Happy (🤞🏻) 2022!

Hello, friends, and happy new year! My last letter (from November!!) included a harried intro/apology for being late, and, despite my genuine optimism and best efforts, I have only fallen further behind in the time since, mostly because Brendan and I have been working from home with Theo.

I’ve had a letter in the works for weeks and I’m thinking about y’all whenever I’m reading. It will be out soon. In the meantime, I wanted to let you know I’m pausing paid subscriptions. Everyone will still be on the mailing list, I just won’t be accepting payments for the time being—at least until I feel like I’m able to deliver, consistently, what you’re paying for. Folks who paid for a year (THANK YOU)—the remaining time on your subscription will pick up when I resume.

Your support means the world to me, paid or not, so thank you for reading and sharing! In lieu of regular programming, here are some updates and miscellanea:

• For Oprah Daily, I wrote about how the scariest thing about Jessamine Chan’s The School For Good Mothers isn’t quite what they’re marketing it to be.

• For The Millions, I wrote about my 2021 in reading.

• I talked about other 2021 faves on WNYC.

• In this thread, a TON of people talked about backlist favorites they read in 2021.

• Here’s an ongoing thread of 2022 books I like a lot.

• ICYMI: I’m doing social media for the forthcoming LES bookstore P&T Knitwear. Here’s a thread of book/TV show pairings that was a lot of fun, and which I probably stressed too much about.

• Speaking of, I’m also managing their newsletter which, if you’ve liked Reading Habits, you will probably enjoy as well. Launching next week! Sign up here.

• Must-reads: Katie Heaney on Holly Whitaker & Quit Like a Woman, Lydia Kiesling on The Lost Daughter, Kate Harding on our failure to read critically, and E. Alex Jung on Mitski.