Summer Reading

I'm on my third and fourth books for the summer now so I figured I should update the world on what I've been reading and working on.


I started out the summer with Dave Eggers' What is the What and it was absolutely amazing. Phenomenal. This is one of the best books I've ever read, hands down. Okay, I could go on but I won't.

While WITW is absolutely heartbreaking at times and painful to read at others, it's only this engaging because of the great job Eggers did at relaying Deng's story and streamlining it in an epic masterpiece kind of way. I went into the book not knowing much about the history of war and genocide in Sudan but the book didn't shy me away. Throughout the book Eggers channels Deng's storytelling and gives good background on where Sudan stands with of the rest of Africa. He does this only periodically and with a voice that is neither preachy nor textbooky. This book would be great for a book club or college course with its only downfall being that it's quite long. It's one of those books that becomes a part of you and you can't stop reading it or thinking about it while you're not reading. While it may not be a beach read, it may be a great winter break read to just curl up and read under the covers and cry a little.


After WITW I knew nothing I read would be good, but I tried anyway. I picked up Deb Olin Unferth's Vacation and it nearly met my low expectations. Ryan got me this book a while back from one of the big McSweeney's sales. Basically, man breaks up with his wife because she's following some man and he follows the man to Nicaragua but he actually has a brain tumor and thinks he's in Nicaragua but isn't and dies and the husband is stuck there because his wife canceled his credit cards. Then there's this side story with a girl and her celebrity mother who dies and her father who steals and "untrains" dolphins. I know, right? The story just seemed forced, jumbled, random and poorly written on top of everything else. While it remained interesting because of its sheer craziness (much like a Coupland novel), I just couldn't believe it. I love reading absolutely ridiculous stories so long as they're believable. Hell, even Harry Potter was alright because it was cute and you could relate to the characters and their situations. You become engaged. This was just bad and never once engaging. The characters were super flat and half the time their names weren't even given.


So on with the now. I'm finishing up Little Things by Jeffrey Brown that I've read here and there for a few months. It's a "little" book of cute comics about Andrew Bird, breaking up, camping trips, etc. This would be my suggested beach read as it's easy to walk away from and read quickly. It just makes me smile.


On top of that, I've borrowed Ryan's copy of Cormac McCarthy's The Road and am plowing my way through it. If I were reading it in the wintertime I might kill myself, but the descriptions of the landscapes of nothingness, ash and destruction seem beautiful amidst the warm sun and growing tomatoes around me. It's a lovely relief after Vacation because of the way the story flows slowly and the words are put together extraordinarily. Sometimes a sentence is so ridiculous I have to read it 10 times and I'm just stunned.

I'm not sure what's next on my list, but grad school starts in a little over a month so I'm looking to read a couple more amazing books this summer. I struggle every week just to read some of the New Yorker because of laziness. Let me know if you have any suggestions and I'll keep them in mind. I've got the graphic novel Black Hole by Charles Burns sitting on my desk as well as two more McSweeney's books lined up. But I've also been wanting to read a Salman Rushdie novel after watching a super long documentary about him in my Modern Brit Lit course. Lemme know, & until next time...

Bookends

I'm on the prowl for English MA programs across the country. In my search today (while also trying to work on editing my statement of purpose), I came across Art Garfunkel's website. I should mention I was listening to Simon & Garfunkel at this moment as well... oh the irony. Anyways, he has kept a list of the books he has read for the last 40 years (over 1000) and with it, lists of his favorites. If you're interested, here's the link:

Art Garfunkel's Library

Maybe sometime soon I will have a real post. Since last time I have finished Kafka on the Shore and After Dark by Haruki Murakami, Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver and am currently in the middle of White Teeth by Zadie Smith so I've got a lot to say. I would like to get on it before the beginning of fall semester when I have to once again throw out pleasure reading.

Until next time,
happy reading.

who gives a shit?

Apathy and Other Small Victories***
by: Paul Neilan


So i bought this book at borders because a.) the cover had a suicidal bathroom symbol, b.) it said apathy in sign language, and c.) the author "is probably unemployed somewhere in Portland, Oregon" and i thought he could use the money. This is his first novel and upon finishing it i realized nothing really happened.  Don't get me wrong, it was funny, raw, enjoyable but surely nothing more than a fun read.  The novel follows Shane, an apathetic, cynical, roll out of bed, slacker. He is witty and crude, always telling it like it is, much like Holden Caulfield (Catcher in the Rye), Art Bechstein (Mysteries of Pittsburgh), or BEE's Clay (Less than Zero) but because Shane is really nothing more than his apathy and humor i didn't give a shit about him by the end of the novel. i could have cared less about him when it all came to an end and i don't know how i feel about that, i guess i am a bit apathetic.

Life on the Rez

The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven****
by: Sherman Alexie

Some say that Alexie can be attributed to the Native American Renaissance but this is a controversial term. I think this is just really good stuff, but about Indians. This book may first come off as a collection of short stories but after reading a few of them it is impossible to put down. It's also controversial whether Alexie properly represents the Native American lifestyle. Anyways, each story is completely different and told in different perspectives of a variety of Native Americans on the Spokane Indian Reservation, but yet all of it is wonderfully interconnected. The stories focus mainly on the character Victor which is undoubtedly Alexie himself. Lone Ranger has a million unforgettable quotes and never ceases to put comedy into things such as alcoholism, depression, poverty, and Native American stereotypes. "When a glass sits on a table here, people don't wonder if it's half filled or half empty. They just hope it's good beer." Other than a good laugh, I feel like I learned a lot from this book such as what fry bread and HUD houses are. It also made me want to desperately move to the desert and live with nothing but Diet Pepsi and a basketball while doing shrooms just to try to see my vision. Who would have thought?

Although Lone Ranger on the writing level of a Young Adult novel, the stories seep with metaphor and deal with issues that everyone can relate to, laugh about, and share. I read this for a 200 level college English elective called Alcohol and American Literature and it was a great addition to the course, but I also imagine it would be great for high schoolers and would bring a bit of diversity into their reading (but that is just the former Education major in me talking). Seriously though, I devoured this thing in a good 4 days of light reading.

Sherman Alexie also wrote the screen play to the movie Smoke Signals that was based off of the story from this book titled This is What it Means to Say Phoenix, Arizona. The movie won tons of awards and would be a great compliment to this reading.

She Make a Man Wanna Speak Spanish (Shakira, Shakira)

Fun Home***
by: Alison Bechdel


Well, as Emily reviewed a book about monk sex I figured I should do something mildly racy. Fun Home is one of my favorite graphic novels. Bechdel is the creator behind the strip Dykes to Watch Out For, and Fun Home is her memoir. Basically it chronicles her life growing up in a funeral home. Her father is a closeted homosexual mortician and she is a growing up and learning to cope with her own sexuality, as well as trying to understand her complicated relationship with her dad. I'm not usually one to read graphic novels, and if homosexual imagery scares you at all, this ones got a few risque animations, but overall it was very entertaining. She put a lot of heart into it. In fact, I'm pretty sure it actually took her seven years to finish. When she animated the novel, she dressed up as each character and took photos of herself for reference when drawing each frame. Anyways, definitely a worth while and quick read.

Monk Sex

The Mermaid Chair**
by: Sue Monk Kidd

I would like to preface this by saying this book was found at the YMCA.
Decently erotic outdoor sex with a monk. That is how I would sum up The Mermaid Chair in less than ten words. The book is basically about a middle aged women's struggle to discover herself after years of feeling as if she isn't her own person. Lovingly devoted to her husband and daughter, Jesse finds that with her nest empty her life is lacking. She takes a vaca and goes to take care of her guilt stricken, senile mother and subsequently commits adultery with a Monk (naughty!) while rediscovering herself and her life's role.
Recently Lifetime made this into a made for TV movie (go figure). I can't say I have seen it but I am sure it is promising. If the sex scenes are well executed it could tun out to be a decent piece of soft core erotica. Maybe I will look up the TV listing and TiVo it to watch sometime when I need a pick me up.