The Reads!
The Books!
The Books and Reads!
The only thing that this blog has been doing consistently for the last 8 years or so is keeping track with a twice-yearly list of the books I read and listened to in 2024.
One of the many things I like about the new job, as opposed to the old one is the added free time to read. I'm driving a lot, especially from the end of March to the middle of August (or so). So the old Audible account gets a workout.
The first half of the list was published on July 7, but I'm just copying it here for you to enjoy, so you don't have to scroll backwards something like 13 posts to read. And if you reading in reverse chronological order, you can just skip that post and look extra long at the picture of the Porn & Beans Typo.
Anyway:
January
The Wishing Pool, and Other Stories by Tananarive Due
A collection of short stories, which seems to be Due's true expert medium. I've liked her novel work, but her earlier collection Ghost Summer was one of my favorite collections in years. And I liked Wishing Pool even better. Ranging across a handful of genres, there's not a stinker in the bunch. Particularly effective, though were the dark speculative story "The Biographer" and the titular "Wishing pool" which hits home with Twilight Zone impact. I also particularly enjoyed a pair of stories about Nayima, a survivor of plague that hits in the near future.
This was a good read.
Practical Demonkeeping by Christopher Moore
I read this almost entirely at the tire shop, when I had to get them replaced. Moore's first novel, and one of his only that I hadn't read to this point. Fun, though I had to look at publication date (1992), when it went so out of the way to make fun of a character communicating with someone communicating via modem....out of place in 2024, as Moore has maintained one of the most pleasing online presences among authors I follow. Fun read.....
Ghosts of South Carolina by Tally Johnson
Snow Day read. A gift from my buddy Dino. Focuses more on the history and verifiable facts around stories being passed down in communities than on building suspense, which was a pleasant surprise, to be honest.
Thunderbolts: Justice, like Lightning by Kurt Busiek, Roger Stern, Mark Bagley
I don't normally include my comic reading in my book list, but out of all the Marvel superhero stuff of the last 60 years, this is probably my favorite. Just your everyday story of villains masquerading as heroes, and then finding that they are suited to heroing. Checks a couple boxes of stories that'll catch my interest....redemption arcs and people finding their niche. There's probably no better writer for capturing the thematic essence of Marvel's stories through the years than Kurt Busiek. I dig the epic collections in general, and this one in particular.
Bulfinch's Mythology by Thomas Bulfinch
I'd been thumbing through this copy since September of 2023, when Mom was first put in the hospital for stroke treatment. I finished it while snowed in at Mom's in a rare snow and ice event in January.
February
Head On by John Scalzi
The work listen. A follow up to Scalzi's Lock In. I was discussing Scalzi with a buddy who'd picked up a couple of his books, and I said that I dig Scalzi's SF concepts, and his humor often hits that same circle on the Venn Diagram Dartboard that Douglas Adams Did....sometimes the darts miss, especially in the dialog, which tends toward geek humor a little too strongly for my tastes sometimes.
This one wandered that way a bit, but I still enjoyed the story, and the concept of avatar bots beating the hell out of each other for points was enjoyable.....
Dark Tower VI: the Song of Susannah by Stephen King
Part of the continuing project. This was one of the books I was concerned about when I began my chronological read-through way back in 2017. I don't dislike books 6 and 7 of the Tower, but I don't enjoy them, especially as much as I do the first 4 books. Part of it comes in the length of time between volumes. Each preceding volume has its own feel, as King's tendencies as a writer and concerns as a human being change over time. Books 6 and 7 felt in 2004 like extensions of book 5, in many ways.
I didn't hate it, but it's still not great. There are character moments I enjoy: Eddie taking the reins once he and Roland start tromping around 1977. And I thought the interplay between Mia and Susannah was interesting, but could have used time in the oven.
King's insertion of himself into the story felt out of place in 2004....it's not as bad in 2024, and I think the inclusion of his journal adds something to the story itself.
The Breach by Nick Cutter
The second of Cutter's I've read....and a sharp decline from The Troop. I didn't enjoy this one.
The Fellowship of the Ring by J.R.R. Tolkien
The work listen, read by Andy Serkis, which ended up being a real treat. While is performance was painted a bit by some of the performances in Jackson's movies (his Boromir and Gimli are lifted pretty much from Sean Bean's and John Rhys Davies' performances), he interpretations of the songs and lilts of some the accents brings much of the story to life. I have a weird relationship with Tolkien....I love the story, and the attention to history, but the digressions in the story itself can tire me out. Still, it's a hell of a good book.....
March
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey
A re-read, though it may as well have been the first time.
I read this for a 20th Century Lit class the same semester I had ridiculous reading lists across 5 or 6 classes. It was simply one of 22 or 23 books I'd read that semester.
Simply put, it's one of the best books I've read. And the section with the boat "rental" might be some of the best writing I've wandered across in years.
A Serpent's Tooth by Craig Johnson
Johnson continues to turn a good phrase. This one wanders a bit more into the weirdness of Abrosoka County than the last couple of books. For a book that takes place out on the Great Plains of Wyoming, it's got cousins down in the Gothic South. I didn't care much for the cliffhanger ending, but sometimes a soap opera has to rear its head....
The Senior Girls Bayonet Drill Team by Joe Lansdale
Was tremendously pleased that Subterranean put this out on e-reader, as their limited edition priced itself out of my hands rather quickly. Especially when short story collections can be such mixed bags, as a rule. This one was fun. I'm all about a Jedediah Mercer story, so the volume's opening tilt with the Wendigo was excellent. I also enjoyed "Gorillas in the Yard" and "the Hoodoo Man and the Midnight Train."
The Dark Tower by Stephen King
The story ends like it needs to. He just rushed the ending a bit.
I'll never forget how mad my Dad was in 2004 when Eddie Dean died. Dad saw a bit of himself in Eddie.
Catastrophe: Europe Goes to War, 1914 by Max Hastings
Good Read. Takes Barbara Tuchman's Guns of August and wanders further into the war itself. Looks a bit harder at its impact on the common man, in terms of both society and at those fighting the battles themselves in the trenches. I liked this one.
April
Kayfabe: a Love Story by Dave Reuter
My buddy Stephen Silver interviewed Reuter a while back about this released, and I picked it up for the Kindle. It wavers back and forth between approaching the stories presented in the wrestling ring as real, to commenting on the medium's absurdities in others. Maybe I'd have liked a bit more consistency on that front. Still, the book made me laugh, so I recommend.
The Angel of Indian Lake by Stephen Graham Jones
I don't champ at the bit often for new releases but I was really looking forward to this one. The third of a trilogy following My Heart is a Chainsaw, which I kinda liked, and Don't Fear the Reaper which I loved, I was really excited to grab this one. I guess I've been reading Jones's stuff for long enough now that I can stop thinking of him as a favorite new-to-me writer. His horror is imaginative with a current of melancholy that few can match. And his shit moves!
It's always gratifying, too, when something lives up to expectations and pays off. I mentioned in a twitter comment that Don't Fear the Reaper moved with lunatic speed almost from the outset. Angel of Indian Lake starts a little more tentatively, but kicks into a high gear that outstrips even that previous novel. The last 150 pages of the book are a fever dream of forest fires, chainsaws, secluded cabins, bear attacks, cave-ins, underwater towns, crossbows, pervert murders and boat collisions.
In the best possible way. Probably my favorite thing I've read this year, so far.
The Road to the Dark Tower: Exploring Stephen King's Magnum Opus by Bev Vincent
I thumbed through this after finishing the Tower. I don't understand my own fascination with the Tower. I guess I'm just glad that other people share the obsession enough to write something like this. Vincent's book is a good one. Good take on the metafictional aspects. Also enjoyed Vincent's impression on the Crimson King, whose depiction in the last volume of the Tower was one of the more confounding aspects of that rushed conclusion....
Infinite Tuesday: an Autobiographical Riff by Michael Nesmith
I won't lie. There's part of me that calls the scant few minutes of the book devoted to The Monkees pure balls. But then, The Monkees really were just 2 or 3 years of the man's life.
Interesting read, with a couple passages into religious thought that I've not read much into, prior to this (Nesmith and his mother were Christian Scientists).
I ended up being more interested in the musical efforts Nesmith made outside of the Monkees. I always thought he was a better singer or songwriter than critics gave him credit for. This volume ended up making me wander through the First National Band and other efforts, which ended up adding a few more songs to the catchall soundtrack.....
A Rule Against Murder by Louise Penny
I need to summer around a lake in Quebec.
Poor Things by Alasdair Gray
Picked this copy up for Shyam when we heard that Yorgos Lanthimos was adapting it for the big screen. Ordered it from England, since there weren't American printings yet. Amused myself with images of a shopkeep having to fight off cats in stacks of a Dickensian book shop to find this volume, when a google search showed that the book was coming from a warehouse not far from the Taskmaster house in Chiswick, near the Heathrow airport.
The film, I can report, is largely faithful to the book. I will say this, and Spoiler Warning: the book's ending (as a poor fool of a man myself) a little cold. It shouldn't, I suppose. But then I tend not to shun whimsy, if it's well enough spun....
Quakeland: On the Road to America's Next Devastating Earthquake by Kathryn Miles
Interesting look at how little we know, seismologically speaking. The great bulk of quakes come from faults unknown until the point they shift. Good look at the increase in seismic activity that comes from wastewater injection.
Also a strong look at how ill prepared we are in terms of infrastructure and response readiness.
Also a takeway: in December of 1990, my school was one of many that participated in Earthquake drills and sat under our desks on the assigned day that a forecast earthquake was to take place. Even at the age of 13, I felt like the prediction was bullshit, but this was always refuted with the "fact" that Iben Browning was correct on the other 3 he predicted.
No. He was not. He was a pseudoscientific crackpot.
The Colorado Kid Stephen King
For the first time in a while, in my continuing project, a new one. I'd tried this one at its publication, but it didn't speak to me.
It's not bad, but it's half a story.
May
The Imprending Crisis: America Before the Civil War, 1848-1861 by David M. Potter
Strong read. Threads the needle between the Polk administration and the Mexican War to the first shots fired at Fort Sumter. Details the political pressures, and various crises created and allayed in that time. I liked this one.
Supersize Island by J.J. Walsh
Quick read. Funny. Scratches a lot of the same itch that Christopher Moore and John Scalzi do.....
Dead Detective Mountain by John Swartzwelder
Not quite as effective as a lot of Swartzwelder's Frank Burly novels, but I still got a chuckle or two.....
Sharp Objects by Gillian Flynn
I'd never read any of Flynn's stuff, despite several recommendations. I liked this one. A little pulpier than I expected. Camille is a fine flawed character, who causes as many problems in her investigation as she solves. Props to the book for keeping one clue that I thought was a grotesque red herring, and was actually the key to the whole thing.....
McSweeney's 71: Horror Stories edited by Brian Evenson
Starts with a mission statement of introducing literary and horror fiction to each other....it's not a bad collection, but I was ultimately underwhelmed. Much of what's here is too....clean? Orderly? Too interested in setting atmosphere, as often as not, but shying away from the dreadful. Yeah, I get letting your imagination do the heavy lifting, but every now and then horror needs to punch you in the gob.
"The Noble Rot" was fun. I kinda liked "The Pond God." Gabino Iglesias's "Dont Go Into the Woods Alone" is probably the best of the bunch.
June
Business is About to Pick Up: 50 Years of Wrestling in 50 Unforgettable Calls by Jim Ross w/ Paul O'Brien
I could listen to Jim Ross talk about wrestling any day of the week. And I have.
Which might be part of the problem. I'd heard a few of these stories on Ross's podcast with Conrad Thompson.
Still, a fun read.
The Demon of Unrest by Erik Larson
I don't know which of Larson's books won me over to become appointment reading, but I can't think of anything of his I've read that I didn't enjoy. A good coincidental followup to Potter's book spanning the years between the Mexican War and the Civil War....Larson's work follows the various camps of the nation in the months between Lincoln's election and the shots at Fort Sumter.
Strong read.
Cinderwich by Cherie Priest
Fun read. Heavy on atmosphere. Was just happening to deliver around Nickajack Lake, the story's setting, as I listened.
Sho gun by James Clavell
Started reading at the conclusion of TNT's excellent adaptation, which concerns itself a lot less with the size of John Blackthorne's penis than Clavell's book does.
Faithful by Stephen King and Stewart O'Nan
Maybe the biggest surprise in my re-read of King's work, and in this year. I enjoyed the hell out of this one, despite having read it back in 2005. Funny how King's and O'Nan's complaints about that Red Sox team in May and June of that season would match my and my friend Ray's complaints about the Cubs this year (though as I write on July 7, I'll be the loudest to say the Cubs have next to NO CHANCE of turning it around in 2024.....and the way things look right now, 2025 might be a long one, too).
A lot of fun. And should be considered one of the books in canon of great books about Baseball.....
Batman by Craig Shaw Gardner (novelization of story by Sam Hamm)
Listened to this the same weekend, plus 35 years, that the Batman movie was released in 1989.
Notable for its narrator Roddy McDowell, being either unaware of the tone of Tim Burton's flick, or being completely uninterested in portraying it in his narration. His portrayal is almost that of a more straightlaced adaptation of the 60's television series.....
The Nineties: a Book by Chuck Klosterman
Nice sociological look at an American Era, where we as a culture were casting about for some meaning as the Cold War ended, and Generation X began to take the reins of popular culture. Interesting because the 90's were my teenage and college years, and I too was casting about for some meaning. Good read.....
Lapvona by Ottessa Moshfegh
After the passing of Cormac McCarthy, Moshfegh might be my favorite user of the English language. Her books are uncomfortable....vaguely sad....uproariously funny....grotesque.
This was is a bit of a departure, while being completely true to that form. A fairy tale constructed out of horror imagery. It is funny and depressing often in the same paragraph.
July
The Fisherman by John Langan
This one kept popping up in best of lists of recent horror. I dug it, but didn't love it like a lot of people seem to. It's a twisted take ona fish tail. I'm still, six months later, bugged by the flashback, and how it's related to us. By the time it's related to us, it's a fourth- or fifth-hand retelling of events. And while it's hinted that there's possibly (probably) some supernatural telepathy at hand, which would account for the omniscience of the narrator....it just took me out of the narrative.
(I'll apparently buy trying to catch the Leviathan that's older than time itself in a Crack between dimensions abovea town flooded to make a reservoir, but a story retaining its structure across five retellings? Bullshit, says I!!!!)
I give it a thumbs up, though. It was quite readable, and that final battle was especially well done.
The Blues Brothers: An Epic Friendship, the Rise of Improv and the Making of an American Film Classic by Daniel de Vice
This one popped up on my radar in the spring. Belushi is a fascination. If you write a book about him, I'll probably read it. It's the self-destruction of a prodigy. He was a natural genius at screen comedy. I'll fight you if you say different.
(No I won't).
I'd say the raio of Belushi discussion to Aykroyd discussion is roughly 3 to 1, if not 4-1. But that's fine. I think even Aykroyd would say his friend was the better subject for biography. The larger than life persona, where we print the legend as much as any truth, makes for better reading.
Pretty decent read....follows Aykroyd through Canada and Belushi through Illinois, and the circles they traveled in before Second City and Saturday Night. I will note that de Vise probably writes a clearer history of the Lampoon/Second City cross-pollination than the authors about those specific groups or the History of SNL ever have.
The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers by J.R.R. Tolkien
The route listen. Andy Serkis reading, which ended up being a treat, especially since Gollum's speeches feel longer in the books than in Jackson's films (I've not measured, even though I watched Two Towers earlier this week, in December, as I write this).
The description of Cirith Ungol and the unwitting trek to see Shelob are some of the best writing Tolkien ever did.
The Final Solution: a Story of Detection by Michael Chabon
I picked up a copy at the local library's Friends of the Library sale. Holmesian, without focusing so much on the mystery. Felt like a writing exercise Chabon gave himself. Which is fine. I like the sound of Chabon's voice....
Cell by Stephen King
Part of the continuing project. This one was kind of a throwback for King, to me, as I'm chronologically reading his work. This felt more like one of the original Bachman books than anything he's published under that name since being outed as Bachman. It's also got major Middle Aged Man Energy, regarding paranoia about cellular phone technology and those darn kids' fascination with it, as they all swarmed to it.
Actually, the first few pages are a nice snapshot of a time period, inasmuch as the mobile telephone was flowering into ubiquity. I think my first cell phone came as a Christmas gift the same year that I received this book....
Animal Farm by George Orwell
The nephew was reading this as part of his summer reading for his English class. I don't think that I'd read it since reading it for Ms. Delapps' English class in my ninth grade year. I wanted to read it to discuss. Yes, it's an allegory for communism's rush through Russia. But it's more about the demagogue.
More than anything, I wanted himm to note how Napoleon changed the rules when it suited him.....
Sugar on the Bones by Joe R. Lansdale
(Spoilers)
I probably look forward to new Hap & Leonard books more than any series going. That said, I didn't realize that this was the 13th in that series, which doesn't seem to have an end in sight, really, even though there have been signals in the last volume or two that Hap and Leonard might be getting a little too old for this shit. Those alarm bells are ringing a little more loudly in this volume, as Leonard is looking right down the barrel of wedded bliss.
And then there's the thing where Lansdale doesn't publish these on any particular schedule. Just when the fancy hits him. We could see another in a year, or in five years, or never again. As things happen, we'll see another in the summer of 2025, as Lansdale just posted in the last couple of weeks that there is another coming down the pipe....
That said, if we didn't get another, it wouldn't have surprised me. There was a real "one last ride" air that ran through this. With Leonard finding his Pooky, and Hap already married, it might just be time for the 50-year-old kids to grow up once and for all.
There was also a Justice League feel to this one, especially with a handful of Batman and Flash references, and the convergence of past favorite characters Jim Bob Luke and Vanilla Sky, and even Veil showing up for the Big Finale. (Veil was an interesting one...created with and serving as an avatar for the late Andrew Vachss, his appearance served to assauge a fear somewhat that Leonard or Brett may have been about to bite the big one....)
All told, maybe not as tight as the last couple of books in the series, which have been firing on all cylinders for the last couple books. It still has a hellacious amount of energy. Its conclusion feels very much like a tribute to Vachss.
I enjoyed it very much.
August
The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York by Robert A. Caro
This was meant to be a year-long project. I'd been reading along with the 99% Invisible podcast, but I was losing the flow of the narrative reading month to month. By the end of July, I just started the whole thing from the beginning and finished.
Exhaustive. EX-HAUS-TIVE. Amazingly researched. Caro hunted down everybody who ever talked to somebody within a couple degrees of separation from Moses. I can see why CaroHeads really dig that guy.
Learned a lot. Highly recommend. One of the better books I've read in my life.
What the Dickens by Gregory Maguire
Borrowed from a friend in 2023, right after Mom had her stroke, I picked it up again after holding onto it for far too long. I really liked Wicked, way back when, but didn't really care for much else of Maguire that I'd tried since then. This one had a more macabre, funny tone. If he does more like this, I might check more out.
Moon of the Crusted Snow by Waubgeshig Rice
Nice little post-apocalyptic tale from the First Nation (which feels mostly forgotten at the top of the world, anyway. Pretty well done. Good sense of community. I had fun with this one.
Hiroshima by John Hersey
Shyam recommended this one. Strong read. Follows the experiences of 6 survivors of the atomic bomb at Hiroshima, both in the immediate days following, and the ensuing years (in an update written after the initial publication, an update in 1989). Extremely strong read.
Horror Movie by Paul Tremblay
It wasn't without its charms, but Tremblay is leaning on his vague, unreliable narrators a little too much. And this one shifts timelines so often that you get the notions that he's speeding you past cracks in the foundation of the story.
I didn't hate it, but I caught the notion about where it was heading pretty early on.....
September
Dynamite Nashville:Unmasking the FBI, the KKK and the Bombers Beyond Their Control by Betsy T. Phillips
Online blogging pal Betsy Phillips has been doing this blog stuff as long as (if not longer than) I have been. This book was a project I've followed her on for a long time. Her hard work paid off. A look at a tumultuous time in Nashville (and American) history. A detective story after the fact, looking to solve the unsolved bombings of 3 sites in Nashville. I dug it.
Signs Preceding the End of the World by Yuri Herrera
I wish I read Spanish well. Was familiar enough with its nuance to recognize poetry when I saw it. Shit, I barely have that ability with English.
I liked it, but I felt like a lot got lost in translation. The magic. The pain.
Annihation by Jeff Vandermeer
Second time I read this. I read it the first time not long after Dad died. And I think I was missing the forest for the trees. This is one of the finer books I've run across that chronicle what it's like to wander through this stressful world of ours, while grieving.
I don't think we truly appreciate what grief is, as a society. How to work through it.
I know I was struggling with it hard in the summer of 2017.
Hell, I'm still struggling with it, I guess. The day we did our family Christmas, after Shyam and I got home, I had to excuse myself because I was missing him so hard I felt like I was going to cry.
The Grandest Stage: A History of the World Series by Tyler Kepner
Kepner is one of my favorite guys writing about the game. He does a great job breaking down the pieces of the machine that make up the intricate pieces of a baseball team, and then the even more convoluated processes that make up games, seasons and careers.
I was wishing more time got spend with the Series early on, though make no mistake, adequate time is psen tin the aughts, but I just like reading about those days best. I think, though, that if you spent several thousand words on every World Series, you've then got a book 1800 pages long.
Though, I like Kepner so much that if he wrote one that long, I'd read it.
October
Lisey's Story by Stephen King
Continuing project, but not a re-read. One of the handful prior to 2017 that I haven't read. I'd tried this one on it's publication, but only made it fifty or so pages in. These are the pages where Lisey has some shitty things to say and think about the South, which I guess in 2006 I wasn't in the mood to hear (especially given how little I cared for Colorado Kid and From a Buick 8). And I found the geographical liberties taken with Nashville irksome, though they're completely inconsequential. 2006 and 2007 Tommy sometimes was an idiot.
2024 Tommy rather enjoyed Lisey's story, once it finds traction and rolls past ground King covered in Misery, the Dark Half and Secret Window, Secret Garden. It's a pretty good revenge story with a good musing on grief.
Words are my Matter: Writings on Life and Books by Ursula K. Le Guin
My buddy John got me a copy of this, and I read it in bits and pieces over a couple of months. The book is a collection of writings from speaking engagements, introductions, reviews and other essays. Enlightening were her initial thoughts on how difficult (tedious, even) writing nonfiction was for her.
As a collection, there's some that miss for me, but most hit the nail on the head. And her piece "Living in a Work of Art" about her childhood home is just some of the best writing I ran across all month.
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
A re-read. Still one of my favorites.
What's Next: A Backstage Pass to The West Wing, Its Cast and Crew and its Enduring Legacy of Service by Melissa Fitzgerald and Mary McCormack
A little stronger than I'd anticipated. A good look at the mechanics of making the series. To be honest, there's still not much more I've enjoyed on TV when Aaron Sorkin (and what staff he had with him early on) was firing on all cylinders. It's not quite a fairy tale, but occasionally in my sourer moments I wander there. It's fun to think about...good people fighting for what they believe in while delivering monologs and dialog in quatrains of iambic tetrameter.
Between Two Fires by Christopher Buehlman
This one kept popping up in recommendations for years. Owing to my own propensity to get my hopes up, and to cut my nose off to spite my face, I kept from reading it for a while.
Well. It is called Big STUPID Tommy.
Helluva fun read. Amazing horror imagery, both fantastic and historic given its setting in France during the Plague Times. Follows and excommunicant knight turned brigand on a quest while Angels and Demons fight a Cold War turning Hot for all of Existance. This was a lot of fun. Recommend.
Any Other Name by Craig Johnson
I listend to most of this one on a long road trip to our North Carolina customers. If I'm remembering right, this was my first trip since Hurricane Helene wreaked havoc around Asheville. Our customers are in nearby Canton, and our normal route is across Interstate 40, which is a no-go, still today. So, this trip went up 74, and under normal traffic conditions, would take maybe 45 minutes longer than 40....but under leaf-peeping conditions coupled with transfer trucks having to navigate the Nantahala Gorge made for about a 5.5 hour drive back. In that time, I listened to the bulk of this one....
Full of Johnson's normal turns of phrase, and Henry Standing Bear's dry wit. I actually spend the bulk of the book annoyed with Longmire. I'm still convinced he makes a lot of wrong decisions here.
Blaze by Stephen King (writing as Richard Bachman)
Another once of King's that I hadn't gone through. It's not good, but it's not bad, either. I'm gonna say that King's writing of the slow and mentally handicapped is one of his best intentions and worst executions. As Bachman projects go, this one was more in line with the Bachman mentality than was The Regulators. Rivals the Long Walk for most melancholy and hopeless of the Bachman titles.
November
The Colour of Magic by Terry Pratchett
A re-read. Bedtime read. I had a mind to read through all the DiscWorld books after Pratchett passed, and made it through this one. Was looking for something that wouldn't bother me much one rather sleepless night, and did this one again. Humorous without punching down. Which I just don't have the stomach for, lately....
The Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler
Haven't read a Chandler Marlowe in maybe 20 years, and I'd never read this one. Tight. One of the best new to me things I've read this year.
Lost Gods by Brom
I've seen Brom books for years in the horror sections of bookstores, but never felt optimistic enough about one to actually pay to read it. Too flashy a package and a name that, frankly, felt like a nickname somebody gave themselves. I'll admit to curiosity over that time, but not an overwhelming one. I found this one cheap at a local used book store.
I've crossed a bridge since I read it. It left a sour taste in my mouth, initially. Felt too much like I was listening to the leader of a role playing game setting the stage for a campaign. I still kinda feel that way, but it makes some sense because Gerald Brom spent a lot of his career writing and designing games.
Now the main story is a flavor of the Orpheus in the Underworld story. It's not too original, and a bit of a bore, if I'm being honest.
I've spent my time since reading the book thinking about the backdrop...the mixed and intermeshed major and minor mythologies that make up the Underworld were frigging great. The mixed belief systems that are gearing up for a war of control of the Lands of Purgatory? That's the good stuff here. And I'd be lying if I said I wasn't thinking about it a lot since reading it.
Why We Love Baseball: a History in 50 moments by Joe Posnanski
Damn! I didn't know I needed to read this, right when I read it. But I needed to read it. I needed the positivity. I needed to be reminded about what is still great in the sport, and in the world.
November was rough.
This helped.
Can I say this? I so tired of Sports Bros. I hate the pompous arguments. I hate the culture that's given rise to the Talking Heads taking over ESPN in the past couple decades. They rob the games (not just baseball) of their poetry, their grace. We have an entire culture that misses the forest for the trees, I don't know if that culture wanders toward sports as a rule, or if sports is just an arm of that misapplication of priorities. I'll just say that I'm tired of living in a world where everybody needs to be the smartest guy in the room, but the constant arguments wear me the fuck out.
I'd read a bit of Posnanski here and there, but never a whole book. This book made me think he might feel similarly about Sports Bro culture. I could be wrong. Regardless, his book Why We Love Baseball is one of the best celebrations of the game that I've read.
Favorite bits: Including the Mound Meeting from Bull Durham and the home plate collision from A League of Their Own in the conversations about best moments (which made me feel a little more justified in Bob Uecker as Harry Doyle losing his mind in Major League when the Indians have won their playoff: "Oh My God, the Indians Win It!"). There are bits from the Dominican, from Japan. From College baseball. From the Minor Leagues. It's not just Major League Baseball, and I dig that.
Perhaps I like it even more that the Liberty Valance rule comes into play. Babe Ruth's called shot? The legendary meeting between Satchel Paige and Josh Gibson? Whether they did or didn't play out like the legend may not be as important as the story itself. It's part of the fabric of the game. And those skeptics aching to disprove? They need a little more magic in their lives....
Memorials by Richard Chizmar
I don't like blasting stuff. But this wasn't very good. I'm unsure why I soldiered through to finish. The payoff wasn't there.
December
A History of Appalachia by Richard P. Drake
If I go to your home, and I'm left to my own devices, I'm going to spend some time inspecting your bookshelves. If I'm feeling really forward, I might ask to borrow something. I borrowed this one from my buddy Eric. It was used as a text book in one of his classes up in Knoxville.
Interesting read. Leans hard into the economic issues within and outside the regions that have shaped the lives and to a large degree defined the regions. Enjoyed the historic overview on coal's role through the last century and a half in shaping the realties of Appalachia and the perceptions of the rest of the world of the area.
Enjoyed the look at the literature of the region, including the shout out for Wendell Berry, who's somebody I need to revisit.
Maybe deserved a strong look at the region's role in shaping modern music, but then, there are entire libraries of books on that.....
Nuclear War: A Scenario by Annie Jacobson
OK, Damn! Maybe I don't want a Nuclear War after all.
I made that joke earlier this year on Letterboxd after watching the 1984 flick Threads, which I'd missed for years until catching it on Tubi. It likewise deals with the subject of a nuclear exchange. My response was taken to task by two people. One for being a hysteric, the other for making light of the ongoing nuclear danger.
Lordy. Even after 30 years or so of being on it, the internet can still wear a brother out.
I'll say this. Fiction very rarely follows me to the point of bothering me. There are a handful. Nathan Ballingrud. Ligotti. Even a couple things King did. But for the most part, I shake fiction off pretty quickly. There are a couple of nonfiction works that really bothered me. Robert Conquest's The Great Terror and Masha Gessen's Man Without a Face gave me legit nightmares.
Now, Jacobsen's work is a scenario. A supposition. It's a fiction. But, it's a fiction based on interviews and readings as a national security correspondent, with of of those who held key positions in the scientific, military and political heirarchies over the last 60 years. You would be hard pressed to match the research and legwork put into this one.
The scenario: North Korea explodes two thermonuclear devices in the United States. The ensuing responses by the United States and other nuclear powers ultimately land the planet in a nuclear holocaust. In less than 3 hours from the initial satellite detection of an ICBM launch in North Korea.
A stretch? I don't really think so. Not by much, anyway.
The book is Terrific. And terrifying. Wonderfully written. This one will stick with me for a while.
A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens
Annual read. And a palate cleanser after reading about Nuclear War.
The Calculating Stars by Mary Robinette Kowal
Quick read. Fun alternate history, where the space race gets sped up owing to a meteor strike.
Batman: Resurrection by John Jackson Miller
Fun. Needed something light to listen to as I navigated the holidays. A better crafted mystery than I'd given it credit for initially. I didn't care for all the stretching of the connective tissue between Burton's two Batman flicks....this one is intended as something of a bridge between the two movies, and that feels very much like an editorial decision. Inclusion of Schreck, Selina Kyle and the sewer dwelling circus that would beget the Penguin in Batman returns feels very tacked on, and outside of one meeting involving Schreck, adds nothing to the plot.
Also underlines how physically draining and pragmatically impossible it would for one man, even an incredible rich man, to be Batman. The physical demands would be destructive.
Still, it was kinda fun. I like the throwback to late 80s and early 90s technology, in keeping with the movie's time period. And I liked imagining a 1990 or so Bruce Campbell in the role of Basil Karlo, the man who would be Clayface.....
Out of Sight by Elmore Leonard
This was fun.
I read 3 or 4 Leonard books right around the time this, Jackie Brown and Get Shorty were adapted for the screen. I enjoyed them, but for no reason in particular, I never wandered back. Watched Out of Sight and found the book for cheap at the local thrift store.
The flick is actually a pretty faithful adaptation of the book (with Albert Brooks getting more screen than the novel counterpart).
As somebody who writes a lot of words in his attempts at fiction to compensate for his lack of anything to say, I really appreciate how tight Leonard's prose is. Very slick....
Crypt of the Moon Spider by Nathan Ballingrud
Remember how I mentioned Ballingrud for his ability to create nightmares?
They are nightmares, I guess, but they're not the scary monster type. The worlds he depicts are so gray. A place where hopes are few and far between. If I ever thought of a writer or set of writings that depict what depression is, I think of Ballingrud's work in Wounds, which is very much a depiction itself of Hell.
This one takes a bit of the concept from last year's The Strange, which was superlative, and throws in a bit more cottony (silky?) darkness.
This was great.
That's it. 70 books. If my count's right, that's 50 fiction, 20 nonfiction. I didn't include all my graphic novels. Again. I think for 2025, I'll do a better job of that.
There were a couple that I started in 2024, and didn't finish. I got about halfway through Ruth Ben-Ghiat's Strongmen: Mussolini to the Present. I may finish it. It was temporally too close to the election for me to really appreciate it....
I got through about a third of Steve Olson's Eruption: the Untold Story of Mount St. Helens before never coming back to it.
The same with Paul Hirsch's A Long Time Ago in a Cutting Room Far, Far Away: my fifty years editing Hollywood Hits. It just wasn't grabbing me. This was a listen, and I found my mind wandering too much when I listened.
I'm also about 60% of the way through Norman Davies' huge history of Europe. It's episodically written, so I can pick it up and leave it. I've been reading pieces of it since the early summer.
So. That's the list......
