Hi all–

Here’s a snippet from a short list the contributors over at paperbackparis.com put together to highlight the best books they read in February. I was completely gutted and transformed by Andre Aciman’s Call Me By Your Name, so I’m making my obsession known far and wide:

Leah Rodriguez’s February 2018 Pick: Call Me by Your Name, André Aciman

“It escapes me now, how and when I came across André Aciman‘s work, but I remember placing his entire bibliography on my TBR. Call Me By Your Name has been on my radar for some time, I just never got around to it…Until the movie was released to wide critical praise, and I knew I needed to read it as soon as possible. I am devoted to the concept of reading an adaptation’s source material before viewing said adaptation (which annoys all my Game of Thrones–obsessed friends). I was especially happy I read this particular novel first. I don’t know how James Ivory managed to capture Elio Perlman’s internal anguish and recursive thinking over Oliver — a young scholar spending his summer with the Perlman family at their home in northern Italy. Elio — a precociously intelligent seventeen-year-old — struggles to understand the dynamic that unfolds between him and Oliver. The obsession becomes all-consuming.

I dove into this novel as a reprieve from another book with heavy thematic elements. The atmosphere of Call Me By Your Name, which is all sun, heat, water, and northern Italian landscapes, pairs perfectly with the nascent blossoming of Elio and Oliver’s relationship. It is completely immersive and gorgeous.”