What are you reading?

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Okay, I know that there's a thread over on ILE with a similar (or maybe even the same) title, but I'm not making it over to ILE very often, and would like to make a movement to starting a similar thread here.

I just finished Jon McGregor's If Nobody Speaks of Remarkable Things, which I think is pretty brilliant and delightful and amazing. And then I think that the whole thing was contrived and I was being manipulated all along and that it was too self-conscious. But, well, I stayed-up far too late to finish the book, and that must say something about how interested I was in the ending (not that I was looking forward to the ending so I could go on and read something new, but I that I was looking forward to the ending so that I'd know how it all came together).

And now I'm vascilating between Lethem's Amnesia Moon, Smith's White Teeth, and Crace's Being Dead, as well as a travelogue about Saudi Arabia from the 1930s. So in the meantime I'm reading a collection of Peanuts comic strips.

― I'm Passing Open Windows (Ms Laura), Thursday, 5 February 2004 13:13 (twenty-two years ago)

this is the old thread, but that's cool. this can be version 2.0

What are you reading?

― scott seward (scott seward), Thursday, 5 February 2004 13:48 (twenty-two years ago)

oh, and i'm reading Going After Cacciato by Tim O'Brien. I'm enjoying it a lot. before that i read Eating Naked by Stephen Dobyns which is a collection of short stories. that was great. Stephen Dobyns is well-known as a poet, but he also writes mysteries, weird sci-fi-ish stuff, thriller/horror, and straight-up literary fiction. he's all over the place.

― scott seward (scott seward), Thursday, 5 February 2004 13:53 (twenty-two years ago)

Finished EM Forster Where Angels Fear to Tread this morning on the bus. Bought Typee by Melville and The Bridge of San Luis Rey by Thornton Wilder at lucnhtime.

― MikeyG (MikeyG), Thursday, 5 February 2004 14:03 (twenty-two years ago)

I liked Being Dead a lot, I liked the way that Crace writes about the relentless decay inherent in nature, but without divesting it of a single shred of its beauty. Heaps better than most of his other stuff, but not as good a book as Quarantine for my money.

Just finished Perfume which I thought was a fairly pointless exercise and pretty much bored me shitless. Thankfully we're on the up again now - got Lolita on the go at the mo (it's repugnant! And charming! And horrifying! And hilarious!), and I've dipped a stinky pink toe into Russell Hoban's Amaryllis Night & Day too which looks great. Then it's into the gloomy forest of Thomas Bernhard's Correction after that...

― NickB (NickB), Thursday, 5 February 2004 14:06 (twenty-two years ago)

God, Perfume is a bore, Nick. And what a ridiculous ending!

― MikeyG (MikeyG), Thursday, 5 February 2004 14:55 (twenty-two years ago)

I've got a big list right now, but oddly enough very little of it is because of school.

Painting the Dog: The Best Stories of Leon Rooke, by Leon Rooke
The Sea Wolf, by Jack London
The Image of Women in Contemporary Soviet Fiction, Sigrid McLaughlin (ed.)
Billy Budd and Other Tales, by Herman Melville
The Anxiety of Influence: A Theory of Poetry, by Harold Bloom
The French Revolution, by Thomas Carlyle
Leviathan, by Thomas Hobbes
Two Treaties of Government, by John Locke
The Complete Short Stories of Vladimir Nabokov, by Vladimir Nabokov
Film: An Introduction, by William H. Philips
The Basic Political Writings of Jean-Jacques Rousseau, by Jean-Jacques Rousseau
The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, by Laurence Sterne
An Intimate History of Humanity, by Theodore Zeldin

Most of these books are dense enough that they're going to take me a long while to read (or I have been reading them for a long while), but they're not the sort of thing I can devote my full attention to either, which is why the list is so long.

― August (August), Thursday, 5 February 2004 16:22 (twenty-two years ago)

At the moment I'm reading "The Sound of the Mountain" by Yasunari Kawabata.

― jel -- (jel), Thursday, 5 February 2004 17:53 (twenty-two years ago)

"Anthropology of an American Girl" by H. T. Hamann
"The Mommy Myth" by Susan Douglas

― Jessa (Jessa), Thursday, 5 February 2004 17:57 (twenty-two years ago)

My reading ability seems to have atrophied over the last few months (perhaps connected with broadband acquisition) but currently laying around my room are:

Georges Perec - 53 Days (his last, unfinished novel, with bonus notebook editing by Jacques Roubaud + Harry Mathews)

Richard Foreman - Unbalancing Acts: Foundations For A Theatre
Walter Benjamin - One Way Street
Cardullo/Knopf eds - Theater Of The Avant Garde
Gertrude Stein - Geography And Plays (perhaps it's evident i'm trying to write a play)
Lyn Hejinian - A Border Comedy.

and there are also the books residing on my shelves of which I've read the prefaces. sigh.

― Jonathan Something (whatwhat), Thursday, 5 February 2004 17:58 (twenty-two years ago)

I've got two on the go. Still working on Enlightenment by Roy Porter, and now I've added Banished Children of Eve by Peter Quinn, which is a historical New York novel. I sometimes wonder if I could get from one end of the year to the other on nothing but historical New York novels. Enlightment is very good, but it's a little bit hard for me to take all in one go. I'm better with narrative history than academic history, really.

― accentmonkey (accentmonkey), Thursday, 5 February 2004 18:17 (twenty-two years ago)

Just finished: "The Unconsoled" by Ishiguro. One of the oddest books I've ever read...a five-hundred-page-long dream.

Just Started: "Middlesex." Love it so far.

On "Lolita" (mentioned above): I know it's an untouchable classic and all, but am I the only one who thought the first part was much better than the second? I alway kinda wanted it to end on that line about Lolita having nowhere else to go.

― Not That Chuck, Thursday, 5 February 2004 20:32 (twenty-two years ago)

Scott - thanks for tracking down that thread - I went looking for it and didn't see it - well, maybe I did see it and just skipped over it without actually recognizing it for what it was - anyway, thank you. Oh, and I read Going After Cacciato for a modern lit. course - now I can't recall a thing about it, except that I liked it. (Though I had a professor several years ago that claimed she'd been having a long-term "romantic correspondence" with O'Brien and had arranged to have her letters burned when she died. No more juicy information other than that, though.)

Yay for Lolita - and I think it's brilliant and amazing and I hate that I find it so incredible. Particularly fascinating is how we never get to know Lolita, just how Humbert has crafted her in his mind. And Middlesex was amazing, I thought.

I've decided on re-reading The Lovely Bones before taking on Being Dead (there's a logic to this decision, but right now I can't remember how I arrived at this conclusion).

― I'm Passing Open Windows (Ms Laura), Friday, 6 February 2004 03:07 (twenty-two years ago)

Just finished Red Mars by Kim Stanley Robinson, which was interesting as I haven't read sci-fi in ages. The book is like Frank Herbert crossed with Isaac Asimov. Right now I'm also reading The Yukon Writings of Jack London, which is appropriate as it's about 4 degrees farenheit right now and not much more than 40 in my bedroom. I've been reading the collected short stories of Colette for a while as well. It's a bit fluffy, each story is only about 2-3 pages long.

― webcrack (music=crack), Friday, 6 February 2004 05:26 (twenty-two years ago)

Webcrack - my S/O loved all of Robinson's Mars series - said that the science was incredible. (He rates sci-fi based on the accuracy of the science - he's a geek that way.)

I've ended-up starting Cookoff: Recipe Fever in America which looks as though it'll not challenge my mind a bit, but maybe I'll feel more favorably toward my fellow Americans once I've read all about how they use refrigerated biscuits and mustard and canned chicken to make "gourmet" (pronounced "gor-met") meals. Gosh, I sound snooty, don't I?

― I'm Passing Open Windows (Ms Laura), Friday, 6 February 2004 06:47 (twenty-two years ago)

"Just finished: "The Unconsoled" by Ishiguro. One of the oddest books I've ever read...a five-hundred-page-long dream."

That book drove me mad. I wanted to hunt down Ishiguro and kick him in the bollocks.

― MikeyG (MikeyG), Friday, 6 February 2004 10:08 (twenty-two years ago)

kick him in the bollocks

Um, I hate to ask this, but what is/are bollocks, exactly?

― I'm Passing Open Windows (Ms Laura), Friday, 6 February 2004 11:16 (twenty-two years ago)

Just started "Angels" by Denis Johnson.

― R the bunged up with jollop of V (Jake Proudlock), Friday, 6 February 2004 11:29 (twenty-two years ago)

UK - US Translation

Bollocks = testicles.

Also known as 'goolies' or 'nuts'

Expect to be kicked in them after writing frustrating 500 page nonsense dream book

― MikeyG (MikeyG), Friday, 6 February 2004 11:55 (twenty-two years ago)

*laughing* That makes a lot more sense, Mikey, thank you. My American Dictionary said that "bollocks" is a verb, and I was feeling kind of puzzled.

If I ever decide to write a frustrating 500 page nonsense dream book, I'll remember to give thanks that I don't have any testicles currently on my person.

― I'm Passing Open Windows (Ms Laura), Friday, 6 February 2004 12:13 (twenty-two years ago)

'lanark' by alasdair gray.

― Julio Desouza (jdesouza), Friday, 6 February 2004 13:13 (twenty-two years ago)

Hooray for Lanark. Are you enjoying it?

― Jessa (Jessa), Friday, 6 February 2004 14:33 (twenty-two years ago)

I really want to read Lanark after reading 1982, Janine.

I'm currently at a crossroads, I'm going to start either Philip Dick's 'A Scanner Darkly' or Jonathan Lethem's 'Gun, With Occasional Music'. Both recommended by this board, come to think of it.

― Jordan (Jordan), Friday, 6 February 2004 15:01 (twenty-two years ago)

I'll give a plug for Gun, with Occasional Music, Jordan - it's a fast read and funny and witty and surprising and very crimestory/noirish.

On the other hand, I need to read Through a Scanner Darkly, myself.

― I'm Passing Open Windows (Ms Laura), Saturday, 7 February 2004 04:08 (twenty-two years ago)

jessa- I'm halfway through and am enjoying it so far.

― Julio Desouza (jdesouza), Saturday, 7 February 2004 11:22 (twenty-two years ago)

"The Devil's Cup" (Stewart Allen), re-reading "Droll Stories" (Balzac) and digging into my new purchase of "The Shorter Pepys" (Robert Latham, ed.).

― yesabibliophile (yesabibliophile), Saturday, 7 February 2004 14:05 (twenty-two years ago)

Julio, you should start a thread on Lanark after you're finished.

― Jessa (Jessa), Saturday, 7 February 2004 16:36 (twenty-two years ago)

still reading lights out for the territory by iain sinclair,which i'm really enjoying,although since i'm not that used to the kind of really dense,abstract prose he writes its taking me ages...
also words and music by paul morley,which i'm really enjoying...

― robin (robin), Saturday, 7 February 2004 16:54 (twenty-two years ago)

Whheeee! Just about 20 pages from finishing Being Dead - quite odd and beautiful and hauting and creative and a little bit too realistic at points. I think it's one of those that shall stick in my memory for some time to come. No idea what I'm going to grab next, though.

― I'm Passing Open Windows (Ms Laura), Saturday, 7 February 2004 19:52 (twenty-two years ago)

so much to read:

Underworld - DeLillo
The Drowned World - JG Ballard
A Wild Sheep Chase - Haruki Murakami
Haruki Murakami and the Music of Words - Jay Rubin
Babbit - Sinclair Lewis
Jekyll and Hyde - RL Stevenson
Now Wait for Last Year - PKD
Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said - PKD

― fcussen (Burger), Sunday, 8 February 2004 05:37 (twenty-two years ago)

And try "The Crystal World" by J.G.Ballard, also. I never hear much about that, but I loved it.

― R the bunged up with jollop of V (Jake Proudlock), Sunday, 8 February 2004 13:32 (twenty-two years ago)

I just started Herman Hesse's Under The Wheel last night. I'm trying to keep myself from reading several books at once now, except for non-fiction ones, as I find I always end up just finishing one before I go back to the other.

― Øystein H-O (Øystein H-O), Sunday, 8 February 2004 13:42 (twenty-two years ago)

And try "The Crystal World" by J.G.Ballard, also. I never hear much about that, but I loved it.

Read it last year. I've read a ton of Ballard but still found it hard to get into for some reason.

― fcussen (Burger), Sunday, 8 February 2004 13:57 (twenty-two years ago)

MMmm, just picked me up a lovely copy of John Donne with his Poems and Prose... makes a nice companion to "The Devil's Cup."

― yesabibliophile (yesabibliophile), Sunday, 8 February 2004 16:51 (twenty-two years ago)

I've decided to spend a few days reading things with no socially redeeming value - so I'm working my way through all of Tim Dorsey's Florida books (Florida Roadkill, Hammerhead Ranch Motel, etc.). They're funny in places, and I pretty much am in favor of any books that show the seemy underside of the state, but these can't hold a candle to any of Hiaasen's stuff. In fact, they strike me as being written by a Hiaasen fan, but they're not as polished as his works.

I'll follow these with Tartt's The Secret History, for a change of pace.

― I'm Passing Open Windows (Ms Laura), Monday, 9 February 2004 15:01 (twenty-two years ago)

I've just started Richard Power's newie, 'The Time of Our Singing'. It's quite enjoyable so far.

I have mixed feelings about RP though: I thought his last book, 'Plowing the Dark' was awesomely impressive... but strangely unloveable. He seems a super-super smart, very fine and sensitive writer, but one who's almost entirely lacking a sense of humour. The back of the new book mentions Thomas Mann, and I wonder if that may have hit the novel-of-ideas nail on the head...

― Jerry the Nipper (Jerrynipper), Monday, 9 February 2004 20:41 (twenty-two years ago)

Just finished Paul Auster, City of Glass, which I quite liked. Now onto Confederacy of Dunces.

― jaymc (jaymc), Tuesday, 10 February 2004 01:06 (twenty-two years ago)

Andrew Holleran Ground Zero
Mark Kurlansky 1968: The Year that Rocked the World
Armand Marie Meroi Mutants: On Genetic Variety and the Human Body
Gail Collins America's Women: 400 Years of Dolls, Drudges, Helpmates and Heroines
John Baxter A Pound of Paper: Confessions of a Book Addict
Sharon Aris It's My Party and I'll Knit if I Want To (It's rather dopey. "Oooh kntting is cool! and you can be crafty and feminist!" insert eyeroll here)
Elana Dykewoman Beyond the Pale (A bit reminscicent of Tipping the Velvet with its turn of the century socialist lesbians but in Russia and the LES rather than the East End, and uh, pogroms and sweatshops instead of musichalls.)

― tokyo rosemary (rosemary), Tuesday, 10 February 2004 15:32 (twenty-two years ago)

the best book eva written has to be lord of the rings, im only 17 an im reading it for the fourth time! is there any other lord of the rings fans out there?!

― gaol clichy (clichy), Wednesday, 11 February 2004 10:16 (twenty-two years ago)

here are some threads on this (its over on ILE, do a search and there's plenty of stuff on the books and movie):

I Have a Colleague Who Has Suddenyl Become Obsessed with Lord of the Rings
Lord of the Rings
Shoudl I read The Hobbit then LOTR, or LOTR then The Hobbit?

― Julio Desouza (jdesouza), Wednesday, 11 February 2004 12:58 (twenty-two years ago)

I think 17 is the ideal age for LOTR. At 18, you'll look back and laugh.

I didn't start reading LOTR until I was 32. I got through two books before I threw it out the window.

I can't see the appeal, but then again, I'm an old fart.

― MikeyG (MikeyG), Wednesday, 11 February 2004 13:17 (twenty-two years ago)

I've been dipping into the Patricia Highsmith short story collection Nothing That Meets The Eye which was pleasurable but not as great as I was expecting, now I'm re-reading Out Of This World by Graham Swift for no particular reason.

"Bollocks" is a noun and a verb - and an adjective, an exclamation and general all-purpose word that suits all situations.

― LondonLee (LondonLee), Wednesday, 11 February 2004 13:39 (twenty-two years ago)

especially situations involving orcs.

― MikeyG (MikeyG), Wednesday, 11 February 2004 14:08 (twenty-two years ago)

"I Wish Someone Were Waiting for Me Somewhere" (Anna Gavalda) is waiting for me after work this evening...

― yesabibliophile (yesabibliophile), Wednesday, 11 February 2004 16:04 (twenty-two years ago)

...And it was absolutely, unsentimentally squishy. Excellent read, "I Wish Someonew Were Waiting for Me Somewhere." Especially the opening story. Now on to the Taschen volume on "Gustav Klimt."

― yesabibliophile (yesabibliophile), Sunday, 15 February 2004 16:13 (twenty-two years ago)

Sinclair's 'downriver'.

― Julio Desouza (jdesouza), Sunday, 15 February 2004 16:27 (twenty-two years ago)

"Bailey's Cafe" by Gloria Naylor, trying to clear a space for Tom Robbins's "Jitterbug Perfume" and Neil Gaiman's "American Gods." (Two months without reading obligations -- must work fast.) And "Middlesex" is not only amazing but a clever way to dodge/illuminate the tiresome "can men write in women's voices" question.

― rams (rams), Sunday, 15 February 2004 17:19 (twenty-two years ago)

Currently reading Lanark: A life in Four Book by Alasdair Gray

― Ursula Barzey, Sunday, 15 February 2004 19:01 (twenty-two years ago)

An odd thing: Lampshades by Carole Morin. Picked it up on a whim 2nd hand. Perhaps the Poms could shed some light on this. It's certainly tryhard but I prefer that to all the frigid stuff that's out there. Before that read Barbara Gowdy's The Romantic. Didn't mind it, pretty girly but not in a bad way (worst fault was an unexplained double narrative line separated by an unclear time period; sytle too similar, so left reader with oft-mentioned "woozy" feeling). Strange to be reading back to back female writers. I've been open to criticism to only reading the self obsessed male fiction (Nicholson Baker, Ford, Sebald, DeLillo). Could a more experienced ILB-er point me in the direction of stuff dealing with these latter chaps.

― David Joyner (David Joyner), Tuesday, 17 February 2004 02:02 (twenty-two years ago)

I tried "Underworld" for the third time- l o n g - It just doesn't hold my interest.
About 100 pages into "The Unconsoled" by Ishiguro. A mind-wrangler for sure in the It's going to be hard to finish but I can't put it down realm.

― brg30 (brg30), Thursday, 19 February 2004 02:08 (twenty-two years ago)

I'm currently wandering through Norman Rush's Mating and I can't tell if it's really excellent or if I'm being manipulated into thinking that. (And I'm still pondering Tartt's The Secret History, too.)

― I'm Passing Open Windows (Ms Laura), Thursday, 19 February 2004 06:30 (twenty-two years ago)

Jasper Fforde: The Eyre Affair

― Vermont Girl (Vermont Girl), Thursday, 19 February 2004 19:25 (twenty-two years ago)

What's your take on it, Vermont Girl? I picked it up in England about a year ago and read in on the plane back. Amusing, fun, clever, but I admit I don't remember much of it. I have the sequal, but haven't been too inspired to read it.

― BabyBuddha (BabyBuddha), Thursday, 19 February 2004 20:03 (twenty-two years ago)

I'm reading Lanark: A Life in Four Books by Alasdair Gray.

Just finished Scoop (Waugh) in three days and before that it was an odd contemporary trio Murakami's Hard-boiled Wonderland at the End of the Universe, Francine Prose's Blue Angel, and Paul Auster's Oracle Night.

― mck (mck), Thursday, 19 February 2004 22:32 (twenty-two years ago)

I read Richard Powers' 'The Time of Our Singing' last month and thought it was almost as good as "The Goldbug Variations" which may be my favorite book of all time. The end of the former book was perfection.

― Jane Tucker, Thursday, 19 February 2004 23:24 (twenty-two years ago)

Finished two books today - Jennifer Government by Max Barry and The Botany of Desire by Michael Pollan.

― Karen King, Friday, 20 February 2004 00:56 (twenty-two years ago)

How was Jennifer Government? It looked interesting, and I played that Nation States game Barry had going, but I haven't decided if I'm going to read the novel or not yet.

― August (August), Friday, 20 February 2004 03:11 (twenty-two years ago)

Just finished Ishugiro's _When We Were Orphans_ and haven't yet congeled my thoughts. It's certainly no Remains, nor even an Unconsoled, but it's got an odd staying-power and I'm glad to have read (and equally to have finished) it in a respectable week of busreading. Anyway, brg30, enjoy it because it's definately a great book.

― Atila the Honeybun (Atila the Honeybun), Friday, 20 February 2004 05:04 (twenty-two years ago)

The first volume of the Alan Clarke diaries - entertaining stuff, and he's not at all how I imagined he was.

― chris (chris), Friday, 20 February 2004 10:40 (twenty-two years ago)

Just started Howard's End. I'm a latecomer to EM Forster, but I've got sucked in of late. I really enjoyed Where Angels Fear to Tread and have a soft spot for the film of Room with a View (the music is perfect in that film).

Does anyone outside of the UK read Forster?

― MikeyG (MikeyG), Friday, 20 February 2004 10:45 (twenty-two years ago)

BabyBudda: I'm loving it. I'm only up to Chapter 8 and already I feel as though I'm missing out on loads of literary allusions.

I can’t get over the names, though. They’re hilarious. Once I got to: “Schitt. Jack Schitt,” I had to go back and look at all the other names. Acheron Hades and his brother Styx. Inspector Paige Turner. They’re the kind of names that make you turn to the person next to you, elbow them in the side and say, “Paige Turner… get it? Page turner?” Then you guffaw as they turn slightly away and dial the paddy wagon to come pick you up.

Can’t wait to finish it and will start it’s own thread when I’m done.

― Vermont Girl (Vermont Girl), Friday, 20 February 2004 13:22 (twenty-two years ago)

While recovering from wrenching my back, I've picked up "Geisha, A Life" and began re-reading "Jane Eyre." It makes for bizarre dreams when the muscle relaxants kick in...

― yesabibliophile (yesabibliophile), Friday, 20 February 2004 16:56 (twenty-two years ago)

Jennifer Government was very good overall - I did have some problem keeping the character names straight however.

― Karen King (Karen King), Friday, 20 February 2004 21:44 (twenty-two years ago)

sp: Howards End

― the spellfox, Friday, 20 February 2004 21:59 (twenty-two years ago)

Marketing Management 11E/Kotler, Financial Accounting: Information for Decisions/Wild ("Information for Decisison": Ha! Best title ever!). I also have about 20 pages left of The Corrections but simply cannot finish that damn book. And "Supreme Court for Dummies."

― Kathleen, Sunday, 22 February 2004 04:21 (twenty-two years ago)

Finished The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency yesterday - enjoyed it. Still reading A Dying Light in Corduba and started The Smoke Ring and Dragons of Autumn Twilight.

― Karen King (Karen King), Sunday, 22 February 2004 14:28 (twenty-two years ago)

Unholy Wars: Afghanistan, America and International Terrorism by
John K. Cooley

― Michael B, Sunday, 22 February 2004 15:35 (twenty-two years ago)

I just finished "Absalom, Absalom" by Faulkner and I'm exhausted. Hard work, but I feel like I want to talk about it all the time. Problem is no one's read it.

I just started reading Middlesex. I'm about 100 pages in. Digging it so far.

― Phastbuck, Sunday, 22 February 2004 16:06 (twenty-two years ago)

so, right now, i've just picked up 'Q' by Luther Blissett. i think subconsciously i was hoping it would be like Eco, but without being 'Baudolino' or 'The Island...'. i suppose we'll see.

― writingstatic (writingstatic), Monday, 23 February 2004 02:49 (twenty-two years ago)

Bridge of Birds by Barry Hughart

(Read it and join next month's discussion over at bookblog.net with me as moderator.)

― Vermont Girl (Vermont Girl), Monday, 23 February 2004 14:00 (twenty-two years ago)

Began "Danziger's Travels - Beyond Forbidden Frontiers" last night... (thanks, MikeyG)

― yesabibliophile (yesabibliophile), Monday, 23 February 2004 14:11 (twenty-two years ago)

Took the opportunity of finishing EM Forster while my girlfriend watched ER in the lounge. An 8 out of 10 on the Mikey G scale.

Currently re-reading Breakfast at Tiffanys. So difficult to read the dialogue without hearing it from the film.

― Mikey G (Mikey G), Tuesday, 24 February 2004 09:53 (twenty-two years ago)

Ah, Breakfast At Tiffany's. Sod the film, that fucking rotten song has scuppered any chances of me ever picking that one up. Don't you find it keeps creeping into your head while you're trying to read it?

― NickB (NickB), Tuesday, 24 February 2004 12:02 (twenty-two years ago)

Ahh, Nick, c'mon! It's a great film too (Mickey Rooney aside). Moon River is a goosebumper of a tune.

― Mikey G (Mikey G), Tuesday, 24 February 2004 12:11 (twenty-two years ago)

This was a thought-provoking comment in last week's LRB:

Lots of women claimed to have been the original of Holly Golightly. The strongest contenders were Pamela Drake and Doris Lilly, who 'were living in this brownstone walk-up on East 78th St, exactly the one in Breakfast at Tiffany's. Exactly. Truman used to come over all the time and watch me put make-up on before I went out,' Lilly, the author of How to Marry a Millionaire, later said. A woman called Golightly sued Capote ('for a fortune', according to Bernard, though he doesn't say whether or not she won). Capote said her case was about as plausible as Joan Crawford claiming to be the model for Lolita. A more clinching argument might have been to point out that not only is 'Holly Golightly' an assumed name in the novella, but that the pseudonym was originally going to be 'Connie Gustafson'. Or perhaps he could have reminded her that Breakfast at Tiffany's is a work of fiction, and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental. Like, duh.

Connie Gustafson!

― Jerry the Nipper (Jerrynipper), Tuesday, 24 February 2004 12:33 (twenty-two years ago)

I read something similar which focused on the male characters: Rusty Trawler etc. I guess some people read In Cold Blood and concluded all Capote's books blurred the line between fiction and non-fiction.

― Mikey G (Mikey G), Tuesday, 24 February 2004 12:42 (twenty-two years ago)

Ahh, I read Breakfast At Tiffany's recently. Admittedly it had no big impact on me, but I felt it was a fun, quick read. My intentions are to read In Cold Blood in the near future, but I have a bad habit of always getting swamped with way too many library books at a time.

At the moment I'm reading an 80s critical edition of Kafka's Amerika, where they've reverted more to the original text, apparently, and included a chapter or so of text that was removed from the end of the original release of the book.
I always hear people talk about Kafka as a difficult author, but I don't really see it. The Norwegian translations have been really appealing to me, and the rather heavy-handed symbolism - if I may be so bold as to call it that - is quite fun!

I did attempt reading Zadie Smith's "White Teeth" as well, but gave up after a few chapters, when I realized that I didn't like her writing style, nor did I actually care about anything that happened in the story. That being said, I'll always have the image of a guy beating pigeons with a bat stuck in my head.

― Øystein H-O (Øystein H-O), Tuesday, 24 February 2004 13:05 (twenty-two years ago)

Everyone knows that Holly Golightly is alive and well as a British chanteuse:

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B000003L0B/ref=pd_sim_music_1/102-2048070-3372139?v=glance&s=music

― Phastbuck, Tuesday, 24 February 2004 14:58 (twenty-two years ago)

okay, so 'Q' was a load of crap. now i'm reading 'Rommel? Gunner Who?' by Spike Milligan. can't go wrong with Spike. not like Italians.

― writingstatic (writingstatic), Tuesday, 24 February 2004 22:20 (twenty-two years ago)

Anyone read One Thousand White Women by Jim Fergus? I thought it was great!

― pepektheassassin, Tuesday, 24 February 2004 23:11 (twenty-two years ago)

Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas - Hunter S Thompson. Slipped through the net when I was younger. At 34, I think it sucks.

― Mikey G (Mikey G), Thursday, 26 February 2004 11:25 (twenty-two years ago)

I've just started on a Norwegian translation of Dürrenmatt's "Der Verdacht", or "The Suspicion" (though this site calls it "The Quarry", so I guess that's the English title)
Picked it up at the library on a whim, although I admittedly know nothing whatsoever about the author. Must've been the ü. It's a short book, so I figured what the hey.

― Øystein H-O (Øystein H-O), Thursday, 26 February 2004 23:55 (twenty-two years ago)

Joseph Wambaugh's "Delta Star". Top notch right-wing cop action.

― Chuck Tatum (Chuck Tatum), Friday, 27 February 2004 18:09 (twenty-two years ago)

Recently finished: A Dying Light in Corduba by Lindsey Davis and The Smoke Ring by Larry Niven.

― Karen King (Karen King), Friday, 27 February 2004 18:19 (twenty-two years ago)

'On Love' by Alain de Botton. Have heard a lot of really good things about this book. Also 'Drinking Coffee Elsewhere' by ZZ Packer. First story was great.

― bookdwarf (bookdwarf), Friday, 27 February 2004 18:31 (twenty-two years ago)

As I finish the Danziger travels book, I've started "Library: An Unquiet History" by Matthew Battles.

― yesabibliophile (yesabibliophile), Sunday, 29 February 2004 16:42 (twenty-two years ago)

Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers by Mary Roach. Interesting reading.

― Chris F. (servoret), Sunday, 29 February 2004 17:04 (twenty-two years ago)

Just finished Club Dead by Charlaine Harris. Currently reading The Dragons of Autumn Twilight and have barely started A Darkness More Than Night.

― Karen King (Karen King), Monday, 1 March 2004 00:58 (twenty-two years ago)

He he he, I've read Dead Until Dark and Living Dead in Dallas by Charlaine Harris. Pretty much literture junk food, but I need a cheesey vampire romance fix now and then. [sob, covering face] I'm so ashamed...

Just started Sparks: An Urban Fairy Tale by Lawrence Marvit (graphic novel). Better be worth the figgin' money ($40.00!!).

― Vermont Girl (Vermont Girl), Monday, 1 March 2004 14:01 (twenty-two years ago)

I started Jennifer Government by Max Barry on the train this morning. Just a chapter or two in and I've already laughed several times which is a good sign.

― LondonLee (LondonLee), Monday, 1 March 2004 14:35 (twenty-two years ago)

'a whore like the rest' by richard meltzer.

― Julio Desouza (jdesouza), Monday, 1 March 2004 15:07 (twenty-two years ago)

I started 'Contempt' by Alberto Moravia last night. I've never read anyhing by him before, but if it carries on as it's started, it'll be the best book I've read in ages. It was written in the 1950's, but feels a lot more contemporary than that. The narrator is a highly self aware, bookish character, and the book follows in detail the break-up of his marriage.

― Joe Kay (feethurt), Monday, 1 March 2004 16:35 (twenty-two years ago)

Finished Lethem's "Gun, with Occasional Music" and started Philip K. Dick's "A Scanner Darkly". I was eating a really good dinner at the time though, and I had to stop reading since the opening bit about the bugs was adversly affecting my appetite.

― Jordan (Jordan), Monday, 1 March 2004 16:39 (twenty-two years ago)

Bill Bryson's The Lost Continent. An unflattering picture of the States, but a funny one.

― Mikey G (Mikey G), Monday, 1 March 2004 17:45 (twenty-two years ago)

Mikey G, that's an excellent read by Bryson. His works always make me laugh aloud :)

― yesabibliophile (yesabibliophile), Monday, 1 March 2004 19:18 (twenty-two years ago)

I got distracted, for the nth time, from finishing Swann's Way by the Christmas receipt from my wife of Stephen Burn's Reader's Guide to David Foster Wallace's Infinite Jest, which meant I had to go and read Infinite Jest again. Christ, what a great frickin' book. It contains a puzzle, and every time I want to slow down to pick apart the clues so I can figure out what happened to Hal, but then I get so entertained I keep reading faster and faster and now I can see I'm just going to have to read it again. Sigh... I'll never finish In Search of Lost Time...

― Glenn Davis, Tuesday, 2 March 2004 06:07 (twenty-two years ago)

Portrait of a Lady by Henry James, for pleasure, and I can't even describe how much pleasure I'm actually getting out of it. The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin (which is modestly intertaining, but it's hard not the find the annecdotal autobiographical style popular-at-that-time rattling) and a book of Liebniz's philosophical writing (which often seems ridiculous). Also, this Derrida Reader, though I'm not quite sure when I'm going to have time to read it.

― Dirk A. Keaton, Tuesday, 2 March 2004 09:16 (twenty-two years ago)

I've been reading some Tobias Wolff short stories that a friend thrust upon me. I can't say I enjoyed them as much as she hoped I would. There was a lack of pizzazz about the prose, an almost complete absence of the 'rustle of language' that made reading even two of them in a row a little gruelling. Not that I hated them, the characters and plots were engaging - it's just that they felt like treatments for episodes of a good HBO drama, rather than something specifically literary.

― Jerry the Nipper (Jerrynipper), Tuesday, 2 March 2004 12:37 (twenty-two years ago)

Well, the Dürrenmatt was certainly nothing I'd recommend, though somewhat entertaining. It read pretty much like a comic book, with silly characters and a simplistic story.

I've just started on Virginia Woolf's To The Lighthouse, which is a different matter entirely! I'm only a few pages in, but I really had no idea what I was getting into, as I'd never read about her, and were both surprised and enraptured by her writing. There's nothing quite like the wonderful feeling I get when I discover a, to me, new author whose bibliography is open for exploration.

― Øystein H-O (Øystein H-O), Wednesday, 3 March 2004 03:42 (twenty-two years ago)

Auntie Mame by Patrick Dennis

― Vermont Girl (Vermont Girl), Wednesday, 3 March 2004 13:11 (twenty-two years ago)

Bel Canto by Ann Patchett. Good study of human behaviour in the context of a thriller.

― Mikey G (Mikey G), Wednesday, 3 March 2004 14:04 (twenty-two years ago)

I loved Bel Canto. There were so many parts that made me laugh out loud.

― Vermont Girl (Vermont Girl), Wednesday, 3 March 2004 14:07 (twenty-two years ago)

I'm only about halfway through, but, yes, I agree, I never knew there was so much comedy in a hostage situtation.

I might have to add the opera singer to the crushes thread. And maybe the young solider girl, Carmen too.

― Mikey G (Mikey G), Wednesday, 3 March 2004 18:54 (twenty-two years ago)

Good grief, you're all so well read! I'm an indescriminate, shameless reader of anything with text on it, including the margarine tub as I butter my bread (nice contradiction there :) and the can of airspray in the bathroom ...

But it certainly is nice to have arrived here today, to find myself in the company of others who read more than one book at a time.

Currently reading:

Life of Pi by Yann Martel
Widows by Ed McBain
and
Re-visiting all my Tintin comics

― Margo B99, Thursday, 4 March 2004 15:57 (twenty-two years ago)

just finished alice munros's 'who do you think you are?' i wish i hadnt... halfway through 'the stone diaries' by carol shields.. i am not enjoying it..

mikeyg, forster is red everywhere.. i live in pakistan and have red him over and over... room with a view is gorgeous.. for some reason, im always having trouble with passage to india.. everytime, i read a few pages and then put it back, feeling suffocated.. very strange

― cheeesoo (cheeesoo), Thursday, 4 March 2004 17:19 (twenty-two years ago)

Forster in Pakistan! Good stuff. I think the films threw an unfashionable veil over Forster's books. All that Merchant Ivory English acting...

I think you have the strangest name / e-mail by the way.

― Mikey G (Mikey G), Thursday, 4 March 2004 17:23 (twenty-two years ago)

Since my last philosophy class was woefully short, I really didn't get enough on Nietzsche~so I'm reading through "What Nietzsche Really Said."

― yesabibliophile (yesabibliophile), Saturday, 6 March 2004 14:19 (twenty-two years ago)

Just finished Leila by JP Donleavy. Up to the usual high standard.

About to start reading The Mortdecai Trilogy by Kyril Bonfiglioli.

― holojames, Sunday, 7 March 2004 17:25 (twenty-two years ago)

Just finished:

Auntie Mame by Patrick Dennis (hahahahaha!)
Jennifer Government by Max Barry (... grumble ...)

Just started:

The Magician's Assistant by Ann Patchett

Initial reaction: Depressing.

― Vermont Girl (Vermont Girl), Tuesday, 9 March 2004 13:16 (twenty-two years ago)

A battered old paperback of The Prime Of Miss Jean Brodie by Muriel Spark which I've had for years and just thought it was about time I read the damn thing. It's very good, though hard to get Maggie Smith's voice out of your head.

― LondonLee (LondonLee), Tuesday, 9 March 2004 13:33 (twenty-two years ago)

New Alexander McCall-Smith book - the fourth I've read this year. You don't always want to have to use your brain to read.

― Mikey G (Mikey G), Tuesday, 9 March 2004 18:03 (twenty-two years ago)

Yeah, The Kalahari School of Typing just came out in paperback today. I have to pick that up after work today. The next one (The Full Cupboard of Life) comes out in hardcover next month (April 20th).

― Vermont Girl (Vermont Girl), Tuesday, 9 March 2004 18:16 (twenty-two years ago)

Drinking Coffee Elsewhere by ZZ Packer

― Megan (bookdwarf), Tuesday, 9 March 2004 18:25 (twenty-two years ago)

"Infinite Jest" by David Foster Wallace, after recently seeing it mentioned on an ILB thread.

― Øystein H-O (Øystein H-O), Tuesday, 9 March 2004 18:30 (twenty-two years ago)

Karma Cola- Gita Mehta
Evelyn Waugh- Work Suspended and other short stories

im about to start 'in chancery' by john galsworthy.. is it any good?

― cheeesoo (cheeesoo), Tuesday, 9 March 2004 21:25 (twenty-two years ago)

Michael Chabon - Wonder Boys. 50 pages in, seems alright to me.

― Mikey G (Mikey G), Thursday, 11 March 2004 14:07 (twenty-two years ago)

I'm reading House of Leaves now, which my girlfriend has been trying to get me to read for three years (and I've wanted to for longer than that, just never got around to it). After that I'm planning to swing back around and read a couple more Philip K. Dick books, and then Fortress of Solitude if I feel up to it.

― Jordan (Jordan), Thursday, 11 March 2004 16:49 (twenty-two years ago)

Finished The Navigator of New York this morning - lots of good Arctic exploration which I like. Almost done with Dragons of Autumn Twilight.

― Karen King (Karen King), Friday, 12 March 2004 01:05 (twenty-two years ago)

"Doing Our Own Thing: The Degradation of Language and Music and Why We Should, Like, Care" by John McWhorter. I'm a third of the way, have found myself nodding, have found half a dozen references to look up, have found some prejudices supported and some assumptions questioned. He's got a bit of snarky wit that I'm enjoying.

― Rabin the Cat (Rabin the Cat), Friday, 12 March 2004 04:49 (twenty-two years ago)

The Da Vinci Code. I'm not enamored with his writing style but it IS very engaging, which is good. I need all the escapism I can get.

I have Cryptonomicon coming in next week on tape, rah! (I listen to books on tape a lot)

― JuliaA (j_bdules), Friday, 12 March 2004 23:47 (twenty-two years ago)

I think I meant to say enamored of. Maybe. Whatever.

― JuliaA (j_bdules), Friday, 12 March 2004 23:48 (twenty-two years ago)

Just abandoned the Mortdecai Trilogy because it is dreadful.

Three chapters into Lucky Jim.

― holojames (holojames), Saturday, 13 March 2004 14:16 (twenty-two years ago)

"A Venetian Affair," Andrea Di Robilant.

― yesabibliophile (yesabibliophile), Sunday, 14 March 2004 21:03 (twenty-two years ago)

I just re-bought "god's gift to women" (paterson) and picked up for the first time "mythologies" (barthes) and "why I am not a painter" (o'hara). I'm trying to craft my own irresistible cartography of readings.

― cozen (Cozen), Sunday, 14 March 2004 22:08 (twenty-two years ago)

Wait Until Spring, Bandini by John Fante. Angry American in small Colorado town. I read a couple of his others a few years ago. Any of you lot read him?

― Mikey G (Mikey G), Monday, 15 March 2004 10:17 (twenty-two years ago)

Read "Confederacy of dunces" this weekend; incidentally entirely because of this board. I see the school library has received the copy of "Trout fishing in America" that I asked them to order, so I'll probably start on that today.
Oh, and still reading Infinite Jest. I figure that with such a monster I'll have to read a bit on the side.

― Øystein H-O (Øystein H-O), Monday, 15 March 2004 11:53 (twenty-two years ago)

Mikey, I read Wait Until Spring, Bandini quite a long time ago, but I can remember it pretty well. Did you read the other couple of books in the Bandini series? Ask The Dust is probably his best one, though Dreams From Bunker Hill is a good one too.

― NickB (NickB), Monday, 15 March 2004 12:25 (twenty-two years ago)

I read The Road to Las Angeles and Ask the Dust about two or three years back. I saw Wait Until Spring, Bandini in a remainder bookstore on Saturday and snapped it up for a bargain £2.95.

These editions are all published by the Rebel Inc arm of Canongate.

I'll keep my eyes open for Dreams from Bunker Hill. Thanks.

― Mikey G (Mikey G), Monday, 15 March 2004 12:31 (twenty-two years ago)

I've got old Paladin editions of them, but I *think* they're all still in print in the Black Sparrow Press editions, mostly due to Charles Bukowski who had a whole lot to do with getting Fante back into print, just as he was slipping away.

There was actually a film version of Wait Until Spring that came out a decade or so ago. Faye Dunaway was in it, but I don't know if it was any good or not.

― NickB (NickB), Monday, 15 March 2004 12:45 (twenty-two years ago)

The intro to Wait Until Spring... is written by his son, Dan. He blames the publisher for not promoting the book with enough gusto when it came out in 1938. Apparentl the publisher was too busy fighting a court battle with an Austrian guy over the unauthorished publication of his book, Mein Kampf. I kid ye not.

― Mikey G (Mikey G), Monday, 15 March 2004 12:51 (twenty-two years ago)

Lost in a Good Book by Jasper Fffffforde

― Vermont Girl (Vermont Girl), Monday, 15 March 2004 13:18 (twenty-two years ago)

I picked up a book of Alfred Bester short stories, Virtual Unrealities, which has distracted me from House of Leaves.

― Jordan (Jordan), Monday, 15 March 2004 15:16 (twenty-two years ago)

I'm on a Dawn Powell tear - finished Angels on Toast on Friday, finished The Wicked Pavilion yesterday (very very funny take on starving artists and various hangers-on). The Golden Spur is the third novel in this volume I've had from QPB for ages, so it will be next.

Thanks for the reminder on John Fante - I read the Bandini books long ago and The Brotherhood of the Grape a few years back. Time for a revisit.

― Jaq (Jaq), Monday, 15 March 2004 15:32 (twenty-two years ago)

Speaking of Fante, they're making Ask the Dust into a film... with Colin Farell (Frarrel?) as Bandini.

What is the world coming to? I always thought of Bandini as an ugly red-head...

― Vermont Girl (Vermont Girl), Monday, 15 March 2004 15:47 (twenty-two years ago)

A redhead? Nah, he had dark hair and freckles on the covers of my editions. There are some nice pictures of the 'real' Arturo Bandini on these pages.

― NickB (NickB), Monday, 15 March 2004 16:10 (twenty-two years ago)

Just finished 'Erasure' by Percival Everett (bitty and unsatisfying), now reading John Bradshaw's study of big-time gamblers, 'Fast Company'.

― winterland, Monday, 15 March 2004 16:13 (twenty-two years ago)

I was looking at that Fante site earlier. His wife was quite tasty, no?

His hair is described as dark in the book, but difficult to keep down. If anyone really cares.

― Mikey G (Mikey G), Monday, 15 March 2004 16:16 (twenty-two years ago)

Hmm... I guess it was the freckles that made me think of a red head.

― Vermont Girl (Vermont Girl), Monday, 15 March 2004 16:18 (twenty-two years ago)

kodwo eshu: more brilliant than the sun

― Julio Desouza (jdesouza), Monday, 15 March 2004 16:36 (twenty-two years ago)

As of late I've read:

In the Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex - excellent and very nauseating.
Out by Natsuo Kirino - very excellent and also nauseating.
Rocket City by C. Alpert - so-so, but not horrid.
The Moor's Last Sigh by Rushdie - pretty enjoyable.
Mating: A Novel by Norman Rush - either brilliant or pretentious.

And now I'm reading Persian Mirrors: The Elusive Face of Iran which is interesting, but I think it should be read in conjunction with Reading Lolita in Tehran to get the foreign female/ native female different viewpoints.

And I want to give a plug for a little known book titled If Nobody Speaks of Remarkable Things, which I loved and I want someone to talk about it with.

― I'm Passing Open Windows (Ms Laura), Tuesday, 16 March 2004 10:50 (twenty-two years ago)

Jaq - I'm a (relatively newly introduced) fan of Powell's works - I'm working my way through the Library of America's two collections of her writings. I'm glad to know there's another Powell reader floating around.

― I'm Passing Open Windows (Ms Laura), Tuesday, 16 March 2004 10:58 (twenty-two years ago)

― I'm Passing Open Windows (Ms Laura), Tuesday, 16 March 2004 10:59 (twenty-two years ago)

Wow - I'm such an enthusiastic fan that I had to announce it twice. Apologies.

― I'm Passing Open Windows (Ms Laura), Tuesday, 16 March 2004 11:00 (twenty-two years ago)

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nightime by Mark Haddon. All the chapters are prime numbers. This book can't stop winning awards.

― Mikey G (Mikey G), Tuesday, 16 March 2004 11:07 (twenty-two years ago)

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nightime by Mark Haddon
The Seduction of Morality by Tom Murphy
The Occult by Colin Wilson
Born to Win by Muriel James and Dorothy Jongeward.
woof :-D

― woof, Tuesday, 16 March 2004 18:17 (twenty-two years ago)

Best Short Stories of 2003

I don't think I know what a short story is anymore. So many times I finish one and all I can say is, "Huh? I don't get it."

― Clellie, Tuesday, 16 March 2004 21:58 (twenty-two years ago)

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