We did it! We got Joe Biden inaugurated without an assassination! It was after it was over that I realized how much space I was holding for this to happen, how full of anxiety I’ve been, just sitting around waiting for an old fashioned mass murder. A few years ago, I didn’t realize how much energy I was using up worrying that my old car was going to break down until I bought a new one that didn’t make weird noises. (It also used to shuck little pieces of itself at random.) Anyway, we have a president who does not hate humanity! I am already annoyed with the New York Times for the article this morning about how Joe is an elitist who wears a Rolex. LEAVE THE MAN ALONE. LET HIM WEAR HIS ROLEX. LET HIM WEAR 12 ROLEXES UP AND DOWN HIS ARMS AND LEGS I DO NOT CARE.

I have read SIX books so far this year. It is only January 22! This won’t last, but I’m enjoying it. Here they are:

—Moonflower Murders by Anthony Horowitz. This guy’s cleverness almost annoys me, and yet I cannot resist a book where someone says, “Someone was murdered years ago, but I just figured out the murderer after reading this book,” and then we get to read that entire book in the middle of the book we are already reading!
—Nobody Will Tell You This But Me by Bess Kalb. Loved it, loved it. She is also my #1 favorite Twitter person, though my #1 favorite tweet of all time remains the one where Sarah Thyre said something like, “Welp, nothing else to do but whittle a dick out of a hunk of cheese, then eat the dick, then eat the shavings,” which I think about at least once daily, maybe more. It is perfection. But anyway, yes, this book is very good.
—Leave the World Behind by Rumaan Alam. I loved this, but had I known there was some apocalypse in it I wouldn’t have picked it up. Fortunately for me, I thought this book was about racial tensions. There’s a little racial tension in this but much more apocalypse.
—The Girls of Slender Means by Muriel Spark. Look, I bought this because of the Smiths song “Nowhere Fast” because there’s no way Morrissey wasn’t referring to this book. It was good. The ending surprised me.
—The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield. I read this when it first came out but couldn’t remember anything about it. My feeble brain is only capable of “good” and “bad” as a way to remember things. I bought the Kindle version for $.99 to read on my phone in case of emergencies, and last weekend I woke up too early and didn’t want to get out of bed or disturb the snoring gentleman beside me, so I started it and then had to finish it. Don’t worry: I have purchased two replacement emergency ebooks for future snoring gentleman mornings. Anyway, this is also kind of a whole book in a book kind of book, and it’s about books, and it’s also very dramatic but it works.
—Daisy Jones and the Six by Taylor Jenkins Reid. I did not want to like this book, but I heard someone say the audio version was amazing, and so I tried it out (on the way home from the snoring gentleman’s house!). It’s fake interviews with members of a fictional 70s band. I had to read the print version to finish because audio just takes so long. It was extremely enjoyable and I may have teared up at the end.

What if my reading ennui returns and these are the only six books I read this year? I guess there are worse things, like accurately predicting an inauguration/murderfest, and then worrying that I am secretly psychic and having every insane and anxious thought be given heft and relevance. I would turn myself in to the FBI so they could use my powerful brainwaves to predict other crimes. I would become a legend, the subject of a popular but problematic podcast, there would be a Netflix show based on me, I will be played by someone much younger and cuter who is also athletic and can jump off of buildings and stuff. If someone points a gun at me I will divert their attention by picking up on their aura and telling their secrets aloud. They will weep, apologize, make amends. So anyway, yes. I will enjoy my reading spree while it lasts.