When someone asks if I have read any good books lately, the answer is always “yes”. It’s always true, mostly because I read lots of books, but it also true because I don’t read any other kind. I start lots of bad books, but I don’t finish them. Since I read for pleasure, why bother with a book that is less than enjoyable?

Just this week I finished The Woman at the Washington Zoo: Writings on Politics, Family, and Fate by Marjorie Williams. Ms. Williams was a columnist for the Washington Post and a contributing editor at Vanity Fair. The book is a compilation of her work. The longer pieces are mostly profiles of famous and not quite famous people. They range from Teddy Roosevelt’s grandson Archie to Barbara Bush. The second half of the book is shorter pieces, essays. These encompass her feelings about motherhood, politics and her battle with cancer. It was a good read. I have my name on the waiting list for her other book, Reputation: Portraits in Power. I’ve heard that it is even better.

Sometimes, I think that journalists make the best non-fiction authors. They don’t need to learn to write. They have already become accomplished at it. They know how to accept judicial editing. They just “get” how to tell a story well. Some other well loved books by journalists are:

-Tuesdays With Morrie: An Old Man, a Young Man, and Life’s Greatest Lesson by sports writer Mitch Albom. This one has become a classic, almost everyone has read it. It’s the story of a grateful student paying homage to a dying teacher.
-Anything by Rick Bragg, the former newspaper columnist. His family biographies including Ava’s Man are his best work.
-Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting by In America by magazine columnist Barbara Ehrenreich.
-The World Is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-First Century by Thomas Friedman, newspaper journalist.
-Once Upon a Town: The Miracle of the North Platte Canteen by Bob Greene, Chicago newspaper columnist. One of my all-time favorite books by a journalist. Greene may have been packed off in disgrace for crummy behavior, but he’s a terrific storyteller.
-Tender Bar by J.R. Moehringer. A well written account of how a bar full of guys became substitute fathers and role models for a neighborhood kid.
-The Glass Castle: A Memoir by Jeannette Walls. The story of the world’s most dysfunctional family. A must-read for anyone who still harbors a grudge against his/her own parents. I gave it to all my own kids for Christmas one year. I wanted them to realize that their childhood could have been worse.
-The Night of the Gun by David Carr. The story of a successful journalist’s fall into drugs and crime.

Whatever your reading tastes, stop by the library. We have a book for you.