Year-End List: Books & Music

books! music! music! books!

A digital library card is what my life was missing until fairly recently. I’ve had the digital library app Libby for a month and I’m on my 3rd book. On top of all the ebooks, free access to all the magazines feels like I hacked the paywall. Harper’s Magazine, Dazed, The Paris Review, The New Yorker, New York Magazine, Vanity Fair, etc. The books have long weeks-long waits sometimes (Britney memoir: ~10 weeks). More often, the new-ish titles I’m looking for haven’t been acquired by my local library branch yet. Still, my digital library card is another reliable avenue for maintaining a crucial feeling of connection with the world-at-large (my other means being NTS Radio, of course).

It’s the end of the year, so time for some lists!

books

First up, a list of the books I read. It’s kind of an odd mix. I didn’t spend time seeking out new books this year which is why most of these were published prior to 2023. Let me know if you have any recommendations. Especially recommendations on where to find book recommendations!! :)

Starred/italicized entries are highly recommended:

1. All the Lovers in the Night - Mieko Kawakami

2. *Milk Blood Heat - Dantiel W. Moniz: Favorite new (to me) writer alert. This short collection of short stories came out in 2021, and I’m already wondering, when are we getting a new book of stories or maybe a novel?

3. *Everything I Know About Love - Dolly Alderton

4. My Brilliant Life - Kim Ae-ran

5. *Florida - Lauren Groff: Poetic, stunning, truthful. Within each of her stories here, I re-read many sentences with my jaw on the floor, in awe of their sheer perfection.

6. One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez

7. Night of the Living Rez - Morgan Talty

8. The Making of Asian America: A History - Erika Lee

9. The Body Keeps the Score - Bessel van der Kolk

10. *Stay True - Hua Hsu - I’m only halfway in, but it’s obvious it’s about to become one of the most memorable memoirs I’ve read recently. A Berkeley backdrop, college, a music-obsession, a self-aware voice and genuine moments centering on his, as well as his parents’ immigrant experiences in the Bay Area. And, ultimately, as I’ve seen it paraphrased: a story of male friendship and an untimely tragic, carjacking involving the author’s best friend.

music

artist discovery: mandy, indiana

a live band from manchester, uk who sound like the scary-exhilarating corner room of a club night in a basement. stream i’ve seen a way.

music to pretend i’m gen z to (aside from 100 gecs, ofc): yeat, newjeans, yeule

it took me a while to come around to yeat, since i’m not a teenager, but anyone who knows my taste could see it coming. it was “nun id change,” the track produced by working on dying’s bnyx that i had on loop.

another one i’m late to and have no excuse for: newjeans! once i read about them ‘pushing the k-pop agenda’ with wide-ranging influences of uk garage, drum’n’bass, jersey club, etc, i knew it was over. i only listened to their 2 ep’s the other day and, as expected, immediately needed to play them again. stream ep 2.

yeule’s softscars is another album i knew i’d love, based on the quick blurbs i’d read about it and that it’s a ninja tune release. dynamic and multilayered, multigenred, with surprisingly catchy hooks, whether they’re sung over an electronic pop beat or belted over distorted guitars, tinged in 90s alt-rock nostalgia.

on repeat: james blake, king krule, jeff rosenstock

james blake finally made a dance album again (stream). it felt well-timed on a personal front since his first album marked a feeling of ‘first adulthood’ in my life in a way. king krule’s latest full-length space heavy felt comforting in its krule brand of wooziness. hell mode by jeff rosenstock is one of my favorite high energy albums this year. i’m criminally late to him, i admit. honestly, it’s because i watched the documentary about him which was re-uploaded on youtube for the first time in years, or something. i found it and him very inspiring. check it out: never get tired: the bomb the music industry! story.

now, let’s get to 2024.