A Life of One's Own: Nine Women Writers Begin Again

“Even if a book is about everything else, it is never not about the life the writer lived.” Memoir meets biography meets literary criticism in this heartfelt bibliomemoir (and yes, I was delighted to learn there's a specific word for this genre-blending). In the wake of her divorce and in the midst of losing her mother, Oxford-educated author Joanna Biggs turns to literature for comfort, wisdom, and guidance; the result is this impressive collection of essays, where she examines the lives and works of eight great women writers (Biggs herself is one of the nine promised in the title). I've admittedly only read the works of some of the included writers, but I found that this in no way diminished my enjoyment of the book; in fact, I adore Biggs's conversational, confessional tone as she spills tea about these women's personal lives and reveals much about her own as she seeks to build a life she's proud of. The cherry on top is the reading list I finished with; I feel rallied to reach for classics I've overlooked (there are spoilers if you read for plot!) and to revisit the ones I've loved before.