A Year in Reading: Morgan Jerkins

December 18, 2017 | 11 books mentioned 2 min read

This year has been a tremendously difficult one for millions across the country as we figured out how to recalibrate our boundaries towards resistance and self-care, protecting ourselves while defending others, and making time for laughter in the midst of a trash-fire administration. For anyone who has been involved with books, this new political landscape has made it difficult for authors, particularly those with debuts, to have a strong opening, as the cultural window kept shuttering around any and everything that did not relate to he-who-shall-not-be-named and a sum total of our political opinions. Yet still, books have prevailed. And they always will, because they are necessary for guidance, transportation, and understanding.

covercovercoverI am proud to say that the majority of the books I’ve read this year was written by women. Immediately in January, I devoured Difficult Women by Roxane Gay within a few days. Homesick for Another World and The Book of Joan were two outlandish works of art that will stay with me for a long time because I feel like despite completing them, there may have been some details that I might have missed, which may or may not give me an entirely new experience while reading them once more. I read All The Lives I Want by my dear friend Alana Massey, The Autobiography of Gucci Mane, and Hunger. Then I read works that delved deeply into the intricacies of family politics, such as Goodbye, Vitamin, What We Lose, Sing, Unburied, Sing, and The Rules Do Not Apply.  I also read some entertaining debuts, such as Start-Up, Marlena,  and Sour Heart, while reading recent works from more established authors, such as Haruki Murakami’s Men Without Women and Jami Attenberg’s All Grown Up.

covercovercoverThere’s still so much I need to finish: Masha Gessen’s The Future Is History, Carmen Maria Machado’s Her Body and Other Parties, and the Nasty Women anthology, and so much more. But the aforementioned books are those that I remember so vividly, whether I was taking a voyage to Brooklyn, reading as I waited for my tapas at a Barcelona restaurant, or having quiet time away from family back in New Jersey. I hope that they will do the same for you.

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Don’t miss: A Year in Reading 2016, 2015, 2014, 2013, 2012, 2011, 2010, 2009, 2008, 2007, 2006, 2005

's debut essay collection, This Will Be My Undoing, is forthcoming in January 2018 from Harper Perennial.