Author Archives: bookdwarf

Monday Miscellany

  • Check it, new fiction from Orhan Pamuk in this week’s New Yorker. I believe it’s part of his forthcoming novel Museum of Innocence due out in October.
  • If you still haven’t read last week’s issue, don’t forget to read the article on New York City’s worst teachers. As someone who is friends with many teachers, I found it pretty fascinating.
  • Hey, look, I’m quoted in the Globe in an article on books of miscellany! I always fear sounding like an idiot when reporters call. I don’t sound that bad this time.
  • That’s it for today. I’m hoping to get back to a regular posting schedule now that September is here. It’s a busy month (I’m getting married at the end of it) but there are too many good books coming out soon to not post about.

Vacation!

I’m leaving tonight for Florence, Italy! I can’t wait. I’ve got a stack of books to bring with me, including some of your suggestions–thanks for them. It’s going to be hot. It looks like it will be 95 to 100 degrees everyday we’re there. Luckily the wedding we’re attending is actually in Fiesole, among the hills of Tuscany on the outskirts of Florence. I’m hoping it will be a little cooler there. I’ll take lots of pictures and fill you in when I get back. Have a good week everyone!

Friday Rambling

I spent a long time writing a review of Richard Powers’s Generosity today. I just couldn’t get it right. It’s a novel of ideas, one which makes Ed say he “foresees some animosity from the vanilla critics hostile to idea-driven novels, but book bloggers, YouTube chroniclers, and MFAs would do well to plunge into this chance-taking narrative, which introduces vital questions about what the reader’s relationship is with media, scientific dissection, and ‘creative nonfiction.'” It’s true. This novel is all over the map, not just in terms of subject matter (Happiness, what is it) but how we access information, the dissolution of privacy, the perception of science in a mass-media world. I’ll try to work more over the weekend on it.

David Ulin’s article on “The Lost Art of Reading” relates to at least one of the themes in the book. He purports that the demands for his attention with our ADD culture prevent him from reading for long stretches of time. It struck a chord with me not because I’m ADD when it comes to reading, but I find my relationship with books has changed now that I work with books all day. Sometime when I come home and have eaten dinner, I don’t want to read! It’s very strange. I love reading. I do it everywhere, even while brushing my teeth. But television has its own allure.

On a completely different topic, Mr. Bookdwarf and I are heading to Florence, Italy in a week or so for a wedding. No, not our own, that’s next month. This is for a childhood friend of Aaron’s. So I’ve got some plane reading to plan for as well as reading while in cafes. Know any books set in Florence or Italy? Suggest away!

And to end this post, doesn’t Judith Jones’s post make you want to see Julie and Julia? I didn’t particularly enjoy Powell’s book, but the movie sounds fantastic. As least the Julia Child parts do. I also throw in a teaser by mentioning an upcoming event my store is hosting later this Fall involving Judith Jones in conversation with Lidia Bastianich. I don’t have an exact date yet and I might get in trouble for even mentioning it, but I’m too excited.

Chronic City by Jonathan Lethem

I’ve been pondering what to say about Jonathan Lethem’s forthcoming novel Chronic City all week. No matter how careful, I worry that I’ll give something away in writing about it. Not that there’s a secret twist necessarily, but the whole book seems cloaked in a paranoia. Perhaps it’s all the pot the characters smoke?

Like his other books, this one plays with genres mixing mystery, romance, science fiction and more all in one. Chase Insteadman acted in a beloved sitcom and now lives off the royalties in Manhattan. His girlfriend is trapped aboard the International Space Station and sends him love letters which the media publish to great fanfare. His social cache makes him a must have at monied dinner parties. One day he meets Perkus Tooth, a slightly agoraphobic, pot smoking critic, whose paranoid delusions oddly rouse Chase’s paternal side. Several mysteries arise including rumors of a loose tiger who causes destruction to various neighborhoods.

There’s so much to talk about with this book! First, I’ll say that the main theme is the disconnectness of modern day urbanites. And what about the names? “Insteadman” stands in for Everyman, but because we’re all so disconnected we can’t imagine a person representing all of us. So we get Insteadman instead. Perhaps I’m reading too much into this. A name can just be a name after all. Twists and turns abound in this book. It goes places you might not imagine when you start reading it. And many of the pop culture references are close but not quite the same.

Gripping, tragic, fantastical are words I’d use if I thought it would help describe this book. It’s too difficult to categorize however. Everyone should definitely read it. I look forward to the discussion I know it will generate.

Nerdy News

Shelf Awareness reports

Sean Bean will star in HBO’s adaptation of the George R.R. Martin fantasy-book series Game of Thrones, with Tom McCarthy directing. The Hollywood Reporter noted that “Mark Addy is in final negotiations to also join the production. Kit Harrington, Jack Gleeson and Harry Lloyd also have come aboard. . . . Bean will play Lord Eddard ‘Ned’ Stark, known for his sense of honor and justice, who becomes closest adviser to King Robert (Addy). Harrington will play Jon Snow, Bean’s bastard son, and Lloyd will play Viserys, a powerless ruler who seeks to marry off his sister to a powerful king. Gleeson will play Joffrey, King Robert’s son. Peter Dinklage also is in the cast for the production, which is in the pilot stage and begins shooting in October in Ireland.”

I read the first book in the series and I’ve had the second on my shelf for a while. I think that because it’s HBO, it might turn out pretty well. It’s nice to a good fantasy adaptation being done that’s not a cheezy NBC Sunday night movie or whatnot.

Monday Musings

Summer finally hit New England. I spent a lovely, hot Saturday wandering around Davis Square’s ArtBeat. I’ve lived in the neighborhood for ten years and not a day goes by that I’m not thankful I live in such a great area.

I also finished reading Christopher Priest’s The Inverted World over the weekend, published by the fabulous New York Review of Books Classics. They really publish some amazing stuff. I don’t think I’ve read any of the series and not liked it to some degree. This is a strange and interesting story about a city constantly on the move. It’s trundled along on rails that must be laid ahead of the city and removed after it has passed. The inhabitants of the city is governed by a Guild system built around moving the city but most know nothing of the outside world. Helman Mann becomes an apprentice to the Future Guild becoming responsible for plotting the city’s path. As he ventures outside the city and learns about their fragile existence and why the city must constantly move, his loyalties are put to the test. I won’t ruin the ending but suffice it to say, it’s thought provoking to say the least. Jonathan Lethem said this about The Inverted World: “A somber psychedelic journey through a landscape that seems a collaboration between Breugel the Elder and M.C. Escher, Priest’s book is an engine of epiphany, and a formal marvel: a narrative in the exact shape of the conundrum it presents.”

I quote Lethem because I started reading his forthcoming novel Chronic City after finishing Priest’s book. I haven’t read all of his books but I’m not sure if makes a difference or not. Kind of strange is the best I can come up with right now to describe it. I’m eager to see where’s he going with this. It’s also another novel set in New York. I’m on this strange New York kick. I should start a Boston one after this.

Also, if you haven’t seen this already, you should check out author Marc Fitten’s website where he’s traveling to 100 independent bookstores around the country. We were his fifth visit. He’s at number thirty five now!

A Quick Mention

Due to the appendix nonsense, I’m very behind at work, which is why I haven’t been blogging. I want to take a minute to mention two great books, however, because they’re so fantastic: Brooklyn by Colm Toibin and Let the Great World Spin by Column McCann. Pretty much all they have to do with each other is that they’re set in New York. Brooklyn follows an Irish woman who reluctantly moves to the United States after World War II to look for work. It’s a quiet but beautifully written novel about the immigrant experience. McCann’s novel on the other hand has a central experience that ties together a series of stories. It’s a risky literary device, but he pulls it off. It’s the dark, gritty New York of the 70s. These might be two of the best books I’ve read so far in 2009.

Hello Again

Hello, remember me? Last you heard, I was recovering from an unexpected appendectomy–are they ever expected? Turns out it left behind an infection and I spent another week in the hospital. I’m slowly recovering. So far June has been a giant time suck.

I’ve managed to read a bit in the past weeks. The new Lorrie Moore The Gate at the Stairs managed to take my mind of the pain for a while in the hospital as did Binnie Kirshenbaum’s The Scenic Route. I should probably go back and re-read portions though as the morphine made it difficult to concentrate completely. Since I’ve been out, magazines, books, and television have been my friends. Luckily I don’t lack for a supply of books or for people to bring them to me. I’m hoping to get back to the blog this week with some actual book related postings as my energy levels are finally returning day by day. Thanks for sticking with me!