99 Books Like But Enough about Me

One of the reasons I like this book is because the author is a man writing about a woman’s inner thoughts and, unusually, doing a very good job.

The time and place: London, the 1890s. Single women are known as “the odd women,” the leftovers. Dr. Rhoda Nunn starts a school to train these women in secretarial skills (back then, most secretaries were men) so that they won’t be dependent on relatives or forced into unhappy marriages. Rhoda herself is proudly unmarried and independent – until she meets an absolutely wonderful man. Will she give up her advocacy for “odd women” and marry the man she loves? 

(Warning: this book is out of copyright, so shoddy rip-offs are being sold on Amazon. Make sure you get a legit copy.)

This trilogy about a girl who leaves a small New England town to work at a glossy magazine in Manhattan in the 1950s helped me understand the roots of the 1960s feminist culture. Men, including the man she ultimately marries, are simply seen as the authority based on their gender.

I’ll never forget the scene where the protagonist is trying desperately to have a baby, goes to a replacement doctor during summer vacation, and finds out that her primary doctor has been giving her birth control pills disguised as other prescription medicine. “I didn’t think you were ready to be a mother,” the primary doctor tells her later. 

This rare novel by the TV writer Gail Parent is a broad, almost slapstick comedy about a proudly Jewish girl in the 1970s who moves from Long Island in Manhattan in her bid to find Mr. Right.

“As a graduation present, I was offered either a nose job or a fur coat. I took the fur coat with a high collar.” Mr. Right proves elusive as Sheila makes her way through the swinging singles scene of the time, and she ends up finding a different kind of success as a teacher.

I’ve probably read this book a dozen times and still find it very funny – although, trigger warning, it’s written in the form of an extended suicide note. (She changes her mind.)

This book is so light-as-air that I’ve read it several times and forgotten it entirely in between readings, so it’s always new again. Two 21-year-old friends from Iowa travel to New York City for a summer working at Tiffany’s in 1945, just as World War II is ending. It’s a summer of jewelry, dating, Broadway shows, riding on open-top buses, and a plane that crashes into the Empire State Building.

It’s the perfect beach read; you can probably polish it off in one sun-drenched afternoon.

To me, the star of this novel is the witty banter between the characters and the super sexy will-they-or-won’t-they tension.

The main character is a divorced journalist who writes an in-depth profile about a very well-known actor. I particularly enjoyed how normal seeming the female main character was, and yet it was highly believable that the male actor would find her deeply attractive and interesting.

Just the way a true romance should be!

I love this book because it describes a closed world; an underground scene that was glamorous and edgy. The world of Andy Warhol attracted writers, artists, models, fashion designers, and other ‘beautiful people.’ Warhol helped many of his minions achieve great fame.

I love that the author is a budding writer and also, for all intents and purposes, fatherless. Many of his experiences resonated deeply with my own. This book has the detailed descriptions and self-reflection of a great memoir. 

I’ve always wanted to learn how to surf, and I stumbled upon Diane Cardwell’s memoir Rockaway: Surfing Headlong into a New Life while we were locked down in the middle of the pandemic.

She writes of learning how to surf in midlife and how finding her balance in the ocean led to discovering balance in her life. I marvel at her ability to set her passions above her fear and discovering a home among like-minded people while building a life centered around joy.

She not only embraced but celebrated the unknown, and that led her to discover her true self. After I read her memoir, I booked my first surf lesson, and while I still have a lot to learn, Cardwell’s voice reminds me to get onto a board again.

Simply the Best is a romance set after the COVID-19 pandemic began, and it doesn’t flinch from the pain that era has inflicted on us all. Kallmaker set out to grapple with the question of how we find joy and love after experiencing such devestation, and why trying to find joy and love at all still matters.

This romance is, despite its serious circumstances, as funny and pleasurable as all Kallmaker novels are. 

Adler’s book depicts a woman’s life through a series of moments, incidents, bits of speech that come at the journalist narrator. The short passages perfectly capture the neurotic energy, humor, and horror of New York City. When I first read it, I was blown away. It showed there is great latitude in ways to approach writing. The short, choppy format is the closest a book has come to mirror my experience as a writer who seeks to find meaning and/or humor in everyday life. It’s a jagged mosaic of a book when put together is a delightful treasure.

Hard to imagine a memoir about suicide can be entertaining but, honestly, it was.

Sean Dietrich’s father shot himself when Sean was a child. The book is a roller-coaster ride of emotions Sean experiences as he comes to terms with that event. While the backdrop of the story is that sad beginning, the details of Sean’s life lived along the way are often funny.

His description of math and why he hates it is downright hilarious: “Math is one of those things the good Lord allowed on this earth to remind mankind that the devil is real,” that paragraph begins. Sean details his journey from being a high school dropout to becoming an award-winning, hugely popular author and columnist with brute honesty, a distinctly Southern perspective, and a wit that puts him right up there with Will Rogers.