Your highly relevant bookish gift guide curated by Megan Collins
Rather than giving you more new releases to keep up with this month, I thought I’d help you out with your holiday shopping and give you some gift recommendations instead.
Because any Gift Guide worth its salt has a theme, this one’s is: Highly relevant book recommendations. From older feminist classic to recent favorites and newer releases, I have everything from poetry to horror to gift the very discerning reader in your life.
Burnt Out Friend: Can’t Even Anne Helen Petersen
We’ve all been there, you’ve succumbed to the pressure of capitalism and pushed too far. Now, you’re emotionally, physically, and spiritually exhausted. While it’s not the holly-jolliest thing to consider right now, it seems to be the harsh reality of the 2022 holiday season. So if you have a friend who’s recently given you the privilege of sharing that they’re hanging on by a tinsel-covered thread, get them Anne Helen Petersen’s Can’t Even. It’s a thoughtful exploration of Millennial work culture that changed my life when I read it last summer.
DESCRIPTION: An incendiary examination of burnout in millennials--the cultural shifts that got us here, the pressures that sustain it, and the need for drastic change
Do you feel like your life is an endless to-do list? Do you find yourself mindlessly scrolling through Instagram because you're too exhausted to pick up a book? Are you mired in debt, or feel like you work all the time, or feel pressure to take whatever gives you joy and turn it into a monetizable hustle? Welcome to burnout culture.
While burnout may seem like the default setting for the modern era, in Can't Even, BuzzFeed culture writer and former academic Anne Helen Petersen argues that burnout is a definitional condition for the millennial generation, born out of distrust in the institutions that have failed us, the unrealistic expectations of the modern workplace, and a sharp uptick in anxiety and hopelessness exacerbated by the constant pressure to "perform" our lives online.
Your favorite client and/or co-worker: Lady Bird Screenplay Book
I personally believe coffee table books are about to be all the rage so why not show off how ahead of the curve you are by gifting one of the coolest ones out there? Indie film It-brand A24 has just the thing with its series of screenplay books. It’s my favorite and I highly recommend if the receiver is a feminist pop culture lover.
DESCRIPTION: Book 006 in the Screenplay Collection features a foreword by Stephen Colbert, essays by Haley Mlotek, Hunter Harris, and E.A. Hanks, and Greta's letters to Dave Matthews, Alanis Morisette, and Justin Timberlake.
Your Super Deep Friend: Alive at the End of the World by Saeed Jones
Save yourself the lecture about how “there’s no ethical consumption under capitalism” and that “compulsory Christmas gifts are silly, especially in this economy” with this perfect read. From co-host of one of my standout podcasts of the year, Vibe Check, Saeed Jones, this book is sure to be full of cutting-edge, thoughtful, perspectives from one of the most brilliant voices of our generation.
DESCRIPTION: Pierced by grief and charged with history, this new poetry collection from the award-winning author of Prelude to Bruise and How We Fight for Our Lives confronts our everyday apocalypses.
In haunted poems glinting with laughter, Saeed Jones explores the public and private betrayals of life as we know it. With verve, wit, and elegant craft, Jones strips away American artifice in order to reveal the intimate grief of a mourning son and the collective grief bearing down on all of us.
Your friend who is taking a break from dating to focus on herself: Women Who Run with the Wolves: Myths and Stories of the Wild Woman Archetype by Clarissa Pinkola Estés
Women Who Run with the Wolves is the All About Love of 2023 (i.e., what all the New York “it girls” will be toting on the subway & LA girlies will be listening to on their hot girl walks). This dense but thought-provoking book is perfect to read and contemplate in the bathtub with a glass of wine or under a blanket with a journal.
DESCRIPTION: Clarissa Pinkola Estes, Ph.D., Jungian analyst and cantadora storyteller, shows how women's vitality can be restored through what she calls "psychic archeological digs" into the bins of the female unconscious. In Women Who Run with the Wolves, Dr. Estes uses multicultural myths, fairy tales, folk tales, and stories chosen from over twenty years of research that help women reconnect with the healthy, instinctual, visionary attributes of the Wild Woman archetype. Dr. Estes collects the bones of many stories, looking for the archetypal motifs that set a woman's inner life into motion. "La Loba" teaches about the transformative function of the psyche.
Your friend who hates reading but loves celebrities: Finding Me: A Memoir by Viola Davis
I added this to my list after they covered it on one of my favorite podcasts, Celebrity Memoir Book Club. Rarely do I walk away from listening to that podcast thinking I must read the book they just essentially spoiled (in the best way!) but Viola’s story is that intriguing. As someone who follows celebrity culture, I have noticed the work of actors sometimes gets overshadowed by the glamor and drama of celebrity. However, hearing Viola talk about her work, her art really, helped remind me why I love tv and movies as a storytelling medium.
DESCRIPTION: In my book, you will meet a little girl named Viola who ran from her past until she made a life-changing decision to stop running forever. This is my story, from a crumbling apartment in Central Falls, Rhode Island, to the stage in New York City, and beyond. This is the path I took to finding my purpose but also my voice in a world that didn't always see me.
Your horror-loving friend: White Horse by Erika T. Wurth
If the recent obsession with Wednesday Addams on Netflix is any indication, the horror genre is only going to continue to dominate. For your freaky friends who can’t get enough, get them the book they probably didn’t even think to put on their list but should read, the new release White Horse by Erika T. Wurth.
DESCRIPTION: Heavy metal, ripped jeans, Stephen King novels, and the occasional beer at the White Horse have defined urban Indian Kari James's life so far. But when her cousin Debby finds an old family bracelet that once belonged to Kari's mother, it inadvertently calls up both her mother's ghost and a monstrous entity, and her willful ignorance about her past is no longer sustainable...
Haunted by visions of her mother and hunted by this mysterious creature, Kari must search for what happened to her mother all those years ago. Her father, permanently disabled from a car crash, can't help her. Her Auntie Squeaker seems to know something but isn't eager to give it all up at once. Debby's anxious to help, but her controlling husband keeps getting in the way. Kari's journey toward a truth long denied by both her family and law enforcement forces her to confront her dysfunctional relationships, thoughts about a friend she lost in childhood, and her desire for the one thing she's always wanted but could never have.