best of 2017: nonfiction

And now it's time for my favorite nonfiction books of 2017!  A few notes before I begin:

• Not all of these were first released in 2017, but that's when I read them.
• Aside from the first two, which were definitely my favorites for a year (and #1 beat out #2 by the tiniest of margins), these are in random order.
• If I read something by the end of December that belongs here, I'll update accordingly.
• And as always, your mileage may vary.

1.  After the Eclipse by Sarah Perry:  When the author was 12, her mother was brutally murdered as Sarah hid in the next room.  Sarah spent the next several years being shuffled between family members and trying to cope with her immense loss.  Alternating between "before" and "after", this memoir is beautiful and heartbreaking; to quote a blurb on the back, the author wrote her mother back into the world. 

2. The Fact of a Body by Alexandria Marzano-Lesnevich:  The author had always been against the death penalty, so when she started an internship working to help people accused of murder, she was shocked when she learned about a case and instantly wanted the defendant to die.  She decided to dig deeper into the case of Ricky Langley, convicted of murdering a young boy, and in the process started to come to terms with her own complicated past.  Absolutely gripping.

3. How to Murder Your Life by Cat Marnell:  The author is a trainwreck, and before you chastise me for saying that, she'd be the first to agree.  This memoir covers her life of magazine jobs, pill popping, alcoholism, bulimia, and stays in both rehabs and psych wards.  I'd say it needed tighter editing, but the stream of consciousness style works really well because it's like she's telling you all about it in person.  Exhausting and occasionally frustrating (so many enablers!), but---please pardon the pun---addictive.

4. My Fair Junkie by Amy Dresner:  A memoir about the author's struggles with drugs, alcohol, and sex addiction.  She doesn't come across as particularly likeable or sympathetic, but I still found this book worth reading.

5. American Fire by Monica Hesse:  A riveting account of a string of arson incidents in rural Virginia.  I knew I was going to like it as soon as I read this paragraph on the opening page:  "I spent the next two years trying to understand why he did it.  The answer...involved hope, poverty, pride, Walmart, erectile dysfunction, Steak-umms, intrigue, and America."

6. Oh Joy Sex Toy by Erika Moen and Matthew Nolan:  A delightfully illustrated series about sex, covering everything from sex toy reviews to interviews with sex workers.  Inclusive, charming, and often quite funny.

7. All the Lives I Want: Essays About My Best Friends Who Happen to Be Famous Strangers by Alana Massey:  A collection of sharp and thoughtful essays combining personal anecdotes with examinations of how we view female celebrities, ranging from Sylvia Plath to my true boo Britney Spears.  There's also an essay that perfectly encapsulated why I had a problem with The Virgin Suicides, an impassioned and deeply sympathetic defense of Anna Nicole Smith, and a great line where the author is talking about her time as a stripper and how she'd hear sob stories from the guys there, and she addresses their significant others thusly:  "I took their money, but I took your side."

8. Priestdaddy by Patricia Lockwood:   After a medical crisis wiped out their finances, the author and her husband Jason moved back in with her eccentric family, including her guitar playing, frequently semi-naked father, a Catholic priest.  (Despite being married with children, he got ordained through a loophole.)  Extremely funny, and practically every page has a quotable line.  (One of my favorites: Jason sees an extremely gory crucifix on her parents' dining room wall and says "It looks like someone screamed into a ribeye.")

9. We Are Never Meeting in Real Life by Samantha Irby:  Another outrageously funny (and occasionally heartbreaking) collection of essays by the Bitches Gotta Eat blogger.  I was reading this in bed while suffering from a massive allergy attack, waiting for the Benadryl to kick in, and there was one scene where her cat was hugging and kicking her dildo and she was screaming "Give me back my dick!" and I started laughing so hard I was weeping.  As I began passing out,  I was still chuckling intermittently, which is honestly a pretty terrific way to fall asleep.

10. Black Dahlia, Red Rose: The Crime, Corruption, and Cover-Up of America's Greatest Unsolved Murder by Piu Eatwell:  A new look at the 1947 murder that scandalized America, with a closer look at a suspect the author thinks committed the crime for sure.   She provides plenty of compelling evidence to support that theory, too.  I know it's too late for justice for Elizabeth Short, as the murderer(s) is/are long dead, but it would be nice closure if the case could be solved once and for all.  It will probably never happen, though, thanks to the cover-up mentioned in the subtitle and the fact that so much evidence was "lost".