Hillary Corbett

is the Website Coordinator for the Harvard Book Store. She holds a master's degree in Information and Library Studies from the University of Michigan, and an undergraduate degree in English and History from the University of Massachusetts. She enjoys many non-work-related activities. She does not often speak of herself in the third person.

Fiction Favorites

• The Anne of Green Gables series, by L.M. Montgomery. If you think it's cheesy, you've probably never read it.
• Anything by Margaret Atwood. Start with her first, The Edible Woman, and keep going. Don't miss her poetry and essays, either.
• Gone With the Wind, by Margaret Mitchell. Not the most politically correct novel, but it's one of those books you see a different side of every time you read it.
• In the Skin of a Lion, by Michael Ondaatje. Much better than The English Patient, in my opinion (although that was a good one, too).
• Kitchen, by Banana Yoshimoto. Beautifully written and well told, about a young Japanese woman who loves kitchens. Her other novel, N.P., is good, as well.
• The Millstone, by Margaret Drabble. Witty, well-written tale of an "unwed mother" in 1960s London.
• Obasan, by Joy Kogawa. A fictionalized account of the author's girlhood experiences in a Canadian internment camp for Japanese immigrants during World War II.
• Small World, by David Lodge. An absolutely hilarious account of academia. See also Kingsley Amis's classic, Lucky Jim.

Everything Else

• Anybody Can Do Anything, by Betty MacDonald. Screamingly funny account of her family's life during the Depression in Seattle. By the author of the (equally good) autobiographical books The Egg and I, The Plague and I, and Onions in the Stew, other books in the series.
• Fault Lines, by Meena Alexander. Fascinating autobiography of an Indian-born writer who came to live in New York by way of the Sudan.
• The Library of Congress Subject Headings, volumes 1-4 (a.k.a. "The Big Red Books"). Okay, so I'm a librarian at heart. If you're ever working in a library and don't have anything to do, you can keep yourself entertained for hours by looking at the strange things the Library of Congress thinks people write books about. ("Potato peelings," "Lesbian vampires in motion pictures," and "One-leg resting position" are only a few...)
• The Logophile's Orgy, compiled by Lewis Grumkes. If you've ever made a list of your favorite words (or even thought about it), you might like to learn about some other (famous) people's favorites. It's worth it just to see how many people ripped off Mark Twain's list.
• The Moosewood Cookbook, by Mollie Katzen. I'm not the kind of person who keeps fresh cilantro and bulgur wheat around the house, so I've only made a few things out of this cookbook, but it's worth having just for looking at (and "Moosewood" is such a good word...).

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