Five

On Reading in 2023

There are two truths I have particular trouble accepting as a mortal being:

1. I will never be able to read all the books.

2. I will never be able to visit all the places.

In my last newsletter, I chronicled my life-long love of reading and my much more recent love of keeping track of my reading using various structures.

In 2023, I read by place.

Step 1: Anytime I had a trip planned, I bought a book that took place wherever I was going. A book of essays to read while at my cousin's wedding in Miami. A novel about Highland Hospital for my future-sister's bachelorette party in Asheville, NC. A memoir about a childhood actor for my brother's wedding in LA.

Step 2: I bought a world and a USA scratch off map. Whenever I finished a book, I tracked everywhere it had taken me by scratching off the states and countries the book had discussed. I used these tiny stick-on color-coded rhinestones to track the exact cities I’d visited. At the end of the year, I can announce that I read my way through 32 countries and 25 states.

My rule was I could scratch off a state or country, and/or add a rhinestone, if the book spent at least one page in a location. That meant sometimes I'd scratch off a country because I spent time with an author who had a profound understanding of the place and chronicled things like a country’s geography, culture, language, and customs, such as when I scratched of Jamaica after finishing Safia Sinclair's memoir, HOW TO SAY BABYLON. But other times, I'd scratch off a country because a character spent a few pages on a foreign beach on vacation, such as when I scratched of Uruguay after reading Alex Dahl's THE BOY AT THE DOOR.

Yep, I admit it. Some countries got scratched off when I had learned nothing about them, when perhaps even the author barely knew anything about them.

So, was there a point to this? Nope. About halfway through the year, I thought about changing the rules and only scratching off places when I felt the author had some profound connection or understanding of them…but the thing is, I love scratching off my map. It's like being a kid in the elevator and pressing the button.

Plus, I figure, when living adjacent to a midlife crisis, isn't it important to do some things that simply have no real point?

Despite my liberal scratching-off “rules,” I did read from a wider swath of the world because of this project. I noticed when authors really evoked a sense of place. I also grappled more directly with my two biggest complaints about being mortal.

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Here are some of the book I read this year that really delivered on that sense of place. (These are in the order in which I read them.)

Tokyo, Japan: DIARY OF A VOID, by Emi Yang (novel, adult)

Miami, FL: THE PRINCE OF LOS COCUYOS, by Richard Blanco (essays, adult)

Canada: DUCKS, by Kate Baton (graphic memoir, adult)

Baltimore, MD: THE VOUCHER PROMISE, by Eva Rosen (non-fiction, adult)

Norway*: THE BOY IN THE DOOR, by Alex Dahl (novel, adult)

Seaside, NJ: THE SHORE, by Katie Runde (novel, adult)

Ivory Coast: AKISSI, by Marguerite Abouet (graphic novel, middle grade)

Jamaica: HOW TO SAY BABYLON, by Safia Sinclare (memoir, adult)

New Zealeand: PET by Catherine Chidney (novel, adult)

Jalisco, Mexico: MEXIKID by Pedro Martin (graphic memoir, middle grade)

(*But not Uruguay)

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I'd love to hear anyone thinks if anyone has read or decides to read any of these!

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And, for those who also enjoy whimsical pointlessness, here are my 2023 book stats

• Total books: 41

• Adult: 35

• Teen/YA: 0

• Middle grade: 6

• Graphic: 5

• Non-graphic: 36

• Fiction: 20

• Memoir: 15

• Non-fiction/Non-memoir: 6

Conclusions:

1. I read much more than I expected to be able to, because this doesn’t count all the reading I did for school. Yay!

2. Six middle grades only? ZERO YA books?? How did that happen? That's just embarrassing.

3. 2023 Caela was very into memoir. This spanned from the deep and heavy to the silly and pop-culture-y. They are often good for lots of scratching off, but I'm also genuinely enjoying them.

2024 Reading Goals:

1. Keep up the reading and scratching the same way–It was too fun to stop after just one year!

2. Read more books by authors who are actually from different countries, including books in translation.

3. Read more kidlit!

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News:

• There’s going to be an audio-book version of my book from 2017, FOREVER OR A LONG LONG TIME! It’s releasing 1/30/2024, and the reader is fabulous.

• And I have a brand new book, THE WORLD DIVIDED BY PIPER, releasing on March 19, 2024. Available now for preorder!

• There will also be a launch event in NYC for THE WORLD DIVIDED BY PIPER, details coming soon!

What I'm recommending:

1. Find something pointless, whimsical, and structured to add to your 2024. If you're someone who lives much of your life for someone else, this can be a radical act of self-care.

2. My fave five books I read in 2024:

• HOW TO SAY BABYLON, by Safia Sinclair

• DUCKS, by Kate Beaton

• I’M GLAD MY MOM DIED, by Jeanette McCurdy

• THE SHORE, by Katie Runde

• PET, by Catherine Chidgey

3. I’m still recommending my favorite book from 2022 because it was one of my favorites of all time: INVISIBLE CHILD by Andrea Elliot. Read it, and then talk to me about it!

What I'm looking for:

Help me read the world! What great books for place have you read?

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And finally, here’s the full list of countries I "visited" in 2023 (no matter how briefly or how inauthentically)

-Austria (1 book)

-Canada (2 books)

-China (1 book)

-Denmark (1 book)

-Dominican Republic (1 book)

-Egypt (1 book)

-France-(3 books)

-Germany (1 book)

-India (1 book)

-Ireland (2 books)

-Israel (1 book)

-Italy (1 book)

-Ivory Coast (1 book)

-Jamaica (1 book)

-Japan (4 books)

-Kazakhstan (1 book)

-Mexico (1 book)

-New Zealand (1 book)

-Norway (1 book)

-Pakistan (1 book)  

-Peru (1 book)

-Poland (1 book)

-Qatar (1 book)

-Russia (2 books)

-Sweden (1 book)

-Taiwan (4 books)  

-Tanzania (1 book)

-Thailand (1 book)

-Uganda (1 book)

-UK (6 books)

-Uruguay (1 book)

-USA (23 books)