Peter Selgin’s memoir, The Inventors, included in Nine Books You May Have Missed in 2016, by William Belcher
Like many readers, my TBR (to be read) pile is out of control. I can’t read fast enough to keep up with the number of books added on a weekly basis. So, more often than not, I miss a lot of the books that make those end of year lists. As 2016 comes to a close, I thought it would be interesting to do two things: 1) take a look at small press books you and I may have missed this year and 2) ask our local booksellers what they’d recommend. Given my tastes and reading habits, you’ll see the first seven books are either fiction or memoir. Some I’ve read; others are still in the queue. The booksellers’ suggestions help round us out with some poetry, non-fiction, and a “children’s book for adults.” I hope you’ll check out the list and add some of these titles to your TBR pile, even if the 2017 books will begin to pile up next week. Also, I hope you’ll tell us what you’re reading. (Give us a shout at @thealtweekly or @wbbelcher on Twitter.)
The Inventors: A Memoir by Peter Selgin (Hawthorne Books)
Another memoir on the list is Peter Selgin’s The Inventors, which was released in March by Hawthorne Books. Selgin’s work has received a lot of praise this year, most notably from Library Journal, who declared that the book was “destined to become a modern classic.” At once, this memoir is about Selgin’s relationships with his father, an inventor, and an influential teacher/mentor, who Selgin discovers had fabricated his life story. “The Inventors is the story of how these men shaped the author’s journey to manhood, a story of promises fulfilled and broken as he uncovers the truth about both men, and about himself.”