An autobiography and some board books
Dust Tracks on a Road: An Autobiography by Zora Neale Hurston
I'd read about Zora Neale Hurston's friendship and falling out with Langston Hughes in Hughes's autobiography The Big Sea, so when the book bingo that I'm playing had a square titled "writer bio or memoir," Hurston was the first writer I thought of, to learn more about her from her own perspective.
From the very first line— "Like the dead-seeming, cold rocks, I have memories within that came out of the material that went to make me"— the writing gripped my attention, telling of her tumultuous birth in 1891, childhood in Florida, mother's death, time at boarding school, work as the assistant to an actress in a traveling theater troupe, college days, and career gathering and cataloguing African-American folklore in the South and beyond. In between, she muses about love, learning, family, culture, and more. She is a talented storyteller and this book is a fascinating picture of her life in the early 1900s. Definitely worth the read!
• Picture books my kid (10 months old) is currently loving:
Goodnight Moon (a classic; she especially likes the red balloon and the young mouse)
Our World: Argentina (beautiful illustrations, a fun glimpse into life in Buenos Aires! Will definitely be checking out more in this series)
Are You There, Little Elephant? (a very cute cut-out book)
(Previous What I've Been Reading posts)
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