The Year of Magical Thinking (Joan Didion)

I just commemorated my mother's passing (yesterday, actually) and this book has always been a touchstone for me. I think acknowledging the complicated grief around the loss of someone so pivotal to your life is a difficult thing to do with grace, particularly if/when people don't want to be vulnerable in front of others at the time. This book says, "I see that you're grieving, I'm thinking about you, I'm not asking you to share anything you don't want to"--ultimately because reading is a solitary activity, and it also opens the door for a conversation in the future.