Reviews

Best American Essays 2020 by André Aciman, Robert Atwan

deecreatenola's review

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4.0

Good collection. To Grieve is to Carry Another Time and Bed were both enjoyable.

samantha_shain's review

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4.0

A few particularly spectacular essays in a volume with an equal number of duds. Definitely still worth it, but not as impressive as some prior collections. However, the first essay was unforgettable.

laurynreads's review

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2.0

No shade, but Andre Aciman has the taste of an old white dude. I don’t care about old white dudes and their opinions. The best stuff in here was not by old white dudes.

ellenmurrayb's review

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emotional informative inspiring sad slow-paced

eileen_critchley's review

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3.0

***½
Some amazing standouts and some I personally would not have included. That’s usually the case, though, with these collections. I like that I can put this down and come back to it (this is why it takes me six months to read, and I will likely spend the next six months reading the short story collection). I read these every year, and will continue to do so.

{owned, paperback}

csaints's review

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3.0

I enjoyed: The Other Leopold, Cosmic Latte, Breathe, Holiday Review, and How to Bartender. The rest were average.

danaray's review

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It's hard to rate a collection that included pieces I both loved and abhored.

ostrowk's review

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One of my least favorite collections in the series, I think. It felt stuffy and blinkered -- so different from the collection that Rebecca Solnit curated the year before. Have to admit I did love two essays by art critics: Peter Schjeldahl's on dying and A.O. Scott's on Sontag.

meghziefromwessex's review

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emotional reflective fast-paced

3.0

meganzc's review

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reflective slow-paced

3.0