books i’ve loved & am yet to love

I'm Glad My Mom Died

Jennette McCurdy · 2022

<b>* #1 <i>NEW YORK TIMES</i> BESTSELLER * #1 INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER * </b><b>MORE THAN 3 MILLION COPIES SOLD!</b><br> <br><b>A heartbreaking and hilarious memoir by <i>iCarly </i>and <i>Sam & Cat </i>star Jennette McCurdy about her struggles as a former child actor—including eating disorders, addiction, and a complicated relationship with her overbearing mother—and how she retook control of her life. </b><br><br>Jennette McCurdy was six years old when she had her first acting audition. Her mother’s dream was for her only daughter to become a star, and Jennette would do anything to make her mother happy. So she went along with what Mom called “calorie restriction,” eating little and weighing herself five times a day. She endured extensive at-home makeovers while Mom chided, “Your eyelashes are invisible, okay? You think Dakota Fanning doesn’t tint hers?” She was even showered by Mom until age sixteen while sharing her diaries, email, and all her income.<br> <br>In <i>I’m Glad My Mom Died</i>, Jennette recounts all this in unflinching detail—just as she chronicles what happens when the dream finally comes true. Cast in a new Nickelodeon series called <i>iCarly</i>, she is thrust into fame. Though Mom is ecstatic, emailing fan club moderators and getting on a first-name basis with the paparazzi (“Hi Gale!”), Jennette is riddled with anxiety, shame, and self-loathing, which manifest into eating disorders, addiction, and a series of unhealthy relationships. These issues only get worse when, soon after taking the lead in the <i>iCarly</i> spinoff <i>Sam & Cat</i> alongside Ariana Grande, her mother dies of cancer. Finally, after discovering therapy and quitting acting, Jennette embarks on recovery and decides for the first time in her life what she really wants.<br> <br>Told with refreshing candor and dark humor, <i>I’m Glad My Mom Died</i> is an inspiring story of resilience, independence, and the joy of shampooing your own hair.

The War of Art

Steven Pressfield · 2002

My Year of Rest and Relaxation

Ottessa Moshfegh · 2019

<b><b>Named a Best Book of the Year by <i>The Washington Post, Time, </i>NPR, <i>Vice, Bustle</i>, <i>The New York Times</i>, <i>The Guardian</i>, <i>Kirkus Reviews</i>,<i> Entertainment Weekly</i>, The AV Club, & Audible</b><br><br>A <i>New York Times </i>Bestseller • <b><i>New York Times </i>Readers Pick: 100 Best Books of the 21st Century</b> <br><br>“One of the most compelling protagonists modern fiction has offered in years: a loopy, quietly furious pillhead whose Ambien ramblings and Xanaxed b*tcheries somehow wend their way through sad and funny and strange toward something genuinely profound.” — <i>Entertainment Weekly</i> <br><br>“Darkly hilarious . . . [Moshfegh’s] the kind of provocateur who makes you laugh out loud while drawing blood.” <b>—<i>Vogue</i></b><br><br></b>From one of our boldest, most celebrated new literary voices, a novel about a young woman's efforts to duck the ills of the world by embarking on an extended hibernation with the help of one of the worst psychiatrists in the annals of literature and the battery of medicines she prescribes.<br><br>Our narrator should be happy, shouldn't she? She's young, thin, pretty, a recent Columbia graduate, works an easy job at a hip art gallery, lives in an apartment on the Upper East Side of Manhattan paid for, like the rest of her needs, by her inheritance. But there is a dark and vacuous hole in her heart, and it isn't just the loss of her parents, or the way her Wall Street boyfriend treats her, or her sadomasochistic relationship with her best friend, Reva. It's the year 2000 in a city aglitter with wealth and possibility; what could be so terribly wrong?<br><br><i>My Year of Rest and Relaxation</i> is a powerful answer to that question. Through the story of a year spent under the influence of a truly mad combination of drugs designed to heal our heroine from her alienation from this world, Moshfegh shows us how reasonable, even necessary, alienation can be. Both tender and blackly funny, merciless and compassionate, it is a showcase for the gifts of one of our major writers working at the height of her powers.

The Creative Act

Rick Rubin · 2023

The Bell Jar

Sylvia Plath · 2008