Great Taste 2024: My Year in Books/Other stuff
The theme is DELUSION ILLUSION
Welcome to Great Taste… where I round up the books (mostly books), movies, songs, and shows that inspired me the most this year. CAVEAT: only about a third of what’s mentioned in this post actually came out in 2024. I’ve decided this is my personal culture-consumption sweet spot… too much old shit and I really feel like I lose the pulse; exclusively new shit and I am utterly bored!
I gave this list the theme DELUSION ILLUSION because that’s the overarching vibe of everything on here. I’d say this is, in general, the theme I’m most preoccupied with in my own work. This year I temporarily reoriented my life so I could prioritize fiction writing over making money. It was an oft-stressful, yet extremely rewarding year… the kind of year you can only have if you’re buffered by delusion (or illusion) yourself! So without further ado… the spirit guides who helped me through:
January & February
My Name is Barbra by Barbra Streisand
If you’re on the fence about Barb, I recommend watching the music video for “Emotion" in which Mikhael Baryshnikov makes an appearance as a window into what awaits you. Streisand’s memoir MUST be consumed as an audiobook, because this 48 hour narrative performance may be her life’s greatest achievement. And getting through it all might be mine.
Worry by Alexandra Tanner
Still thinking about the perfect way Alex ended this novel— that final scene on the beach is sooo sad beautiful tragic. It just hit for me.
Contradiction Days: An Artist on the Verge of Motherhood by JoAnna Novak
An inspired account of going on a writing residency in Taos while you’re very pregnant and under the spell of Agnes Martin’s truly mystical paintings.
The Lover by Bee Sacks
A half-Jewish scholar from Canada moves to Israel and falls in love with a teenage boy in the IDF… no more spoilers. A painful education on the soldier’s role in the Israeli imagination; you won’t see the ending coming.
March, April, May
THIS IS ME…NOW: A LOVE STORY
I watched Jennifer Lopez’s magnum opus sooo many times this year. It is a romantic fantasy musical very very very loosely based on the Puerto Rican folktale “La Leyenda del Picaflor” that tells, through song and dance, the story of JLo’s 30+ year search for true love. It is also a visual accompaniment to her album This is Me…Now. The first time I watched this I was high; the other five times I was not. I have screened it for multiple groups of people this year because I find it to be an extremely rich psychological text. If I wasn’t working on two manuscripts all year, I would have taken the time to devote an entire post about it. Maybe I still will… the Bennifer of it all! (Do not watch the accompanying documentary The Greatest Love Story Never Told without watching this first. The doc is good but you need the context of the movie musical.)
A Year on Earth With Mr. Hell by Young Kim
Surpassed my expectations! First off, the book itself is a beautiful object— its shape, textures, and typeface make it the most luxurious paperback I’ve ever held. Young is a fascinating narrator— she is earnest yet facetious; kind yet unsparing. And it’s refreshing to read a book by someone who did not get an MFA. Every so often I stumbled upon a sentence so odd it took my breath away: “I arrived first and was checking in my rabbit fur coat when he arrived, all snowy,” for example.
Cat Cohen’s COME FOR ME
Cat Cohen is a genius, I can’t believe I am in a Taylor Swift group chat with her. Come For Me has a similar comedy cabaret format to The Twist…? She’s Gorgeous but revved up like 500%: music, jokes, intellect, delivery are all on master mode. “Bit humbling, innit?” is now something I just say all the time. Also her stage fits are to die for. Sorry if you didn’t get to see it live, but you can (and should) watch it here!
“Dade County Dreaming” by Camila Cabello ft. JT & Yung Miami
Cabello did the best thing she could’ve done for her career, which was hire El Guincho to produce for her. This song gets me hyped! It’s everything that inspires me about Miami bottled into a 2.5 min song. So fun. And my hot take is C,XOXO is a better album than Short and Sweet. Though it is a shame there’s so much Drake on it, and that its title has one too many Cs, and two too many Xs. (Cough brat cough)
FAN FICTION by Tavi Gevinson
If you are interested in the parasocialism of modern fandom this is a must read— download the PDF and put it on your Kindle. So smart and inventive and good. Especially poignant for anyone with a foot in the Taylor Swift fandom (I have 2 feet, 2 arms, head, etc in it)
June, July, August
The Member of the Wedding by Carson McCullers
I’ve had this book for ever. Pretty sure I got it from the dollar shelves outside The Strand a decade ago. Frankie is one of the greatest adolescent heroines I’ve ever read, and Berenice her perfect foil. So idiosyncratic and ahead of its time. Hugely on theme for “delusion illusion.” I already want to read it again.
Maud Martha by Gwendolyn Brooks
A nearly perfect novel in fragments written by a great poet. To be read in one glorious sitting. I bought it on the last day of my wedding weekend from Seminary Co-op in Hyde Park. A great Chicago novel.
Angela (1995)
I love the Criterion 24/7 channel too much. It’s amazing how something that used to be standard now feels like a novelty. That’s how I discovered this movie about a young girl named Angela who, after her aging starlet mother is institutionalized, embarks on a spiritual journey to “purify” herself. Artie Bucco from the Sopranos plays her father. I was so moved by this movie, I watched it twice in a row.
My Heavenly Favorite by Lucas Rijneveld
A confession of obsession written from the perspective of Kurt, a farm veterinarian, to Little Bird, a pre-pubescent girl with gender dysphoria who desires to grow a penis. Kurt is writing this from prison, where he’s already been apprehended for his crimes. Fucked up, and weirdly addicting to read. Little Bird is an extremely well-drawn character, both on the page and in Kurt’s imagination.
Exalted by Anna Dorn
Became a big Anna Dorn fan this summer. I read this and Vagablonde, my only two summer reads that actually match the vibe of the season. Propulsive, crazy, extremely LA! Excited to read Perfume and Pain, her latest that was released this year.
Georgia O’Keefe’s My New Yorks at the Art Institute
Beautiful show of paintings O’Keefe created while living in the Shelton Hotel in Midtown Manhattan in the 1920s and 30s. The Shelton was one of New York’s only skyscrapers at the time.
September
Spain (the country)
If I could spend one month in Spain every year for the rest of my life, I would. “Spain” is my recommendation. Go all over. Madrid is a NYC-level cool city, and Basque Country is as magical as everyone says.
The Neapolitan Novels by Elena Ferrante
These rewired my brain for a few months. I read the first 2 in Europe and then the next 2 later in the fall, but I’m lumping them together here because September is when my obsession began. Honored that people often assume she is a major fiction inspiration of mine— well, she is now! The biggest win for 1st person POV there has probably ever been.
The Human Stain by Philip Roth
I did not expect to like this one as much as I did; I don’t think it’s considered one of Roth’s greats. I read The Ghostwriter earlier in the year and enjoyed it a lot but this one really hit diff. It should have its time to shine now that idpol discourse has died down.
October, November, December
Metropolitan (1990)
Not much to say that hasn’t already been said about this perfectly imperfect NY classic! I could watch this on a loop. Seeing the scene where Audrey cries inside St. Thomas Episcopal during Christmas Eve mass on the big screen at the Siskel Center was a highlight of my holiday season!! Also Whit Stillman was there and did a Q&A, and he said don’t move to France if you want to stay culturally relevant. Someone tell my enemy Anna Kloots.
“Downtown Lights” by Annie Lenox (cover)
For the Swifties and the Swiftie-curious, this is the song that Matty Healy sent to Taylor Swift that inspired the TTPD-standout (and my most played song of 2024), “Guilty as Sin.” This song was originally written by The Blue Nile, but Annie’s cover is 10000x better than the original. (It’s better than “Guilty as Sin” too.)
Rejection by Tony Tulathimutte
Compulsively readable, impossible not to lyao every 5 pages. But Tony’s characters, much like the narrator of the Rijneveld novel I mentioned above, will take you down with them— be prepared! I have not been able to stop thinking about “Pics,” the second story in the collection about a girl who hooks up with a guy friend she doesn’t even like like that. The rest of the stories go crazy too. Also, by saying Fiction instead of Stories on the cover, this book is doing the lord’s work.
The Outrun (2024)
Why does it seem like no one saw this movie except my mother in law and I?Saoirse Ronan plays Rona, a recovering alcoholic who moves back home while struggling to stay sober. Home for Rona is the Orkney Islands in Scotland; she was a biology major in college, and there are a lot of sea metaphors. It’s a quiet, stunning film, with an extraordinary performance by Saoirse. Like me, you may have to politely excuse the too-sentimental ending.
Toni Erdmann (2016)
First time seeing this movie by German writer/director/producer Maren Ade that put Sandra Hüller (of Anatomy of a Fall and Zone of Interest fame) on the map— I could not have been more pleasantly surprised! I had no idea what to expect, but even if I did have expectations, I’d have never seen this movie coming in a million years. TRULY WEIRD and BRILLIANT.
WHAT I’M EXCITED TO READ IN 2025:
The Bombshell by Darrow Farr
Yes Darri is one of my good friends…and yes I read an earlier version of this novel. So I can vouch that this book is irresistible, brilliant, and fun! Come summer, every girlie will be consumed by the story of Séverine Guimard, the teenage daughter of a French diplomat who gets kidnapped by Corsican rebels while riding her bike along the Mediterranean sea. No more spoilers, but expect sex, bombs, beautiful prose, and the funniest “girl lost in the wilderness” sequence I have ever read in my life. Pre-order it to waste no time— it’s out in May!
Fortunata and Jacinta by Benito Pérez Galdós
I discovered this book at an English language bookstore in Madrid, and immediately borrowed it from the library once I was stateside. It’s about two women who love the same man. I haven’t cracked it yet because the font is extremely small and I think I need reading glasses lmao. Once I get those, I will be reading this. I’d also appreciate if Penguin Classics re-issued this in a new edition with slightly larger font. Or at least an e-reader version! In the meantime I’m on the hunt for a chic eyeglass chain.
Paradise Logic by Sophie Kemp
I was curious about Sophie’s book since seeing the good ol’-fashioned PW deal announcement about it— a picaresque that follows a gal named Reality Kahn around Brooklyn as she attempts to win the boyfriend game. I read an ARC, it was a blast. Amazing how universal the experience is of being a single girl in NYC in your 20s is. For all the girls who swear they’re “chill”!!!
Sister Carrie by Theodore Dreiser
Random! Got this at Pilsen Community Books over a year ago. It was published in 1900 and considered the first “modern American novel.” I might start reading this over break. The first scene takes place on a train (win), and the font is NORMAL SIZED.
STUFF I REALLY DIDN’T LIKE THAT I THOUGHT I’D LOVE:
Anora (2024)
This is no shade to Mikey Madison, who I think did a really great job with what she was given. I hope to see her gorgeous mug in many more movies. But otherwise this movie was nottt ittttt. Maybe it’s because I grew up around a lot of Russian Jews, or maybe it’s because I simply know what’s up?… but I found this movie wildly unsuccessful on so many levels. First problem being that it wasn’t made by a Safdie. Location scouting was pathetic; there’s so much more to explore in Brighton Beach. It wanted to pay homage to that particular South Brooklyn culture, but it just ended up flattening it. Liana Satenstein was brave enough to write at length about why Anora sucks on Neverworns… thank you queen!!!!
The Secret History by Donna Tartt
I need to know why on God’s earth this book has had such staying power? It’s SO BAD. It loses 100% of its steam halfway through and the rest of it is one long boring drag. I know she went to college with Bret Easton Ellis and that he was a big influence on the way this story is told, but that doesn’t excuse the fact that this book is, put simply, OVERRATED. (First 250 pages are excellent though)