Kate Ardis Oden
@odenka.bsky.social
Brief book reviews and book-related posts. I’m reading and reflecting instead of pursuing a formal MFA.
https://substack.com/@kateardis?r=dvz41&utm_medium=ios&utm_source=profile
https://substack.com/@kateardis?r=dvz41&utm_medium=ios&utm_source=profile
A very happy New Year from my table of tiny reading notebooks and California pinot.
December 31, 2025 at 10:47 PM
A very happy New Year from my table of tiny reading notebooks and California pinot.
Kate Ardis Oden (@kateardis)
A “razor-sharp piece of a broken dream.”
substack.com
December 31, 2025 at 3:27 PM
2026 reading goals and candy. I’m stoked to read on a theme/one author for a couple months at a time. Feeling peak geek.
December 29, 2025 at 4:51 PM
2026 reading goals and candy. I’m stoked to read on a theme/one author for a couple months at a time. Feeling peak geek.
Brief trip to NYC coming up. I know The Strand, but are there any used book-/thriftstores with great book selections you can recommend? I’m looking for 20th-C classics like Woolf…
December 29, 2025 at 12:23 PM
Brief trip to NYC coming up. I know The Strand, but are there any used book-/thriftstores with great book selections you can recommend? I’m looking for 20th-C classics like Woolf…
A stormy day has its merits, but there’s nothing like reading by sunlight. The Waves by Virginia Woolf.
December 28, 2025 at 2:30 PM
A stormy day has its merits, but there’s nothing like reading by sunlight. The Waves by Virginia Woolf.
Finished.
Doris Lessing’s Memoirs of a Survivor, an “autobiography in dreams.”
But, as a reader, you’re not even aware you’re in dreams, you’re just on another puzzling plane…
Gorgeous and ominous.
Doris Lessing’s Memoirs of a Survivor, an “autobiography in dreams.”
But, as a reader, you’re not even aware you’re in dreams, you’re just on another puzzling plane…
Gorgeous and ominous.
December 23, 2025 at 3:29 PM
Finished.
Doris Lessing’s Memoirs of a Survivor, an “autobiography in dreams.”
But, as a reader, you’re not even aware you’re in dreams, you’re just on another puzzling plane…
Gorgeous and ominous.
Doris Lessing’s Memoirs of a Survivor, an “autobiography in dreams.”
But, as a reader, you’re not even aware you’re in dreams, you’re just on another puzzling plane…
Gorgeous and ominous.
Spot the typo on the front cover? There’s another, of a Lessing book title, in the author bio at back. Like if you’re going to get anything right, make it the front cover and previous works. Damn.
December 22, 2025 at 4:54 PM
Spot the typo on the front cover? There’s another, of a Lessing book title, in the author bio at back. Like if you’re going to get anything right, make it the front cover and previous works. Damn.
This is me holding back.
A new favorite used bookstore…
A new favorite used bookstore…
December 20, 2025 at 11:00 PM
This is me holding back.
A new favorite used bookstore…
A new favorite used bookstore…
Doris Lessing’s tantalizing storytelling.
December 20, 2025 at 4:22 PM
Doris Lessing’s tantalizing storytelling.
It’s Friday night again and I’m starting something new. I’m hoping The Memoirs of a Survivor will wrap me in its long, strange arms and never really let me go…
December 19, 2025 at 10:02 PM
It’s Friday night again and I’m starting something new. I’m hoping The Memoirs of a Survivor will wrap me in its long, strange arms and never really let me go…
I have some specific frustrations with Gaddis’s writing style, but the plot of The Recognitions is so great and the visual details of the made world are so rich, I’m still reading.
December 19, 2025 at 1:14 PM
I have some specific frustrations with Gaddis’s writing style, but the plot of The Recognitions is so great and the visual details of the made world are so rich, I’m still reading.
It’s true, I want to read it all over again.
December 19, 2025 at 1:18 AM
It’s true, I want to read it all over again.
I began and ended the day with reading (and the middle wasn’t so bad, either). Both these stories are deliciously vivid and strange, comical and tragic.
December 17, 2025 at 1:13 AM
I began and ended the day with reading (and the middle wasn’t so bad, either). Both these stories are deliciously vivid and strange, comical and tragic.
For many reasons, I didn’t read much between about 2002 and 2022. Now I always have a book (or five) going.
Today I counted my library of fiction and short stories: 462 volumes. Here’s to reading 400 of them before the next 20 years go by.
Today I counted my library of fiction and short stories: 462 volumes. Here’s to reading 400 of them before the next 20 years go by.
December 15, 2025 at 7:50 PM
For many reasons, I didn’t read much between about 2002 and 2022. Now I always have a book (or five) going.
Today I counted my library of fiction and short stories: 462 volumes. Here’s to reading 400 of them before the next 20 years go by.
Today I counted my library of fiction and short stories: 462 volumes. Here’s to reading 400 of them before the next 20 years go by.
This Richard Krawiec poem absolutely shells me. It’s in this amazing anthology I just got. Thom Schramm is the bomb.
December 14, 2025 at 4:47 PM
This Richard Krawiec poem absolutely shells me. It’s in this amazing anthology I just got. Thom Schramm is the bomb.
Free and fifty-cent finds. I’m skewing more non-fiction today. I’d like to know more about the history that informed some of my favorite authors’ lives, hence the Tuchman. SPQR is about the Roman Empire. The Mary Oliver is an essay collection. All real lookers.
December 13, 2025 at 11:10 PM
Free and fifty-cent finds. I’m skewing more non-fiction today. I’d like to know more about the history that informed some of my favorite authors’ lives, hence the Tuchman. SPQR is about the Roman Empire. The Mary Oliver is an essay collection. All real lookers.
Bookclubs.com and search for The Canonball…
December 13, 2025 at 5:41 PM
Bookclubs.com and search for The Canonball…
Is any parent of a college applicant getting any chill this Friday night? I’m actually pulling my hair out.
December 13, 2025 at 12:26 AM
Is any parent of a college applicant getting any chill this Friday night? I’m actually pulling my hair out.
The “short list,” alphabetical A-M, also known as “armchair candy for the next 2-3 years.”
December 12, 2025 at 3:11 PM
The “short list,” alphabetical A-M, also known as “armchair candy for the next 2-3 years.”
I bought some hot tickets this evening before the thrift store closed. Don’t tell my former supervisor.
December 12, 2025 at 12:03 AM
I bought some hot tickets this evening before the thrift store closed. Don’t tell my former supervisor.
GHOSTWOMAN and Aubrey Plaza and books, seeing me through.
December 10, 2025 at 4:02 PM
GHOSTWOMAN and Aubrey Plaza and books, seeing me through.
“Agnus Dei” just back from Puerto Rico, here to redeem men of sin…
December 10, 2025 at 12:00 AM
“Agnus Dei” just back from Puerto Rico, here to redeem men of sin…
Too cold outside. Taking refuge with Gaddis for the moment in chapter 4, on a banana plantation. It’s the end of the rainy season and Otto, a benign outgrowth of a playwright, is searching for his “playa.”
December 9, 2025 at 5:21 PM
Too cold outside. Taking refuge with Gaddis for the moment in chapter 4, on a banana plantation. It’s the end of the rainy season and Otto, a benign outgrowth of a playwright, is searching for his “playa.”