SantaThingSantaThing Entry #218

LibraryThing member EerierIdyllMeme

Recipient is not the account.

Gift is for: my mom

Book tastes

I thought this would be a fun way to get something that's new to her and bring some random, so I'm hoping for a hidden gem rather than something mainstream that's she's already heard of.
She's interested in overlapping combinations of the following:
- memoir
- graphic novels (or even comic books, if you think it's a particularly good one)
- books about medicine, especially exploring the medicine-neurology-psychology continuum (can be informative, but also can be memoir, fiction, etc.)
- books (fiction or nonfiction) set in interesting cultures (or times or places or around historical events)
- art books, especially landscape/cityscape/geometrical (visually interesting/aesthetically pleasing--not *too* edgy)
- speculative fiction--the genre has blossomed since she last explored it, so it might be fun to try out some different subgenres, but so far she seems to be into urban fantasy/modern setting overlay
- cozy mysteries
- books about food (cookbooks or other books, fiction or nonfiction)
- books about books
- books with different interconnecting timelines
- well-written prose

Don't get this!

Things she has already read/owns/knows about/I own and will lend her (although this gives a sampling of the sort of thing she's interested in, star next to ones she particularly liked):
- Educated*
- Stir
- Fun Home
- Gender Queer
- Persepolis
- Parenthesis (Durand)
- Belonging (Krug)
- The Best We Could Do
- They Called Us Enemy
- March (John Lewis)
- Lea Ypi
- Debbie Tung
- I am Malala
- Henry Marsh
- When Breath Becomes Air
- Twelve Patients
- Paper Girls*
- Bitter Root
- Oliver Sacks*
- Phantoms in the Brain
- Daniel Kalla
- Lisa Genova
- Elizabeth is Missing
- Memory-Keeper of Kiev*
- Anita Rau Badami
- I'm from Bouctouche, Me
- Monet
- Neil Gaiman
- Nalo Hopkinson*
- Kenji Lopez-Alt
- Elizabeth Peters
- The Cat Who...
- Donna Andrews
- Joanne Fluke
- Cloud Cuckoo Land*
- Alice Munro
Also, if you're going for memoir, please avoid celebrity memoirs unless it does one or several of the other categories well (like Takei's does). She's more likely to be interested in a memoir because the person has come from an interesting background or lived an interesting life or done something interesting than because of their fame.

Other notes

She prefers eBooks, or audiobooks if it's good in that format.
My LibraryThing account reflects my own reading, so that's a way to choose my santee.

Secret Santa

EerierIdyllMeme's Secret Santa was ARaw!

Purchasing Details

Store: Blackwell's (https://blackwells.co.uk/bookshop/home)

Gift Amount: $30 (USD)

If bookstore prices are listed in with non-USD amounts, use the currency converter below.

Comments/suggestions

Join LibraryThing to leave comments and suggestions here.

EerierIdyllMeme: Thanks, all, for the picks and recommendations! My mom seemed really excited about the ones she received, and I've passed this thread along to her, since the other picks also look like things she'd be into. (Jan 13, 6:16pm)
ablachly: ordered! (Dec 7, 2023, 9:09am)
katemcangus: Santee switched from Kindle to Blackwell's. We had to remove "The Birth of the Mind" by Gary Marcus because the cost was more than you paid into SantaThing. And we had to remove "Ms. Koizumi Loves Ramen Noodles Volume 1" because it was unavailable at Blackwell's.

(Dec 7, 2023, 8:51am)
baystateRA: A thought-provoking graphic memoir, Good Talk by Mira Jacobs, might not have come across her radar because it came out in 2020. (Nov 26, 2023, 7:56pm)
bell7: The Initiates by Etienne Davodeau is an interesting graphic memoir about the author (an artist) and his friend (a wine artisan) as they learned about each other's jobs. (Nov 20, 2023, 6:44pm)
TheDivineOomba: Look into Blankets by Craig Thompson, an interesting Memoir about growing up in an evangelical household.

(Nov 20, 2023, 1:49pm)