Then you should read these short stories from the Guardian summer reading issue. Authors include William Boyd (one of my favorites), Hanif Kureishi, Helen Simpson, Jeanette Winterson, and Alice Munro.

Ed over at Return of the Reluctant (a daiily read) has written a great review of Chang Rae Lee’s Aloftover at January Magazine. This is a book I read several months ago and reviewed here as well (though not as well as Ed has done).

Sarah has some good points about the Laura Miller piece from the NYT Book Review. In this piece, Miller comments on the sheer number of books that get published—1 new fiction book every 30 minutes. I agree with Sarah on many points. Working at a bookstore, I get calls every day from an author who wants us to carry her/his book. You know what? Most of them are crap. Sure, it is just my opinon, but a lot of things should just never be published. Many are books that an author has self-published. But many are from big name publishers. Need I mention the Bill O’Reilly book coming in the Fall The O’Reilly Factor for Kids? Frankly, a lot of these books are just too hard for us to get. The discounts suck and we have to order more than we need. Sometimes it is just not worth it for us. Plus, like I said earlier, many of the self-published stuff is crap. And I agree with her about how it is hard to keep up with all the new books. I read pretty quickly too, but my TBR list seems to grow exponentially.

And the last link I am providing is to the event list at my store. As everyone knows, the DNC starts soon (something everyone in the Boston area is dreading) and we are having some killer events that week. A panel discussion with Al Franken, Toni Morrison, Joe Conason, Sidney Blumenthal, and Robert F. Kennedy, jr. on politics, books and the culture of war. We have Senator Edward Kennedy and Wesley Clark introducing Robert Byrd, who will speak about his book Losing America: Confronting a Reckless and Arrogant Presidency. Plus lots more—Molly Ivins, George McGovern, Joseph Wilson, etc. So anyone in the Boston/Cambridge area can check it out.

Let me start off by saying, holy shit, this is an amazing book. Originally published as 6 separate short stories, the episodes in this novel feature Margaret Sargent, who is based on McCarthy herself. We see Sargent, a intellectual bohemian, having a love affair that will end her marriage, working for a shady art dealer, meeting a man upon a train, going to an elitist dinner party, affecting the life of a married liberal reporter, and confessing to her analyst. You get a clear sense of what New York social world was like in the 1930’s from McCarthy’s detailed writing. Her sly wit hones in on its subject slowly and carefully. For instance, in the fifth episode ‘Portrait of an Intellectual’, you get the sense that she is poking fun at the man throughout the story. Or maybe that she is commenting on a certain type of person who was prevalent at the time. Parts of the stories seem dated—the attitudes toward race, sex and so forth, but other parts still seem relevant. A young woman, trying to find her way in a confusing time. Negotiating through a labyrinthine social network while trying to retain whatever scruples she had when she started. The random love affairs, flirting with Trotskyism, failed marriages, all vestiges of a struggle for personal identity. Throughout the book, McCarthy drops these wonderful sentences. This is a great book. I am sad to see that not many are reading McCarthy these days. That is too bad. She has such a great style and preceptiveness about society.

Based on strong recommendations from TEV I grabbed a copy of this book from our Used department when I happened upon it. He says it is a good starting point for Banville. And now I can see why. Banville is like that music you are not sure you like when you first hear it. But as time goes on, you find yourself humming the songs and the more you listen, the more you like. I thought the storyline interesting enough. After Frederick Montgomery, a charismatic and indolent Irish expatriate, aimlessly floats his way through California and the Mediterranean’s sleazier areas, he winds back up in his hometown. There Freddie becomes obsessed with a painting and decides to steal it to raise money. But along the way, he murders a young woman before taking flight to an old family friend’s place. The whole story is told through a confession by Freddie while he is in jail awaiting trial so you are left to wonder what is true and what is fiction in his account. Banville’s writing is subtle, but elegant. And you really get into the Freddie’s schizophrenic mind in a way that is almost uncomfortable. But this book is definitely worth reading.
I think I have been converted to being a big fan of Banville. I certainly want to read more. I just wonder which novel I should pick next.

Biography is a genre I had not really explored until a few years ago. I enjoy learning about the era in which the person lived as well as the person’s life. With Meyer’s biography of Maugham, you get a lot of history as well as an in depth analysis of Maugham’s every move. Maughm lived for almost 92 years and in those years, he wrote a great deal, read a great deal and lived a great deal. As the author of several of my favorite books, Of Human Bondage, The Razor’s Edge, and The Painted Veil, I wanted to know more about the man behind these extraordinary books. Notoriously secretive, Maugham lived a life caught between repressed homosexuality and artistic expression. Trained in medicine, he learns to empathize with the poor and brutalized women he met as he attended them in childbirth. These experiences deeply influenced his writing. He was also a spy for years in Switzerland, the South Seas, and Russia just before the revolution. Maugham earned a great living not just with his novels, but also with his plays. With his profits, he bought an estate in Cap Ferrat on the coast between Monte Carlo and Nice. Invitations were prized but Maugham also expected his guests to entertain him in return for a stay at a gorgeous and lush palace.
Reading this book was a thorough education in the life of W. Somerset Maugham. I only wish that Jeffrey Meyers had given the same attention to his writing as he gave to his research. Some of the chapters felt thrown together. And as much as I learned, reading this book was not always pleasant. One nice thing that Meyers does do however is cite the influence Maugham had on future writers. Overall, this is a fact filled book, but carelessly written I would say.

Here are two reviews I found online: one by Christopher Hitchens at the Atlantic and one from Merle Rubin at the Christian Science Monitor.

Due to a light workload this week, I was able to consume Maugham’s novella The Painted Veil yesterday afternoon. The story really grabs hold of you. Walter Fane, a bacteriologist in Hong Kong, discovers his wife Kitty’s affair with Charles Townsend. He forces her to accompany him into the heart of a cholera epidemic in the Chinese countryside, where she begins to find new depths to her character. She finds work and self-worth at a convent taking care of orphaned children. She and Walter dance around each other but begin to find a common respect for one another. But then Walter contracts cholera and dies, leaving Kitty with the realization that she has nowhere else to go. She returns to England, after first having a adulterous relapse in Hong Kong, and tries to the attention and love of her father. In the end, she decides to raise her unborn daughter as an independent minded woman, so as not to end up like her.
Kitty’s spiritual journey seems rather trite to modern eyes, but I can’t deny the strength of the story. The characters seem a little thin at times too, but occasionally they surprise you. Overall, I found it a great read.

I finished Franzen’s first book last night The 27th City. I am not really sure what to say about it, except that I found it nowhere near as good as The Corrections. The plot was overdone. There were too many characters to keep straight. And the sense of urgency that filled the book was annoying and unwarranted. I think the Complete Review’s coverage is better than mine. So you should check that out if you want a lengthy review.

One of America’s preeminent critics in the 20s, 30s and 40s, H.L. Mencken was known for his no-holds-barred attacks on Puritanism, the “booboisie,” (a term he created and intellectual laziness and corruption. People either loved him or hated him, but everybody listened. He was first and foremost a journalist and he helped discover some of the greatest writers of the 20th century as founder and editor of the influential American Mercury magazine, including Theodore Dreiser, F. Scott Fitzgerald and Sinclair Lewis. He heralded Huckleberry Finn as the greatest American novel and made the notorious Scopes trial one of the biggest landmarks in American law history. His bestselling books covered topics as varied as the imperfections of women, the American language (as opposed to the Queen’s English) and the failures of democracy. Most of all, he loved to write about Puritanism overtaking America.

Terry Teachout’s biography is not all praise, however, and Mencken had plenty of shortcomings. Mencken lived in the same house in Baltimore for all but five years of his life, and Teachout blames this and his lack of formal education for Mencken’s narrow vision and the fact that his tastes and politics never seemed to change. Teachout also addresses the complex issues surrounding Mencken’s racism and anti-Semitism, which lost him both credibility and readership. His pro-German views also were detrimental during the periods before and during the two world wars. Mencken wrote against lynchings and the continuing segregation of Baltimore’s sports clubs, and counted numerous Jews and African-Americans as his friends. In fact, one of his longest friendships was with Alfred Knopf, one of America’s most influential publishers. But his views towards minorities were negative and conflicting. For example, he often proclaimed his belief in every individual’s freedom, but considered non-Caucasians inferior, dismissed Hitler as a crank, and seemed to think that the Jews had brought the holocaust upon themselves.

I originally picked up this book both because I enjoy Terry Teachout’s weblog and wanted to read more of his work, and because I wanted to learn more bout Mencken. I was well-rewarded: even during the offensive, obscure, or boring parts of Menken’s life, Teachout’s style held my interest and kept the content relevant. I’d recommend this book to anyone who has wondered about the considerable influence of one of the angriest writers of the last century, as well as to those interested in the history of journalism, literature, and ideas.

I made a trip down to the Used department today and this is what I got:

The Pained Veil by W. Somerset Maughm—-I am reading Maughm’s recent biography right now and consider The Razor’s Edge and Of Human Bondage two of my favorite books of all time.

The Book of Evidence and Mefisto by John Banville—-There has been a discussion over at Tingle Alley about where to begin with Banville. The ever helpful TEV suggested The Book of Evidence.

The Company She Keeps by Mary McCarthy—-I read The Group last Fall and loved it. I remember someone recommending this one somewhere.

Blue Angel by Francine Prose—-I have always heard good things about this book.

Brief Interviews with Hideous Men—-Everyone either loves this one or hates it. I thought it time I found out for myself.

Do you envy my future reading yet?

I came in to my office today and saw my stash of used books on the bookshelf. We are allowed to keep a stash of 25 books or less. It is an evil practice. I have some good stuff in there though. I have Junot Diaz’s Drown, Hanif Kuresihi’s The Black Album (though I hear The Buddha of Suburbia is his best book), W.G. Sebald’s On the Natural History of Destruction, Colette’s The Pure and the Impure, a biography of Simone de Beauvoir (loved her Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter) by Deirde Bair, and I have a few books by Simon Schama that I may never get around to reading because they weigh about 20 pounds each (The Embarassment of Riches and Citizens: A Chronicle of the French Revolution, though Landscape and Memory was recommended to me). Christ, this seems insurmountable. I will prevail! Though if no one sees me for more than a few days, you had better make sure I was not crushed under a giant pile of books.