Home Sweet Own Book 12

For Book about Books, I read Judging a Book By Its Lover by Lauren Leto. This review will be kind of long as I have a few bones to pick with Miss Leto.

I loved the sound of this book. As a bibliophile, it seemed like a really fun read. I expected someone who loved books in all incarnations. Instead I got someone who either ignored or bashed most of what I like to read.

I strongly suspect Leto is a genre snob. Classic and contemporary literature are ubiquitous but everything else gets a quick nod or is skipped entirely. She mentions romances to mock them, mysteries never, and only classic sci-fi (Clarke, Heinlein, Asimov, etc). If there was any mention of contemporary genre or speculative fiction, I missed it.

Leto claims to love memoirs by celebrity relatives but you wouldn’t know it from the way she talks about them. Most of what she said about memoirs and essays lead me to believe she’s annoyed by their existence. If she hadn’t outright said she loved them, I’d have never known.

The how-to-fake-it section was interesting, helpful, and introduced me to some books I want to read. It started fun then dragged then stopped being compelling and just something to get through.

It either needed to be broken up or some authors should have been cut. I have never had to fake having read Zadie Smith among many others. And for all the authors included, Jane Austen was omitted.

I know Leto hates chick lit but most women and some men have had to fake having read something by Austen at some point. I’ve read a lot of articles touting the reasons why Jane Austen should be considered classic literature instead of highbrow chick lit. I suspect Leto omitted Austen because it’s not literati cannon and is therefore beneath her.

I wasn’t nuts about the narrative structure either. The book was split between Leto’s life and bits from her blog. If it had been all of one or the other or divided so it was read that way, it would have better flow. This just felt disjointed and cobbled together.

Leto had plenty of interesting things to say, especially in the final chapter. She has talent and I would love to see it somewhere else. Parts were fun but as a whole? I give it an unenthused meh.

1) Fiction 

2) Nonfiction – The Man Who Loved Books Too Much by Allison Hoover Bartlett

3) Sci-Fi – Redshirts by John Scalzi

4) Fantasy 

5) Mystery 

6) Horror 

7) Memoir/Biography – Data, A Love Story by Amy Webb

8) Chick Lit – Me and Mr. Darcy by Alexandra Potter

9) Feminist 

10) Teen 

11) Holiday 

12) Essays – What Was I Thinking? ed. by Barbara Davilman & Liz Dubelman

13) Short Stories 

14) Library 

15) Animal 

16) Book about Books – Judging a Book By Its Lover by Lauren Leto

17) New – Pitch Perfect by Mickey Rapkin

18) Old – Dark and Stormy Knights edited by P. N. Elrod

19) Pop Science 

20) Near 

21) Far 

22) Graphic Novel – Love and Capes: Do You Want to Know a Secret? by Thomas F. Zahler

23) Reread – Ready Player One by Ernest Cline

24) Wild Card 

25) Otherworldly Creature 

26) Free – Point Your Face at This by Demetri Martin

27) Noteworthy 

28) Bestseller 

29) Themed Anthology 

30) Steampunk 

31) Movie-Book 

32) Media  

33) Travel 

34) Food 

35) Classic 

36) Humor 

37) Poetry 

38) Past – Stasiland by Anna Funder

39) Future 

40) Dystopia/Post-Apocalyptic 

41) Zombie 

42) Sports

Music: She Don’t Like Firefly by Mikey Mason