Ex Libris, Michiko Kakutani
Ex Libris, Michiko Kakutani
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Ex Libris
100+ Books to Read and Reread

Author: Michiko Kakutani

Narrator: Tavia Gilbert

Unabridged: 8 hr 1 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 10/20/2020


Synopsis

Pulitzer Prize–winning literary critic Michiko Kakutani shares her enthusiasm for more than 100 books in a series of succinct, thought-provoking essays.

“An ebullient celebration of books and reading.”—Publishers Weekly (starred review)
 
“Books can connect people across time zones and zip codes, across cultures, national boundaries, and historical eras,” Kakutani writes in her introduction to Ex Libris. Here readers will discover novels and memoirs by some of the most gifted writers working today; favorite classics worth reading or rereading; and nonfiction works, both old and new, that illuminate our social and political landscape and some of today’s most pressing issues, from climate change to medicine to the consequences of digital innovation. There are essential works in American history (The Federalist Papers, The Writings and Speeches of Martin Luther King, Jr.); books that address timely cultural dynamics (Elizabeth Kolbert’s The Sixth Extinction, Daniel J. Boorstin's The Image, Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale); classics of children's literature (the Harry Potter novels, Where the Wild Things Are); and novels by acclaimed contemporary writers like Don DeLillo, William Gibson, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, and Ian McEwan.
 
Ex Libris is an impassioned reminder of why reading matters more than ever.

About The Author

Michiko Kakutani, the former chief book critic of The New York Times, is the author of the 2018 bestseller The Death of Truth: Notes on Falsehood in the Age of Trump.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Paul on May 06, 2022

Some people are at their best when they’re in a bad mood, their teeth clamped in some nearby flesh, violent words set off like firework rockets, injuries happening to bystanders, more suffering to follow. Their whole brain is engaged, their vocabulary erupts and you don’t want to catch their eye. I......more

Goodreads review by Lynne on January 25, 2021

I get no greater pleasure in life than receiving a book with a high quality presentation. This has indeed proved to be the case with the US New York publisher Clarkson Potter and printed in China. The book design is exquisite as are the colourful illustrations by Dana Tanamachi. When I began reading......more


Quotes

“Former New York Times book critic Kakutani delivers an ebullient celebration of books and reading. She comes up with an eclectic list of titles that have shaped her life, including classics (Shakespeare, FrankensteinMoby-Dick), biography and memoir . . . and contemporary fiction (Zadie Smith’s White Teeth, Donna Tartt’s The Goldfinch, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s Americanah). Each selection is accompanied by a brief, elegant essay explaining her connection to the work. . . . Kakutani’s recommendations and her ‘sense of the shared joys and losses of human experience’ are revelations.”—Publishers Weekly (starred review)