Books

Books

Traded a bunch of books at a used book store yesterday. Just tired of having some of them around and tripping on them. What do I walk out of the bookstore with? More books. I'm the dumbest man in America.

I haven't been updating my read list, and that's something I'll try to take care of this weekend. I did pencil out a quick list of what I've read over the past month. I'm leaving something off, I think. I can't think of what it is.

In the last little bit, though, I've read:

Into the Wild, by Jon Krakauer.

It's a look at Christopher McCandless, who gave up everything he owned to live the vagabond's life, in search of a Great Adventure. McCandless wandered into the Alaskan wilderness, and lost his life. Krakauer talks with those who knew Chris, especially in his last days. Krakauer lets the people of the story tell it as much as they are able.

Krakauer has a role in the story, largely to explain his motivations in retracing Chris's journey. It's necessary, and it doesn't glare in its shifting the tone of the narrative. But it does break up the tone of the book, a little. I'm nitpicking, however. I read this in a couple of sittings. Krakauer has a style that lends itself to a quick but extremely engaging read.

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time by Mark Haddon

I just about got bludgeoned to death with the number of places and people wanting me to read this one. NPR, the Today Show (which made the book its Book Club selection), plus a couple of people I used to work with really liked this one.

It's an interesting novel. Told in the first person by autistic Christopher Boone, it's a recounting of his attempt at detective work, following the death of a neighbor's dog. Christopher, obsessed with order and facts, tells his story in the only way he can. Everything happens along a linear model. Simply, this happens, and this happens, and then another thing happens. Which is generally poor storytelling, but it's the only way Chris can understand and explain the world. He says himself that he views life along a single line. He can rewind his memory, he says and has a startlingly good memory, but in the course of his investigation, this is the best way for him to tell his story.

The style's interesting. I'll warn that at a couple of points, I put the book down because with Chris narrating, it gets a little monotonous. There were a couple of times I found myself getting thrown out of balance by the lack of passion in the telling of events. It works within the frame of the story, but a couple of times, I had to make myself stop, and go back and re-read something just to make sure I'd picked up on another character's nuance. Chris doesn't pick up on them, so you're often left to fill in the blanks that he didn't get. It's a neat device. I just got irked at having to stop my own freight train for a second.

Coraline by Neil Gaiman

A creepy story for kids in the mold of Wizard of Oz and the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. With a nice little bit of Edmund Gorey thrown in for good measure.

Coraline's a precocious girl who, in exploring her new flat, finds a secret door which leads to a world that is a twisted mirror image of her own. The inhabitant(s) of that other world have taken someone very dear to Coraline. This book is her trying to get it back.

It's written right around the same level as the Wizard of Oz. So it's for younger readers. But I enjoyed the flow of the book, and found the imagery sufficiently creepy.

Savage Season by Joe Lansdale

The first of the Hap Collins and Leonard Pine novels. Very pulpy. Smartass buddies getting into trouble. I like Lansdale. He writes books for guys. Pulpy, like I said. Lots of action, lots of buddy comedy. With an odd bit of East Texas philosophy thrown in for good measure.

Dark Tower VI: Song of Susannah by Stephen King

A really quick read. One of the interesting points of the book itself was the lack of substantial fore- or afterword. Mr. King likes to talk about what he's done in his books. But I think with this sixth book, he's interested in tightening the screws a bit, and just pushing you down the chute as we move toward the last book in the Dark Tower series, in the fall.

In the last book (which we had to wait something like 8 years for), things got a little metaphysical, as Father Callahan recoils in horror to find that his story is told in a book he finds, Stephen King's Salem's Lot.

The sixth book dives deeper into that meta-type story, as King his own self becomes something of a character. I read these parts at first with a skeptical eye, but I liked how things worked out in the end.

Going back briefly to the wait between books. We had to wait seven or eight years between the fourth and fifth books, and then six months or so between the fifth and sixth. And then the last book in the series will appear in September. I appreciate Stephen wanting to finish the story at last, and maybe this is his way of recompense for the long waits up to this point between books. Not complaining, but it's an adjustment from 7 years to 3 months.

Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers

I picked this up at a yard sale. I alternated between laughing out loud and throwing it across the room out of frustration. Ultimately, I liked it, but there are large expanses where you just want Dave to get to the point.

Still, Dave's excellently descriptive. He describes a lot of the mundane details of his life in a way that made me smile. I liked his descriptions of both the family den, at their home in Chicago, and also his telling of the difficulties he and his brother Toph have keeping house when they've set up home in Berkeley. I think those two sections may have hit close to home.