Random Reading Thoughts: War, what is it good for?

[bryan1311]

Ooh, I also have Visit From the Goon Squad and I'll pick At Swim, Two Boys as well. I love the winter season...I finally have time/energy to read and catch up on films.

Thanks everyone for the suggestions.

[Jeff Beachnau]

Dante's Inferno
Well, this took me a long time to read, it was sort of a chore. I've been wanting to read it for a while, just to say that I've read it. Well, it has some memorable moments, the first few Cantos are very good and set it up nicely, but it the book is very difficult to read. Much of the book is filled with names, so though each Canto is rather short, they're filled with individual names and events that you have to go to the endnotes to catch up on what each names if referenced to. In fact, the endnotes are longer than the actual book itself. And the story is very repetetive. Dante journeys into Hell with his guide Virgil, and Virgil takes him through all of the layers, making frequent stops and anyone Dante sees he demands to know who they are, so it gets pretty repetetive. However, the last few Cantos are very good, when the reach the ninth circle until they finally meet Lucifer, who is given a great description. So, while it was a difficult read and hard to understand a lot of the time, it was worth it.

and on a completely different note:

Kevin Pollak: How I Slept My Way to the Middle
This was a quick, fun, and very entertaining read. An autobiography by actor/comedian Kevin Pollak, he tells of his who life, growing up, how he got into the business, and all the people he met along the way. Each chapter has a fun story, some of my favorites include his friendship with Walter Matthau, almost killing Warren Beatty, the line up scene in The Usual Suspects, and messing aroudn with Alan Arkin and Paul Reiser. While at times Kevin seems a little arrogant, at least he acknowledges it and jokes around about it. While I bet Kevin's a little upset about the timing of the release of the book, since there's a chapter that talks about how Michael Clarke Duncan was a dick on The Whole Nine Yards, nevertheless it's worth a read and if you want some laughs I'd say check it out.

[haqyunus]

I have just started Memoirs of Hadrian. Such an elegant, deceptively simple but hypnotic book. The language itself is a marvellous.

Meanwhile, NYTimes' book critics (Janet Maslin, Dwight Gardner and Machiko Kakutani) released their top 10 lists. Quite a few non-fiction and the intro (their justification) is so true:

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/21/bo...orites.html?hp

In the midnight hour these 10 Favorites — not 10 Bests — call for a gut check. Bottom line, for each of us: Is this a book I’d give to a friend? Aside from “The One,” there are three music books I did give to friends and regret not including here. The Leonard Cohen twofer, “I’m Your Man” by Sylvie Simmons and “The Holy or the Broken” by Alan Light, are transfixing for Mr. Cohen’s admirers, this one included. But they are detailed and specific, best suited to devotees. And there wasn’t space for Rod Stewart’s memoir, even though it’s a ton of fun. Michiko Kakutani wound up listing Oliver Sacks’s “Hallucinations” rather than Junot Díaz’s “This Is How You Lose Her.” Dwight Garner chose “Spillover” rather than Gil Scott-Heron’s memoir, “The Last Holiday.”


Anyway, after too much deliberation, we recommend these. Each list is in descending order.

[Cricket]

haqyunus, Memoirs of Hadrian is a beautiful, beautiful book. Just sublime.

And James Wood wrote up his favorite reads of the year for the New Yorker.

I haven't had much time for reading lately, but I did read two recent Zadie Smith essays that people might be interested in. The first was a piece on Joni Mitchell in last week's New Yorker, and it's quite good. (It's ostensibly about Mitchell, but seems really to be about the mutability of taste and, by extension, identity.) It's behind the paywall, so you have to buy the issue. The other is freely available in The New York Review of Books, and its subject (and title) is "Joy". I'm less sure about this one. It's more a philosophical piece, and didn't do a whole lot for me. Still worth reading, though. I hesitate to call Smith a great essayist. At least not yet. She doesn't quite have the style of a Joan Didion or the sheer intellectual power of a David Foster Wallace. But she might be the best we have right now. Not many people are writing as cogently and meaningfully about the world we live in.

[Cricket]

LOL, I promise I'm not a shill for the New Yorker (I'm actually halting my subscription in the new year), but I just read the new fiction piece published in the current issue, and was very impressed by it. I'm pointing this out because you can read it for free on the magazine's website. It's called "Shirley Temple Three", by Thomas Pierce.

http://www.newyorker.com/fiction/fea...fiction_pierce

This story is particularly interesting because Pierce is apparently still a MFA student at the University of Virginia. This is obviously the first time he's appeared in TNY, and it seemed to me quite something that the magazine decided run the story in the year's final double issue. Having read it now, I can see why; it's one of the best stories they've published this year.

It's remarkable because a story of this kind (a heavily symbolic piece that deals with subjects such as cloning, reality television and religion) could have been really heavy-handed. But Pierce works it together with surprising deftness. For anyone who reads it, I'm curious to know what you think of the ending. At first, I wasn't sure about it. But now I think it's kind of perfect.

[TheOppressionRepressesMe]

LOL, I promise I'm not a shill for the New Yorker (I'm actually halting my subscription in the new year), but I just read the new fiction piece published in the current issue, and was very impressed by it. I'm pointing this out because you can read it for free on the magazine's website. It's called "Shirley Temple Three", by Thomas Pierce.

http://www.newyorker.com/fiction/fea...fiction_pierce

This story is particularly interesting because Pierce is apparently still a MFA student at the University of Virginia. This is obviously the first time he's appeared in TNY, and it seemed to me quite something that the magazine decided run the story in the year's final double issue. Having read it now, I can see why; it's one of the best stories they've published this year.

It's remarkable because a story of this kind (a heavily symbolic piece that deals with subjects such as cloning, reality television and religion) could have been really heavy-handed. But Pierce works it together with surprising deftness. For anyone who reads it, I'm curious to know what you think of the ending. At first, I wasn't sure about it. But now I think it's kind of perfect.

I loved this story. Just read it, per your recommendation.

As someone who's had sick pets, I felt an emotional punch. I loved the religion stuff too. Don't know about the ending though.

[Critix]

I wanted to take a shower after reading Gone Girl, but boy can Gillian Flynn write characters.

[veritas]

Just finished John Green's The Fault in Our Stars yesterday, and I know it's all super ha ha funny to make note of how much I cry at things (since, you know, I frequently talk about how much I cry at things), but I fucking w-a-i-l-e-d over the last, I don't know, four chapters of that shit.

Whenever the movie gets made, I'll murder Fox if they screw it up.

[Artimus]

I wanted to take a shower after reading Gone Girl, but boy can Gillian Flynn write characters.

Very vivid but the nastiness was too much for me. I got it for my sister for Xmas, though. It's popularity makes total sense.

I finished Mo Yan's The Garlic Ballads this week. It's amazing the Chinese government is so pro-Mo considering the themes of the book (and apparently his others). But I guess it's just a continuation of the fascinating disconnect in China where the national party is perfectly happy blaming anything on the past or, especially, local governments.

[haqyunus]

LOL, I promise I'm not a shill for the New Yorker (I'm actually halting my subscription in the new year), but I just read the new fiction piece published in the current issue, and was very impressed by it. I'm pointing this out because you can read it for free on the magazine's website. It's called "Shirley Temple Three", by Thomas Pierce.

http://www.newyorker.com/fiction/fea...fiction_pierce

This story is particularly interesting because Pierce is apparently still a MFA student at the University of Virginia. This is obviously the first time he's appeared in TNY, and it seemed to me quite something that the magazine decided run the story in the year's final double issue. Having read it now, I can see why; it's one of the best stories they've published this year.

It's remarkable because a story of this kind (a heavily symbolic piece that deals with subjects such as cloning, reality television and religion) could have been really heavy-handed. But Pierce works it together with surprising deftness. For anyone who reads it, I'm curious to know what you think of the ending. At first, I wasn't sure about it. But now I think it's kind of perfect.

I am not a pet person but that is a thoroughly enjoyable read. The character of Mawmaw is a solid one which is insightfully created. She is religious and of course conservative but sensible and so matter-of-fact too. It is never made into a caricature. The author clearly has respect for his country and it shows. I am ambivalent about the ending too. In a way it is OK, given the theme of the story. Giving it a more defined resolution wouldn't have added any major value, I guess.

The writing is clever and smart too ('knock on fossil', Mawmaw's ruminations about the tragic fate of mate-less ST3 etc.) Never mushy or manipulative.

[Critix]

I found The Round House kinda boring, juvenile, scattered narrative-wise with extraneous plot points and characters, and with a total cop-out of an ending.

I thought The Round House was a lovely read with pretty rich characters.

[Thomas]

I needed to read something miserable to take me away from my own private little trials, so I just finished Joyce Carol Oates's widow thing. It was fine, I guess.

[dyedred19]

I'm reading The Marriage Plot, which I'm finding very compelling but also a tad cold and distant.

[Ceilidh-ann]

I must admit I was so disappointed with The Marriage Plot. I love Eugenides's work and I love that he experiments as much as he does with tone, style, etc, but I was just bored and irritated with his latest.

My first book of 2013 is Fun Home by Alison Bechdel. Oh, how I love her.

[haqyunus]

Apparently Steinbeck was not the first choice (or the desired choice) for the Nobel Prize. The internal deliberations and behind the scenes working of the Nobel committee were disclosed recently (they do it every 50 years, I believe.) I find it somewhat similarly interesting and intriguing as we do and wonder about other awards' bodies and their members voting decisions.

http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/20...-steinbeck/?hp

[Largo]

The first book I bought on my Nook, and, consequently, my first book of 2013, is Conan Doyle's Complete Sherlock Holmes. I'm up to 'The Man With The Twisted Lip', and I'm really enjoying the world that Doyle is creating. I was a bit taken aback when the stories became much shorter after The Sign of Four, but in going through, the tapestry that's being woven out of the public and private lives of Holmes and Watson is making a lot more sense to me, especially as the protagonists become gradually more aware of the notoriety Watson's write-ups are bringing them and refer to past stories by the names Watson's given them.

[Ceilidh-ann]

The first book I bought on my Nook, and, consequently, my first book of 2013, is Conan Doyle's Complete Sherlock Holmes. I'm up to 'The Man With The Twisted Lip', and I'm really enjoying the world that Doyle is creating. I was a bit taken aback when the stories became much shorter after The Sign of Four, but in going through, the tapestry that's being woven out of the public and private lives of Holmes and Watson is making a lot more sense to me, especially as the protagonists become gradually more aware of the notoriety Watson's write-ups are bringing them and refer to past stories by the names Watson's given them.

That's what I'm reading right now as well. Thank you, public domain!

[Jali]

My last book of the year was The scarlett letter. My first two books of 2013 are The perks of being a wallflower and The brothers Karamazov.

[Largo]

That's what I'm reading right now as well. Thank you, public domain!

High-five for copyrights expiring!

[Artimus]

The first book I bought on my Nook, and, consequently, my first book of 2013, is Conan Doyle's Complete Sherlock Holmes. I'm up to 'The Man With The Twisted Lip', and I'm really enjoying the world that Doyle is creating. I was a bit taken aback when the stories became much shorter after The Sign of Four, but in going through, the tapestry that's being woven out of the public and private lives of Holmes and Watson is making a lot more sense to me, especially as the protagonists become gradually more aware of the notoriety Watson's write-ups are bringing them and refer to past stories by the names Watson's given them.

Did you pay or get a free version?