August 2026 Reading Roundup - and News! And a Milestone!
In France, everybody vacations in August. When they all come back to work and school in September, it's called "la rentrée." I totally slacked last month on the newsletter front, and I realized when I got two newsletters from other writers who also slacked last month. We're all doing la rentrée whether we know it or not.
Let's start with the milestone: Today, September 1, 2026, marks 20 years of freelancing for me. I have not had a W2 job since before Barack Obama was elected president. I have edited hundreds of books, had more hundreds of articles published, written thousands and thousands (maybe millions?) of words, published a half-dozen books, and earned a master's in English language and literature over those 20 years. And I can take a nap in the afternoon if I like. Freelancing is not for everyone, but it suits me extremely well.
News next: I'm considering moving this newsletter yet again, a decision that will not affect any of you loyal readers at all really. I'll just move you all like I have before, and I appreciate how many of you have moved along with me as platforms have come and gone. Not that Ghost, which is my current platform, is going anywhere. It's been pretty great, actually.
But Ghost caters to people who use their newsletters as sales funnels, a phrase which makes me grind my teeth and shudder with disgust. I promise not to put you in a sales funnel.
When I shuffled my newsletter over here from Substack, Ghost promised to have some of the same discoverability aspects as the 'Stack, which seemed nice. But I'm not seeing a lot of people from other Ghost-powered newsletters arriving here; I'm seeing a lot of people who have found me via my writing or at in-person events signing up. Welcome! You're the kind of people I want here anyway.
Then, while doing a little refresh on my official website (https://kristenhallgeisler.com/), I saw via my very basic stats graph that hundreds of people visit that place every month. Those are people who are actually interested in what I've been working on as a writer and editor, and there's no clear and easy way for them to sign up for this gem of a newsletter on my website. They could click over here, but who has time for that? No one.
I'll probably move the newsletter back to my website, which I have used before, so it will be familiar to many of you. And the newsletters will post as blog entries, which means you can visit them whenever you like or send links to your friends. I've also got a new series of essays planned, and that will go on my website too when it's ready. Being a newsletter subscriber means you'll get all that stuff without having to do anything extra.
On to the reading part! I mostly read for review this month, so a few of these books will be coming out soon. When my reviews of them are published, I will let you all know.
But first, I reread The Talisman by Stephen King and Peter Straub, a book I hauled around the state of Pennsylvania while playing clarinet in state and regional orchestras. I have the same very battered paperback copy with very yellow, brittle cheap-paper pages. There's a second Talisman book, Black House, that came out ages ago that I have on deck because there's a new third book, Other Worlds than These, coming in November. I have preordered it.
Links:
- The Talisman: https://bookshop.org/a/7065/9781501192272
- Black House: https://bookshop.org/a/7065/9781501192296
- Other Worlds than These: https://bookshop.org/a/7065/9781668233092
I finally finished my slow read of the new translation of Camus's notebooks. They're not really meant to be read cover to cover; they're more for reference. I kept the book on the coffee table and read a little while I was waiting for other things, so it took me months to get through it all. Now it's on the shelf as a reference book, as intended.
Link: https://bookshop.org/a/7065/9780226694818
Then I started my review reading with The Long Version by Petra Hulova. Funny enough, given the title, it's a short book, only about 125 pages. A novella, really. But it gives the reader plenty to think about (and plenty of material for a review). The protagonist, Sylvie Novak, is a middle-aged novelist whose daughter, Judita, tries to force her to reckon with the power dynamics of a relationship with an older man she had as a teenager. It's got #MeToo, it's got 90's feminism, it's got mother-daughter clashes, it's got unapologetic affairs and unrequited love. I'm not sure I even agree with the Sylvie's or Judita's takes on things, but I like that I'm being asked to think about it. I recommend it if you're in a thinky mood. My full review will be published in October.
Link: https://bookshop.org/a/7065/9781642861693
I would not probably recommend To Think Is to Say No, a new translation of early lectures by Jacques Derrida, to most people. They are interesting, and I have some quibbles with and questions for the translator. Reading these is not easy going in English or French, so having some familiarity with Derrida, philosophy, and theory will help. If none of that sounds like your thing, skip this one. If it does sound like your thing, we should probably hang out.
Link: https://bookshop.org/a/7065/9781531514600
I pitched reading The Book of Hours for review because it has ties to medieval literature, which I love. It turns out, this novel is far more about trying to get pregnant, being pregnant, and delivering the baby than I anticipated. But weirdly, as a non-parent myself, I kind of liked this book. It was unapologetic, it did weave in medieval saints and Catholic faith (or lack thereof), and it had exactly the right amount of sarcastic humor to make the narrator believable and the narrative bearable. The full review of this one will be published in October too, I think.
Link: https://bookshop.org/a/7065/9781938603952
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