I’m looking for great books to read while I’m breastfeeding, and seeing as you’re all so smart and well-read I’d like your recommendations. I have been given a bookstore voucher by my father that will probably get me three or four books. Here are my three favourite books I’ve read this year so far, what are yours?
The Emperor’s Children by Claire Messud
Dreams From My Father by Barack Obama
The Reader by Bernhard Schlink
From my picks you can see that I like relatively weighty/thought-provoking books, enjoy both fiction and non-fiction (though given that I am sent a lot of non-fictions for review I am looking more for novels right now), prefer contemporary to historical stories, and that I’m pretty predictable and like a lot of the books that everyone else likes.
So, what you got for me?
Ah, right up my alley!
Anne Enright’s The Gathering.
Also, it’s a little older, but Zadie Smith’s White Teeth.
Margaret Atwood has a new one (haven’t seen it myself yet).
And, though it isn’t a novel, you might enjoy Sandra Steingraber’s memoir Having Faith: An Ecologist’s Journey toward Motherhood.
Love the idea of Sandra Steingraber’s memoir, thanks. And have long been an Atwood and Enright fan.
The librarian in me always has to comment on these types of posts! A book that I read this year that I totally wouldn’t have normally read but really enjoyed was Life of Pi by Yann Martel. It’s a powerful read that left it’s mark. You have probably already read Charlotte Perkins Gilman. She’s a feminist favorite of mine. Herland is a great utopian novel. And The Yellow Wallpaper is amazing – although it’s about postpardum depression, so maybe that’s not quite fitting!
Have you ever read The Stranger by Camus? Also good.
Loved Camus’ The Stranger.
I am shamefully only getting around to Octavia Butler’s work (years after her sad passing and vow to do so then). Bloodchild and Other Stories is a good collection of shorts: broody humanistic speculative fiction is about how I’d sum it up.
Tracy Crisp’s Black Dust Dancing, if you haven’t read it already. I’ve also just finished Distraction by Damon Young, which is philosophy for a laid back lay audience – it’s weighty content but very easy to read. Unless a toddler snatches it out of your hands and tries to read it, thinking its about cars, because it has a picture of rushing traffic on the outside.
Bel Canto by Ann Patchett (best book I’ve read in years) and most anything by Kate Atkinson.
You’re doing very well to want substance while breastfeeding. I read Rumpole omnibuses.
Our Fathers by Andrew O’Hagan was a good read. Or how about What I Loved by Siri Hustvedt?
Have you read The Time Traveller’s Wife? Also anything by Lily Brett. And I presume you’ve read Motherhood by Anne Manne.
The Night Watch by Sarah Waters.
It’s sort of historical (set during the blitz in londong), but it is amazing. The best and most enjoyable novel I’ve read in years. Agh, don’t quite know how to convey my enthusiasm adequately. Seriously, seriously good. The writing, the characters, the plot, the atmosphere. Loved it.
That is quite a recommendation, sounds like I have to read it.
that would be london…
I read Jane Austen while I was breastfeeding. Smallish books, easy to hold, well known stories so I could just enjoy re-reading them, plenty of entertainment and mindfood.
I LOVED Obama’s book.
Mm, I guess I’m into more self-help and investment books at the moment, not much help, although I can recommend some good titles if you’re interested. and I read the first two comments and remembered how much I *didn’t* enjoy White Teeth or Life of Pi! Something else in that vein (which I also didn’t enjoy, but others might, because I think it’s similar to those two books) is The White Tiger.
Oh! I did just read Cloudstreet for the first time and thought it was fabulous, so you might try that.
Currently enjoying William Maxwell, I’m reading The Folded Leaf at the moment, have recently read So Long See You Tomorrow and They Came Like Swallows. May be hard to buy in Australian bookstores though, I ended up ordering a few of his books from US and had quite a long wait for them.
Sebastian Faulks, but you have probably read those. I thought Girl at The Lion Dor and Birdsong were fabulous.
I really like Alastair MacCleods ‘No Great Mischief’, but many people find it a bit heavy going. I’m a sucker for nostalgia and writing about a strong connection to place, and family and hard work etc. If you like his writing ‘The Island’ is a collection of short stories, so you could finish one off in a feed perhaps, they are however similiar to the novel, but not as good.
For non-fiction that reads like a novel ‘Two Lives’ by Vikram Seth is really enjoyable. About his Jewish aunt and Indian uncle. I won’t recommend his ‘A Suitable Boy’ for breastfeeding due to its weighty proportions but is thoroughly enjoyable if you haven’t read it.
I could go on and on, but won’t.
Am thoroughly enjoying “Brooklyn” by Colm Toibin (anything by him is reliable). “Book, bomb and compass” was a rollicking non-fiction read about sinologist Joseph Needham, fascinating life.
Hmm, a woman, a woman… I second any of Sarah Waters’ work, it’s clever and absorbing and un-put-down-able.
I have to disagree about Kate Atkinson – avoid Case Histories & absolutely avoid When Will There Be Good News?.
I recommend American Wife – it was so gripping I was happy to be waking up every two hours to read more.
Oh, but just realised they were all kind of historical and you like contemporary… oops. I also liked “Girl meets boy” by Ali Smith, one in a series of contemporary rewriting of Greek myths, sounds weird, but it works. It’s a lesbian/transgender story; short. I found it absorbing, my other bookclubbers were not convinced.
I am loving Anne Enright at the moment, but I think you’ve read her short stories haven’t you? It was a while ago but I was really convinced by Rachel Cusk’s Arlington Park.
Peter Pan and Wendy is a really, really meaty interesting spooky confronting read and has heaps of interesting things to say about domesticity and girlhood (not all of it, I would argue, bad). The Mouse and His Child by Russel Hoban is an amazing kid’s book too, very philosophical. The Neverending Story by Michael Ende and Momo by the same author are two rich, meaningful, captivating books ‘for children’ (but so good for adults too).
Gilead by Marilynne Robinson. Am anxious to read her follow up novel Home.
I for Isobel (and it’s arguably superior follow-up Isobel on the Way to the Corner Shop) by Amy Witting. One of those books I think everyone should read.
I loved Diary of a Bad Year by Coetzee, was taken totally by surprise, but it might not be great for breastfeeding (you have to be able to turn pages backwards and use a few booksmarks – it’s hard to explain). Maybe try something else by him?
Butterfly by Sonya Hartnett, though it’s a bit bleak.
Penni – we are so on the same wave length. Love Anne Enright and Rachel Cusk. And The Neverending Story.
Oh, and my books of course. (Memo to self: self-promote.)
I’ve been reading mountains of Young Adult, lately, and stumbled upon Meg Rosoff’s How I Live Now … female heroine, and despite eating-disorder talk (not a lot – and handled well, I think) which initially set of my “Teen Authors, Why Must You Pick This Particular Flaw” alarm, the book is astoundingly good and I think darn feminist. It’s my #2 book ever, now.
There’s some romance but the book is largely about survival, and about love, but love for family as much as romantic love. The two main characters are both girls, one 15, one 9, so we have friendship and “I am taking care of you” and it’s just so much better than any other YA for girls I have ever seen. You can read it in a night, it’s not long. If it turns out I have daughters, I’ll give it to them, for sure, but I’m making everybody that loves me read it.
I second Bel Canto by Ann Pratchett.
I cannot say enough good things about Muriel Barbery’s The Elegance of the Hedgehog.