At the start of 2022, I was reading two books simultaneously, and I had a mental list of many more. Little did I know that I would be experiencing the devastating pain of my grandmother's unexpected departure only a week into the new year. In addition, the end of my contract was approaching, and my unexpectedly extended holiday trip triggered a lot of anxiety. It was not until weeks later, when things had calmed down a bit, that I could pick up where I had left off. And it was not easy.
I have been documenting my reading journey for three years now, and this has been the hardest when it comes to finding the motivation to read: as they say, progress isn't linear. I wish I could say books provided a safe harbor in times of pain, but it wasn't my case if I'm honest. I felt like I needed to be in a peaceful mental state to enjoy my reads. I wondered if I had lost the habit I had taken such a long time to build. And even though it took longer than expected, I am glad to say the will is still there. It is often not as rampant as it used to be, but I am learning to let myself be without forcing things.
Despite all these changes and turns, I have finished some books. Although, perhaps because of my pain and stress, I haven't enjoyed many of them, which is fine, too. Because when good books do come along, I enjoy them more.
I am narrating my experience to let you know that it is okay if you don't feel like reading sometimes. This activity provides excellent learning opportunities, but it is something you should enjoy. Just take it one page at a time, no pressure.
Without further ado, here are my opinions on the books of 2022 in chronological order:
1) Atomic Habits - James Clear:
I am the kind of person who always wants to improve herself but gets distracted easily. Naturally, one of my resolutions for this year was to build sustainable habits that take me where I want to be, and this book was the perfect roadmap for that.
James Clear is an American author and speaker who writes about habit-forming, decision-making, and self-improvement. He started his journey as a productivity newsletter editor, which eventually grew into magazine and media features, and, ultimately, a New York Times Best-selling book.
In this easy read, I found guidelines on how to create and commit to healthy habits and, most importantly, how to break bad ones. Although some tips might seem intuitive, sometimes it's essential to have them laid out and numbered. Furthermore, the author offers clear examples and frameworks to make his advice more palatable and easier to remember. I stand by this book because I started applying its tips to my routine, which has led to significant, long-lasting results.
2) La Etiqueta está Pasada de Moda (Etiquette is Out of Style) - Maria Paula Camacho:
I have been following La Etiquette on Instagram for a few years now. On this account, Maria Paula offers friendly, practical, and quick etiquette tips, or what she accurately calls "the art of knowing how to be / el arte de saber estar".
Etiquette picked my interest in my teenage years, so reading about a topic often considered unnecessary, elitist, or out of style from a millennial's perspective intrigued me.
Maria Paula is a Colombian publicist with extensive experience in protocol and public relations. In addition to growing her successful Instagram account and podcast, she speaks and delivers training on etiquette and personal branding.
In her first book, "La Etiqueta está Pasada de Moda," she offers a guide on managing oneself in all kinds of social settings, from dinner parties to funerals. It includes theories, examples, and golden rules on many of the most common situations we can experience. I found it a helpful pocket guide with tips that place respect at the center of our interactions.
As our world evolves exponentially, I think books like these should continue to exist and make room for our global society's new conventions. In a community that puts the individual above all, it is essential to remember the importance of empathy to be more graceful and better human beings.
3) Lives of Girls and Women (La Vida de las Mujeres) - Alice Munro :
I started this book at the end of 2021 and had to abandon it many times. However, what kept me going were the words of my friend who had recommended it: "it is precious." Unfortunately, I got to the last page without agreeing with her.
The book was written by Alice Munro, a Canadian short-story writer, and winner of the 2013 Nobel Prize in Literature. She is known for the structure of her writing, in which she seamlessly travels back and forth.
The Lives of Girls and Women is about the early years of Del, a girl living in rural Canada. The story starts when she is a child and ends when she is about to graduate high school. Therefore, the book narrates family anecdotes, the teachings of her visionary and rebel mother, the friendships she fostered and then grew apart from, her romantic misadventures, and the way she felt about social conventions. I saw a little bit of myself in the ever-familiar comparisons we women make with one another and how we wonder if we will live up to society's high standards. But still, something failed to capture my attention throughout the book.
Perhaps, it was because I was not reading it in its original language but in Spanish. Being my native language, I was surprised when I couldn't understand several things and when I caught many mistranslated words. I think this distracted me from the actual meaning of the story and made me lose focus when time travel occurred. However, this is a book from a critically-acclaimed author, so I am sure it is far better than its Spanish version. So, if you plan on reading it, I highly recommend sticking to the original.
4) The Four Agreements - Don Miguel Ruiz:
Many people recommend this book as a must-read for personal improvement, and I expected a lot from it. It was written by Don Miguel Ruiz, a Mexican writer and Toltec specialist, and Janet Mills.
From its very cover, the book reveals the four agreements - based on Toltec wisdom - that will help readers end self-limiting beliefs:
Be impeccable with your word
Don't take anything personally
Don't make assumptions
Always do your best
The book then explains these agreements in an exciting display of Toltec wisdom, which I had never heard before. However, while very insightful, I didn't find them to be novel.
In between the chapters, I did find some information that I enjoyed and took in. For example, the author explains the importance of communication as a tool that keeps us from making assumptions and hurting others. Again, intuitive information that we tend to forget to apply in our daily lives.
To conclude, it is a good short book that, while good, I will not be counting among my favorites.
5) I Know this to be True: Jacinda Ardern - Ruth Hobday:
Jacinda Ardern is the public servant I admire the most nowadays, and I try to read as much as I can about her. I Know This to be True is a series created by the Nelson Mandela Foundation compiling "extraordinary figures from diverse backgrounds answering the same questions and sharing their compelling stories, guiding ideals, and insightful wisdom."
The book reads like a magazine interview, but it shows Jacinda's thoughts on empathy (a core pillar of her leadership style), not feeling good enough, facing failure, facing unexpected hardships, and standing out in a male-dominated field. While the book mentions her childhood and early days in the Labor Party, I wish I could have a more in-depth look into her thought process and decisions, the steps that took her where she is, her college years, and how she faced her fears.
In short, I wish I knew more about the in-between moments that made her the woman so many people look up to today.
6) Man's Search for Meaning - Viktor Frankl:
A couple of years ago, a person I admire encouraged me to read this book. I put off buying it, thinking it would be a heartbreaking account of life at concentration camps, but I was wrong. The author described the horrors he faced in Auschwitz and Dachau, but the book is more than that: he recounts his experiences to showcase truths about humankind.
Viktor Frankl was an Austrian neurologist, psychiatrist, and Holocaust survivor. He divided the book into two parts: the psychological conclusions during his stay at different concentration camps and his findings/postulates on logotherapy. Logotherapy is the school of thought that he created, which considers the search for meaning as the motivational force in people's lives.
The first thing that surprised me was how short it was. The second was how it entraps you from the first page with his evident kindness. The third is that every page contains so much wisdom that you cannot put it down. Among the many that caught my attention, here are some of my favorite quotes:
"There are things which must cause you to lose your reason, or you have nothing to lose" - on unexpected reactions to unexpected, unknown conditions.
"Love goes very far beyond the physical person of the beloved. It finds its deepest meaning in his spiritual being, his inner self. Whether or not he is actually present, whether or not he is still alive at all, ceases somehow to be of importance" - on how he held onto his wife's memory to survive.
"Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of human freedoms - to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way" - on the importance of one's mind in preserving independence and freedom, even in the worst of adversities.
"The neurotic who learns to laugh at himself may be on the way to self-management, perhaps to cure" - on the importance of humor and reducing the importance of one's fears to heal.
7- Antología de Cuentos Inolvidables - Various authors:
My friend's dad was kind enough to give me this book, along with the one I read afterward, Chronicle of a Death Foretold. Antología de Cuentos Inolvidables is a compilation of short stories from several authors of many nationalities. The book itself is concise, and the stories do not exceed four pages, some being just a paragraph long.
This was my first time exploring this type of prose, and I was in awe of the power that most of them conveyed in such few words. I would definitely recommend this book to those who want to start reading but cannot undertake more than a few pages a night.
Below is one of my favorites: wisdom encapsulated in only 5 lines.
8- Chronicle of a Death Foretold - Gabriel García Márquez:
It had been a couple years since I last read García Márquez. This book was also short, and as everything he wrote, engaging and full of details and magical realism that, for us Colombians, feel just like home.
The story recounts the moments preceding the death of Santiago Nassar, a wealthy young man, and how everyone knew about the plans to kill him except for himself. I found it to be an easy and light read. I would also recommend it to those wanting to read this author yet cannot get past the specificity of the details and the multiplicity of characters in his longer works.
9- Still Alice - Lisa Genova:
This year has been a painful one for me after my grandmother's death due to Alzheimer's, and I have found some solace in the stories that hit close to home. After finishing This is Us, I recalled hearing about a movie called "Still Alice," and trying to find how to watch it, I discovered it was based on a book. I did not hesitate to buy it.
Still Alice became my favorite book that I have read in 2022. We have all heard stories of family members with Alzheimer's, but we rarely hear about patients themselves. This book led me to a profound introspection, questioning how I never asked my grandmother how she felt and what was going on in her mind. Also, in empathizing with Alice, I felt at moments that I had the illness myself, and I couldn't help but feel frustrated, isolated, and sad. I also learned a lot about the disease, things I did not know despite having co-lived with it for 12 years.
In short, this book is an exercise and a call to action to be more empathetic and understanding. It also motivated me to keep supporting research efforts to find a cure to what I believe to be the cruelest disease.
10- If I Can't Have You - Charlotte Levin:
This year has been very convoluted, so it has been hard to keep up with reading. Because there are so many things going on in the world outside, books have rarely trapped me lately. However, I know that the medicine for my short attention span will always be a thriller.
If I Can't Have You is Charlotte Levin's first book, and it makes for a promising debut. The story traps you from the beginning, making you giggle and cringe. It was refreshing to read a book from the perspective of a character that is well aware of what she is doing, be it positive or VERY negative. I like how the story ended and how it showed the effects of loneliness, trauma, and family chains.
11- One Italian Summer - Rebecca Serle:
I was going to Europe on vacation, and I wanted to have something to read that was light but engaging. I felt this Rebecca Serle book was going to meet my expectations, and it very well did.
"One Italian Summer" was the perfect companion for a fully-relaxed state of mind. I liked to read a book about a close and loving mother-daughter relationship, the pain of that loss, and rebuilding life afterward. In particular, I really enjoyed the descriptions of the locations and the food. They were so vivid that I could imagine me sipping wine and tasting heavenly pasta in Positano's most iconic restaurants and hotels.
While I disagreed with the main character very often, I can understand the confusion caused by grief and how the loss of a loved one can alter how you perceive your relationship with others, your place in the world, and the meaning of life altogether.
If you want to unwind and mentally travel to Europe, this one is for you. Warning: it made me extremely hungry.
12- Qué hacer con estos pedazos - Piedad Bonnet:
To me, Piedad Bonnet's writing is flawless, breathtaking, raw, and capable of making hurtful points, sometimes inadvertently, after any short sentence. I think her gift is being capable of taking even the most minor acts of daily life and observing them till they become too mesmerizing or too painful. On the other hand, she can also explain the smallest trivialities with an eloquence that seems smooth and natural.
In this book, she describes the life of Emilia, a woman in her 60s who revisits her past choices and questions her present circumstances. And even when some of the situations she goes through are routine and others I have not experienced, I found my empathy at its peak. I felt this weight in my heart, this desire to hug this fictional character and listen. Because I think we women are used to taking pain, hurt, and humiliation and storing them in our chest until they inevitably explode.
13- Grit - Angela Duckworth:
Grit is a book about the power of passion and perseverance. I chose it because I wanted to find out how to become a grittier person, and in a laughable act, I actually took a long time to finish it. That was just because, no matter how great a book is, it is just not as entertaining for me to read books that go over more scientific facts/research than stories. In particular, the one had a lot of success stories from the military and sports, two fields I am not too interested in.
Nonetheless, I liked the featured stories of grit paragons, people who started in challenging contexts and succeeded against all odds. For example, I was very impressed by the case of Cody Coleman, a young man who grew up in harsh economic and family circumstances, ended up going to MIT and working in Silicon Valley, and is building a career to inspire other people like him to push through. He says asking himself, "why not?" was pivotal in transforming his life.
To conclude, the book does feature fascinating information, and it achieved something: making me realize the importance of doing one hard thing every day to develop discipline as a way to become grittier, something I aspire to be. Additionally, the book has plenty of information on parenthood and guiding young people to be the best version of themselves. I hope to revisit this book when the time to parent or mentor comes.
14 - The Art of Gathering - Priya Parker:
I saw this book online and it promised to be transformative. As the title suggests, the Art of Gathering explains the importance and the privilege of gathering, and how most times, we take encounters for granted and focus only on logistics, forgetting that they can be meaningful and inspirational.
The book was indeed interesting, with illustrative examples of unique meetings that happen around the world. Since Events have always been an important part of my job, it did make me reflect on the way we are used to doing things, which leads to us not necessarily adding value or respecting people's time.
I would recommend this book to people who love gathering or who do it for a living. It is a lesson about not leaving the course of events to luck, not even if they are a small dinner you host at home. It is also an invitation to add some reflection and depth to our reunions. These lessons are something I think about constantly, and I have found that there are always things, that could be as short or small as a sentence or a toast, that can make people feel special, which is what I think, this is all about.
15 - The Queen: Her Life - Andrew Morton
I got my hands on this biography, published on the occasion of Queen Elizabeth's diamond jubilee, at the perfect time. It came before the premiere of The Crown's Season 5, but most importantly, before the she passed away in September.
Although much is publicly known about the Queen's life, I personally enjoyed learning about lesser publicized parts of her life, such as her childhood and her days as a young wife and mother. I also liked to get new information on the family's reaction to more recent events like Harry and Meghan's departure from the royal family and Prince Phillip's death.
All in all, I think it is an interesting book for people who are interested in current events, the royal family, and/or the life of the longest-reigning monarch in British history.
16 - Beloved - Toni Morrison:
Beloved is an American classic, and a book I was really looking forward to reading. Despite my enthusiasm, it took me a while to understand it and ultimately get the hang of it. But, when I actually did, I was captivated by the tragic story of Sethe, a formerly enslaved woman, and the unexpected twists it took.
17 - Open Book - Jessica Simpson:
My last book of 2022 ended up being my favorite. While I have admired Jessica Simpson's musical talent since I was 12, I never knew much about her life aside from being Ashlee's older sister and having been married to Nick Lachey. So, when I discovered the book inspired an Amazon Prime series, I got curious.
The version of Jessica I found in the book surprised me positively for how far it portrayed her from the stereotypes that the media has reproduced over and over. I was thrilled to learn about the many traumatic experiences she went through at a young age, and her losses and insecurities felt very personal to me, even though our upbringings and realities could not be more different. I was shaken to discover how young she was when she got married, how Christianity has led her life, and the details of her relationships and the personal growth they brought about. Overall, it fostered a newfound respect for her, and I wish she continues to thrive in life.
In process:
Fall of Giants: Ken Follet
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