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Ed Park's novel 'Same Bed Different Dreams,' now out in paperback, was a Pulitzer Prize finalist and winner of the 2024 Los Angeles Times Book Prize for fiction. Below, the author, editor, and critic names six of his favorite books of 2024.
'Stubs' by John Jaewon Kim
A simple conceit yields the coolest memoir of the year. Kim found an envelope containing ticket stubs to 32 indie-rock shows (plus a Warhol exhibit and a Joan Rivers set) that he'd attended between 2001 and 2010. Each stub sparks a memory, producing a portrait of the artist as a young law student, avid concert-goer, crush-haver, life liver. Buy it here.
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'1095 Short Sentences' by Donato Loia
The best of these numbered entries have an offhand wisdom ("210. Your success or failure as a professor depends enormously on the tone of your voice"). And they might change your life in small ways if you let them: "4. The first coffee of the day should be consumed as slowly as possible." I'll drink to that! Buy it here.
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