The following list was decided after consultation between California Review of Books co-editors David Starkey and Brian Tanguay and the journal’s most frequent reviewers, Walter Cummins and George Yatchisin. As always when creating year-end lists, we could have easily generated another one that included dozens of additional outstanding books. However, we believe a reader who dives into these particular volumes will find work that is stimulating, provocative, deeply memorable — and in some cases unexpected. Once again, CRB‘s celebrated eclecticism is on proud display in this list. (The books are presented in alphabetical order by author’s last name.)
The Harder I Fight the More I Love You by Neko Case (Grand Central)
Uber-talented singer-songwriter Neko Case pens a memoir as lyrical as one of her enchanting songs, less a standard music bio than a book examining and defending art — how and why we make it and need it. That involves digging, a care to ever reconsider the past, a drive to outrun whatever hunts and haunts us, from the Green River Killer to familial trauma. And a hope to be fiercely feminist — at one point she rightfully laments, “How do women have any space left inside us with all the shit we swallow?” (Read George Yatchisin’s full review here .)
