Top Ten Books I'll never read

Another Top Ten from the Broke and the Bookish.

1-4 -  The Twilight books by Stephanie Meyer.  My wife adores the books.  I even went to one of the movies with her.  I picked up the first book, opened it up, and didn't get more than a couple of pages in before I put the thing down FOREVER.  I've heard enough about these books to know that I just don't care. 

5. The DaVinci Code by Dan Brown.  So many people have told me that it is poorly written that I don't want to find out.

6. The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson.  Here is where I admit my prejudices.  I've tried reading the influx of Scandinavian crime authors ...Arnaldur Indridason, Jo Nesbo, Karin Fossum, Henning Mankell...and I just haven't really cared for ANY of them.  Being of Swedish descent, you'd think I'd have some interest, but nope.  I have seen the movie, and I kind of liked it.  Unfortunately, though, it reinforced my belief that I just won't like this book.  I don't care for serial killer stories.

7.  Vanishing Point by David Markson.  I read Wittgenstein's Mistress, and it was the most painful read for me in 30+ years of reading.  No desire to ever read Markson again.

8-10 and beyond.  I've left these for last, so I could give room for other books, and also so readers would read the rest of the post before sharpening their pitchforks.  Any of the Harry Potter books by J.K. Rowling.  There is one exception here (and we have all of the books - wife again), and that would be if my son asked me to read them to/with him, in which case I would gladly read the entire series.  Other than that, sorry I'm just not interested.

I haven't disappeared.  Today's top ten courtesy of the Broke and the Bookish is favorite authors. I'll do no particular order and just come up with names quickly, so as not agonize over picks because then I will just lament going over the list at a later date wondering why I left an author off.  Who am I kidding?  I'll still do that but, yeah, ok here goes:

1. James Lee Burke -  He is sort of a hero for me.  Burke published a handful of books in the 60's that were fairly well received critically.  He wrote stories of down on their luck folks looking for redemption.  They were essentially the same types of stories that he writes now, but they were classified as literary fiction.  Despite this modest early success, however, Burke went unpublished for nearly a decade.  His novel, "The Lost Get Back Boogie" spent eight years circling the publishing houses and received over 100 rejections.  Finally, Louisiana State University Press, published it, and it was nominated for a Pulitzer (I'm not really sure what that means).  Burke on the advise of Charles Willeford, then took on the crime/mystery genre.  He created Dave Robicheaux and basically continued to tell the same sorts of stories he always had except with a recurring character -- a police detective.  He is now a bestselling author, and a two time Edgar Award winner and a Mystery Writers of America grandmaster.  He also writes some of the most violently, beautiful prose this side of Shakespeare.  As someone that fancies himself a part time writer, and holds the dream, occasionally, of someday being read outside of immediate family, James Lee Burke's story of persistence is particularly inspiring.

2. Ernest Hemingway - In music, sometimes the beauty is not in the notes played but in the space between the notes.  In architecture, it is often the space between the elements rather than the craft lavished upon the elements.  In literature, sometimes the beauty is Hemingway and not everyone else that came before him.  He is the master of the unsaid.  Plus he writes about slaying big fish, bullfighting, climbing mountains, war...c'mon, what's a guy not to like.

3. Walter Mosley - He writes about a world I have never known (post WWII black L.A.), and makes me feel as if it is my own.

4. Vladimir Nabokov - I've read ONE book by him, and it's enough to make room for him on this list.  Anyone that can make the reader sympathize with a pedophile is masterful. 

5.  Charles Dickens - yes, it all seems dated and long winded. But the stories, my god, the stories.  Great Expectations is probably my favorite "assigned" book I've ever read.  Freshman year, high school.

6. John D. MacDonald -  he is a man of his times, and to enjoy him perhaps you need to give him a mulligan on that, but he was also ahead of his times in other regards - his thoughts on the environment seem particularly relevant today.  I discovered him on my dad's bookshelves one weekend when I was visiting him, and read that book ( "Nightmare in Pink" ) in one sitting, and was forever hooked on his Travis McGee books.  Part of the allure was McGee's adventures were set in Florida and having lived there all my life the locales were familiar to me. Just writing about him has me wanting pull one of the ratty paperbacks out of my collection.

7.  Cormac McCarthy - my first exposure was "The Road".  It was, maybe, the most powerful book I had ever read.  McCarthy's ability to portray one driving image throughout the length of the novel was reminiscent to me of Hemingway's "The Old Man and the Sea".  I have since read most of his other books.  Most of them more than once.  McCarthy is one of the few authors that hold up to re-reads for me.  I alway find greater appreciation the second time through.  This was especially the case with "Blood Meridian", McCarthy's opus. A very disturbing look at America's lust for violence and expansion.  I often catch myself telling people McCarthy is my favorite author, though I'm not sure if that is true or not.

8. William Shakespeare -  C'mon, really, has there ever been a greater storyteller?  I love him on the page and on the stage. I love him writing sonnets.  Hell, I even love the stuff he is said not to have written...

9. Raymond Chandler - As a mystery writer, his plots aren't the greatest.  He leaves his share of loose ends, and the whole thing kind of meanders all over the place...from one kick ass scene to another...from one colorful character, like no one you've ever seen, to another.  And that, not the metaphors, is what Chandler brought to the detective genre.  His voice is more compelling than Dashiell Hammett's, which for me, makes him the King of the hardboiled.  His 'The Long Goodbye' should be read by everyone in my opinion.  It is his most literary achievement.

10. J.R.R. Tolkien - "The Hobbit" was assigned to me in 7th grade, and it was the first fictional book that had really caught my attention since the Roald Dahl books I had read in elementary school.  I had spent the prior five years or so reading books like, "Greatest Halfbacks of the NFL" and an untold number of Mickey Mantle biographies. About the time I read "The Hobbit", I was also playing a lot of Dungeons and Dragons, so the adventures of Bilbo Baggins held an additional appeal in that regard.  Of course, I went on to read LOTR, and even dabbled in some of the mythology reading parts of The Silmarillion and other works.  I think Tolkien is most impressive in this regard - the detail involved in his mythological history.  As a storyteller, though, I don't think he ever surpassed "The Hobbit."

Top Ten Tuesday - Favorite Book Quotes

Another Top Ten Tuesday.  List requested today by Broke and Bookish is favorite book quotes.  I'm not very good at this, because I have terrible memory.  But I do have SOME favorite opening and closing lines.  Also I have been highlighting some favorite passages as I read Les Miserables, so I will toss out some of these.  (Oh and I'll skip Call Me Ishmael...that's too easy)

Openers

1.  We were about to give up and call it a night when somebody dropped the girl off the bridge. Darker than Amber by John D. MacDonald. Yep, that will keep you reading.

2. The sky above the port was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel.  Neuromancer by William Gibson.  It's unfortunate that generations of readers won't really get this..."you mean sky was blue?"  But for those of us living and reading at the time this book was written it is a near perfect image.

3. It was Wang Lung's marriage day. The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck.  Such matter of fact way to start this story of one man's epic journey from a poor, single farmer to successful family businessman.  This books was assigned in my English 101 class freshman year of college.  I don't remember much about the plot (I remember enjoying the book), but the first line is unforgettable, despite seeming like such a throw away line.  I probably need to re-read this some time.

4. My father's family name being Pirrip, and my Christian name Philip, my infant tongue could make of both names nothing longer or more explicit than Pip. So, I called myself Pip, and came to be called Pip.  Great Expections by Charles Dickens.  Another favorite book that I need to re-read.  This opener to me is astounding in it's ability to illuminate the character of Pip (uncertainty) in so few words...and right at the beginning of the book, no less.

5. In my younger and more vulnerable years my father gave me some advice that I’ve been turning over in my mind ever since.
“Whenever you feel like criticizing any one,” he told me, “just remember that all the people in this world haven’t had the advantages that you’ve had.” The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald.  Every time, and I mean every time, I hear somebody getting all negative and critical of somebody else this line comes to my mind.

Closers

6. "Isn't it pretty to think so?" The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway.  This is impotent main character Jake's response to Lady Brett's comment that they could have been so good together.  It's just so Hemingway.

7. I never saw any of them again—except the cops. No way has yet been invented to say goodbye to them. The Long Goodbye by Raymond Chandler.  The irony of this line is that Marlowe would be perfectly just in not wanting to see ANY of the characters populating this novel again, yet he almost laments the fact that these people are gone from his life.

Les Mis

8.  Some people are malicious from the mere necessity of talking. Their conversation, tattling in the drawing-room, gossip in the ante-chamber, is like those fireplaces that use up wood rapidly; they need a great deal of fuel; the fuel is their neighbor.  I don't know about you but I know a few of these people.

9. In vain we chisel, as best we can, the mysterious block of which our life is made, the black vein of destiny reappears continually.  A neat metaphor of fate.  I like how he bookends the line with vain and vein.

10. One can no more prevent the mind from returning to an idea than the sea from returning to a shore. In the case of the sailor, this is called the tide; in the case of the guilty, it is called remorse. Another neat metaphor from Hugo.

Ok, that wasn't so painful.  So, dear reader, what are some of your favorites?

Addendum:  a #11 because I can't believe I forgot it, and because it totally encompasses the first 25 years of my life.  This would fall under the "Closers" category.

11. You spend a good piece of your life gripping a baseball and in the end it turns out that it was the other way around all the time. Ball Four by Jim Bouton. My favorite sports book.

Book Hop Friday

It's hop time courtesy of Crazy-for-Books.  Today's task is to honor our favorite book bloggers.  I'm going to go with:


Dead White Guys A blog written about the classics that doesn't take itself too seriously.  I disagree with her frequently, but she writes a good, humorous review.  This blog is fun.

Roof Beam Reader He's another male book blogger.  Them's hard to come by.  Plus, the blog has a cool, literary name.  Plus, he writes great reviews.  And he has a cool weekly feature on censorship. What's not to like?

Ok, there goes...if you're stopping by on the hop.  Say hi...let me know what other blogs are kicking maximus.

Top Ten Tuesday - 10 Books I'm Dying to Read

I like lists.  So, this meme over at The Broke and the Bookish is something I look forward to.  This week's list is Top Ten Books I'm Dying to Read.  Now c'mon, if I was really dying to read them, they would probably already have been read, no?  Unless, of course, we're talking about books with upcoming releases, and (with few exceptions) I'm just not enough of a fan boy to follow books soon to be released.  Anway, here's some books I look forward to reading at some point --

1. The Financial Lives of Poets - Jess Walter

Jess Walter's "Citizen Vince" is one of my favorite books of all time.  It's crime fiction, sort of, but I think it appeals far beyond genre readers.  I don't even know anything about "...Poets", as far as story goes, but it has Jess Walter's name on the cover, and that is enough for me.

2. Dark Places - Gillian Flynn

Flynn's debut novel "Sharp Objects" was a surprising 'hit' with both the masses and me.  Flynn basically writes about women being a bunch of evil bitches, which sounds really shallow and silly, but it's actually kind of refreshing.  Flynn goes beyond femme fatales and manipulative women and tells stories of women doing the kinds of things we generally expect only out of men...actually Flynn's women are even worse.  Anyone who has spent any time in the high school cafeteria knows where these characters come from and why they ring true.  It's not only the men who are pigs.

3. Redemption Street - Reed Farrell Coleman

Another crime novel,  and series book no less.  Coleman's series is somewhat unique in the crime genre in that the series is a story arc (similar to the trilogies you see in sci-fi and fantasy), rather than just a series of books using the same characters in un-linked stories.  The interesting thing, to me, is that I've read the series out of order and can still :  1) appreciate the books on an individual level  2) appreciate the overall story arc of the series.  The story arc btw isn't so much a mystery/crime story, it's mainly a story of family conflict.  This is the 2nd book in the series...I've read #1, #3, #4.  There are five books.  The other I need to read is "Empty Ever After".

4. Song of Solomon - Toni Morrison

I've read Morrison's debut "The Bluest Eye", and I have her so-called masterpiece "Beloved" at home.  I enjoyed "...Eye" more than I thought I would.  "Solomon", not "Beloved", is the book Harold Bloom claims is Morrison's opus, and Bloom's opinions have served me well in the past.

5. To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee

This book was on my prior Top Ten list of books I haven't read.  This makes me wonder why these two lists aren't more similar? Hmm...

6. The Postman Always Rings Twice

This is the classic noir novel.  No clue why I have yet to read it.  The Italian neo-realist film Ossessione is one of the best pictures I've ever seen. It was based on the novel, and is superior to the American noir film that carries the Cain title.

7. Barabbas - Par Lagerkvist

This one is on the list of 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die, and came up on a random number search of  that list, and I became intrigued by it's story of the man pardoned to "make room" for Christ's crucifixion.  I like intelligent biblical stories, and this appears to be one.  Lagerkvist is a nobel laureate.

8. Veronika Decides to Die - Paolo Coelho

I've never read Coelho.  I've heard him referred to as simplistic.  I find beauty in the simple.  Plus, I picked this book up at the Big Ass Book Sale, and on the cover it says it's a Novel of Redemption.  I like redemptive stories.  Win?

9. Snow Crash - Neal Stephenson

I have to confess to having picked this book up more than once, and being turned off by Stephenson's writing style.  I'm not even much of a sci-fi guy, but I do LOVE Gibson's Neuromancer and people are always telling me how great this cyberpunk novel is...so I want to read it and I want to like it.  Unfortunately, that can be a bad combination.  High expectations and all...

10. I don't know.  You tell me.  What book should I be dying to read?

An Update on Les Mis

As I mentioned at the end of my review of "Decline and Fall",  I am currently reading Les Miserables by Victor Hugo.  This was one of the books on my Top Ten Books I've never read.  I'm only about 200 pages in.  It is going slow for a number of reasons.

One, I am married and have a son and work full time and, right now, I'm in one of those periods where I have so many balls up in the air that I cannot think straight.  I usually read on average fifty pages per day, and have for years.  It's not something I set out to do. It is just something I have noticed over the years...at the end of the day, most any day, I will have read around fifty pages.  I've been reading about ten pages per day lately, because I am so exhausted that I can only prop my eyes up for that long before drifting off to sleep.

  Two, this book is intimidating in its heft.  At well over 1000 pages, it is like reading a marathon and I think my subconscious mind is slowing myself down to a trot for the long haul.

  Finally, it was written something like 200 years ago (not quite) and whenever I read a book written so long ago, the style seems to make me read slower to appreciate it.  This happened somewhat with Sister Carrie, which was written at the turn of the 20th century.

I am enjoying the book.  Valjean is becoming one of my favorite literary creations.  The bishop, though he only makes a brief appearance, is a wonderful character - love his dialogue with the dying man.  The book is like a conglomeration of my favorite themes.  I just wish I wasn't so tired all the time, and could make some more headway on it.

Top Ten Tuesday - Words

Another Top Ten Tuesday at the Broke and the Bookish. Today's top ten list is ten favorite words. This will be a reach, as I can't say I give this much thought except for #1, which has been my fave word for many years and will remain so for years to come.

1. Copacetic - Very satisfactory. The word was used in many of James Lee Burke's early Robicheaux novels. It was also featured heavily in Local H's one hit wonder "Bound for the Floor." It is the most copacetic of words.



2. pronate - a word I heard many times when working on my mechanics as a collegiate pitcher. One of the more technical sounding words I heard come out of my pitching coach's mouth. He tended towards four letter ones. It rolls off the tongue. For a pitcher it meant the palm, with ball in hand, and forearm should face backwards (i.e. opposite direction of target) at the point in the rotation that the pitcher begins his transition towards the plate.

3. whim - can you even say this word without smiling?

4. ambiance - just sounds better than atmosphere, and I have a friend that overuses the word and it's funny.

5. existential - it's a word that can either lead to a lot of conversation or someone just looking at you like you have two faces. So it is good to use the word early on in a conversation to see who you're dealing with. FWIW, I am no expert on existentialism, but I do like hear people talk about it and try to explain it to me.

6. podjo - okay, so it is slang. It's basically the same as buddy, and can sometimes be heard in south Louisiana. Another word that frequents James Lee Burke books. It's also what I call my son.

7. serendipity - sounds better than luck or fate or good fortune. Has almost a staccato sound coming out of your mouth. I have a crush on Kate Beckinsale.

8. honor - I would be doing a disservice to this word if I tried to explain it or justify it's inclusion here.

9. love - see honor above

10. teabagger - not to get too political, but this just seems such a perfect label for the fringe element of the tea party movement. Note I say fringe element. If you don't know what I mean by that, you're likely just not paying any attention (completely justifiable) or you are one yourself (which is really unfortunate).