Whatcha reading, just read, plan to read as summer draws to a close?

Me:

Currently reading:

The Places In Between, by Rory Stewart
Intrepid Scottish journalist walks across Afghanistan shortly after the fall of the Taliban. So far, very engaging.

Surfacing, by Margaret Atwood
I'm reserving judgment.

Until I Find You, by John Irving
A friend lent this to me and I read about 150 pages before realizing that I don't care about these people or what happens to them, the same problem I have with every book by John Irving after Garp. But because the friend lent it, I'll slog through.

Race Manners: Navigating the Minefield Between Black and White Americas, by Bruce A Jacobs
His heart's very much in the right place, and there's a lot of sense in what he says, but I can't really gauge to what extent he's *right* (like when he talks about healthy ways for Black people to view insults from whites) and to what extent he's actually just perpetuating a problem. It is indeed a balancing act. Most of his comments to white people are well taken, though.

Just finished:

Becoming Justice Blackmun, by Linda Greenhouse
Very engaging, but I think you have to be a fan of the Supreme Court to really get into this stuff. She focuses on death penalty, abortion, and women's rights issues, so it's cool to see his jurisprudence develop and it's very nice to peek inside his personal ruminations on the cases.

Passing: When People Can't Be Who They Are, by Brooke Kroeger
Well intentioned but frankly superficial. I think there's a lot more to be learned from other sources.

Growing Up Fast, by Joanna Lipper
About teen pregnancy. This was an interesting set of new information to add to the stuff I've been reading on the working poor, but I just feel like the group studied was too small to give me a sense of what's really out there. I actually kept thinking of the book All Alone in the World: Children of the Incarcerated, by Nell Bernstein, because the issues of teen pregnancy plus a ton of other issues are dealt with in there really well. If you have to choose, choose the latter.

Oryx & Crake, by Margaret Atwood
I was reading Endgame: Volume 2: Resistance, by Derrick Jensen, which I don't know whether to include in my now reading list because I don't know how firmly I've put it down, lol, but he mentioned this and I thought, you know, I want to read a novel. I really really liked this, so then I re-read

The Handmaid's Tale, by Margaret Atwood
which held up well, but then inspired me to buy Surfacing, on which I'm reserving judgment.

Strangers in the House: Coming of Age in Occupied Palestine, by Raja Shehadeh
I can't argue with this book, but it's really more of his search for resolution with his father and the memory of his father than it is *really* about occupied Palestine. For that, I so so strongly urge Drinking the Sea at Gaza: Days and Nights in a Land Under Siege, by Amira Hass. It's truly a remarkable book that will lend tremendous insight to the issues.

Up Next:

Ahmad's War, Ahmad's Peace: Surviving Under Saddam, Dying in the New Iraq, by Michael Goldfarb

Not One More Death, by John Le Carre, Richard Dawkins, Brian Eno, and Michael Faber and others




~~~~~

Breathe and know you're breathing

I'm currently reading "Simple Taoism: A guide to living in balance." I'm hoping to start reading "Freakanomics;" mostly at the request of a co-worker who lent it to me.

Other than that, I'm on the hunt for a new book for the fall/winter.

Peace-Like Stylee,
J-Bird

"Nobody light-skinned reppin' harder since Ice-T"

"Where does a platypus learn a word like hodgepodge?"

it's a quick read.

The Wire: Truth Be Told

That oughta keep me occupied for the 3-4 weeks.

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kurly's Super-Duper Awesome DVD Collection:
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I was trying to decide whether to buy it yesterday...

~~~~~

Breathe and know you're breathing

It's not drawing me as quickly as Drama City did, but I'm only maybe 40 pages in. I can't give it a glowing recommendation yet.


>I was trying to decide whether to buy it yesterday...


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kurly's Super-Duper Awesome DVD Collection:
http://www.dvdaficionado.com/dvds.html?cat=1&id=kurlyswirl

I opened it up last night and discovered I was on page 92. It's getting better. I'm at the part where the case is just starting to unfold.

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kurly's Super-Duper Awesome DVD Collection:
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Not highly yet (I'm about halfway through), but it's pretty engaging.

The references to things that also happened on The Wire are kinda interesting. And there's an appearance by a character in some of Pelecanos's other books.


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kurly's Super-Duper Awesome DVD Collection:
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I like Ramone. It'll be interesting to see him develop as a character. I think Pelecanos does his best character work about 2 books into each series.

Then I read Hard Revolution which apparently I never read (?) even though I bought it when it first came out.

So that makes me think I missed Drama City, too. Back to the bookstore, I guess.

>I like Ramone. It'll be interesting to see him develop as a
>character. I think Pelecanos does his best character work
>about 2 books into each series.

Ooh! Did you hear somewhere that this is a new series? I was under the impression that it was another standalone book, like Drama City.


>
>Then I read Hard Revolution which apparently I never read (?)
>even though I bought it when it first came out.

Oops. lol

Did you like it?


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kurly's Super-Duper Awesome DVD Collection:
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this guy at the bookstore I go to most often is a HUGE Pelecanos fan which I didn't know until last weekend, and he has seen him speak a few times and so forth.

I also learned from him that Pelecanos's wife is Black, and they may or may not have children of their own loins but they definitely have a couple of adopted kids, both Black boys, I understand. Which explains a LOT about Pelecanos's ability to write about Black issues. And of course, the whole Gus/Regina relationship.

Yeah, so this bookstore guy said that this is definitely a new continuing character. I don't know when the last time was that he saw Pelecanos speak, but I kind of gathered that he had it from the horse's mouth.

And Right As Rain is supposedly in development as a film. *crosses fingers that it gets made and that it doesn't get fucked up*

>I also learned from him that Pelecanos's wife is Black, and
>they may or may not have children of their own loins but they
>definitely have a couple of adopted kids, both Black boys, I
>understand. Which explains a LOT about Pelecanos's ability to
>write about Black issues. And of course, the whole Gus/Regina
>relationship.

You know, it occurred to me before that he might be married to a black woman, and then when I read The Night Gardener, I was even more sure of it. It doesn't surprise me at all that he adopted black boys. That's really admirable. Oh, here, I found an EW article. It says they also have a little girl, also adopted. http://www.ew.com/ew/report/0,6115,214646~5~0~mysterywritergeorgepelecanos,00.html


>
>Yeah, so this bookstore guy said that this is definitely a new
>continuing character.

That's great news. I've been waiting for a new series. I really like the relationship between Gus and Diego and am looking forward to seeing how that evolves as Diego gets further into his teenage years.


>And Right As Rain is supposedly in development as a film.
>*crosses fingers that it gets made and that it doesn't get
>fucked up*

Good! I hope whomever makes it does right by it. I hope Pelecanos writes the screenplay.


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kurly's Super-Duper Awesome DVD Collection:
http://www.dvdaficionado.com/dvds.html?cat=1&id=kurlyswirl

>The Wire: Truth Be Told

I blazed through it in a day.

I'm taking my time with it, reading each section right before or after I watch the corresponding episode.

>>The Wire: Truth Be Told
>
>I blazed through it in a day.


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kurly's Super-Duper Awesome DVD Collection:
http://www.dvdaficionado.com/dvds.html?cat=1&id=kurlyswirl

After listening to all the Wire commentaries and watching season three again, I have become completely obsessed with all of David Simon's work.

----------------
I'm forever blowing bubbles,
pretty bubbles everywere

> I have become completely obsessed with all
>of David Simon's work.


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kurly's Super-Duper Awesome DVD Collection:
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got DC and Right As Rain, Hell To Pay and Soul Circus off of bargain table for $15...now i ain't too eager to read the other three. I give my books to the public library when i'm done, so someone will get to enjoy them.

i tried Pelecanos because i love The Wire and all the co-signs i've seen in these Janey threads.

"This is some BULLSHIT" (c) me at Central Booking

What didn't you like about it?

>got DC and Right As Rain, Hell To Pay and Soul Circus off of
>bargain table for $15...now i ain't too eager to read the
>other three.

Right As Rain is my favorite Pelecanos book. Give it a try. If you don't like that one, then I guess he's just not your cup of tea.

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kurly's Super-Duper Awesome DVD Collection:
http://www.dvdaficionado.com/dvds.html?cat=1&id=kurlyswirl

~~~~~

Breathe and know you're breathing

Yeah,I feel the same way about Simon's work...I'm reading Clockers now because of the debt that Simon said The Wire owes to that book(he made this comment in The Wire:Truth Be Told)...it's actually very good, the dialogue and feel(shiftin p.o.v.'s), very similar to that of the Wire...there is also one scene on the show, season 3 I think, that is taken directly from the book, but that's not surprising seeing how Price was taken on as a staff writer...

I'm also reading:
Lunar Park, Four Arguments For the Elimination of Television...I might pick up the Corner next...and/or Consider the Lobster by David Foster Wallace...I curious about Danielewski's(House of Leaves) new book...oh yeah,I also am going to read Toure's book of essays, I Didn't Drink the KoolAid...

How is homicide?...

Arrian was a Roman general that penned one or two historical epics. I'll put it this way: it's before the time of "editors", but an interesting read nonetheless.

I'm going onto The Idiot next.

--Maurice

_____

Bonding over sutures is what's hot in Oh-Nine.
--JS

Yer way 2 smart fer me

>Yer way 2 smart fer me

I can't tell if you're being facetious and whether I should be grossly flattered or pleasantly insulted.

I'll chill at "flattered" until further notice.

--Maurice

_____

Bonding over sutures is what's hot in Oh-Nine.
--JS

I don't even attempt that smarty pants stuff.


~~~~~

Breathe and know you're breathing

Not a Dostoevsky fan, then? My sister swears by him.

--Maurice

_____

Bonding over sutures is what's hot in Oh-Nine.
--JS

everyone has about fifteen of them

ugh

Have you read anything else by Dostoevsky?

I've been dodging the classics for a while now, telling myself that I'm getting my reading stamina back up...I did read The Sorrows of Young Werther right after a bad breakup, that was fun...I was thumbing through Goethe's Faust the other day...I'm rambling...


mutatis mutandem

...currently enjoying Human Capital by Stephen Amidon.

Finished Fat Land a while back. More Fast Food Nation type stuff, but a good read.

Can't wait to get my hands on All Aunt Hagar's Children by Edward P. Jones.

**This has been another positive bignick post.**

next month

http://www.cityarts.net/

this is a grrrreat venue, too. I've seen a whole mess of these and they're always great.

Very no-nonsense. But I like that.

from this past sunday's times. review's by david eggers.

"I maintain with clemency and munificence" -- J-Live

...a couple of weeks ago in the New Yorker.
It was unimpressive and yet memorable. If I
were to begin talking about it I might say
it wasn't good but I can't determine if the
fact that I can recall a good portion of the
stories details speaks to some latent quality
I'm not picking up on.

Didn't know he had a new book coming.

--------------------

blah blah blah

For work I am reading:

The Stranger, Billy Budd, Pudden'head Wilson, The Name of the Rose, Merchant of Venice, Uncle Tom's Cabin and In Cold Blood + Richard Posner's Law and Literature and a host of law review articles.

For pleasure I am trying to stick with Quicksilver, althought the lack of plot development is really starting to annoy me. I am also really enjoying The Known World World. This is truly an engaging and touching novel with a unique voice. A subject that could have been simply a gimmick in the hands of a less talented writer (blacks owning slaves), is explored here from an authentic perspective using the characters to bring the conflicts to the forefront in a very real way.

Check the site www.onfumes.com Old School Hip Hop vids and exclusive content

I thought it might just be me. Remember: If you really liked it, I was going to pick it up again.

I'd be interested to hear how you fit The Name of the Rose into *Law* and Lit.


~~~~~

Breathe and know you're breathing

>I thought it might just be me. Remember: If you really
>liked it, I was going to pick it up again.
>
>I'd be interested to hear how you fit The Name of the Rose
>into *Law* and Lit.
>
>
>~~~~~
>
>Breathe and know you're breathing


Yeah, although I do admire the amount of work that went into writing Quicksilver, I really thought that after 300 pages the plot would pick up a little. LOL. I will finish it evetually, but it is going on the back burner for now.

As for the Name of the Rose, I am probably going to address some of the more prominent themes in the book such as law vs. equity, natural law vs. man made, the role of motive in acertaining guilt and the role of the prosecutor in criminal law. The main protaganist encompasses many of these themes. There are many discussions of the inquisition and the role of the inquisitor that relate in many was to the role of prosecutors in our modern criminal justice system. In addition, it is actually a really good inroads for an introduction to various philosophers that critically discuss law.

Check the site www.onfumes.com Old School Hip Hop vids and exclusive content

Currently reading:

The Flowers Of Evil by Charles Baudelaire

Just finished reading:

McTeague by Frank Norris. I loved this one.

As for what I'll read next, I'm not sure yet.

I had some stuff set aside already. . . but now I'm itching to read another book by Pier Paolo Pasolini. Another one of his novels maybe.

That's the only book (other than the Updike you and I discussed) published recently that I for some unknown reason think you might have read....

>That's the only book (other than the Updike you and I
>discussed) published recently that I for some unknown reason
>think you might have read....
>
>

No, I've never read that one.

I'm really bad when it comes to new books.

But I still have it in mind to read Cloud Atlas and a couple of the other "new" books you recommended to me a long time ago.

Only lately I've been wanting to read a lot of the classics that I neglected over the years.

I'm going to read Zola's "Germinal" and Proust's "Swann's Way" and Dreiser's "Sister Carrie".

I really wish I hadn't wasted my late-teen years on all those Beat Generation books.

Jack Kerouac and William Burroughs got nothing on Alfred Doblin and F. Scott Fitzgerald.

just finished "the Stone Raft" by Jose Saramago. I liked all of the characters a lot, but the plot dealt with a lot of European geo-politics which I didn't understand. Saramago's writing style can be exhausting as well. I won't read another one of his books for a while.

Before school starts next monday, I'm trying to finish "the New York Trilogy" by Paul Auster. I had already read the first book, so it shouldn't be too hard. I was a little disappointed to find out that they're actually 3 different stories, but so far, "Ghosts" is really good.

I'll be down to like 1 book/month once school starts. Weak sauce

I was horrible. The whole time I was in law school I was reading novels about 2 hours a day. At least.

thought i'd mention this since *i think* this might be the first time it's been mentioned in one of these threads. janey?

I'm not a big fan of Harris' previous books, but this one dealt directly with the issue of homosexuality in the African-American church, so I gave it a try. The very beginning and very end are awkward, but the rest is very well done.

I've been working on "Despite Everything" by Aaron Cometbus, a 600+ page compilation of his old zines (of which I've always been a big fan). What can I say about Cometbus? He captures something so real and visceral about the punk rock lifestyle and attitude - he's a brilliant writer. He's got this uncanny knack for introspection that somehow inspires me to want to see the world around me more clearly, and to live in the moment more. It's the literary equivalent of splitting a six-pack with an old friend full of crazy stories. So far, I'd have to say "Double Duce" was better, mainly because it was all Aaron's voice. The Bobby Madness comics from issue #39 were kick-ass, though. And, the sheer volume of this compilation is satisfying to me after years of having to content myself with just small doses of his writing every few years. In a couple weeks, I'll be up to my neck in Skinner and journal articles, so, this has been a nice distraction.

peace,
murph

awful in that I've hardly read a thing.

I've finally got my copy of "The Time of Our Singing" back, so I'll be getting back into that VERY soon.

I'm also half-way through 100 Years of Solitude.

Don't get me wrong, these are great books so far. I have just lost all momentum when it comes to reading on a day-to-day basis. Maybe the colder weather just suites me better.

If all else fails I'll just buy something I'm really looking forward to and hold off on reading it. That usually intices me to speed things up.
_________________________________

you used to be alright
what the hell happened?

Currently Reading-

Zadie Smith- On beauty

Gabriel Garcia MArques- Memories of my melancholy whores

Reading next-

The Crowd, by Gustave Le Bon

The Human Stain, by Philip Roth

War Is A Force That Gives Us Meaning, by Chris Hedges

"The shit baby, los gran mojones"

_
http://youtube.com/watch?v=4TztqYaemt0
http://preptimeposse.blogspot.com/

_
http://youtube.com/watch?v=4TztqYaemt0
http://preptimeposse.blogspot.com/

I haven't gotten to either of those yet.

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kurly's Super-Duper Awesome DVD Collection:
http://www.dvdaficionado.com/dvds.html?cat=1&id=kurlyswirl

I've been told The Sweet Forever is his best and King Suckerman is a kick.

_
http://youtube.com/watch?v=4TztqYaemt0
http://preptimeposse.blogspot.com/

I'm only on #2, Nick's Trip.

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kurly's Super-Duper Awesome DVD Collection:
http://www.dvdaficionado.com/dvds.html?cat=1&id=kurlyswirl

Mari Evans: "Clarity as a Concept: A Poet's Perspective" (Essays)

and

The Straight Path by Richard Katz (an account of Fijiian Traditional Healing)

http://i.imgur.com/vPqCzVU.jpg

1. Irving writes like he's paid by the word. I don't need MORE words, I need BETTER words.

2. Irving uses real places (restaurants, hotels, streets, cities) in order to set moods that a better writer could and would do with descriptors.

3. Irving tries really fuckin hard to enter into a subculture he doesn't understand but he hasn't done sufficient research on any of it. "Eyelid" piercing? come on. And granted, maybe *I* just haven't heard of it, but all this crap about a Rose of Jericho tattoo? I don't buy it.

4. And while we're on the subject, how can you write an 800 page novel that includes as a major plot point a tattoo incorporating women's genitalia and yet call it "vagina"? This man needs an editor. That's not the only place he says "Vagina" when he means "vulva," but it's the most prominent. Imagine what went through my head when the protagonist is said to have seen two vaginas in one day. I of course pictured him carrying a speculum in one hand and a flashlight in the other. No one who considers themselves literate should make this mistake and certainly not someone who writes for a living.

5. And while there is, as always, a ton of sex in the novel, Irving, as usual, manages to make it the LEAST erotic sex I think I have ever read. Worse than Kinsey.

i haven't read this one (and don't plan to), but you and i are on the same page when it comes to irving.

"I maintain with clemency and munificence" -- J-Live

was because it was offered to me by a woman who had read a book on my recommendation, so I felt like I owed her, you know?

I should have been warned, because she's a serious Irving fan and even she said that it falls off after the first 400 pages or so. I'm reading the first half of the book and wondering how the hell writing this bad could FALL OFF?

I am also kind of disgusted at him for (1) having the woman with whom the protagonist is most closely emotionally bound suffer from vaginismus (I just think this and other women-related issues in the book reek of misogyny) and then having the gall to (2) dedicate the book to his infant or toddler son.

I'm racing through Swans Way and a theory book on tolerance to get to the new releases by Jonathen Franzen, Murakami and Edward P. Jones.

native son

the blue castle by l.m. montgomery. now, i've never read anne of green gables or any of her other work, but a friend of mine wanted me to read this. it was predictable at a lot of turns but it had its charms.

and "upstate" by kalisha buckhanon, which i LOVED and seriously can't say enough complimentary things about. it's not often you see epistolary fiction set in the present day, especially not a borderline bildungsroman about a high school couple torn apart by murder and prison. it's all kindsa dope and deserves all the accolades it's getting.

now it's a toss up between f. scott fitzgerald's "the beautiful and the damned" or tonya lewis lee & crystal mccrary anthony's "the gotham diaries." i've started the latter, but i'd rather be reading the former.

i know one thing: i better get on them both before classes start next week. i might not have any time for outside reading then.

http://postbourgie.com
http://stacialbrown.wordpress.com

---------------------------------------
(Insert witty quote here)

I come from a city where they love to hate (c) DJ Paul

Wild 100's BAP. We wild wild!

if not, are you interested?

what are your thoughts?

---------------------------------------
(Insert witty quote here)

I come from a city where they love to hate (c) DJ Paul

Wild 100's BAP. We wild wild!

I was really impressed but I never really felt like I needed to read more, so I didn't read the book until rather recently.

I think there's value in what she did, but mainly what I learned from that book was that I should never hire a cleaning service for my home. There's a book called The Working Poor, by David Shipler, that I think makes Ehrenreich's point WAY better than she does, because he deeply investigates the lives of people who really are living on the edge of poverty, no parachute, no master's degree in hand, no healthcare benefits, often missing teeth, and really trying. Really working at it. Not as a lark, not to write a magazine article, not with a wealthy family waiting at home, but for real. And that makes their stories so much more compelling and immediate. I find his work stayed with me much longer and on a much deeper level than hers.

Similarly, there are two other books in this general area that I would recommend:

All Alone in the World: Children of the Incarcerated, by Nell Bernstein.

and

American Dream: Three Women, Ten Kids, and a Nation's Drive to End Welfare, by Jason DeParle

As with The Working Poor, both of these are compelling stories of real people, written in a manner that will grab your attention and not let it go. Both take a look at the larger social policy issues that operate hand in hand with the individual rights aspects. They all respect their subjects deeply in a way that I just didn't find with Ehrenreich. It's like she feels sorry for them but most of the time she's too busy telling us how dirty her motel room is to turn her attention to the real lives at home and at work of her coworkers who, after all, her book is really supposed to be about.

Anyway. My two cents.

is how she didnt make that much money as a waitress. Was she undertipped? Not enough tables?

---------------------------------------
(Insert witty quote here)

I come from a city where they love to hate (c) DJ Paul

Wild 100's BAP. We wild wild!

and I kind of doubt that she was a very good waitress, lol.

it's embarassing that it's taken me this long to get through it. i really do like it a lot. i've just been really busy lately.

isn't oryx and crake a good novel? it's by far her best (followed by alias grace and then blind assassin) and is the perfect dystopic tale for today. as i was reading it i couldn't help but think that the world she is describing is one inspired by bush administration policies (minus the policies that pander to the religious right, i guess). i keep forgetting about this novel whenever people ask for recommendations, but i do think this one is important enough to be must reading.

so her new one's not so good huh? not so surprising. with her novels she either hits a home run or grounds out to short. (and she grounds out more than hits homers!)

"I maintain with clemency and munificence" -- J-Live

and Surfacing is an ollllllllddddd one, 1972, but there was some jacket blurb on either O&C or The Handmaid's Tale in which a reviewer said it was her best realized work "since Surfacing," so I figured, okay, give that one a whirl. I just didn't care much for it.

i keep losing track.

regardless, i think you'd like alias grace.

"I maintain with clemency and munificence" -- J-Live

vikram seth's 'two lives'

(d'you ever finish 'a suitable boy'?)

and I started Two Lives and just never got into it. There are some similar stories out there that are equally compelling and that grabbed me a little tighter. And I bought it when I was suffering from an excess of good things to read, rather than the reverse.

Maybe I'll start A Suitable Boy again. I did really like it. It was just a very bad time for me. I was so depressed when I started to read it that I had a really difficult time holding onto the thread of the story, and had to revert to children's books for a while.

then perhaps it's just that i am something of an indiaphile (sic)

I decided to spend my short vacation from work and school by catching up on some American classics.

Re-read:

In Cold Blood
The Great Gatsby

Reading:

Catch-22
For Whom the Bell Tolls (For some reason this is one of the few Hemingway I never read)

http://www.timothypaulmoore.com
http://www.lettertojane.com

It tolls for thee

_
http://youtube.com/watch?v=4TztqYaemt0
http://preptimeposse.blogspot.com/

Trying to slog through The End of Poverty By J. Sachs......it's not going well. I'm just not interested in reading it right now anymore. Might put it away for winter.

I grabbed The Known World by Edward P. Jones. Apparently it's popular college reading, so it'll be like going back to school. I read like two pages and really liked his style. I'll dive in soon.

Lastly The Pursuit of Happyness by Chris Gardner. I was in San Antone last week and he spoke at my conference. Interesting story and soon to be Will Smith star vehicle/tear-jerker.

That's about it.

P.S.

donutsandass


************************************************

<<<<<<<<Don't Drool On The Avy>>>>>>>>

"There's a fine line between persistence and foolishness..."
-unknown

"To Each His Reach"
-George Clinton

**************** OKP Free Agent****************

I really loved that one.

PS

I visited my tattoo artist last night and we'll probably get started on the poetry in a couple of weeks.


~~~~~

Breathe and know you're breathing

Flesh and Blood - Michael Cunningham
Heat - Bill Buford
The Atlas - William T Vollmann
A Moveable Feast - Hemingway
Revenge/Legends of the Fall - Jim Harrison

Janey - would love some recommendations. Going to spend a long weekend at a beach house. Would even go straight to St Marks books and buy something new if I thought it would satisfy.

BTW

Have you read Cloud Atlas yet? I always forget who the David Mitchell fans are. If you haven't, I strongly recommend it, as do a number of others here.


~~~~~

Breathe and know you're breathing

I really just like straight-forward, dramatic fiction. I tried Mitchell's "number9dream" and put it back after 25 pages. Maybe less... So I guess I'm not a fan. Anything else? What about Tobias Wolff or Michael Chabon (besides Adventures of K&C)?

BTW

I love Chabon, but Adventures of K&C is rather different from his earlier novels. Mysteries of Pittsburgh and Wonder Boys are terrific, but don't expect the same kind of story.

I guess, if you liked Adventures of K&C, I would recommend

The Corrections, by Jonathan Franzen
Carter Beats the Devil, by Glen David Gold
Middlesex, by Jeffrey Eugenides.

I loved "The Corrections" and a number of people have said the other two you mentioned. Thanks.

BTW

because they're very different, and Wonder Boys in particular is a really good, straightforward story.

Let's see, Anna Karenina is also good in that respect.

Also consider The Mulberry Empire, by Philip Hensher. I really loved that one.

for the most part, i'm re-reading books that i've read before. i'm curious to look "backwards" into the books to see how i've changed.

"the blood runs like a river through my veins"-- nasdijj

i'm trying to come to a thoughtful "conclusion" (if there can be one) about the memoir genre. i read his several of his books a few years ago, but "the blood runs" was my favorite. on a second read, i find some parts of the memoir to be hokey, but the unmistakable energy in his prose is still there, and it still moves into some refreshing places. by accident, i found out that nasdijj is in the center of a james frey-esque storm about THE TRUTH in his memoirs. from what i can tell, it's a fairly recent development. there are several painfully gleeful "aha we've caught you with your hand in the cookie jar" articles about nasdijj. my favorite name that the literati press has given him? "navahoax". say it ain't so, dijjy. one thing i don't understand, in the case of frey and other scorned scoundrels like him, is how readers can feel betrayed. when i heard that nasdijj was possibly a phony, i felt disappointed, not betrayed.

"as i lay dying"-- william faulkner

wow. wow. wow. and wow. i didn't appreciate or even halfway "get" this novel the first time i read it. i read it 3-4 times during the course of a year and gave up on faulkner.

"the god of small things"-- arundhati roy

it seems like everybody at some point and time read this book or atleast ran into someone that told them to read it. i have mixed feelings about it now. but in general, it's solid. what works for me in this book are *ahem* the details. i could easily see this being a movie, but i don't want it to be. let the book stand.

"selected poems"-- rita dove

fantastic. i must've skimmed through these poems when i first read them. since then, i've learned to come to poetry at a different pace. it's paid off. her pulitzer prize winning thomas and beulah poems are included in the selections that i've got. back then and even now, the thomas and beulah cycle isn't nearly close to being among any of my favorite dove poems. i think she's at her best when she's in pure lyric mode. dove has an unexpected and substantial amount of beauty in her poems. it's not the kind of beauty that clobbers you over the head. it kind of builds up or creeps up on ya, so i'm glad i got the selected poems. she's never dull.

when I started to re-read his work at 30. I HATED The Sound & The Fury in college and was blown away by it at 30 and then pretty much read everything he wrote.

Blue Highways by William Least Heat Moon
All the Pretty Horses by Cormac McCarthy

I was almost killed by a pompous Serb at the store.

_
http://youtube.com/watch?v=4TztqYaemt0
http://preptimeposse.blogspot.com/

It seemed like a great companion piece to Zen & The Art of Motorcycle Maintenance and Travels With Charley.

Were you fighting with my Serbian Copy Boy? For shame!

_
http://youtube.com/watch?v=4TztqYaemt0
http://preptimeposse.blogspot.com/

I miss him so.

Even if you run across short Serbs, you have to remind yourself that they're killers. Don't mess with them, dear.

He's got one eyebrow and he sounds like Andre the Giant. He tells me Croats are scary. I NEVER want to meet one.

_
http://youtube.com/watch?v=4TztqYaemt0
http://preptimeposse.blogspot.com/

MY Serb told me that Croats are pussies, lol.

Just finished:
Jack Kerouac - On the Road
Kurt Vonnegut - Slaughterhouse-Five

Right now:
Albert Camus - The Plague
Hubert Selby, Jr. - Last Exit to Brooklyn

Next up:
André Gide - The Immortalist
Par Lagerkvist - Barabbas
Vladimir Nabokov - Invitation to a Beheading
Richard Powers - The Time of Our Singing
John Steinbeck - East of Eden

Not Immortalist. Jesus.