It's become a dumping ground for recent gifts from family members. I read these books in short bursts before falling asleep. From my sister: Letters to a Young Teacher by Jonathan Kozol. Consider this: "fighting to defend that right to celebrate each perishable day and hour in a child's life may, in the current climate of opinion, be one of the greatest challenges we have." From my brother-in-law: Satchel: The Life and Times of an American Legend by Larry Tye. Satchel Paige was much more than a ballplayer.
Favorite book when you were a child:
I found it in a bargain bin at a fundraiser when I was about 10--Somebody Up There Likes Me by Rocky Graziano. I still have it. An old dime-store paperback held together by a rubber band.
Your top five authors:
Though the reasons may be different, the reason for each one is good and real. These are the writers who have had the greatest impact on me over the last decade: Joseph Mitchell, Louise McNeill, Frank X. Walker, Jim Comstock and Rick Bragg.
Book you've faked reading:
There are so many. I wasn't always the most diligent student of literature in school. What comes to mind are things like The Age of Innocence and The Portrait of a Lady.
Book you're an evangelist for:
Refuge by Dot Jackson. A true and beautiful novel.
Book you've bought for the cover:
From the Smithsonian Institution, a book simply titled Human. Consider the lines in a human being's hand. See where that takes you.
Book that changed your life:
The Road by Cormac McCarthy. It made me think of my sons and myself as a father, in a particular way I hadn't before. This is both good and bad, of course. Simultaneously it is life-affirming and horrifying.
Favorite line from a book:
"I have gulled the pith from a sumac limb
To play a tune that my blood remembers."
--Epigraph for The Ballad of Trenchmouth Taggart, from former West Virginia poet Laureate Louise McNeill.
Book you most want to read again for the first time:
Joe Gould's Secret by Joseph Mitchell.