April 2016 Wrap Up

My month of reading only nonfiction has drawn to a close.  It's been a different kind of month reading only informational books, and I have to say that I really missed my fiction! I had a hard time keeping focused on some of these novels.  I read for an hour early in the morning, before work, and I had trouble staying awake sometimes. 

That's not to say I didn't enjoy myself though - I learned a whole lot too. For example, I now know how a human body decomposes, how to spark joy through cleaning my house, and how Victorian London dealt with their sewage.  I read about how two boys orchestrated the first school shooting and saw what happened when a celebrity turned his hand to teaching.  I watched an 8th grader try out fashion advice from the fifties and learned about the emotional complexities of animals. My brain is bursting with new knowledge and I am undoubtedly a better person for it.

Another hidden benefit of reading nonfiction was that it made for excellent conversation-starters.  No one cares about what's going on in a fiction novel, but nonfiction reading gives you endless facts to discuss with people, in which they will usually politely feign interest.  

In the end, I confirmed that fiction will always be my first love, but there's nothing wrong with throwing a little nonfiction into the mix every now and then.

Books Read
Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers by Mary Roach
The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up by Marie Kondo
Spark Joy by Marie Kondo
Columbine by Dave Cullen
I'd Like to Apologize to Every Teacher I Ever Had by Tony Danza
Dirty Old London by Lee Jackson
Popular by Maya Van Wagenen
Beyond Words: What Animals Think and Feel by Carl Safina

Best of the Month: Stiff, I'd Like to Apologize to Every Teacher I Ever Had, Popular
Worst of the Month: No worsts!  All were pretty good.


Books I didn't get to, but am saving for later:
True Notebooks, A Writer's Year at Juvenile Hall by Mark Salzman
In the Garden of Beasts: Love, Terror, and an American Family in Hitler's Berlin by Erik Larson
In the Kingdom of Ice by Hampton Sides

New Favorites:
I'd Like to Apologize to Every Teacher I Ever Had, Stiff


I'm glad to be getting back to fiction again, but I'm glad that I chose this theme for April.  It was nice to step outside my comfort zone and experiment with a different kind of reading for a little while.  I proved to myself that I am more than capable of polishing off a thick nonfiction novel without getting too bored, and I won't hesitate to pick up these types of books in the future.