Wednesday, September 21, 2005

Brooks' Top 10

I love seeing repeats on these lists. Brooks (in brief: Hayden's high school roommate, a recent resident of San Francisco, all-around funny guy, blogger [www.brooksrun.blogspot.com], and boyfriend of the lovely and talented Autumn) has noted that he has two overlaps with Wib's list.

in no particular order:
Atomised, Michel Houellebecq
Tender Is The Night, F. Scott Fitzgerald
Market Forces, Richard Morgan (a recent read, which I adored, but it's also just been optioned by Joel Silver to be the next Matrix. But it was fantastic in the same way as Shogun.)
Shogun, James Clavell (I bought a samurai sword halfway through)
Carter Beats The Devil, Glen David Gold
Really The Blues, Bernard Wolfe, Mezz Mezzrow (autobiography)
Dr. Excitement's Elixir Of Longevity, William Ryan (criminally out of print)
The Moviegoer, Walker Percy (only book I read every couple years)
Franny and Zooey, Salinger
A Wrinkle In Time, Madeleine L'Engle

Eric's Top 10

Eric is Hayden's co-worker and friend in France. He has been extremely nice to me every time I've been in Paris. He's also a good reader, and (being French) has access to some books that may have not made into onto the american radar:

1. La nuit des Temps, Barjavel (FR, available in the US as The Ice People)
2. American Tabloid, James Ellroy (US)
3. Journey to the End of the Night (Voyage au bout de la nuit), Céline (FR)
4. Bel Ami, Maupassant (FR, various translations available under the same title)
5. The Little Prince, Antoine de Saint-Exupery (FR, widely available)
6. Lord of the Flies, William Golding (UK)
7. The Flowers of Evil, Baudelaire (FR)
8. History of Mountain Climbing, Roger Frison-Roche (FR, available in English)
9. We Could Almost Eat Outside : An Appreciation of Life's Small Pleasures,
Philippe Delerm (FR: amazon says that this was a major French best-seller. It was published here in 1999. The reviews are quite good--I'm surprised I haven't heard of it before.)
10. His Dark Materials, Philip Pullman (UK)

From AB: looking at this list makes me realize that I need to make more of an effort to read foreign writers. There's a wealth of material out there.

Lisa Bach's Top 12

Lisa is a good friend from Chronicle. She works in the sales department, but is a published editor as well--Her Fork in the Road is an excellent collection of writing by women about food and travel (and really, is there a better thing to write about?). She reports that making this list was pretty hard--it really depends on time and mood. Here's what she came up with:

The Color Purple, Alice Walker
Geek Love, Catherine Dunn
Comfort Me with Apples,Ruth Reichl
Anything written by MFK Fisher
Mrs. Dalloway and A Room of One's Own by Virginia Woolf
The Royal Road to Romance, Richard Halliburton [ab: I wrote about this in the early days of the blog--it's one of the grand novels on "the grand tour."]
Tipping the Velvet, Sarah Waters (Also fancied Fingersmith)
Me Talk Pretty One Day, David Sedaris
The Names of Things, Susan Brind Morrow
The Bluest Eye, Toni Morrison
Autobiography of a Face, Lucy Greely

Monday, September 19, 2005

Wib Walling's Book List

Wib is Hayden's dad, and has recommended numerous good books to me in the past. He also believes in asking people about their favorite books during job interviews--I agree with him that it's a really good way to learn about someone.

(in no particular order, not necessarily his top 10 but a list of books he really likes):

Too Late the Phalerope, Alan Paton
Franny and Zooey, J.D. Salinger
All the King's Men, Robert Penn Warren
Brothers Karamazov, Dostievsky
The Godfather, Mario Puzo
Shogun, James Clavell
A Town Like Alice, Nevil Shute
The Amateurs, Halberstrom, nonfiction
East of Eden, Steinbeck

Rebecca's Book List

Rebecca lived with me in college, and is currently studying to be a doctor in Philadelphia. Here's a list of her favorite humor books:

Me Talk Pretty One Day, David Sedaris
Fraud, David Rakoff
Welcome to My Planet, Where English is Sometimes Spoken, Shannon Olson
Choke, Chuck Palanchuk
Girls Guide To Hunting and Fishing, Melissa Bank
Come On Up and See Me Sometime, Erika Krouse
The Unthinkable Thoughts of Jacob Green, Joshua Braff (actually I haven't read this one yet, but it is the next one on my list to read) [from ab: I have read this one; it's quite funny.]
America, Jon Stewart

and here some other books i have thoroughly enjoyed:

Tender at the Bone, Ruth Reichl
Comfort Me With Apples, Ruth Reichl
House of Spirits, Isabel Allende
The Crying of Lot 49, Thomas Pynchon

Friday, September 16, 2005

My Top 10 Books

I expect this list to change from time to time, but here goes:

(in no particular order)
* The Stand (Stephen King). I love survival fiction--anything that details the end of the world (excepting alien invasion--I just don't find reading about aliens particularly diverting). How the world is destroyed isn't important; it's the regrouping of civilization that I find interesting. This is certainly at the top of the genre. Two other good ones to check out are Lucifer's Hammer and the comic book series Y The Last Man.
* Lonesome Dove (Larry McMurtry). Love, cowboys, the taming of the west--this has it all. The mini-series is pretty good too.
* My Year of Meats (Ruth Ozeki). I re-read this every year. Several people I've loaned this too have found it disturbing (it deals with the evils of modern meat production), but I love the characters and the story.
* Carter Beats the Devil (Glen David Gold). Arguably the best book ever written about Oakland (I realize that many would vote for Hunter S. Thompson's Hell's Angels instead, which is definitely a great work). It's a fictionalized tale of a real-life magician, the love of his life, a lion, and a dead President. Doesn't that sound intriguing? Buy the hardcover edition--it includes several color prints of original Carter posters. Gold is married to Alice Seybold of Lucky fame.
* A Town Like Alice (Nevil Shute). A death march through Southeast Asia, a love story, the creation of a town, and a lonely British lawyer as narrator: this book unites several disparate elements into one incredibly compelling novel. The writing is exceptional.
* Geek Love (Katherine Dunn). This is another book that just isn't for everyone. It's about circus freaks--a family of them, in fact. At times it's very upsetting. It's not unlike Middlesex, but Geek Love is far better.
* The Source (James Michener). I like Michener, unlike most of my friends. He's great to read on vacation, particularly if you can find one on the place you're visiting. I think the trick to enjoying Michener is to be a really fast reader with some time on your hands--if you can't skim through one of his books in under two weeks, you'll find it tedious. The Source deals with an archaeological dig in Israel, and manages to weave in a history of western religions by the end. It's fascinating--I've read it 4 or 5 times, and still enjoy every page.
* In Cold Blood (Truman Capote). I like everything Capote writes, even his short stories (as a general rule, I think most short stories fail--they're either long magazine articles or failed novels, not actual short stories). This murder mystery is a classic. I have yet to meet a person who doesn't like it.
* Pride and Prejudice (Jane Austen). If you haven't read this, give it a chance--Austen is really funny.
The Chosen (Chaim Potok). This book is in a class by itself. Read the books above because they're interesting and fun; read this one because it will make you a better person. Seriously. I cry every time I read it (3 times and counting). It's about friendship and Judaism.


And 4 honorable mentions:
David Sedaris--just about everything. I much prefer his books on tape to the printed versions--his voice adds a lot to the material. "You Can't Kill the Rooster" is my favorite story.
The Time Traveler's Wife (Audrey Niffengger)
White Boy Shuffle (Paul Beatty)
East of Eden (John Steinbeck)

Jason Headley's Top 10

This is a promising list--there are several books I haven't read yet. I'll have to make another trip to the library. I'm particularly interested to see that he has a Nevil Shute book on here. -ab

In no particular order:
Nobody’s Fool – Richard Russo
Round the Bend – Nevile Shute
The Sweet Hereafter – Russell Banks
Spartina – John Casey
The Stories of Breece D’J Pancake
The Seas – Samantha Hunt
A Good Scent from a Strange Mountain – Robert Olen Butler
The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay – Michael Chabon
The Little Prince – Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
To Kill a Mockingbird – Harper Lee

One more note from Alicia: I know Jason through Chronicle, and in a round-about-way through a family friend. He has written a very good book that I'd definitely recommend: Small Town Odds.

Thursday, September 15, 2005

Elese's Top 10

I had a bit of inspiration this afternoon--rather than subjecting all of you to my book opinions, I can draw on my friends. The idea is to post a bunch of top ten lists, in hopes that we'll get a better selection of books. I'll add personal comments from time to time. Elese is the first to contribute (and had trouble limiting the list to 10; I suspect that will become the norm). These are listed in no particular order:

The Sun Also Rises (Ernest Hemingway) [alicia's note: I prefer A Farewell to Arms, but you really can't go wrong with Hemingway. There's also a great biography out about one of his wives, who was a pioneering war reporter: Gellorn: A Twentieth-Century Life, By Caroline Moorehead).]
The Sheltering Sky (Paul Bowles) [AB: awesome]
Burmese Days (George Orwell)
Gone with the Wind (Margaret Mitchell)
This Earth of Mankind (Pramoedya Ananta Toer)
Drop City (T.C. Boyle)
Cat's Cradle (Kurt Vonnegut)
Tom Wolfe in general, but none of his books in particular [AB: The Right Stuff is a good one to start with]
Same goes with Bret Easton Ellis
The Art of Travel (Alain de Botton)
Lonesome Dove (Larry McMurtry)
Gig: Americans Talk About Their Jobs (John Bowe, ed.)

(The last two are books I love but they're also two of my favorites to recommend to people)

From AB: I've read 10 of these 12. You really can't go wrong with any. Elese has very good taste.

August 2005 Book Reviews

I've decided that the best way to do book reviews is on a monthly basis--I just can't see myself motivating to write after finishing each one. I'm also not sure that I'm up to adding comments for every title--in my journal, I use a rating system to differentiate titles, and just comment on the books I like. I think I'll stick to this system for now, though do let me know if it would be helpful to have more information.

Rating System:**
1 Barely Readable
2 Readable, with major flaws
3 Decent
4 Recommended
5 Excellent

**I'm not pretending to be the New York Times here. I used to rate books in terms of "quality," but have since come to terms with the fact that my taste often tends to be a little low-brow (my favorite book is Steven King's The Stand). My ratings are based entirely on whether or not a book was fun or interesting to read. Therefore, if you're in the market for a new book, stick with 3.5 and above ratings.

Another note: this list is long; I apologize for future short lists. I just have a little extra time on my hands these days.

1. The Many Lives and Secret Sorrows of Josephine B., by Sandra Gullard. Rating: 3.9
I blame Elese for getting me on this historical fiction kick. This series is a bit girly (though surprisingly chaste), and highly readable. The 3-volume set covers, with fairly well-researched details, the entire life of Napolean's first wife.
2. Tales of Passion, Tales of Woe, By Sandra Gullard. Rating: 3.9
Volume 2 of the series.
3. The Last Great Dance on Earth, By Sandra Gullard. Rating: 3.9
Volume 3.
4. Princess, By Jean Sasson, Rating: 3.7
Not very well-written, but a well-intentioned (if oddly structured) look at the life of upper class Saudi women in the 1980s.
5. The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency, By Alexander McCall Smith. Rating: 2.8
What's the deal with this series? It's predictable and often downright boring.
6. Away From You, By Melanie Finn, Rating: 3.2
Memoir; story of a woman that returns to her childhood home in Africa to deal with unresolved father issues. Good descriptions of Africa in the 1960s and today, otherwise skipable.
7. Or Give Me Death, Ann Rinaldi, Rating: 2.9
I realized half-way through this book that it must be written for teens. It's more historical fiction, this time about the wife of Patrick Henry. The author takes major liberties with the story.
8. The Twins of Tribeca, Rachel Pine, Rating: 3.1
Chic-lit, but of the better variety. Whiny (they all are), but has decent insights into what it's like to be a movie publicist.
9. Losing It, Alan Cumyn, Rating 3.0
I read this three weeks ago, and the plot has already skipped my mind. I guess it wasn't that good. All I wrote down was "dark, formulaic, readable."
10. Snowed In, Christina Bartolomeo, Rating: 3.8
This poor book is actually quite good, and cursed with a chic-lit cover. I grabbed it at the library thinking I'd get something really light and fluffy for the weekend, and instead got genuine literary fiction. The author isn't quite there yet, but I'll watch for her future books. The plot is somewhat complicated, but it boils down to finding out who you are.
11. Population: 485, Michael Perry, Rating: 3.0
Another library book, with yet another misleading cover. The jacket claims it's about finding entrance into a community by being a volunteer firefighter. It is about being a volunteer firefighter, but this guy never finds a community. You get the distinct feeling that he wrote this book so that people would think he has friends. It's weird.
12. A Town Like Alice, Nevil Shute, Rating: 4.7
I mentioned this in a previous post--please read it. Ignore everything else on this list. It's really, really good.
13. On the Beach, Nevil Shute, Rating: 4.2
Decent, but read A Town Like Alice instead.
14. The Smoke Jumper, Nicolas Evans, Rating: 4.1
I really liked this, probably because it was a book on tape. I've been painting the living room and dining room, and it passed the time well.