Each year, the Department of English gathers book recommendations to share with alumni and friends. We hope you enjoy this year’s list and discover books that delight and surprise, offering both new ideas and familiar comforts.
Rudolph P. Almasy, Professor Emeritus, recommends:
All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr
Set in pre-WW II and during the war. Extraordinary, powerful narrative of the interwoven
stories of a blind French female and an orphaned German male, both children in
their separate countries when the story begins whose teenage lives come together
during the allied bombing of Saint Malo on the Brittany coast in 1944.
Brian Ballentine, Faculty, recommends:
The Space Between Us by Thrity Umrigar
Stark disparities of class and wealth are only part of the story revolving around
a Parsi housewife and her long-time servant. Set in Bombay, Umrigar’s striking
novel shows her characters’ intimate connections as well as their deepest divides.
Patricia Bello, Retired, recommends:
Marine Tigers: A Newyorican Story by José Bello
A true American story told by a self-described Newyorican. It begins on the colorful
island of Puerto Rico and goes on to New York City, where his story of assimilation
into American life begins. A tale of personal and economic struggles and urban
survival with a New York City backdrop.
Gwen Bergner, Faculty, recommends:
Piecing Me Together by Renée Watson
Recent protests of racial injustice in the Northwest and across the country make
this novel about a Black girl from a low-income neighborhood in Portland attending
an elite and predominantly white private high school even more timely. Jade, a
ta lented collage artist and standout Spanish student who wants to study abroad,
navigates friendships, family, and school to reveal the challenges of inequality
for teenagers trying to chart a future. Engaging and accessible—without parental
advisory warnings—for youth, families, teachers, and others who want to explore
the thorny issue of race in this country.
Kate Blackburn, M.D., recommends:
Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead by Olga Tokarczuk
Man Booker International winner for 2018, and a worthy one. Now the Nobel Prize
as well. She is brilliant, original and this mystery covers a lot of ground—philosophy,
astrological fore, William Blake (from whom the title is taken). Jennifer Croft’s
translation is fluid and matches the brilliance of the author.
Laura Brady, Faculty, recommends:
Black Water Rising and Pleasantville by Attica Locke
If you need a break from the chaos of 2020, why not restore a little order with
a mystery novel? Attica Locke’s mysteries offer suspense along with sharp social
commentary.
Black Water Rising (2009) introduces her detective Jay Porter, a former civil
rights activist turned attorney. He returns in
Pleasantville (2016).
Mark Brazaitis, Faculty, recommends:
I’m Thinking of Ending Things by lain Reed
A literary horror novel in which the narrator, an unnamed young woman, drives with
her boyfriend to his parents’ house, to a Dairy Queen (in a raging snow storm),
and, finally, to an isolated high school. She keeps doing what no one would recommend,
including going into a dark, dank basement that serves as the world’s creepiest
artist’s studio.
Betijane Christopher Burger, Retired English Teacher, recommends,
The Clue of the Broken Locket by Carolyn Keene
Found at a used book sale, the mystery book takes me back to adolescent reading
and it holds up well. Nancy Drew is determined and helps the reader practice inductive
thinking! It was fun.
The Blackberry Tea Club by Barbara Herrick
This is a joyful embracing of life and aging – go ahead with adventure in what
she calls “the Glory Years.” Keep moving, keep learning.
Erin Brock Carlson, Faculty, recommends:
YA book series
The Raven Cycle by Maggie Stiefvater
Stiefvater’s series is a mystical tale set in the woods of Appalachia with a host
of strong female characters. Keep your eyes peeled for Jesse Dittley, who is perhaps
the most endearing character I’ve ever encountered. Great for the teenage fantasy
reader in your life, too!
Christopher Carson, Communications Center Supervisor – HCC Brandon, recommends:
Everything Begins & Ends at the Kentucky Club by Benjamin Alire Sáenz
Sáenz reminds us about the humanity of our differences. His stories invite the
reader to explore a world of grey, both in character and morality. Lines become
blurred and all you’re left with is pure story.
Cari Carpenter, Faculty, recommends:
The Age of Miracles by Karen Thompson Walker
Something about our current reality made this novel delightful to me: perhaps
because the thought of the earth spinning a little more slowly makes the horrors
of 2020 a little less stark. Gracefully written and endearing, it is a perfect
way to escape an epidemic.
The Overstory by Richard Powers
This is one of those books that is hard to describe without simplifying it rudely.
So I won’t attempt it. It’s about trees, in the best way. A book you won’t ever
forget.
Rose Casey, Faculty, recommends:
Hurricane Season by Fernanda Melchor
Fernanda Melchor’s
Hurricane Season is a bewitching novel about love, desire, grief, and gendered
violence. Translated into English in 2020 by the exceptional Sophie Hughes, Melchor’s
fable about femicide in contemporary Mexico offers insightful social commentary
through tender prose and taut plotting. Part mystery, part fairy- tale,
Hurricane Season is a must-read.
Anna Elfenbein, Faculty, recommends:
Dark Money by Jane Mayer
If you are reeling from the events of the last four years,
Dark Money: The Hidden History of the Billionaires Behind the Rise of the Radical
Right by Jane Mayer of
The New York Times will add to your understanding of how we arrived at this
point, as a nation and as a region. (Among the many evidences of the “hidden
hand” of the Billionaires’ Caucus that Mayer detects and analyzes are the smudges
left by their “Dark Money” on West Virginia University.)
Glenn Gallagher, Laborer, recommends:
Christine by Stephen King
I love rock ‘n roll, antique cars and love triangles (in fiction). If you love
these three, you’ll love
Christine.
Sara Georgi, Managing Editor, WVU Press, recommends:
The House of Broken Angels by Luis Alberto Urrea
A beautifully told Mexican American immigrant story and family saga, set over
the course of one weekend with two big events: a birthday party and a funeral.
The House of Broken Angels is filled with humor and heartbreak, in equal
measure.
Rosemary Hathaway, Faculty, recommends:
March by John Lewis, Andrew Aydin and Nate Powell
The death of Civil Rights leader John Lewis during a summer of Black Lives Matter
protests was both a blow and a reminder that there are still many battles to
be fought and won. For a powerful testament to Lewis’ life, work, and humility,
I highly recommend
March, a three-volume graphic memoir about Lewis and his role in the Civil
Rights movement. Powerfully drawn by Nate Powell, the three books take the reader
from Lewis’s childhood preaching to chickens on his Alabama farm through
the march across the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, all inside a frame
story about Barack Obama’s inauguration.
Kirk Hazen, Faculty, recommends:
Language in the Trump Era: Scandals and Emergencies by Janet McIntosh
and Norma Mendoza-Denton
The rhetoric of Donald Trump has disgusted and infuriated some people and enthralled
others. How does his divisive rhetoric whip up such fervent hatred? This book
explains how Trump’s language in Tweets and speeches actually operates. The editors
have crafted a readable exposition of Trump’s rhetorical gears that is sure to
entertain and educate all.
Christine Hoffmann, Faculty, recommends:
Divers (album) by Joanna Newsom
“What muppety nonsense is this?” was my first reaction to Joanna Newsom’s music.
The complicated lilt of her voice grows on you, I promise, plus the experimental
poetry of her lyrics. This is a woman who never met a feminine rhyme she
didn’t love (grass her / master; obsolescence / fluorescence), and whose alliterative
storytelling will make music on the page when you don’t feel like turning on
the volume. (The cause is Ozymandian / The map of Sapokanikan / Is sanded
and bevelled / The land lorn and levelled / By some unrecorded and powerful
hand.) If someone told me Kate Bush and Seamus Heaney had created Joanna Newsom
in a lab, I’d believe them. All the stuff in parentheses is from “Sapokanikan,”
a labor-of-love song that uncovers the obscure(d) history of Manhattan Island;
it performs the restorative work it celebrates as somehow both accidental and
inevitable, and I really like it.
Jenny Johnson, Faculty, recommends:
How to Do Nothing: Resisting the Attention Economy by Jenny O’Dell
“What if curiosity is the emergency?” O’Dell asks in this stirring mediation.
An unexpected call to action, O’Dell beautifully weaves together interdisciplinary
ideas from Martin Buber to John Cage to Audre Lorde. This book will spur you
to say no to all that divides your attention and yes to all that sparks your
senses.
Helen King, Retired Librarian, recommends:
Dreamland: The True Tale of America’s Opiate Epidemic by Sam Quinones
A fascinating if sad story of how drugs became such a part of our lives. There
are no easy solutions but the author offers reasons for hope.
Richard Kooken, Retired Teacher, recommends:
Washington Black by Esi Edugyan
Washington Black is a fictional slave narrative and a fast-paced nineteenth
century adventure novel. Protagonist-narrator “Wash” escapes bondage in a balloon
piloted by his mentor-rescuer who has encouraged the boy to develop his prodigious
artistic talent for making scientific drawings. The narration becomes a rumination
on the effects of alienation.
Janice (Jan) Lapp (Wilson), Retired English Teacher, recommends:
The Elephant Whisperer by Lawrence Anthony with Graham Spence
My book club read this nonfiction book for one of our 2019 readings, though it
was published in 2009. I read a good deal and remember outstanding fiction like
Poisonwood Bible and
Nightingale, but I have never been as mesmerized by a subject and writing
style as this book.
Renée Nicholson, Director of Programs for Multi- and Interdisciplinary
Studies and Director of the Humanities Center, recommends:
Cinderland by Amy Jo Burns
A memoir set in the Pittsburgh suburb of Mercury, PA, focuses on a town both
down-and-out from the collapse of steel, and rocked by a piano teacher accused
of sexually assaulting preteen female students. It’s a well-drawn portrait of
small-town Western Pennsylvania in the 1990s, well-observed and emotionally resonate.
It shows the best and worst of a youth-obsessed culture, showing a complicated
coming-of-age for a young girl in this not-quite ghost town.
Gilead by Marilynne Robinson
"Gilead (is) a quick, deep, celebration of life that you must not miss,” The Christian Science Monitor Review. I loved this book.
Felon by Reginald Dwayne Betts
“Name a song that tells a man what to expect after prison.” Felon is that song. From the opening ghazal to the closing crown of sonnets, Betts’ third book of poems reckons with loss, longing, regret, violence, cages, and what does not end. There is a line spoken by a mother in a courtroom that may haunt me forever. It is a gorgeous and devastating book.
Frances Simmons, Retired Teacher, recommends:
Where The Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens
Set in the marshlands of the North Carolina coast and written in beautiful prose,
this novel deals in abandonment, trust, coming of age, an engrossing whodunit,
and a lovely tribute to the natural world.
Lynne Stahl, Faculty, recommends:
In the Dream House by Carmen María Machado
I used to think I liked memoir, then I realized I just liked cultural critique
framed through personal experience. Then I read
In the Dream House and realized I do in fact like memoir, at least when
it helps me see the form of memoir itself and the act of reading it in a new
light. Written in the second person,
In the Dream House is a dark archive and testimony of an abusive relationship,
yet it also casts a Medusan gaze on all things literary - including its readers
- that is both illuminating and empowering.
Timothy Sweet, Faculty, recommends:
Washington Black by Esi Edugyan
Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead
The Water Dancer by Ta-Nehisi Coates
Several recent historical novels have creatively engaged with the experience
of slavery, such as Esi Edugyan’s
Washington Black or Colson Whitehead’s
Underground Railroad. Maybe the best of these is Ta-Nehisi Coates’s
The Water Dancer. It’s realist with just a touch of magic.
Kate Van Sant, Retired, recommends:
The Mask of Command by John Keegan
Keegan is probably the best military historian of the 20th Century. His meticulous
description of battles and the psychology of the commanders involved are spot
on, as General Giap said, “Your people have not read enough history.”
Lisa Weihman, Faculty, recommends:
The Dutch House by Ann Patchett
Ann Patchett’s eighth novel is a contemporary gothic tale of a family haunted
by the eponymous house, a 1922 mansion that forces its occupants to reconsider
who is family and what makes a home. Over the course of five decades, siblings
Danny and Maeve Conroy endure a series of adversities straight out of a fairy
tale: the loss of their parents, a wicked stepmother, and a quest to understand
the rise and fall of their family’s fortunes. The novel investigates the power
of family myth in our construction of the self, and how our lives are often shaped
by our fractured memories of an unrecoverable past.
Johanna Winant, Faculty, recommends:
The City and the City and
Embassytown by China Mieville
I’ve been deep in the oeuvre of China Mieville for my pleasure reading, and I
highly recommend two of his novels:
The City and the City (a police procedural set in imagined eastern European
twin cities) and
Embassytown (a science fiction novel set in a far distant future planet
that’s also an exploration of how metaphor works). Both are incredibly original,
quite moving, and will make you think about our own world in new ways.
Want to see your name next year? Share your updates and book recommendations with us.
We’d like to know what you’ve been up to! Please email Marsha.Bisset@mail.wvu.edu with the following information, and your recommendation will be featured on next year’s list.
- Name
- Address
- Connection to the Department of English (Faculty, Alumni, Friend, Donor or other)
- Degree Earned and Year of Graduation
- Current Occupation (optional)
- Title and Author of Recommendation
- Brief Recommendation (50-100 words)