This is Show & Tell where I tell you some things I loved from the week and the one thing I hated, plus round up everything else going on around these parts. The first half of Show & Tell is free to all. The adoration and hateration are for paid subscribers only.

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I am late this week with Grown-Up Show & Tell because this weekend was the LA Times Festival of Books. It was the best time. It also kicked my ass. So I am giving an almost 12-hour late GUS&T because I am tired. If you want to know more about the FOB, on Friday, I post an all things Bookchella (aka Festival of Books) Q &A. If you have questions about the amazing book festival, please leave them in the comments and come back on Friday to see what I have to say. And feel free to get weird, nosey, or logistical with your questions. I am ready!

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I made a similar post for my 2024 trip to the National Book Awards. I loved this one so much we’re running it back for Bookchella.

This Week in The Stacks

I talked about the moon, and musicals, and The Drama.

The most wonderful and brilliant Ada Limón came on the show to talk with me about poetry and feelings and it was an absolute delight. She is perfect. I will not be taking any other opinions at this time.

For this month’s bonus episode we ran back Poetry Therapy with five poets discussing five poems with me. If you just want to sit with a poem and learn how it works and why it’s good, this is the episode for you.

Books I Read This Week

I Lived to Tell the Story: A Memoir of Love, Legacy, and Resilience by Tamika D. Mallory
A memoir from activist and Women’s March organizer about her life and how she got to where she is. This book is very much exactly what you’d expect from a public figure’s memoir. It doesn’t go too deep and isn’t written in a particularly noteworthy style, but provides background into her personal life and gives details on moments you might remember from her public life. I found the level of vulnerability and accountability to be wanting, but ultimately this book did what I think it set out to do. Mallory has certainly lived a life.

Room Swept Home by Remica Bingham-Risher
A collection or poetry that connects the poet to her ancestors using poems, archival research, and images. I didn’t know a poetry collection could do what this book does. It is akin to a family memoir in many ways. I was impressed by the uses of form and rhythm in the collection and how those elements enhanced the emotional resonance of the story being told.

Upward Bound by Woody Brown
A novel in vignettes about a daycare center for disabled adults. The book is cute and sweet and has the reader think about the ways we judge each other without really noticing. It is light and easy (for the most part) and a little cuter than I like. I could see this being a book that gets adopted in schools because of how it seems interested in teaching its audience while also not being too intense for young people. Upward Bound has made headlines because the author, Brown, is a nonverbal autistic man who wrote the book using a technique that is controversial. The book was totally fine and feel good, but I do wonder about the ways that Brown’s own story makes this book into something that fetishizes disability and gives able-bodied people a chance to pat themselves on the back. Which, of course, is not Brown’s doing, but is something I have noticed.

Another Word for Love by Carvell Wallace
This was a reread of one of my favorite books from 2024, and it was just as good the second time around. I love this memoir that captures the harms and traumas done to Wallace alongside his efforts at repairing himself. It is a deeply personal book that offers us something bigger and more communal. The writing, the structure, the voice, the whole thing is just fantastic. I don’t know what else to say but I love this memoir and I think you should read it.
Fave of the Week

Housekeeping

On May 2nd, join me at the Los Angeles Public Library’s Night at the Library. I’ll be doing an interview show with readers in the stacks1. All the details for the event are here (there are performances, food trucks, activities, games, bookstore pop-ups and more). If you’re in LA please come out and hang.

Things I Love…

Books

I mean, Bookchella, duh. I had the best time this weekend. More pictures and thoughts coming in the week ahead including my Q&A on the weekend, so please ask me anything in the comments.

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Sports

The Warriors had a surprising come from behind win against the Clippers in the NBA playin tournament, which I loved. They promptly turned around and lost to the Suns which was les than ideal. However, at the very end of the game we got peak Draymond trolling the world. The way he eggs on the crowd and just hams it up. Chef’s kiss. That man is an icon. I don’t care what anyone says, Draymond Green is a genius.

Internet Things

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