Three recs, burning edition

A moving family saga novel, a heart-warming British sitcom, a revelatory classic Christmas movie

Jan 11, 2025

Well, friends, it’s 2025. Despite being halfway around the world from it, I feel kind of strange wishing people a happy new year while a city I once lived in burns. Many of my friends and family – including many of you – have evacuated. At least one person I know has lost their home. There will be a time, in the future, for metaphors about rising from the ashes, but, right now…

How can this be a happy new year when it has started with such a ghastly bang?

Perhaps it was inevitable. 2024 was already pretty awful, a long series of punches that ended, for me at least, with a whimper. I got a cold on Christmas that I still haven’t shaken, and I’ve been in a funk for weeks largely thanks to my pathological Californian aversion to winter. Was anyone really looking forward to the horrors we knew 2025 would bring?

I had other things I wanted to write about today. For example, I have a very entertaining story about kidnappings (I know, but trust me) that I’ve been saving up for months. But this is where we are, and so we adapt. Perhaps that is the important thing going into this new year, and whatever else it has in store.

Rec 1
The Most Fun We Ever Had (book)

Claire Lombardo’s 2019 debut novel about a Chicago couple and their four daughters built up and broke my heart more than a few times. What’s ridiculous is that I only finished it a few days ago and I want to go back for the same ride all over again. Good thing Lombardo has a new book out…

Honestly, this was one of my favorite reads in a long time. I’m annoyed with myself that I didn’t read it sooner. I could have had this experience months ago, when it was first recommended to me, but I unknowingly deprived myself. Luckily, it’s rather long, so, once you start, you’ll get to hang out with the characters for a little while.

Told non-linearly, through alternating perspectives of almost everyone in the family, this is a story about family, love, and what it means to be a parent/child/sibling while also trying to be yourself. Lombardo does such an excellent job of capturing the way you can both hate and love a family member. The way they can know you better than anyone else while simultaneously completely misunderstanding you. She captures the way love changes, and how relationships (of all sorts) require work. How everyone can try their best and still get it wrong, and also not try at all and get it right. How the people you love change you in ways you could never expect. How life gets away from you and leaves you to pick up the pieces.

I could tell you more specifics about the story, which is clever and thoughtful and devastating and uplifting, but is that really the point? Good literary fiction gets at the heart of the human experience – and does it with plenty of heart. I highly recommend this one.

Anyway, if anyone wants to join me in reading Lombardo’s latest, just holler.

(Real fast: I have a lot of pregnant friends at the moment, and I would maybe save this one until after you’ve had your baby.)

Where: Borrow for free from your local library, or buy from your non-Amazon bookseller of choice. (Here’s the Bookshop US** link, and here’s the Bookshop UK link.)

*(In the name of full transparency: I’ve included affiliate links to Bookshop.org – if you’re going to order from them anyway, please use my link so I can make a little extra cash! If you want to see/order any/all of my book recs, I’ve made lists on Bookshop, too: US version, UK version.)

**Sorry to email subscribers that I forgot to change the link! It’s fixed now, this one is for the correct book.

Rec 2
Ghosts (TV)

Ugh, guys, I am obsessed with this BBC sitcom in which a young British couple unexpectedly inherit a ramshackle stately home inhabited by a bunch of bored, friendly ghosts. I know, I know, everyone’s been telling me to watch this for years and I’ve been so slow to the party, but I’m finally here and I love it so much! It’s hilarious, it’s heart-warming, it genuinely makes me grin and cackle and think my heart might explode every episode.

If you like What We Do in the Shadows but want something a bit gentler, this is the ticket. If you’re British and grew up with Horrible Histories, it’s the same crew – I assume that will mean something to you, because it doesn’t to me. All I know is that it’s full of great British comedians that I know from other things (mostly Taskmaster, but also Sex Education, The Thick of It, Paddington 2, etc). They all funny and endearing, and it’s such a delightfully good time.

Lest I haven’t gushed enough to convince you: I’m already considering a re-watch. Which is something, considering I think I’ve re-watched maybe five shows in my entire life. But it’s also especially awkward considering I still have three episodes left in the whole series. (For those with commitment issues, it finished in 2023 and there are five seasons of six episodes each plus a Christmas special.) I’d apologize for recommending it before finishing it, except that the last three episodes could be abysmal and I’d still recommend the rest of it – it’s that good. Enjoy!

Oh, and: I know there’s a US version that started in 2021. I haven’t watched it. I’ve heard it’s also fun. Maybe I’ll try it next.

Where: BBC iPlayer (UK), Paramount+ (US)

Rec 3
It’s a Wonderful Life (film)

A month ago, if you’d told me I’d be recommending Frank Capra’s 1946 Christmas classic, I wouldn’t have believed you. I now think it might actually be one of the best films ever?

To rewind, I last saw this film in high school or college, alongside other Frank Capra and James Stewart collaborations. Honestly? I always found it too saccharine and schmaltzy. As much as I’ve always been a fan of Stewart, my take on Capra was something like “how nice that he believes in the best in people and that the good guy can win, but that’s not realistic or interesting.” (Which is pretty dark for a teenager, but we’ll explore that another time.)

Then, a couple years ago, I read a brilliant (and celebrated) script by my very talented friend Alexandra Tran (remember her name!) about the making of It’s a Wonderful Life. It had never occurred to me that this was both Capra’s and Stewart’s first post-war film, the one they made as they were grappling with their trauma and questioning the point of making their art. After reading the script (which hopefully will become a film in its own right one of these days), I found myself intrigued, and tempted to watch the film again – but not enough to actually do it, apparently.

Until this Christmas. It was being screened at a cinema near us, and my husband had never seen it, so we decided it could be a fun festive trip.

What I did not expect was that I’d absolutely love it, find it more timely than ever, and end up sobbing by the end. As a story about a man whose life didn’t go the way he wanted, it’s far darker than I remembered – though it of course has its moments of humor and cheesiness. Thinking about it now, it actually reminded me a bit of Past Lives, another beautiful film about the choices we make and the lives we end up with. But It’s a Wonderful Life is also about capitalism and community, the uber-rich vs. everyone else just trying to get by, in a way that felt like it could have been made for this very moment in time; this same tug of war was happening in 1946, it turns out.

I don’t know what else to say other than that everyone should revisit this film. After this experience, I suspect it will become an annual tradition for me.

Where: Lots of streaming services, honestly, but I really recommend seeing it in the cinema if you can.

That’s all for this week! What are you reading/watching/listening to that I should be aware of? Drop me a line (or comment) to let me know if you check out any of my recs and what you think.

Please spread the word and I’ll see you in a couple weeks.

xo
Kate

Keep Up, Kids

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