sad girl summer

Hello.

While I grow mildly envious of watching people spend their summers in the hamptons and in europe, I’ll be home applying to jobs, interviewing, and mapping out a career change.

I might go the beach and I might not.

I might have a picnic at the park. Touch grass. I might not.

I might have a dinner party with friends or make homemade ice cream or plant an herb garden or go to the farm to pick blueberries. I might not.

I might be too tired and too emotional exhausted to engage in such summer festivities.

I do, however, indulge in being completely engulfed by a novel, daydreaming about another world I wish to be in or fantasizing about complex and passionate relationships that only exist between the pages of a book.

I’ve shared a summer master list with you filled with lots of recommendations for books, films, activities, etc, but today, I want to be hyper specific about what I’m going to recommend to you.

Today’s recs are for those of you who are like me, fully immersed in sad girl summer, craving books and media that make you feel something. A bit masochistic of us, but I won’t judge.

books:

• White Nights by Fyodor Dostoevsky: An introspective journey of a lonely man in St. Petersburg whose brief but profound connection with a melancholic woman explores the themes of loneliness, longing, and the ephemeral nature of happiness.

• Giovanni's Room by James Baldwin: An intense exploration of identity, sexuality, and personal conflict, this novel narrates an American man's tumultuous affair with a charismatic Italian bartender in Paris.

• Letters to Milena by Franz Kafka: A collection of passionate letters from Kafka to Milena Jesenská that unveils the depths of his thoughts and feelings, offering a rare glimpse into the mind of a troubled genius.

• Everything I Know About Love by Dolly Alderton: This memoir offers an uproariously funny yet profoundly candid look at surviving your 20s, detailing Alderton’s mishaps and heartfelt encounters with love, friendship, and self-discovery.

• Conversations with Friends by Sally Rooney: A sharp and modern novel about two college students and former lovers in Dublin navigating the complexities of relationships and personal desires that blur the lines between friendship and romance.

• Normal People by Sally Rooney: A compelling depiction of the tender but complicated relationship between two teenagers from a small Irish town as they come of age and deal with personal and societal pressures in and out of university.

• The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath: A poignant and powerful semi-autobiographical novel that follows a young woman's descent into mental illness and depression while trying to find her identity as a writer in 1950s America.

  

tv shows:

• Fleabag: A raw, brutally funny, and profoundly honest depiction of a troubled woman navigating life and love in London while trying to cope with tragedy.

  

• Normal People: A sensitive and intimate portrayal of the complex relationship between two Irish teens as they evolve from schoolmates to lovers and navigate the challenges of adulthood. This show is so fucking sexy.

  

• Insecure: A smart and heartfelt series that follows the personal and professional lives of two young African-American women navigating the ups and downs of their careers, relationships, and internal struggles in Los Angeles.

  

• Modern Love: An anthology series exploring love in its multitude of forms, including sexual, romantic, familial, platonic, and self-love, inspired by real-life personal essays from the New York Times' column of the same name.

  

• Conversations with Friends: (the book was better) A nuanced and introspective look at the life of two Dublin university students as they form a complicated connection with a married couple, challenging their dynamics and personal beliefs.

I’ll leave you with a melancholic playlist, too.

I want to write more but I’ve been a bit debilitated by my current life circumstances. I’ve been thinking a lot about my writing. I want to start a project- maybe not a book. That feels a bit overwhelming. I’m not sure what I would write about. Am I a non-fiction writer or a fiction writer? I don’t write poetry. I’m not ready to tell my story. But I want need to write something. Maybe a literary fiction piece. Let me think on this…

I love you <3

See you tomorrow.

If you’re struggling, I hope this helps.

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