saturday september 30
The Keep by Jennifer Egan is the story of two cousins who are restoring a medieval castle in Europe, and the dark history that connects them. Within this framework, Egan introduces us to another character, Ray, a convict taking a writing class in prison where he creates a story about- you guessed it- two cousins in a medieval castle. Ray has written himself into the tale of the castle, but we're not sure where he fits in, or whether any of his account is autobiographical. What follows is a compelling story which is part mystery, part suspense and possible allegory- it's a thought-provoking book which is extremely well-crafted. I'm looking forward to checking out more by this author.
My apologies for not posting in a while - it's certainly not for lack of great reading! My desk is piled with books I'm dying to get to, and I'm having a hard time deciding what to read next. It's always difficult to follow up a great book and not be set up for disappointment. Also, I've been in the midst of a career change, and this will unfortunately be my last post. I've enjoyed sharing my passion for books in this blog, and hopefully have inspired a few to pick up some of my suggested reads. Keep reading!
thursday september 28
Sometimes it’s hard to plunge in and start reading a prolific author. You feel as though you’ll never catch up. So if the thought of tackling James Lee Burke’s Dave Robicheaux mysteries is a little intimidating, or if you’d like a change of pace from the steamy, haunted Louisiana delta setting of that famous series, try The Lost Get-Back Boogie, a stand-alone suspense novel Burke published in 1986. You’ll get the gorgeously lyrical writing, the gritty realism, and the inescapable violence, all set against a big Montana landscape.
Iry Paret is out on parole after serving two years for manslaughter (a barroom fight that got out of hand) and is finding it impossible to settle down quietly in his home parish. With his guitar, his pickup, and an open case of beer, he takes off for Montana, where a former fellow prisoner, Buddy Riordan, has offered him a job on a ranch.
But trouble follows Iry there, too.
Continue Reading…
wednesday september 27
In a recent post, I headed a list of milestones in modern comics history with Will Eisner’s 1978 A Contract with God and Other Tenement Stories. The pioneering writer, artist, publisher, and teacher for whom the Eisner Awards are named marketed this collection of adult tales as a “graphic novel.”
A few months before his death in January 2005, Eisner decided to republish his landmark work together with two other collections set on the mythical New York tenement street that reflects his childhood home. The Contract with God Trilogy: Life on Dropsie Avenue includes the stories of A Life Force, written in 1983, and Dropsie Avenue from 1995, both new to the Library with this omnibus volume.
While A Contract with God and A Life Force portray the world of the 1930s, Dropsie Avenue traces the changes in the neighborhood, especially the succession of ethnic groups, since 1870, when “still there were farms in the Bronx.”
Continue Reading…
tuesday september 26
Tom LeClair, one of my English professors when I attended the University of Cincinnati, has written his fourth novel, The Liquidators. In this story, Tom Bond, of Middletown, Ohio, operates a mobile salvage enterprise, Midwest Liquidators. Bond’s caravan of independent truckers hauls a varied inventory of remaindered and discontinued goods on a circuit of tertiary cities of the Midwest.
Business is good, but Bond wants to recruit a successor. His son refuses (“I don’t want to live off failure”); his daughter sees the business as a cult of economic defeat; and his truckers aren’t interested. He considers the ephemerality of his enterprise and wonders, “What lasts?” That’s when Bond has a dream to build an enduring memorial to human industry and folly in his hometown. The Liquidators is a discerning character study and a blackly comic fable written partly in homage to Faulkner's Absalom, Absalom.
Continue Reading…
monday september 25
“Advice is what we ask for when we already know the answer but wish we didn't.” Erica Jong
I'm not very interested in current-day self-help books, but I love old ones. There is nothing like immersing yourself in the aphorisms and advice of the first half of the twentieth century to give yourself a feeling of the utter strangeness of a familiar culture.
We recently got a book that sent me down that road again. How to be Popular is a collection of short excerpts from self-help books and articles for teens on the subject of popularity. These are drawn from books and magazines, mostly from the 1960's and 70's, with art from the same time period. A classic quote from this title is "Take a good look at those who are popular. Where do they go? What do they do? Try to be like them."
Continue Reading…
saturday september 23
George P. Pelecanos is a writer who makes me think of Walter Mosley for the amazing vividness of his writing. You can feel the grit under the soles of your shoes as you walk down these fictional mean streets, and the dialogue is so pitch perfect you can just hear it sing off the page. People who like noir crime fiction really shouldn’t miss Pelecanos’ work.
His books are set in Washington, DC, in the Greek-American and African-American communities there. The same characters show up in many of the novels, so it can be hard to find a place to start reading. Try his new novel, The Night Gardener, or if one book is not enough (and it won't be!), start with one of his recent series, beginning with Right as Rain.
Continue Reading…
thursday september 21
This week, instead of writing about a particular author or title, I thought I’d share some bits and pieces of news from the book world with you. In no particular order…
Hannibal Rising, a novel about the early days of psychopathic killer Hannibal Lecter, will be published on December 5. According to the president of the Bantam Dell Publishing Group,
Hannibal Rising will give readers the chance to “learn of Lecter's beginnings and will see the evolution of his evil.”
Thomas Harris is also working on a screenplay for a movie by the same name. It has an estimated release date of early 2007. Unfortunately Anthony Hopkins (who won an Academy Award in 1991 for his performance in
Silence of the Lambs) will not reprise his role of Dr. Lecter in the new movie.
Continue Reading…
