From January 1 to June 1 2009 I "read" 34 books. I would have made 35 (should've been "Candide") but Friday was crazy and didn't go as I planned. Now it'll be my first book for the second half of 2009.

Below is the title of the book, the author, the narrator then my score of the book and the narration.

Diary - Chuck Palahniuk - Read by Martha Plimpton - 6, 8
In Cold Blood - Truman Capote - Read by Scott Brick - 6, 7
Live and Let Die - Ian Fleming - Read by Robert Whitfield - 7, 6
Year of Living Biblically - AJ Jacobs - Ready by AJ Jacobs - 6, 5
The Corrections - Jonathan Franzen - Ready by Dylan Baker - 4, 7
Moonraker - Ian Fleming - Read by Robert Whitfield 8, 8
The Stranger - Albert Camus - Read by Jonathan Davis - 7, 6
Interpreter of Maladies - Jhumpa Lahiri - Read by - Matilda Novak - 10, 8
Deacartes' Bones - Russell Shorto - Read by Paul Hecht - 7, 5
Kidnapped - Robert Louis Stevenson - Read by Ralph Coshman - 10, 8
The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing, Traitor to the Nation, Volume II: The Kingdom on the Waves - MT Anderson -  Read by Peter Francis James - 6, 8
Moll Flanders - Daniel Defoe - Read by Virginia Leishman  - 7, 7
All The Pretty Horses - Cormac McCarthy - Read by Frank Muller - 10, 10
Diamonds are Forever - Ian Fleming - Read by Robert Whitfield - 7, 8
Manhunt - James L. Swanson  - Read by Jonathan Davis  - 7, 6
The Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas - Read by John Lee - 9, 7
The Namesake - Jhumpa Lahiri - Read by Sarita Choudhury - 10, 9
From Russia With Love - Ian Fleming - Read by Robert Whitfield - 7, 8
Cities of the Plain - Cormac McCarthy - Read by Alexander Adams - 7, 5
The Crossing - Cormac McCarthy - Read by Alexander Adams - 7, 5
Unaccustomed Earth - Jhumpa Lahiri - Read by Sarita Choudhury and Ajay Naidu - 9, 8
Morality In Our Age - Human & Civil Rights - Read by Robert Guillaume - 7, 4
Morality In Our Age - War & Terrorism - Read by Robert Guillaume - 6, 4
Morality In Our Age - Civility & Community  - Read by Robert Guillaume - 6, 4
Founding Brothers - Joseph J. Ellis - Read by Nelson Runger - 4, 2
Atlas Shrugged -  Ayn Rand - Read by Christopher Hurt - 7, 4
Dr. No - Ian Fleming - Read by Robert Whitfield - 7, 8
Blood Meridian - Cormac McCarthy - Read by Richard Poe - 5, 8
Botany of desire - Michael Pollan – Read by Scott Brick - 7, 7
Shadow of the wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafón - Read by Jonathan Davis - 7, 6
Coraline - Neil Gaiman - Read by Neil Gaiman - 9, 7
Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole - Read by Barrett Whitener - 7, 4
On the Road -  Jack Kerouac - Read by Matt Dillon - 6, 8
Bridge to Terabithia - Katherine Paterson - Read by Tom Stechschulte - 10, 10

Obviously Frank Muller & Tom Stechschulte are two of my favorite narrators.
Muller & Stechschulte have these deep, manly voices that are best when paired with characters with southern accents. Yet their voices are...supple...enough to do fair depictions of women and children. I would listen to them read anything, including the clichéd phonebook.

I've been listening to audiobooks on a regular basis for about a year now and I've noticed that then they need a black voice the go-to guy is Peter Francis James. He has a great voice. Even and mellow. I think the best book I've heard him narrate is "Invisible Man" which I listened to late last year.

Sarita Choudhury has a great English/American/Indian accent that is perfect for her work reading Jhumpa Lahiri. Lahiri writes with so much sadness, alienation and displacment; Choudhury converts that from the page to spoken word so well.

Nelson Runger's reading of "Founding Brothers" was among the most boring things I've ever listened to. I mean I had to force myself through it. I didn't care for the book either but a good narrator can make a boring book a little more exciting but pairing a boring book with a boring narrator; ZzzZzzZzzZzz....It's a shame because the founding fathers were very interesting and you can get a good sense of that in this book but it's just so dry. When I finished it and found out that it won a Pulitzer I was shocked.

The narration of Alexander Adams just bores me. His voice bothers me; high and nasaly. Blah.

The Cristopher Hurt reading of "Atlas Shrugged" was off. I couldn't put my finger on what exactly was wrong with it. His voice work was good overall but it just didn't move me. The production quality of the recording wasn't very good so that didn't help the already weak narration. Later this month I'll listen to his "The Fountainhead" and see how that goes.

I listened to "On the Road" because I felt I needed to. I started it in high school and it bored me then and it mostly bored me now. I kind of like how Kerouac writes, I dig that free style but I just don't care for the beat lifestyle and the people in the book; they people just bothered me, careless fools. I did groove on the narration by Matt Dillion though. I was a little nervous going into it, I don't really get down with him as an actor but I think his voice was perfect for the New York / New Jersey-Italian narrator of the book.

I read "Coraline" because I saw the movie and loved it. I saw it twice. I really liked the book and movie. It's a near perfect fairy tale. Magical.

"Bridge to Terabithia". Another one where I saw and loved the movie and had to read the book. Saddest book ever. I knew what was going to happen in the end and that didn't lessen the sadness. According to the American Library Association it's in the top ten of the most challenged books. I feel like I understand why but those people can suck it. This book is great. It's awesome. It's one of my favorite books. This book makes me want to have kids so they can read this book, fall in love and have their hearts broke.


In the next six months I hope to finish all of the James Bond books.
I will get through all of the "Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy" series (which I've read about half of) in time for the release of the new book. I'll get through a few more of Time's 100 best English language novels since 1923; I've already read 16 of them (I want to re-read about 5 of that number) and have another 15 or 16 waiting for me to make time for them.

I'm also going to be refocusing my efforts on the "classics". I've got a huge stack of them that I feel like I've let fall by the way side recently; "Moby Dick", "Don Quixote", "Robinson Crusoe". Books where you can almost smell the dust when you read the title.

I spend all day five days a week listening to books on CD on my iPod. I've written about it before. But a couple weeks ago I "read" something that just stopped me in my tracks and rendered me unable to move on.

When I read The Road I thought I had read some hard, dark stuff. We're talking about a book where the world is over (over, like OVER, it's not coming back) and the few people that remain eat babies and keep people in basements, carving off portions of their frame just to survive.

Seriously fucked up shit.

Over the last couple weeks I read Blood Meridian, it took me weeks because I couldn't bring myself to finish it. It should have taken two days but ended up taking 12.
The darkness, the horror that I thought was so perfectly rendered in The Road was turned up well past 11 in Blood Meridian.

If you picked up this book, opened it to any page someone or something would be being raped, killed, scalped, stabbed, shot, murdered, trampled, burned alive, decapitated....just pick an act of violence; it's in there. It was so jolting I felt like I couldn't go on reading it. I had to take a break.

All of that being said, this is a pretty good book. I wouldn't recommend it as a book for people new to McCarthy to start with but it's worth reading, or at least trying. McCarthy writes in the most lyrical, fascinating way. Using arcane words in ways that fit so well you can't help but do it yourself from time to time after reading his work.

I've read that it is one of top 100 books written in the last 100 years and is packed with imagery and allusions. I'm not deep or educated enough to understand even 1/4 of that stuff. I've got theories about somethings but in order to confirm them I'd need to re-read the book and to be perfectly honest I don't think I can do it again.

Great book, but not worth reading unless you are a McCarthy completist or looking to push your boundries.

When you’re lying awake in the middle of the night, unable to sleep, you start thinking of things. Where do those bats that are flying by outside live? Who first came up with the idea to harvest, roast, grind and brew coffee? Eventually my mind turned to the books I’ve been reading.

The last half dozen books I've read have all been about outcasts, men and women who strike out on their own, against what is expected of them from families, friends and society. They are mostly outlaws; either literally or societally. They are heroes, not only in the sense that they are the subject of books but in the classical sense of Gilgamesh and Odysseus.

 

In the case of Moll Flanders her journey is laid right out in the full title of the book:

The Fortunes & Misfortunes of the Famous Moll Flanders Who was Born in Newgate, and during a Life of continu'd Variety for Threescore Years, besides her Childhood, was Twelve Year a Whore, five times a Wife (whereof once to her own Brother), Twelve Year a Thief, Eight Year a Transported Felon in Virginia, at last grew Rich, liv'd Honest, and dies a Penitent. Written from her own Memorandums . . .

Born in prison to a criminal mother who was transported to the colonies it seemed Moll Flanders would lead a similar life, or one locked in servitude to the rich. But she persevered, striking out against her lot in life, suffering the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune and coming out fairly ahead. Hero may not be the first word that comes to mind when most people think of Moll Flanders (perhaps anti-hero is) but when society itself corrupted a hero must take whatever steps are necessary to achieve freedom; even if that means picking pockets for a living.

 

John Wilkes Booth on the other hand was a hero in his own mind. To him, shooting of Lincoln was akin to Beowulf slaying the Grendel. From his perspective he alone was in the position to strike down the tyrant and it had to be done for the glory of Dixie. With help of sympathetic southerners (mostly strangers) Booth used his charm, good looks, fame and skill as an actor to not only kill the president but to evade capture for nearly a fortnight. He suffered immensely but did not complain; in the face of impossible odds kept up the fight for his life and his beloved confederacy for he felt, ne knew, that his actions were just. Never mind that he was also the most reviled person in the country and people burned letters and autographs from him fearing that someone would find them and think the possessor to be a Booth sympathizer.

 

I'm not even sure I can articulate what I feel about Gogol Ganguli and path he walks. His journey is perhaps the most obfuscated in this group. Considering himself more American than Indian; yet considered an outsider, looked on as a thing of curiosity by Americans who seem to consider him more Indian than American. Gogol is a man in-between worlds, not comfortable with his parents Bengali traditions or his adopted American ones. He rejects his name, his namesake, the path set before him and wanders his own road.

 

Cormac McCarthy's Border Trilogy (All The Pretty Horses, The Crossing & Cities of the Plain) are about the death of heroes and the emptiness that takes their place.

The series starts off with All The Pretty Horses which fairly drips with romance and introduces us to John Grady Cole, the "All American Cowboy", a 16 year old boy who sets off for Mexico in search of a life that he sees fast disappearing from his beloved Texas. What he finds in old Mexico damages him and destroys his notions about the world, he returns broken but still the hero; out there alone, searching for his own light to bare against the darkness of the coming void.

.

In the second book, The Crossing, we meet two brothers, Billy & Boyd. Almost on a whim, 16 year old Billy desserts his family in an effort to return a pregnant wolf he has captured to the mountains of Mexico. He returns to find his family, save his brother murdered. Billy again crosses into Mexico (this time with his 14 year old brother) in search of the killers and stolen horses. Over the course of the book, they each meet their heroic destinies. By the end of the book, with the outbreak of WWII you can feel the modern world creeping in, swallowing the world these boys, these teen aged men, loved and will always love.

In Cities of the Plain the modern world has all but devoured the lifestyle these men hold in such high esteem, the romance is gone. In its place is whisky and whores. The world has changed. As Stephen King would say "The world has moved on." As McCarthy puts it in the final chapter "They all just seemed to be waiting for things to be a way that they'd never me again." These solitary men, brothers of sorts have found each other while working on one of the last ranches in the south west in the years after WWII. Unable to stay down when faced with destruction of themselves and their way of life these both Billy & John Grady hold on to the last vestiges of their way of life but their stubborn refusal isn't enough. By the end, the sweeping romance of All The Pretty Horses is gone. A fading memory. Something people talk about, not sure if it was ever real or just stories told by old men around the campfire.

*&*&*&*&*&*

In thinking of this topic it came to me that we as Americans are lacking in this department. Our concept of the heroic individual has been compromised. We have become of nation of sheep, herded not by shepherds but one another. The people who strike out on their own path are ostracized while those who compromise their very essence for the sake of fitting in with the crowd are praised.

America was influenced by the concept of individualism. People came here to make their way against oppressive religions or regimes. To be an American was to be an individual yet part of something larger. Somewhere along the way we seem to have lost the ideal of the rugged individualist as the American idol and replaced it with Kelly Clarkson.

By virtue of being archetypal, heroes are both revered and reviled by those around them and nobody in this era of media saturation and scrutiny wants to undergo that. Can you blame them?

So lying there in bed, awake past 3am, I decided to add a few more books to my reading list.

 

 

What’s the best book that YOU haven’t read yet?

We’ve all seen the lists, we’ve all thought, “I should really read that someday,” but for all of us, there are still books on “The List” that we haven’t actually gotten around to reading. Even though we know they’re fabulous. Even though we know that we’ll like them. Or that we’ll learn from them. Or just that they’re supposed to be worthy. We just … haven’t gotten around to them yet.

Simple.

I came across it while reading today and I’m not sure what to make of it.

 “They that yield when they're asked, are one step before them that were never asked to yield and two steps before them that yield before they are asked.”

I think it means that it is good to be thoughtful, but not too thoughtful. I could be totally off base though.

Thoughts?
Ideas?
Meaningful literary interpretations?

I might be order two or three copies to give as gifts.
From:
http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,25025871-5012749,00.html

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I was about to start a book today, a book that I have never finished but always wanted to.
I don't particularly care for what I read of the book but I feel that it is important that I actually read it so I can say beyond a shadow of a doubt that I don't care for the masturbatory writings and ramblings of Jack Kerouac; or maybe my opinion will be changed. That's why I want to listen to it.

I've had a copy on my hard drive for years and last week finally decided to load it on my iPod and give it a listen.

I don't remember the book being very long so it seemed reasonable that four audio files could cover the book.
But when I started it I noticed right away that the files were short, too short. I know the book was short but 160 minutes? Less than three hours? Animal Farm was that short but that book was under 100 pages and I know that On The Road was at least twice as long as Animal Farm.

I looked up the audiobook online and found that in actuality it is contained on 10 CDs, totaling more than 12 1/2 hours.

How can this be allowed? How can you cut 75% of a book, a novel no less, and still call it the same book?

I can understand an argument for abridging non-fiction. With non-fiction you can leave out portions of the book that don't concern the thesis; but in a novel, where every portion adds to the depth of the character or situation?

And this book in particular where the rhythm and the manner in which Kerouac writes is so elemental, how could any one think to cut that?

Why?

/rant

Since “Inspiration” is (or should) the theme this week … what is your reading inspired by?

In a word: Thirst

Thirst for knowledge.
Thirst for understanding.
Thirst for...life? I dunno.

I have this...well...thirst, to know everything, learn everything.
To absorb as much information about the world as possible and reading is a great way to do that.

Reading as a way to understand people and things. It's a way to connect and live through the experiences of another.
Despite having grown up in our modern world I'm still mystified by it. For every one thing I take at face value there are three other things I want to have an intimate knowledge of.
I see reading as a way to obtain some of that knowledge.

In high school many of my friends were in the AP classes and read college level books, books that fascinated me. I would take their copies and read them in my spare time. I recall wanting to know what secrets of life I could rend from their pages. My brief flirting with these books only made me more curious about them and other books like them.

That is why my reading list will never stop growing. I hear about a book in a book and I need to read it.
When I was in high school I read Goethe's Faust because it was referenced in another book I had read; I just had to know what was in there. (For the record, I only understood about half of it. I got the point but I still feel like I was missing something. I should give it another read.) (Also, when I was in high school, college too, ever the rebel, I almost never read anything that was assigned to me. As soon as it became expected I lost interest.)

I like to keep my reading lists filled with a variety of books. Serious Modern Fiction, Classic Literature, Non-fiction and Fun Books. I have a pattern that I try to follow.

• Serious Fiction
• Classic Literature
• Non-fiction
• Serious Fiction
  
• Classic Literature
  
• Fun Book

Rinse, lather, repeat.

Examples of what I call Serious Modern Fiction are: The Corrections and my new favorite book of short stories, The Interpreter of Maladies.
Classic Lit might be Sense & Sensibility, Moll Flanders or even Treasure Island.
Right now I'm trying to keep my Fun Books as parts of a series. Currently it's the original Ian Fleming James Bond novels.

For many years I ignored books. I would read various magazines, newspapers online, whatever caught my eye.
It wasn't until I realized how boring my job was and the abundance of good books on CD that my love for books was rekindled.

I worry that I've been spoiled by audio books and that when I have a new job my love affair with reading books will once again take a back seat.
I try not to think about it too much.
I'll still be thirsty, and I'll still read things but will those things sate my thirst now that I've tasted the nectar?

You know, now that I've written all that out, it sounds pretty pretentious.

For the past few months I've been devouring audiobooks, in my "reading" I've come across several quotes that really stuck with me. Some of them strike me as funny, others as truths.
I've left my favorite person to quote, Hunter S. Thompson, off the list. I could quote the man for days and am afraid to pick a favorite or fill the page with his prose.

"The problem with people who are shameless is that they are curiously invulnerable." - from Devil May Care by Sebastian Faulks (writing as Ian Flemming)

"No man is wise in every hour." - from The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing, Traitor to the Nation, Vol. 1: The Pox Party by MT Anderson

"What you don't understand, you can make mean anything." from Diary by Chuck Palahniuk

"He who approaches the temple of the Muses without inspiration in the belief that craftsmanship alone suffices will remain a bungler and his presumptuous poetry will be obscured by the songs of the maniacs." - Plato (as quoted in Diary)

"There's nothing like isolating a man to make him think." - from Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison

"When I discover who I am, I'll be free!" - from Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison

"I thought Mr. Clutter was a very nice gentleman... I thought so right up to the time I cut his throat” - from In Cold Blood by Truman Capote

I have a boring job. Have I mentioned this before?
It's almost like a factory job where I do the same mostly mindless task over and over and over again all day long.
At least it's a job. I live in a small town where work in my profession isn't exactly easy to come by so I'm thankful to have this one.
The one and possibly only upside to my job is the boredom and the mental freedom it gives me. While I while away the days not thinking about my job I can spend it doing other things like pondering the mysteries of the universe; what are cuticles for? Who comes up with these silly names for drugs? How excited was the first guy who discovered...well just about anything? How did someone decide to super-heat sand and turn into glass? What was that guy thinking when he left the house this morning wearing that?

These are the things that go through my head on a daily basis. Some day’s I just give myself over to my curiosities and let my mind wander. Most days though I keep my mind occupied with a good book.

An audio book.
Since starting in mid-August I've listened to more than two dozen books. Sci-Fi and Fantasy, spy thrillers and post apocalyptic dramas, books on philosophy and economics and most of all "classics."

I define a "classic" as a book widely regarded by folks as the pinnacle of storytelling; something that will endure through the ages. As defined it's a pretty big category that can include anything from "Moby Dick" (on the list to read before the end of '09) to "Are you there God, It's me Margaret?" (no plans to read that in the near or distant future).

The last week and a half has brought me three such books; one of them I had read in high school, one of them I should have read in high school and the final book is something I might have read if I had stayed in college.

This book rocked my world. Damn it. I knew from the opening 30 minutes of this book that I wanted to own this book and put it on my shelf. Ellison writes in a way that just makes the words come alive and gives his narrator so much soul. This is as much a story about race as it is about finding yourself. Listening to this I actually had one of those moments that we used to always talk about in school when we talk about allusions (is that the right word?). Upon hearing a certain part of the story unfold I said to myself "ahhh, it's like he's being born anew!"
I even picked up a new literary quote from this book: "When I discover who I am, I'll be free!"

I read this in the 10th grade and while re-reading it I was able to look back and see that this book helped to shape and warp my view of the world and politics. I didn't really care for Orwell's style during either reading but I do love the message and many of the elements. It really doesn't seem that far off that some of these events could come to pass. I liked "Animal Farm" better.

In my high school most 9th graders had to read this book, I, however, did not. When I went on to work at my high school I ended up grading a few hundred quizzes and tests on this book and never picked up one hint of an idea what it was about. I've never even seen the movie.

This book is amazing and the recording of it is fabulous! The copy I have was narrated by Sissy Spacek and it was perfect.
This story of growing up, civil rights and right and wrong moved me to tears. Big, fat, wet tears all over my keyboard. Books like this are why audio books were made. A great story, a great narrator and the next thing you know a grown man is crying at his desk over a fictional tragedy.
It's storytelling at its finest.
I'm certainly buying a copy of this book to have as my very own.

The other book I listened to this week is a classic in its own right, I suppose.
Fun, easy, short, enjoyable. The recent movie version was surprisingly close to the book.