Good Reads & Views

The Office BFFs: Tales of The Office from Two Best Friends Who Were There by Jenna Fischer and Angela Kinsey
Nonfiction  

What it’s about: Jenna Fischer and Angela Kinsey will probably always be best known as Pam and Angela from The Office, but in this heartfelt and exuberant memoir, they share the story of their real-life friendship and their love of their work. You’ll hear the true stories of how famous scenes were filmed, as well as humorous and surprising tales of the making of the show.   

Why you might like it: If you enjoy behind-the-scenes memoirs, workplace chronicles, or books about the creative process, this book is for you. It’s also a great narrative of friendship, with the authors telling the story as if they’re sitting in the room with you. Highly recommended on audio! 

You might also like: If you’re a fan of The Office, there are several other great memoirs by cast members and creators, all of which are excellent as audiobooks: Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? (And Other Concerns) by Mindy Kaling, The Bassoon King: My Life in Art, Faith, and Idiocy by Rainn Wilson, and Welcome to Dunder Mifflin: The Ultimate Oral History of The Office by Brian Baumgartner and Ben Silverman.  

Visit Stacey’s My Librarian Page

Year of the Tiger: An Activist’s Life by Alice Wong
Nonfiction

What it is: This memoir is an “impressionistic scrapbook” of Wong’s life as an Asian American disabled activist. Wong, who uses a wheelchair and a BIPAP ventilator machine (“I became Darth Vader,” she quips when she acquires the machine) due to a neuromuscular disability, has drawn together a powerful collection of original essays, interviews, blog posts, personal photos, and artwork by disabled artists that address what it’s like to navigate in an ableist society. Wong is the founder and director of the Disability Visibility Project, an online community dedicated to creating, sharing, and amplifying disability media and culture.

Why you might like it: Alice’s candor and ferocity make space and understanding for people living with disabilities. She shares her family stories, her history of “accidental" activism, and her love of pop culture, food, and cats with humor, playfulness, and creativity. Her wit, honesty and rage create an intimate and enlightening portrait of what it is like to face the obstructions and joys of living in a world made for the able-bodied. Empowering and entertaining.

You might also like: Being Heumann by Judith E. Heumann, an intimate and irreverent memoir by the “mother” of the Disability Rights Movement; Sitting Pretty by Rebekah Taussig, a nuanced and lyrical memoir, and the funny and edgy Golem Girl by Rita Lehrer.

Visit Laura’s My Librarian Page

Ducks: Two Years in the Oil Sands by Kate Beaton  
Nonfiction 

What it is: A graphic novel memoir that asks, “what do you do when you come from a place that you love passionately but that holds no promise for your future?” 

What it’s about: Its 2005, and 21-year-old Kate is newly graduated from college with a liberal arts degree and no prospects. To pay off her mountain of college debt, Kate leaves her beloved Cape Breton and heads west to join Alberta’s oil rush, where men outnumber women 50 to 1, and loneliness is reflected in the landscape.  

Why it stands out: The graphic panels depict lush beauty—deep snow, starry skies, and the northern lights—but also portray the imposing mass of machinery obliterating the landscape in staggering, gigantic scenes carving scars in the wilderness. Beaton knows what to show and what to leave out, both in the story and in the cartooning. This personal history is audaciously honest, powerful, compassionate and humane, and is laced with deadpan humor. 

Visit Laura’s My Librarian Page

Last Train to Memphis: The Rise of Elvis Presley by Peter Guralnick 
Nonfiction 

What it’s about: While many of us know a thing or two about Elvis, this immersive biography is a meticulously researched and compelling look at his young life that reveals the vulnerability—and eventual triumph—of his early years. In 560 pages that fly by, Guralnick gives us the young Elvis Presley in vivid technicolor.  

Why you might like it: For rock & roll enthusiasts, this book is a treat: it’s the first of two volumes considered the definitive biography of Elvis. Readers who love biographies will appreciate the in-depth research combined with sparkling writing about larger-than-life personalities against a lovingly depicted backdrop of 1950s America. 

Reviewers say: “A serious, musically literate, and historically attuned biography. An American epic that belongs on every bookshelf” (Kirkus Reviews).

Visit Stacey’s My Librarian Page

Left on Tenth by Delia Ephron
Nonfiction

About the Author: Delia Ephron is a bestselling author, screenwriter, essayist, and playwright. Her novels include Siracusa, The Lion Is In, and her movie credits include You’ve Got Mail and Hanging Up. Her play, Love, Loss, and What I Wore, written with her sister Nora Ephron, ran for two years off Broadway.

Reviewers say: “Ephron’s memoir is a heart-wrenching tale of second chances at life and love” (TIME Magazine).

You might also like: Sister Mother Husband Dog by Delia Ephron or The Most of Nora Ephron by Nora Ephron

Visit Roseanne’s My Librarian Page

Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing by Matthew Perry
Nonfiction

What it’s about: Friends, Lovers and the Big Terrible Thing is Matthew Perry’s memoir about his addiction, his illness, and his paralyzing loneliness. He takes us through his “hell” but doesn’t wallow. Ultimately, this book is filled with hope for the future.  

Reviewers say:  “The beloved star of Friends takes us behind the scenes of the hit sitcom and his struggles with addiction in this ‘candid, darkly funny...poignant' memoir” (The New York Times).

You might also like: Greenlights by Matthew McConaughey or Will by Will Smith.

Visit Roseanne’s My Librarian Page

Are You There, Vodka? It’s Me, Chelsea by Chelsea Handler
Nonfiction

About the author: “Chelsea Handler is an accomplished stand-up comic and actress, as well as the bestselling author of My Horizontal Life. She was the star of her own late-night show on E!, Chelsea Lately; was one of the stars of Girls Behaving Badly; has appeared on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno and Late Night with David Letterman; and has starred in her own half-hour Comedy Central special. Chelsea makes regular appearances in comedy clubs across America and lives in Los Angeles” (Amazon).

Reviewers say: "Ms. Handler's style is a friendlier, more workaday version of the haughty self-abasement practiced by Sarah Silverman, leavened by the everywoman spirit of Kathy Griffin... She seems like a cruel queen bee from an expensive college: There's something suspiciously sophisticated about how her jokes line up that suggests the moral austerity of a comic not of [Joan] Rivers's bad-girl school: Tina Fey" (New York Times).

You might also like: Why My Third Husband Will Be a Dog by Lisa Scottoline or Lies That Chelsea Handler Told Me by Chelsea Handler.

Visit Roseanne’s My Librarian Page

Ancestor Trouble: A Reckoning and a Reconciliation by Maud Newton
Nonfiction   

What it’s about: In this candid, vulnerable, and engaging mash-up of memoir, genealogical research, science, and sociology, the author investigates her troubling family history. From shocking stories about her parents to disturbing discoveries about her Southern ancestors, Newton faces the unsettling truths about her family. Interspersed with her genealogical quest, she explores genetic research to learn more about nature vs. nurture, and she does some serious soul searching to determine how to respond to her findings.

You might also like: Readers of The Glass Castle will find Newton’s family story similarly compelling. To read another memoir about life-changing genealogical discoveries, pick up Dani Shapiro’s Inheritance: A Memoir of Genealogy, Paternity, and Love.

Reviewers say: “An engaging and thoroughly researched memoir relaying a family history that is at turns recognizable and abhorrent, as an honest and typical history of American exceptionalism, racism, and misogyny. Will appeal to lovers of memoirs, family secrets, genealogy, and the sociological makeup threading U.S. history” (Library Journal).

Visit Stacey’s My Librarian Page

Chasing History: A Kid in the Newsroom by Carl Bernstein
Nonfiction

What it’s about: Before he became famous for his Watergate reporting at the Washington Post, Carl Bernstein started his newspaper career as a teenage copy boy at the Washington Star. This engaging, spirited memoir tells the story of a young man finding his calling in the rollicking newsrooms of the early 1960s. Bernstein provides a wide-eyed, first-hand, behind-the-scenes view of reporting major 20^th century news stories, including the Civil Rights Movement, Sputnik, and the Kennedy assassination.

Why you might like it: Bernstein is a great storyteller, and the people of the newsroom are quirky, larger than life, and unforgettable—so this memoir reads like fiction (even though it’s true).

You might also like: While the timeframe and setting are completely different, Mark Twain’s Life on the Mississippi is another exuberant memoir of mastering skills through on-the-job training.

Visit Stacey’s My Librarian Page

You Can’t Be Serious by Kal Penn
Nonfiction 

What’s it about: The star of movies and television recounts why he rejected the advice of family and his high school guidance counselor and, instead of pursuing a degree in the sciences, he majored in theater, film and sociology. He has confronted racism in Hollywood, met his NASCAR loving future husband, and took a sabbatical from acting to work in the Obama administration. Kal Penn narrates the audiobook himself and it’s amusing and candid.

Reviewers say: “An incredibly joyful and insightful experience for the reader . . . Kal Penn’s journey is unique and special and demands respect. He delivers his story with a kind of compassion and humor we simply do not usually see. I recommend this read to anyone and everyone” (Kiefer Sutherland).

You might also like: Greenlights by Matthew McConaughey or My Squirrel Days by Ellie Kemper  

Visit Roseanne’s My Librarian Page