Susan H. McFadden's 3 favorite reads in 2023

My husband was diagnosed with lung cancer when he was hospitalized with Covid in 2021. Since then, various treatment side effects have produced more miserable days than happy, carefree days. This book by a British palliative care doctor offers beautifully told tales of her patients, their families, friends, and medical staff, and it has given my husband and me a different perspective on his situation.

Dr. Mannix says we have forgotten how to talk about dying and death in our time, and she gently opens up the conversation with her sensitive descriptions of how people face their endings.

We have recommended this book to many people who also have appreciated its honest sensitivity about a difficult topic.

This is a marvelous story by a young Ghanaian-American author about a family coping with living between several competing cultures: Life in Ghana, in the American South, and in the high-pressure world of academia and neuroscientific research conducted at Stanford.

I loved the way she wove religious themes through the book, as well as her loving portrayal of the tragic outcomes of family members dealing with untreated mental illness and drug abuse.

I was very impressed with the accuracy of her descriptions of the neuroscientific research conducted by Gifty and her colleagues at Stanford.

You don’t have to be a lifelong fan of John Waters’ proudly transgressive work in film to appreciate this book. You have to be open to sliding into a wild and funny tale of how the author hitchhiked from Baltimore to San Francisco when he was in his 60s.

You’ll never look at hitchhikers standing by Interstates or resting in rest stops the same way.

Waters’ stories are remarkably imaginative, but when you get to the last third of the book and read his actual descriptions of the hitchhiking adventure, you’ll gain a new appreciation for the way he cares deeply about people who are often shunned in our society.