SL Lifestyle Managing Editor Shares Her Favorite Books

a bit of life by Hanya Yanagihara

As I started reading this, SL editor Charlotte told me, “This is the best book I’ve ever read and I never want to read it again.” Closing the book at the end, I could see his point. A devastating read, Hanya Yanagihara’s million-copy bestseller brought tears to my eyes for three weekends in a row, but it’s certainly one of my most life-changing reading experiences. The story centers on four graduates of a small Massachusetts college who move to New York to make their way: skinny, adrift, and fueled only by friendship and ambition. There’s the handsome Willem, an aspiring actor; JB, a witty Brooklyn-born painter looking to break into the art world; Malcolm, a frustrated architect at a major firm; and withdrawn, bright Jude, who serves as his center of gravity. Over the decades, their relationships deepen and darken, touched by addiction, success, and pride. His greatest challenge, however, is Jude himself, a gifted middle-aged litigator but an increasingly broken man, scarred in mind and body by an unspeakable childhood and haunted by a trauma that will define his life forever. forever. I say I’m hesitant to read the book again, but then I booked tickets to see the long-awaited West End adaptation next year, so I’m preparing to relive the intense sense of loss again.

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