A couple of people who commented on my Six Year post asked about what I am reading, both in terms of books and blogs.
Books is the easier answer. I am currently reading Teach Your Children Well by Madeline Levine. I recently ready Amy Sohn’s Motherland and re-read Operating Instructions by the incomparable Anne Lamott. Next up is Lee Woodruff’s Those We Love Most. After that, my list includes Allison Pearson’s I Think I Love You, Molly Ringwald’s When it Happens to You, Andrew McCarthy’s The Longest Way Home, and Will Schwalbe’s The End of Your Life Book Club.
Blogs. I read a lot of blogs. There are some I read in full every single time they write something, others that I tend to skim. It’s hard to pick my favorites, and even trying to list the ones I read makes me nervous because I know I’ll forget someone. Some of my favorite blogs are dormant right now, so I don’t list them. But here is a partial list of people whose blogs read most devotedly: Katrina Kenison, Jena Strong, Amanda Magee, Denise Ullem, Aidan Donnelley Rowley, Pamela Hunt Cloyd, Meredith Winn. There are so many more! There are over 100 blogs in my Google Reader, and I check that several times a day.
I read blogs in other categories, too. I read several style blogs religiously, a handful of cooking blogs, and a couple of hilarious commentary-on-celebrity blogs. I read a lot of what Lisa Belkin shares on Parentry at the Huffington Post and many pieces on Literary Mama.
For years I joked that you could tell a lot about someone from the magazines they read. After all, I have such a varied magazine list that a stranger on a plane once commented on it. I think that the same is true of someone’s Google Reader. What they value, what they love, what interests them: these are all apparent from what is contained in their Reader list.
If that’s so, I think my Google Reader selections demonstrate someone who cares passionately about excellent writing, who thinks often and hard about parenting, who likes clothes and fashion and Hollywood news, and wishes she cooked more often and more successfully than she currently does.
What do you read? Books, blogs, magazines? What do your selections say about you?
Madeline Levine’s book is on my night table – I need to read it! I met her this summer in CA. She’s a friend of my sister in-law.
I have quite a varied list too. I try to keep track with Goodreads but my Google Reader is getting bigger and bigger.
A few of my faves:
writeplacewritetime.tumblr.com
brainpickings.org
bookriot.com
catchingdays.cynthianewberrymartin.com
You know what, when someone asks what I’m reading i never think to include blogs, but I SHOULD. I read a lot of blog posts in a week. And I’m glad to see this post as I’m one of the people who asked. 😉
How was Motherland?
Daily RSS feed: This blog! Seth Godin, Hello My Name Is, Thomasville Townie, Print & Pattern, Wired, Springwise, WSJ, CNN.
Book: Seabiscuit – can’t tell you why I am just getting to this book
Magazines: Garden & Gun, Southern Living, House Beautiful, Wired, Fast Co, and many more, especially if I fly anywhere.
Yes, that is an odd combo. You should see my iPod!
Love this. And thank you. I think you know this, but you are my first (and sometimes only) bloggy stop of the day. xxo
Thank you!! I am so honored!!
hmmm. books i have more cookery ones on my shelves than any other seconded by creativity books and photography ones.
magazines – current favourties are kinfolk, nz life & leisure, dumbo feather and 3191 quarterly.
blogs – yep, alot of those too. mostly creatives, photographers and recipes as well! plus colossal, the DO lectures and a few other places that make me think.
guess i am inspired by creativity:)
We are definitely mutual readers! Am honored to be on your list, and as you know, always take time to absorb and ponder your words here. Love that our worlds have come to overlap and intertwine. xo
Honored to be listed as one of your regular reads. Thank you! (And as, you may know, like Aidan, yours is often the only stop I make.)
xoxo