Allen Guy Wilcox discusses A Gentleman in Moscow” by Amor Towles. Towles’s first novel, “Rules of Civility”, was a New York Times bestseller, and “A Gentleman in Moscow”, his second novel, was on the New York  Times bestseller list for over a year and was included on several “best books“ lists in 2016. 

Allen is the founding Artistic Director of The Theater at Woodshill, a not for profit summer Shakespeare festival in central New York. Allen also runs a tutoring company in New York and works for Happiness Studies Academy which is in Tel Aviv and New York.

(Click on picture above for more details.)

Camilla Calhoun discusses The White Moth, a beautifully told, moving and lovely memoir, both historical and very personal. Much of the story takes place on a 15th century farm villa in Tuscany during very challenging times in Italy, from the 1930s to the 1970s: wars, political upheaval, deprivation, fascism, occupation and change. The book is very much a tribute to Camilla’s rock of a mother-in-law, Alda Innocenti Rafanelli. The tribute is offered in the form of Camilla’s memoir of what was intended to be a sojourn in Italy to pursue her passion for writing, her romance with and marriage to Alda’s son, Aldo and eventually a story of three generations at the villa, Aldo’s grandparents, Elvira and Ugo, Aldo’s parents, Alda and Floro, and finally Aldo and Camiila, and also a number of beloved siblings, aunts, uncles, cousins and children.

(Click on picture above for more detail.)

Kendra Dodson Breitsprecher, owner and editor of the Dayton Leader newspaper in Dayton, Iowa, and the “very definition of an establishment Democrat”, discusses the books written by Democratic Presidential candidates Pete Buttigieg, John Delaney, Amy Klobuchar, Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, Andrew Yang, and Joe Biden. These are the remaining candidates of those whose books were on the list put together for the 2020 Book Club created by Andrea Phillips, then Vice Chair of the Iowa Democratic Party, to help Iowans, in advance of the February 3 caucuses, to know the presidential candidates better and to provide a forum to discuss the books written by the candidates.

(Click on the photo above for additional detail, including summaries and reviews of the books written by ten of the candidates)

Uli Beutter Cohen, founder of Subway Book Review (@subwaybookreview) discusses her enthusiasm for five books that she has recently read and that she recommends and that she described as “books that deal with identity and how to find your place in the world”.

These are the essay collection of Korean American artist and activist Alexander Chee (How to Write an Autobiographical Novel); the striking anti-patriarchal manifesto  “with enough rage to fuel a rocket” written by Egyptian American activist Mona Eltahawy (The Seven Necessary Sins for Women and Girls); the semi-autobiographical novel of Vietnamese-American writer Ocean Vuong (On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous); author and illustrator Erin Williams’ “intimate, clever, and ultimately gut-wrenching graphic memoir about the daily decision women must make between being sexualized or being invisible” (COMMUTE - An Illustrated Memoir of Female Shame) and Teen Vogue award-winning columnist; and author of the “Donald Trump Is Gaslighting America” op ed, Lauren Duca’s how to book (How to Start a Revolution: Young People and the Future of American Politics). 

Uli also discussed Bird by Bird: Instructions on Writing and Life (“one of the best books on writing”), by Anne Lamott, and also Devotion: Why I Write, by Patti Smith.

(Click on picture above for more detail.)

Uli Beutter Cohen, founder of Subway Book Review (@subwaybookreview on Instagram) discussed her New York City based and now global social media project, her love for subways, readers and reading (physical books - “the book is a character itself” - not e-books and certainly not listening to books), her love for New York and New Yorkers (“New Yorkers are the most loving people in the universe. This is one of the best cities that ever existed”).

Subway Book Review is a digital community (+ IRL), with contributors in Washington D.C., London, Berlin, Milan, Barcelona, Mexico City, Sydney, and Santiago. + New York, and has had memorials and birthday celebrations and also a 5th anniversary celebration on the G train.

“Books are a reflection of our identity and the questions that we have about our identity; often people are exploring, through the books they are reading, who am I, who can I become and how am I affecting those around me. How am I affecting my environment, how does my environment perceive me.”

(Click on the picture above for more detail.)

Tracy Sidesinger, a clinical psychologist and psychoanalytic psychotherapist in New York City, discusses What My Mother and I Don't Talk About: Fifteen Writers Break the Silence, edited by Michele Filgate. (“Some of these essays are harrowing, some heartwarming, some — like a lot of mother-child relationships — a mix of both. All of them suggest, though, that if you can talk to your mother, you should.” Tampa Bay Times)

Tracy also refers to Mothers: An Essay on Love and Cruelty by Jacqueline Rose, and also Feminine Law: Freud, Free Speech, and the Voice of Desire by Jill Gentile with Michael Macrone. Tracy has said that all three books are along a similar theme, that is, addressing expectations of the feminine and opening up more authentic and useful discourse. 

(Click on the picture above for more detail)

Season Two of our “Tell Me What You’re Reading” podcast has just wrapped up. Thanks to all my Season Two guests and to all who listened in to one or more of our podcasts. Lots of fun discussions. More to come. Listen to all “Tell Me What You’re Reading” episodes on Spotify, Anchor or wherever else you get your podcasts https://anchor.fm/howard

(Click on picture above for additional detail.)

Ep. #11 Dylan Marron: Educated, by Tara Westover + Dylan’s “softness as strength”, etc.

Ep. #12 Alexis Coe on history, research and writing and the tale of Alice + Freda Forever

Ep. #13 Keith Grossman: Bad Blood, American Kingpin and Red Notice - “You Can’t Make This Stuff Up!”

Ep. #14 Nick Lyons: Fly fishing and other lit.; flys, tiers; joy, intensity and solitude of fishing.

Ep. #15 Sophie McManus: The Art of Time in Fiction

Ep . #16 Kate McGloughlin - Requiem for Ashokan - The Story Told in Landscape

Ep. #17 Josh Raff discusses four sets of "paired" books, and more.

Ep. #18 Pride Month/ Stonewall 50: The Great Believers by Rebecca Makkai

Ep. #19 Visiting Days, by Gretchen Primack

Ep. # 20 The Call Me Ishmael Project; Steph Kent and Logan Smalley

Steph Kent and Logan Smalley, founders of the Call Me Ishmael project, are privy to the reading interests of the thousands of people who have called in to.Ishmael’s phone number:(774.325.0503) to leave a voicemail message about the books they love and the stories they have lived. Steph and Kent discuss the Call Me Ishmael Project, their passion for reading and what they have learned about the readers who call in to leave an anonymous message for Ishmael. 

Logan refers to Ishmael of Herman Melville’s Moby Dick as “a fortuitous witness”, as “insatiably curious” and as a collector of stories. An apt way to describe Steph and Logan as well. 

(Click on the picture above for more detail.)

Andrea Phillips, Vice Chair of the Iowa Democratic Party and founder of the 2020 Book Club asked everyone to respond to various questions for each of the books written by the 2020 Democratic candidates. I post on Facebook and also, @bookwormsitw, on Instagram my response to the first question, “How would you review this book in one sentence?”

(Click on the picture above for all of my reviews for the books read so far.)

Bookworms In The Wild is pleased to announce the opening, at The Pines on Route 212 in Mt. Tremper, New York, of our second Little Free Library. Stocked with books donated by a number of friends, our Little Free Library supplements our “Tell Me What You’re Reading” podcast (anchor.fm/howard) effort to encourage reading. Stop by The Pines for dinner or for brunch on the weekend and take a book, or leave a book for someone else to read.

Gretchen Primack discusses her book of poems called ”Visiting Days”, which is inspired and informed by her years of first hand experience teaching and administrating in maximum security prisons.  Visiting Days has been described as a collection of short, keen dramatic monologues, a work of advocacy as well as of poetry. 

(Click on picture for links to books and other resources)

Bookworms In The Wild is pleased to announce the opening, at Marty’s Mercantile on Route 28A in West Shokan, New York, of our first Little Free Library. Stocked with books donated by a number of friends (and special thanks to my personal book dealer, Marlene Lippmann), our Little Free Library supplements our “Tell Me What You’re Reading” podcast (anchor.fm/howard) effort to encourage reading. Hoping to find a way to collaborate with the wonderful nearby Olive Free Library. Stop by Marty’s for breakfast or lunch and take a book, or leave a book for someone else to read.

We recorded this special episode of our podcast at the offices of my law firm, Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe as part of Orrick’s celebration of Pride Month and the commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall riots.

I’m very proud to say that Orrick has a long standing commitment to inclusiveness that enables the LGBTQ lawyers and staff of the firm to be authentic and to thrive. LGBTQ Inclusiveness and Leadership @Orrick

In connection with our Pride Month Celebration, we recorded a podcast discussion of the very moving, beautiful and at the same time devastating, award winning novel, The Great Believers, by Rebecca Makkai, about the AIDs epidemic in Chicago in the 1980s, its impact on the young gay men and on the survivors as well.

(Click on picture for more detail.)

Josh Raff, an accomplished reader and an emerging writer, publishes a blog, which is called “Unbarred” and which is about food, wine, travel, books and , as he says, “other stuff”. The focus of our podcast discussion was on several sets of books, which Josh refers to as either “twinned” or “paired” books + additional books that Josh is reading.

(Click on picture for additional detail.)

• Kate McGloughlin is a painter and printmaker (and storyteller), and through her paintings, poetry and prose, Kate’s book, Requiem for Ashokan, The Story Told in Landscape, is her outlet to tell a personal story with universal themes of tragedy, loss, grief, confusion and rage, as well as of migration, shared resources, competition for resources, and the importance of fair treatment by the government.

(Click on picture for more detail)

Sophie McManus (master's degree in fiction writing/ teaching writing at Sarah Lawrence College; author of critically acclaimed novel, The Unfortunates) discussed with me The Art of Time in Fiction by Joan Silber, and a variety of books written in “Classic Time”, “Long Time”, “Slowed Time”, “Switchback Time” and “Fabulous Time”.

(Click on picture for more detail.)

Nick Lyons is an author, a publisher, a fly fisherman and an avid reader, from Tom McGuane and Ted Lesson to Yates, Melville, Roth and many more.. A Sporting Legend of the Catskills!

(Click on picture for more detail.)

Keith discusses three astounding and true tales included in his “You Can’t Make This Up” category, as well as internet privacy and manners, audio books and walking down the aisle to Springsteen!

(Click on picture for lots more detail.)

Alexis discusses book, Alice + Freda Forever, a tale of same sex love and a murder in Memphis, Tennessee . . . in 1892! Alexis also discusses history (George Washington, etc.), research and the writing process.

Dylan Marron on Tara Westover’s Educated + reading audibly; and Dylan’s forthcoming book about having difficult conversations, empathy on the internet, and wielding softness as strength. It’s called “Snowflake”.

(Click on picture for lots more detail!)