, especially among librarians, and it makes a good companion to #ReadWomen2014. NPR has been doing quite a bit of coverage on the topic this week, but I especially enjoyed this story about how to sell diverse books, as the lack of market is often cited as the primary reason for the lack of diversity in serious literature.

Finally, Roxane Gay is recapping the entire Outlander series for Vulture, episode-by-episode, so you have yet another compelling reason to get into this show/book series.