Four friends wrestle with abuse, shame, and loyalty

Are you emotionally ready for 800 pages of heartache? A Little Life [2015] by Hanya Yanagihara is set in NY and follows four friends - Willem, J.B., Malcolm and Jude - with different aspirations, privilege, relationships, and temperaments. Before taking a quiz to see if you’re a Willem or a Malcolm, let me say that this is not a boys version of Sex In the City. Or any version of it. A Little Life is excruciatingly painful to read. We watch them grow up, grow apart, be there for one another, disappoint each other. We also learn about their pasts and the pains, physically and emotionally, that influence who they become. Beautiful and harrowing, this novel is one that might take you a while to read but is worth the journey.

Thank you to Will Simpson and Andy Whalen for recommending this book to me!

An amicable couple gets manipulated by divorce lawyers

A married couple somewhat peacefully falls out of love and gets manipulated by the divorce legal system. OR the never-ending argument for why New York (authenticity! culture!) or Los Angeles (space!) is better. OR the Laura Dern show. OR white actors, Scarlett Johansson and Adam Driver, play very good white actors. OR a drama that’s actually pretty funny. Marriage Story (2019) is good to watch alone in your living room because your partner refuses to watch it (“I don’t like break up movies, ok!” - Josh).

Don't tell grandma she's dying

The Farewell (2019) is about an Asian American woman who finds out her grandma is dying but nobody in the family wants to tell grandma is dying. Come for the bittersweet story of emotional suppression, the wrestling of Asian vs Asian American values, the A24 artsy fartsy cinematography, or the warm smile of Nai Nai. Don’t let the synopsis fool you though. This is not a bummer of a movie.