Bluish-green rectangle with leaves in shades of brown and gold. Text: Nonfiction November Week 1: 10/28/24 to 11/1/24. Your Year in Nonfiction hosted by Based on a True Story

Nonfiction November Week 1: My Year in Nonfiction

Because I have a personal penchant for alliteration, I’ve been reading nonfiction in November for the past few years. Only a couple of months ago did I discover that Nonfiction November is An Actual Thing, an established book-blogging meme:

Announcing Nonfiction November

I apologize to the hosts for not acknowledging them in past years, and I’m eager to participate properly this year. Since about 98% of the books I read are novels, I look forward every year to concentrating on nonfiction in November. 

Over the years most of my nonfiction reading has been memoirs, particularly women’s memoirs. I got so involved in that topic that I went back to school in my late 50s and got a degree in psychology. I wrote my dissertation on life stories. Since then, I’ve been amazed at how often I recognize novelists using elements of life story psychology (technically known as narrative identity theory) in their books.

Most recently, I’ve been interested in how readers talk about their experiences with reading, particularly reading fiction, and more particularly their childhood reading. I’ve therefore been reading nonfiction books that deal with that topic, which has in turn lead me to an exploration of how memory works. These are the general areas that I’ll be reading about this month.

Almost all of the nonfiction I’ve already read in 2024 falls under those topics:

  • The Lives of Literature: Reading, Teaching, Knowing by Arnold Weinstein
  • The Sense of an Ending by Frank Kermode
  • Why We Read by Shannon Reed
  • Rewrite Your Life by Jessica Lourey
  • My Hijacking by Martha Hodes

The single exception is Emperor of Rome by Mary Beard. In anticipation of Nonfiction November, I put off reviewing those books, so reviews of some of them will be upcoming throughout the month.

Although my own nonfiction reading this month will be quite focused, I look forward to hearing what other book bloggers are reading. I love a well written piece of creative nonfiction, and I look forward to learning about a lot of new (new to me, not necessarily recent) books to add to my TBR shelves. I’m particularly interested in memoir, biography, social and cultural history, literary history and criticism, reading, and writing.

I will be promoting #nonficnov24 on Mastodon.

© 2024 by Mary Daniels Brown

10 thoughts on “Nonfiction November Week 1: My Year in Nonfiction”

  1. Ok that is too funny that you were doing your own Nonfiction November (kind of like a Taco Tuesday?), not knowing it was already a thing.

    I look forward to your review of The Lives of Literature as the summary on Goodreads doesn’t really tell me much.

    Also looking forward to your review of Why We Read. Curious to know what is funny about it?

    ​The Hijacking book sounds good, too, so I am curious to hear what you liked / didn’t like about it.

  2. A fascinating story there – to get so involved in people’s life stories that it leads to a degree in Psychology. I think that’s amazing. Thanks so much for sharing your choices Mary and for taking part in Nonfiction November.

I'd love to hear from you!

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