My book of the year for 2022 is Orwell’s Roses by Rececca Solnit.
I’ve enjoyed Rebecca Solnit’s work for a while, particularly her earlier book Wanderlust. I think this is even better, a series of essays and a meditation and exploration of gardens, life, death, Orwell, creativity, time and place.
Read the Guardian Review HERE
I also read, and was amazed by, Gravity’s Rainbow, so inaccessible and wonderful, and so different to the breezy prose of Anne Tyler in French Braid. Her insights into family and time have always struck me as true somehow. It was also good to enjoy a new book of poetry again. Kasey Jued’s book has been well reviewed and deservedly so. Cormac McCarthy’s The Passenger was unlucky not to make the list; that was a compelling and at times exasperating read.
As always you can check the READING link of my PoetryPages to see more about my reading over the years and what I’ve enjoyed.
Text version (to paste into your shopping app of choice!
Rebecca Solnit. Orwell’s Roses (NF)
Thomas Pynchon. Gravity’s Rainbow (F)
Karl Ove Knausgaard: Morning Star (F)
Anne Tyler. French Braid (F)
Kasey Jueds. The Thicket (P)
thinking about poetry 