Reviews, recommendations, and essays for serious readers.
Loveyoumeanitblog — A Life in Books Reviews, recommendations, and essays for serious readers. Browse Latest Posts Books deserve better than star ratings and summary paragraphs. We write about what we’re reading — novels, essays, history, science, poetry — with the kind of attention that treats literature as the complex art form it is. You won’t […]
On a Tuesday in October, I found myself staring at a shirt that says LET’S ROOT FOR EACH OTHER AND WATCH EACH OTHER GROW. The words wrap around four smiling root vegetables—a carrot, a radish, a beet, and an onion—their roots visible in soil. They look like they’re at a party I wasn’t invited to. […]
On the shirt, a small tan chihuahua stands in red boxing gloves in front of a brick wall. Above it, in cream lettering, I GOT THAT DOG. Below it, IN ME. Behind the chihuahua, much larger, is a black wolf-shaped shadow. The shadow is not a second dog. It is the chihuahua’s own shadow, drawn […]
There is a chair in my bedroom that has not been sat on since 2022. It is not a decorative chair. It is not an accent chair. It is a laundry chair, which is a different piece of furniture entirely: a chair that has been demoted from seating to sorting, from furniture to limbo, from […]
The ball is already at the bottom. Above it, in white block capitals: I HAD POTENTIAL. A dashed circle waits at the top of a curved ramp, keeping a place for the version of the ball that was going to amount to something. This is an unusually economical way to disappoint a guidance counselor. The […]
There is a candle on my bookshelf that has never been lit. It sits in a heavy amber jar with a wooden wick and a label that says something like Fireside Fig or Hinoki Smoke—I can’t remember, because I refuse to look directly at it. Looking directly at it would require acknowledging that I bought […]
Comparison culture is the habit of measuring an actual, unedited life against other peopleâs displayed ones â the promotion post, the highlight reel, the friend whose linen closet has labels. It travels with a whole family of named concepts: social comparison theory, FOMO, status anxiety, lifestyle creep, the compare-and-despair loop. And its signature move is […]
Thursday, March 14, 2024. 1:17 AM. Couch. A sweatshirt I have owned for eleven years, with a hole near the collar that I have been meaning to sew for so long that the hole has become a feature. Cereal from a mixing bowl because the cereal bowls are in the dishwasher, which I have not […]