Books Update

In January, I proclaimed that 2014 would be the Year of the Classics & chose a book for each month of the year. Since we are getting on to the halfway point in the year (!!!???), I figured it was time for an update.

January: A Canticle for Leibowitz, by Walter M. Miller. Isaac Asimov's Foundation meets Neal Stephenson's Anathem, at a third the page count. I'd call it more spec fiction than sci fi; it takes place in the distant future where the vast majority of science, technology, & culture has been obliterated by nuclear war & reactionary fundamentalist sects, so parts of it feel more medieval than futuristic. Brilliantly & shrewdly written, confronting questions of history, philosophy, theology, ethics, and the cyclic nature of human civilization, without ever getting preachy or didactic. As relevant now as in 1960. Fans of Asimov & the like should love it.

February: Uncle Tom's Cabin, by Harriet Beecher Stowe. I started this book in February, but keep having to take breaks to read something else. It's easier to read than I thought it would be, but somehow still feels like hard work.

March: Anna Karenina, by Leo Tolstoy. This is what I'm currently trying plow through right now. Like Uncle Tom's Cabin, it's been easier going than I was afraid it would be and has a lot of interesting parts, but it's still looooong and slooooow and there are long stretches in which nothing much happens except protracted discussions of early 20th century Russian property laws & farming methods. I've taken a couple of breaks from it to read other things, but I'm hoping I'll be able to finish it by the end of May June.

April: A Room With a View, by E.M. Forster. This book seemed appropriate for the April since that's when we left for Italy. In general, it was a cute, engaging read, and I spent most of the middle of the book surprised & excited about where it seemed to be going. Then, after the last two chapters, I wanted to hurl it across the room. I mean I know it was 1908 & all & ladies still weren't all that far removed from just being property, but still. Beautifully written, but a disappointing ending.

May: Catch-22. This book was sold to me as "a classic that's actually funny" and "like 'The Daily Show' in terms of tone & political poignancy," so I thought it would make a nice break from srsbzns reading. Ha ha ha ha. Not. Yes, there are some funny parts, and the absurdist-satire-"hell is bureaucracy" theme has its moments, but it definitely ranks among the darkest, most depressing and harrowing books I have ever read, because war & stupid people.

Other Stuff I've Been Reading

The Goldfinch, by Donna Tartt. This is probably the best book I've read so far this year. I'd been kinda-sorta meaning to read this book for a while now & putting it off because I wasn't sure I was up for the all the darkness, but recently a friend was like, "No seriously. Amazeballs," so I took it with me on vacation, and she was absolutely right. On the one hand I kind of think I'd say this is a great read as long as you're not going through dark, nasty stuff at the time, but on the other hand, maybe this is *exactly* the type of book you should read in that case because you might decide that things aren't really all that bad by comparison.

The Long Run, by Matt Long. The next time you start feeling sorry for yourself or like you're going through some hard times and are feeling frustrated & discouraged about how long the road seems, give ol' Matty Long a hundred pages or so. If you still feel the same way after, you are not human. I don't want to spoil the impact of the first few chapters, but the broad strokes are that Long was a Brooklyn firefighter, BQ marathoner, & Iron Man who got run over by a bus (LITERALLY LIKE A BUS DROVE OVER HIM) in December 2005 & suffered a litany of absolutely horrific injuries. The book chronicles is journey from a miserable, barely recognizable, barely functional, physical & mental wreck of a human to, well, the guy on the cover of the book. So yeah. This book basically convinced me I don't get to feel discouraged about anything ever again.

The Sound & The Fury, by William Faulkner. This was a challenging book for me, but I'm glad I read it, and I can totally appreciate why people are still reading & studying it xx years later. BUT, know going in that it is depressing as hell. On the other hand, it's only like 300 pages long. I'd advise getting some background on the story before actually starting it, because some of it can be hard to follow & definitely requires your 100% focus & attention. Don't be ashamed to consult Wikipedia/Cliff's Notes/etc. as you read.

Let's Pretend This Never Happened: A Mostly True Memoir, by Jenny Lawson (aka, "The Bloggess"). Do yourself a favor & get this one in audio book. Nothing beats The Bloggess herself narrating. I lost count of the number of times I nearly fell off the spin bike I was laughing so hard. The hijinks that girl gets up to!

Dad Is Fat, by Jim Gaffigan. Parents, you'll appreciate this one. Not *quite* up to the quality of his stand-up, but really the book is only maybe half comedy anyway & half about being a parent in general and being the parent of five (7, 5, 3, 1, & newborn) in New York City specifically. Reasonably entertaining overall, with a few absolute laugh-out-loud moments.

The Signal & The Noise, by Nate Silver (of Five Thirty-Eight fame). I loved this book for the same reason that I loved The Predictioneer's Game and Data, A Love Story. All of them lie at the intersection of math/statistics/data/modeling and psychology/sociology. While I still think Nate Silver is brilliant, after reading this book I have a better understanding of just how terrible at modeling and predicting so many other people are (& I'm talking about people who are paid for making predictions) & why it's so easy for him to look that much more brilliant by comparison. What it's really about is the use & abuse of statistics & data--what sorts of things can be predicted (short and/or long term) and which kind of can't, the most common mistakes people make when they try to use data to make predictions, and how living in the age of "big data" actually puts us more at risk for bad predictions.

What's left for me this year....

June: The Brief, Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, by Junot Díaz.

July: To Kill A Mockingbird, by Harper Lee.

August: Madame Bovary, by Gustave Flaubert.

September: One Hundred Years of Solitude, by Gabriel Garcí­a Márquez.

October: The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, by Robert Louis Stevenson.

November: Journey to the Center of the Earth, by Jules Verne.

**NOVEMBER BONUS READ**: The Metamorphosis, by Franz Kafka.

December: The Little Prince, by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry.

**DECEMBER BONUS READ**: A Christmas Carol, by Charles Dickens.

This is where I solicit from you other worthwhile reads!! What else is out there that I absolutely must read? Oh also you can be my friend on GoodReads if you want.

The Goldfinch, by Donna Tartt

I've been kinda-sorta meaning to read this book for a while now; ten or so years ago I read The Secret History & loved it, in that kind of way that you love a book that is utterly depressing and dark and heartbreaking as shit but so incredibly well-written that you almost can't put it down. I'd been putting off The Goldfinch because I wasn't sure I was up for the all the darkness, but recently a friend was like, "No seriously. Amazeballs," so I took it with me on vacation.

Depressing? Check. Dark? Check. Heartbreaking as shit, especially for someone who spent many years working with teenagers? Check. But, like The Secret History, it was also beautifully and poetically written, and in some way I can't really understand or explain Donna Tartt manages to pull off writing a wide range of characters from disparate worlds (despondent teenagers, Manhattan socialites, Russian drug dealers, high-end art dealers, etc.) convincingly & authentically, down to the text messages they send one another.

On the one hand I kind of think I'd say this is a great read as long as you're not going through dark, nasty stuff at the time, but on the other hand, maybe this is EXACTLY the type of book you should read in that case because you might decide that things aren't really all that bad by comparison.

The Long Run, by Matt Long

So here's the only thing I think I really *need* to say about this book: If you think that you are having a bad day, or week, or month, or year, just pick up this book. The next time you think you think you've been through something really "difficult" or get caught up in how "hard" your life has been, give, say, the first quarter of it a read. If you ever start feeling sorry for yourself or feel like you're going through something tough and are feeling frustrated & discouraged about how long the road seems, give ol' Matty Long a hundred pages or so. If you still feel the same way after, you are not human.

I don't want to spoil the impact of the first few chapters, but the broad strokes are that Long was a Brooklyn firefighter, BQ marathoner, & Iron Man who got run over by a bus in December 2005 & suffered a litany of absolutely horrific injuries. The book chronicles is journey from a miserable, barely recognizable, barely functional, physical & mental wreck of a human to, well, the guy on the cover of the book. (I won't spoil the ending any more than that.)

So yeah. I've basically decided I don't really get to feel discouraged about anything ever again.

There are a few things about the writing & Long's personality that kind of bug me (particularly with regard to how he seems to view women), but the story itself is just so overwhelmingly incredible that I can't really deduct more than, like, a quarter of a star.

Once A Runner

This is one of those running books I've heard about here & there, but only really often enough for the title to be familiar. It was part of an Audible BOGOF promotion so I figured, "Eh, why not?" It was short (~8.5 hours), & at least then I'd know if it lived up to all the hype.

Well. 12 chapters in I was convinced it was about the stupidest book I'd ever read. The writing was cliche & forced, & the dialogue was unbelievable and frankly hard to follow (though I'm sure that's at least partly to do with trying to decode 1970s Florida college slang). I couldn't relate to the characters, and the jumpy, meandering style of storytelling made the main story line difficult to follow (or even detect) for the first half the book. Many of the scenes felt bafflingly irrelevant. If it wasn't so short I probably would have given it up there.

However, the second half had some redeeming qualities. Once he ditched most of the side characters (including the lone woman, who was, sadly, kind of whiny & cringe-inducing), the story felt more coherent and a narrative arc gradually became detectable. And although as a runner I have never been anywhere *near* the level of the protagonist (a collegiate 4:00 miler obsessed with running a sub-4:00), there were actually a lot of parts I was able to relate to on some level. (It also brought back all the most painful, most horrific parts of running track, which sort of sucked, but I guess that's kind of the point.) It's when Parker was actually writing about running and training and racing that it wasn't too bad, and there were definitely a few sections near the end where I found myself thinking, "OMG, it is/was *totally* just like that," so he gets some props for that. On the other hand, I doubt anyone who hasn't had the experience of running track at least semi-competitively will really "get" those parts.

So yeah. If you are or have been a super competitive male college track star, this book *might* speak to you. If you're a distance runner in the sense of, "Meh, I run marathons & half-marathons sometimes for fun/health/thrillz," you can probably just skip it without missing much.

The Signal and the Noise, by Nate Silver

I loved this book for the same reason that I loved The Predictioneer's Game and Data, A Love Story. All of them lie at the intersection of math/statistics/data/modeling and psychology/sociology. While I still think Nate Silver is brilliant, after reading this book I have a better understanding of just how terrible at modeling and predicting so many other people are (& I'm talking about people who are paid for making predictions) & why it's so easy for him to look that much more brilliant by comparison.

What it's really about is the use & abuse of statistics & data--what sorts of things can be predicted (short and/or long term) and which kind of can't, the most common mistakes people make when they try to use data to make predictions, and how living in the age of "big data" actually puts us more at risk for bad predictions.

The great tragedy of this book is that the people who are most likely to read it are probably the people who already have a pretty decent understanding of data/statistics, and the people who have a less-good understanding of those things are probably the people who would most benefit from reading it.

Assassin's Quest (Farseer #3), by Robin Hobb

First, just about all my comments from Book #1 still hold.

Realistically, I kind of want to give it 4.5 stars. The characters & writing hold up, the story was unpredictable enough to keep me intrigued & guessing about how she'd wrap it all up, and the ending satisfying, if a bit heart wrenching. My only quibbles are that books #2 & #3 both felt just a tiny bit slow in places--at times it felt like there were long stretches where I didn't see where things were going. Not to say that nothing happened--plenty was happening; it just didn't always feel like it was moving the story forward. Also it's a complicated story, & in retrospect there are some things where I felt either like the foreshadowing could have been paced better.

BUT, overall, a really excellent, interesting, well-written high fantasy series.

2014: Year of the Classics

The Mission: One classic novel per month in 2014. Which means, like, actually making choices. There are a lot of classic reads I have to admit I just don't have any interest in (War & Peace, Moby-Dick, Infinite Jest, Crime & Punishment, etc)*; also anything with more than three parlor scenes is automatically eliminated via the Austen / Brontë Clause.

Get me out of this parlor forthwith, Darcy, or
I shall straight-up cut a bitch. Looking at you, Elinor.

(While we're at it, let's just all agree that Mr. Darcy is a creepy, creepy man who remains, to quote CaptainAwkward, "the supposedly totally dreamy main character of what became the boilerplate for every romantic comedy ever." Pretty much sums up Pride & Prejudice, eh?)

The Fitzwilliam Darcy School of Victorian Pickup Artistry: "If seducing
her via telepathy / brooding looks fails, just vomit your feelings at her."^TM

So I spent the last few days combing through my Goodreads "To Read" list & trying to pick out some classics that sounded interesting & like they wouldn't make me want to shoot myself in the face after. (Under The Volcano, anyone?) I totally reserve the right to change my mind later, but here are the twelve I chose, and a few pinch hitters in case I finish them before the year is over or abandon something.

Update: Okay fine, it's fourteen now, since two of my original selections are less than 100 pages & it kind of doesn't seem like they should count as part of the one-per-month deal. Still. Books I plan to read this year:

JANUARY: A Canticle for Leibowitz, by Walter M. Miller. "In a nightmarish, ruined world, slowly awakening to the light after sleeping in darkness, the infantile rediscoveries of science are secretly nourished by cloistered monks dedicated to the study and preservation of the relics and writings of the blessed Saint Isaac Leibowitz. From there, the story spans centuries of ignorance, violence, and barbarism, viewing through a sharp, satirical eye the relentless progression of a human race damned by its inherent humanness to recelebrate its grand foibles and repeat its grievous mistakes." Wicked.

FEBRUARY: Uncle Tom's Cabin, by Harriet Beecher Stowe. "Eliza Harris, a slave whose child is to be sold, escapes her beloved home on the Shelby plantation in Kentucky and heads North, eluding the hired slave catchers. As the Harrises flee to freedom, another slave, Uncle Tom, is sent "down the river" for sale. Befriending a white child, Evangeline St. Clare, Tom is purchased by her father and taken to their home in New Orleans." This is my Black History Month selection.

MARCH: Anna Karenina, by Leo Tolstoy. "Anna Karenina seems to have everything - beauty, wealth, popularity and an adored son. But she feels that her life is empty until the moment she encounters the impetuous officer Count Vronsky." I am terrified of Tolstoy so this will be my attempt at getting un-terrified.

APRIL: A Room With a View, by E.M. Forster. "A chance encounter… a murder in the Piazza Signoria … an impulsive kiss…and Lucy Honeychurch’s world is forever changed. Torn between settling for a life of acceptable convention or the calling of her true passion, Lucy epitomizes the struggle for individuality and the power and passion of love." Since we are going to Italy in April/May, some Italian literature seems in order.

MAY: Catch-22, by Joseph Heller. Set in the closing months of World War II in an American bomber squadron on a small island off Italy, a bombardier named Yossarian is frantic and furious because thousands of people he hasn't even met keep trying to kill him. (He has decided to live forever, even if he has to die in the attempt.) I've heard this book repeatedly compared to "The Daily Show" in terms of tone & political poignancy, which is probably mainly what sold me on it. A classic that's actually funny? Sold. Not Italian, but set there, so good enough.

JUNE: The Brief, Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, by Junot Díaz. "Things have never been easy for Oscar, a sweet but disastrously overweight, lovesick Dominican ghetto nerd. From his home in New Jersey, where he lives with his old-world mother and rebellious sister, Oscar dreams of becoming the Dominican J. R. R. Tolkien and, most of all, of finding love. But he may never get what he wants, thanks to the Fuku: the curse that has haunted Oscar's family for generations, dooming them to prison, torture, tragic accidents, and, above all, ill-starred love. Oscar, still waiting for his first kiss, is just its most recent victim." Comes highly recommended from several nerdy book friends.

JULY: To Kill A Mockingbird, by Harper Lee. "Set in the small Southern town of Maycomb, Alabama, during the Depression, To Kill a Mockingbird follows three years in the life of 8-year-old Scout Finch, her brother, Jem, and their father, Atticus--three years punctuated by the arrest and eventual trial of a young black man accused of raping a white woman. Though her story explores big themes, Harper Lee chooses to tell it through the eyes of a child. The result is a tough and tender novel of race, class, justice, and the pain of growing up." Awwww, this one's going to break me, isn't it?

AUGUST: Madame Bovary, by Gustave Flaubert. "Set amid the stifling atmosphere of 19th-century bourgeois France, Madame Bovary is at once an unsparing depiction of a woman’s gradual corruption and a savagely ironic study of human shallowness and stupidity. Neither Emma, nor her lovers, nor Homais, the man of science, escapes the author’s searing castigation, and it is the book’s final profound irony that only Charles, Emma’s oxlike, eternally deceived husband, emerges with a measure of human grace through his stubborn and selfless love." Sounds suspiciously like a parlor book, but how can you pass on something hailed as "possibly the most beautifully written book ever composed"? I wanted to read this one for Banned Books Week, but it overlaps with Hispanic Heritage Month in September, so August it is.

SEPTEMBER: One Hundred Years of Solitude, by Gabriel Garcí­a Márquez. "The story of the rise and fall of the mythical town of Macondo through the history of the Buendía family. Rich and brilliant, it is a chronicle of life, death, and the tragicomedy of humankind. In the beautiful, ridiculous, and tawdry story of the Buendía family, one sees all of humanity, just as in the history, myths, growth, and decay of Macondo, one sees all of Latin America." This is my Hispanic Heritage Month selection.

OCTOBER: The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, by Robert Louis Stevenson. "When a brute of a man tramples an innocent girl, apparently out of spite, two bystanders catch the fellow and force him to pay reparations to the girl's family. The brute's name is Edward Hyde. A respected lawyer, Utterson, hears this story and begins to unravel the seemingly manic behavior of his best friend, Dr. Henry Jekyll, and his connection with Hyde. Several months earlier, Utterson had drawn up an inexplicable will for the doctor, naming Hyde as his heir in the event that he disappears. Fearing his friend has been blackmailed into this arrangement, Utterson probes deeper into both Jekyll and his unlikely protégé. He is increasingly unnerved at each new revelation." Jekyll & Hyde is my Spoooooktacular Halloween selection.

NOVEMBER: Journey to the Center of the Earth, by Jules Verne. "Noted geologist Professor Liedenbrock discovers a cryptic message hidden in the pages of an ancient volume purporting to show the way into the center of the earth. Liedenbrock determines to make this fantastic journey, insisting his 16-year-old nephew, Henry, accompany him." Something on the lighter side for Sci-Fi Month.

**NOVEMBER BONUS READ**: The Metamorphosis, by Franz Kafka. "The story of a young traveling salesman who, transformed overnight into a giant, beetle-like insect, becomes an object of disgrace to his family, an outsider in his own home, a quintessentially alienated man. Rather than being surprised at the transformation, the members of his family despise it as an impending burden upon themselves." November is also German Literature Month, & since this book is like 60 pages & I have been meaning to read it since college, I really don't have any excuses.

DECEMBER: The Little Prince, by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry. "A pilot stranded in the desert awakes one morning to see, standing before him, the most extraordinary little fellow. "Please," asks the stranger, "draw me a sheep." And the pilot realizes that when life's events are too difficult to understand, there is no choice but to succumb to their mysteries." Seriously, how have I not read this yet?

**DECEMBER BONUS READ**: A Christmas Carol, by Charles Dickens. Because seriously, it's like 80 pages and how have I never read it??

The Pinch Hitters:

A Prayer for Owen Meany, by John Irving. "In the summer of 1953, two 11-year-old boys – best friends – are playing in a Little League baseball game in Gravesend, New Hampshire. One of the boys hits a foul ball that kills the other boy's mother. The boy who hits the ball doesn't believe in accidents; Owen Meany believes he is God's instrument. What happens to Owen after that 1953 foul ball is extraordinary and terrifying."

East of Eden, by John Steinbeck. "This sprawling and often brutal novel, set in the rich farmlands of California's Salinas Valley, follows the intertwined destinies of two families - the Trasks and the Hamiltons - whose generations helplessly reenact the fall of Adam and Eve and the poisonous rivalry of Cain and Abel." I have a hit-or-miss history with Steinbeck, but got a lot of recommendations for this one.

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, by Ken Kesey. "Tells the unforgettable story of a mental ward and its inhabitants, especially tyrannical Big Nurse Ratched and Randle Patrick McMurphy, the brawling, fun-loving new inmate who resolves to oppose her. We see the story through the eyes of Chief Bromden, the seemingly mute half-Indian patient who witnesses and understands McMurphy's heroic attempt to do battle with the powers that keep them all imprisoned."

Middlemarch, by George Eliot. "Dorothea Brooke is an ardent idealist who represses her vivacity and intelligence for the cold, theological pedant Casaubon. One man understands her true nature: the artist Will Ladislaw. But how can love triumph against her sense of duty and Casaubon’s mean spirit? Meanwhile, in the little world of Middlemarch, the broader world is mirrored: the world of politics, social change, and reforms, as well as betrayal, greed, blackmail, ambition, and disappointment." Better not be too many parlor scenes.

The Alchemist, by Paulo Coelho. An Andalusian shepherd boy named Santiago travels from his homeland in Spain to the Egyptian desert in search of a treasure buried in the Pyramids. Along the way he meets a Gypsy woman, a man who calls himself king, and an alchemist, all of whom point Santiago in the direction of his quest. No one knows what the treasure is, or if Santiago will be able to surmount the obstacles along the way. But what starts out as a journey to find worldly goods turns into a discovery of the treasure found within.

Any other classics I should add to my list of pinch-hitters???

*If anyone can give me a really convincing reason to take on any of the books I've already ruled out, I will totally give them a shot. But it's got to be reeeaallly convincing.