I’ve gotten in the habit of reading The Best Nonrequired reading series, and recently finished reading the 2004 edition. As usual there were a lot of interesting pieces from small publications, as well as a few from the bigger ones that I did manage to catch at publication (David Sedaris’ “Full House” and Michael Paterni’s “The Fifteen Year layover” both from GQ). There were several stories that were written from the perspective of immigrants or foreigners (Africa-“Half of a Yellow Sun” by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie and South America-“City of Clowns” by Daniel Alarcon). There was another excellent story that was concerned with Jewish Orthodoxy and coming of age, “The Smoothest Ways Is Full Of Stones” by Julie Orringer. There were a couple of well-written journalistic pieces as well. One was an inspirational story about a Rwandan runner who survived the genocide after almost being burned alive. The other, “The Futile Pursuit of Happiness” by Jon Gertner, is about economicist who look at how changes or the purchase of goods affect out level of happiness-for example getting a new job, getting married, or buying that new car. The results were interesting since greater wealth beyond being able to easily get by don’t necessarily make people happier. I found Christopher Buckley’s story “We Have a Pope!” very humorous and well written as well. I didn’t enjoy every story, but there are plenty of great stories worth reading in the volume.
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