Another Year Has Arrived

"And the city in which this might happen will seem to be opening from the inside out and speeding, so it would seem, towards inevitable catastrophe."

Dear readers: — all ten of you? — Happy New Year!

Goodbye and mostly good riddance to 2024. It was the year of the film camera, the year of the dinner party, the year of the picnic, the year of the beach day, the year of downtown legacy experimental theatre, the year of the international sojourn. It was also the year of the flood, the year of the existential malaise, and globally, the year of fascism’s expansion and America’s ready acceptance thereof.

The year flew by and dragged; the days were long and the weeks were short. Time moved as it always does, and more than ever before, I felt unmoored within it, tumbling atop waves and crashing onto shores that only moments ago seemed very far away. In so many ways it was a beautiful year full of cherished moments with loved ones. But I also had the keen sense that I was hiding out all year, trying to stay out of sight of something malicious and watchful. I was by and large less anxious than I have been in recent years, but more uneasy. There are of course innumerable current-events-rooted reasons for this, but something more broadly about the shape of my early twenties was at play, too. The contrast between wanting to feel settled and craving spontaneity, the urge towards self-sabotage and the disruption of the familiar, and an inability to understand the shape of any future — mine, political, planetary — colored my year in shades of confusion, yearning, and frustration.

Three really life-changing theatrical projects marked my year: MUDPIT, which Celia and I devised in the Movement Lab in April; ATLAS DRUGGED (Tools for Tomorrow) which I assistant directed with The Builders Association at NYU Skirball in October; and Suppose Beautiful Madeline Harvey which I stage managed with Object Collection in the Ellen Stewart at La MaMa ETC in December. It was a big year for investigating relationships to technology, playful worst-case-scenarios, and groups of collaborators I would sell my soul to reconvene ad infinitum. I had to be tougher, faster, and smarter in the rehearsal room than I’ve been asked to be in a long time. Something in my brain was set back on track by these demands (I think, I hope). None of these projects were just jobs, they were all consummate works of art by people who need to do this shit for the rest of our lives or else we will turn to ash. Thank god.

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The year of the film camera. This was the year I finally gave in and bought a fuji automatic camera on eBay, which arrived in shockingly great condition. I’d been wanting to take up photography in this low-stakes way for a long time, but felt hemmed-in by fears of seeming cringe. I think this all stems from when I got a digital camera for Christmas in middle school and posted a black and white photo I took, which led a truly awful boy from my school to comment “give a white girl a camera and all of the sudden she thinks she’s Ansel Adams.” The photo was of, like, my grandma, though, and not Yosemite, so he could have at least invoked Dorothea Lange or someone. Anyway, here I am, learning how to point and shoot and when to deploy flash. It’s made me really happy this year — how refreshing to have a creative outlet that is pure hobby.

Above are 9 of my favorite photos from the year, not because of any composition or skill, but because they were taken of or with some of my favorite people in beautiful moments I cherish.

My aunt found an old film camera of my grandfather’s recently, a Minolta manual camera from the 70s, so one of my resolutions is to learn how to use that one, too!

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More than anything else, however — as part of the hiding, as part of the brain fixing — this was my year of reading. Having been unable to reliably read for pleasure in any consistent way for a humiliatingly long time, at the beginning of 2024, I set out to read at least one book a month. I ended up reading 85 books. I still don’t really know how this happened, truth be told, but having the kindle app on my phone and computer (mostly for Libby e-books) was certainly a game changer. I know I should just spend less time on my phone, but since that seemed like a harder goal than reading more, I made the main activity I do on my phone reading, and my quality of life massively improved. Baby steps.

My ten favorite books of the year, in chronological order (because narrowing to this list was hard enough without having to further rank them), were:

1. The Lathe of Heaven, Ursula K. Le Guin* (1971)

2. The God of Small Things, Arundhati Roy (1997)

3. Beautyland, Marie-Helene Bertino* (2024)

4. Babel, R.F. Kuang (2022)

5. The Door, Magda Szabó (1987)

6. Kitchen, Banana Yoshimoto* (1988)

7. Disappearing Earth, Julia Phillips (2019)

8. Friday Afternoon Club, Griffin Dunne* (2024)

9. Cassandra at the Wedding, Dorothy Baker (1962)

10. Ragtime, E.L. Doctorow (1975)

Honorable mentions go to: Água Viva, Clarice Lispector; The Shards, Bret Easton Ellis; Democracy, Joan Didion.

At the bottom of this post, you will see the full list of all 85 books I read this year. My (32!) favorite and most-recommended titles are in bold.

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On resolutions, briefly:

1. More art. See it, make it, watch it, read it, love it, hate it, need it.

2. Get up! I’m a homebody, we know this, whatever. I want to be seeing people, doing things, yes, but also getting up and out of the house to move my body. I started running a little bit this past fall, and the lifelong anti-athlete in me is ashamed to say I have come to really love it. So more of those things. Fresh air.

3. Write even when it’s really hard. This silly substack has been a great way to force me to practice Having To Write anything at all, and it comes more easily to me than any other writing. Probably because it’s a largely uncensored public journal. But my actual writing? Oh, baby, it’s like pulling teeth. So less of that feeling. And on the subject of teeth, I’m overdue at the dentist’s.

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WHAT I READ IN 2024:

1. Eve’s Hollywood, Eve Babitz

2. The Years, Annie Ernaux*

3. Breasts and Eggs, Mieko Kawakami

4. In the Woods, Tana French

5. The Likeness, Tana French

6. Tom Lake, Ann Patchett*

7. Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, Gabrielle Zevin

8. A Manual for Cleaning Women, Lucia Berlin

9. Reflections in a Golden Eye, Carson McCullers

10. Severance, Ling Ma*

11. White Noise, Don DeLillo*

12. The Late Americans, Brandon Taylor

13. The Lathe of Heaven, Ursula K. Le Guin*

14. Hello Beautiful, Ann Napolitano

15. Earth Angel, Madeline Cash

16. My Brilliant Friend, Elena Ferrante

17. There Must Be Happy Endings, Megan Sandberg-Zakian

18. The God of Small Things, Arundhati Roy

19. The Talented Mr. Ripley, Patricia Highsmith

20. Dear Life, Alice Munro

21. The Argonauts, Maggie Nelson

22. Don’t Look at Me Like That, Diana Athill

23. Run Towards the Danger, Sarah Polley

24. Inferno, Eileen Myles

25. Simple Passion, Annie Ernaux

26. Up With the Sun, Thomas Mallon

27. Bark, Lorrie Moore

28. The Idiot, Elif Batuman

29. Priestdaddy, Patricia Lockwood

30. What I Lived For, Joyce Carol Oates

31. Beautyland, Marie-Helene Bertino*

32. Babel, R.F. Kuang

33. There’s Going to Be Trouble, Jen Silverman

34. This is How You Lose the Time War, Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone*

35. Bel Canto, Ann Patchett

36. The Man Who Spoke Snakish, Andrus Kivirähk

37. Chain Gang All Stars, Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah

38. Água Viva, Clarice Lispector

39. NSFW, Isabel Kaplan

40. Outline, Rachel Cusk

41. Bliss Montage, Ling Ma

42. Inseparable, Simone De Beauvoir

43. The Book of Love, Kelly Link

44. Either/Or, Elif Batuman

45. The Dud Avocado, Elaine Dundy

46. Norwegian Wood, Haruki Murakami

47. Runaway, Alice Munro

48. Beautiful Ruins, Jess Walter

49. The Bridge of San Luis Rey, Thornton Wilder

50. The Door, Magda Szabó

51. No One Is Talking About This, Patricia Lockwood

52. Kitchen, Banana Yoshimoto*

53. Disappearing Earth, Julia Phillips

54. People Collide, Isle McElroy

55. The God of the Woods, Liz Moore*

56. The Searcher, Tana French

57. Speedboat, Renata Adler

58. The Memory Police, Yoko Ogawa

59. Parakeet, Marie-Helene Bertino

60. Lincoln in the Bardo, George Saunders

61. Friday Afternoon Club, Griffin Dunne*

62. Democracy, Joan Didion

63. Great Expectations, Kathy Acker

64. Assumption, Percival Everett

65. Castle Gripsholm, Kurt Tucholsky*

66. Little Fires Everywhere, Celeste Ng

67. The Princess of 72nd Street, Elaine Kraf

68. Real Americans, Rachel Khong

69. Long Island Compromise, Taffy Brodesser-Akner

70. The Night Watchman, Louise Erdich

71. A Visit from the Goon Squad, Jennifer Eagan (re-read)

72. The Shards, Bret Easton Ellis

73. Nightbitch, Rachel Yoder

74. Desi Arnaz, Todd S. Purdum*

75. The Extinction of Irena Rey, Jennifer Croft

76. The Postman Always Rings Twice, James M. Cain

77. Cassandra at the Wedding, Dorothy Baker

78. The Hunter, Tana French

79. The Big Sleep, Raymond Chandler

80. Super Sad True Love Story, Gary Shteyngart

81. Paul Takes the Form of a Mortal Girl, Andrea Lawlor

82. The Candy House, Jennifer Eagan

83. American Mermaid, Julia Langbein

84. Ragtime, E.L. Doctorow

85. Rejection, Tony Tulathimutte

(* Indicates books I’ve already recommended on this Substack)

Wishing you a peaceful, hopeful, and thoroughly enjoyable 2025 <3