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30 Books in 30 Days: 8.29.11

This is one of the only books on the list that is more of a “classic” a.k.a. something we would find on a high school or college reading list. But, I chose to write about it because it is one of my favorite books. The reason I love it so much is not so much for its subject matter–important as that is. Instead, my love for this book arises out of my complete regard for Woolf’s style of writing. She covers an academic and political subject not through the use of a cold, factual academic prose, but rather through a blending of the personal and the political. It is this kind of writing that not only is a pleasure for me to read but is also a more true reflection of what I think writing should be: an emulation of our experience as we move between the personal to the public. It is something I strive to emulate in my own writing. Indeed, Woolf’s book was empowering to me as a writer because it showed me that I too could strive to accomplish this melding of the personal and the public, the historical and artistic, the confessional with the expository. I love the way Woolf’s prose seems to meander–in an almost casual, stream of consciousness style, when, really, she is completely measuredly making her point. She simply finds that stream of consciousness or diary-like style to be her best way of conveying that point. And of course, what better way for her to forge new ground in the way people thinking about women’s roles than by forging new ground in her writing style.

30 Books in 30 Days: 8.28.11

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Townie by Andre Dubus III

This summer, I’ve been reading this memoir and living inside of Dubus’ gritty, violence-infused scenes. This is a memoir that speaks directly from the New England town of Haverhill, where Dubus grew up with his brother and two sisters under the care of his mother. Right across the way, living on the college campus of the local junior college, Dubus’ father enjoyed fame as adored writing professor and increasingly renowned short story writer. While Dubus’ father did see his children once a week, he was far from involved in their lives.

Dubus provides rich descriptions of New England working class neighborhoods, bars, friendships, and codes of the street. Much of the book depicts Dubus’ building of a tough identity as a town fighter, A quiet and diminutive child, he became obsessed with proving himself physically. But, while building up his physical body he also developed a fighting mentality where he learned to see past the humanity of people to fight them. His discussion of how he learned to penetrate the membrane of humanity so that he could will himself to fight and be violent is interesting.

At times, I was overwhelmed with the numerous descriptions of fights in the book. But then, perhaps that is the point. Dubus was so immersed in fighting and violence that it was soul-deadening. The violence wears the reader down much as it must have Dubus.

But then, about three-quarters of the way through this book, Dubus describes his emergence as a writer and his discovery that he could write. This is where I find this book so valuable and moving. It is often rare to hear a writer describe his birth as a writer. From the ground up. Much like everything in Dubus’ life, he had to forge his writing skills and identity himself. He literally describes sitting down at a clear table, taking a pen to paper, and beginning to write. I love this image, myself. It makes me feel not so alone as a writer. And, it also somehow captures the magic of the writing experience. Spartan. Simple. Hardscrabble. Life-giving. Beautiful.

The amazing thing about this book is that Dubus resists the “tell-all” nature of a memoir which certainly talks a lot about the shortcomings of a famous writer, his father. Instead, Dubus’ tone is straight-froward and truthful. Yes, there is blame, but it’s not the type of blame where Dubus is exploiting his father’s neglectful parenting in order to gain readers’ sympathy or outrage. Rather, it is the truth-telling of a son who both reveres his father while also being all too aware of the ways he was absent. There is a note in the back of the book where Dubus quotes his father (I am paraphrasing here). Dubus says, “To my father who told me not to wait until my parents were dead to start writing about my family.” On the one hand, great writing advice from one writer to another. On the other hand, I can’t decide if Dubus’s father is gutsy or self-aggrandizing in this advice.

30 Books in 30 Days: 8.27.11

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The Hour I First Believed by Wally Lamb

This book is a tome. Something to read over a period of weeks or even months. And yet, Lamb writes in such a simultaneously accessible and beautiful style that it doesn’t feel like a chore. It is an elevating book. One that makes you feel like you’ve grown as a person after reading it.

The book begins with a timely setting: the shootings at Columbine. That plot line alone is enough to rivet the reader. But, Lamb merely starts here. In this way, the book is really a book for our times. Taking the loss of innocence of our young men as a major premise, Lamb then moves from the tragedies in Columbine to the east coast where a teacher flees after these tragedies, seeking shelter in his family’s Connecticut land after these Colorado happenings.

I do feel a kinship with Lamb since he is a Connecticut writer. Lamb’s main characters eek out a life in Connecticut despite their spiritual bankruptcy after the Columbine shootings. At this point, Lamb brings in history as backdrop to these characters’ lives. And then history even becomes something to interact with and comment upon these particular struggles of these modern-day characters who seem caught in a world where boys’ lives are squandered. Lamb’s scholarship as well as fiction techniques are high level. I recommend this book. It is one of the best books I have read in recent years.

30 Books in 30 Days: 8.27.11

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The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen

There’s nothing like a hurricane to get one hunkered down and blogging. Thanks, Hurricane Irene, for getting me in front of the computer. So, where are we? For today’s post, I thought I’d talk about a “hurricane” of a book in that it sparked such a controversy. You all know what I’m talking about: The Corrections, by Jonathan Franzen. You know, Franzen. He’s the one who, after Oprah put his novel on her booklist, had the audacity to tell her he didn’t want the recommendation. Which led to cries of elitism from many. Which led to his re-accepting Oprah’s support. Which led to another great drama for Oprah to show on her show. Which, of course, led to more publicity all around for The Corrections. The thing is, scandal and fanfare aside, The Corrections is a good book. I really enjoyed it. It took me awhile to get to reading it just because of all of the hoopla surround ing it. But, when I finally sat down and read it, I was completely absorbed. It covers an American family, both the parents and the adult children, as they navigate personal, family and national crises. And, Franzen creates such lively story lines and individual voices for each character that the reader can totally lose herself in the pages. Parts of the novel were especially well done, captured tragedy and humanity and humor all at once. For example, Franzen’s rendering of the character of the father of the family is spot on, portraying the father as he descends into a senility that is horrifying and ridiculous as once. One child works in the restaurant business in Philadelphia–and Franzen’s scenes of restaurant life play out realistically. One son works for a company in Lithuania, and Franzen’s portrayal of this son’s search for meaning through bizarre capitalistic schemes is very true to our modern life. Franzen captures the midwestern sense of place in his descriptions of the family homestead, while simultaneously capturing the midwestern sense of displacement when family members uproot themselves and become ensconced in an urban east coast lifestyle. By the end, Franzen has portrayed a family both maddening, heartbreaking and funny. If the sign of a good author is one who can make the reader feel with great intensity, then Franzen has accomplished this. All hulabaloos with Oprah aside.

30 Books in 30 Days: 8.24.11

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Perfection: A Memoir of Betrayal and Renewal by Julie Metz

This is a tale of a woman who did not know her husband as well as she thought she did. And, page by page, we learn of the rather elaborate other life he led all while married to her. I guess the reader reads partly to see how this woman could have missed it. We may read a little bit to feel like, “Wow, thank god this isn’t me!” We may read for the delicious scandal of it (even though this isn’t the tale of anyone famous.) At the end of the day, I guess, it’s just a book that gives a window into another person’s life.

I have to say, by the time I got to the end of this book, I was a bit exasperated. Metz states, (and I am paraphrasing) toward the end of the book, “I have come to see that I am just a pretty poor judge of character.” By the time I had read to the end of this harrowing story between this man and wife, Metz’s statement seemed like the largest of understatements! The reader can’t believe her husband is so deceiving. But the reader also can’t believe what Metz accepted as reality for a long time.

Metz is a good writer. Her depictions of life in the suburbs as well as the city are accurate and help to show how these two different settings can in fact contribute to romantic happiness or discord. This book may in fact get a lot of readers if only because of its promise to tear open the “perfection” of what looks so good and satisfying on the outside. I guess the trouble with reading books like this is that, though they are fascinating, they can, in fact, break your heart when they show just how cruel the world can be. I can’t say I felt very uplifted by the end of this book. I felt a little trashy for having been so voyeuristic in looking in at someone else’s pain. And, I felt sorry for Metz. The writing, in the end, is where I hope that Metz has found her solace. Though she writes about happier relationships after this failed marriage, I feel that her greatest comfort, hopefully, has been the introspection and insight gained through using her writing voice to tell her story.

30 Books in 30 Days: 8.18.11

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Coal Run by Tawni O’Dell

With a first name like Tawni, you know this author’s got to be interesting. O’Dell’s Coal Run and her third novel, Sister Mine, both appeal to me for their evocation of place: the rural and economically struggling areas around the Pennsylvania coal mines. The main character of Coal Run is an ex-star football player who, after suffering injury, has become a local sheriff who succumbs quite often to drinking when he isn’t on the job. His dreams of former glory are much like the town’s memories of its former glory when the coal mines brought prosperity to the region. There’s something about the combination of the beautiful descriptions of the mines, the rambling towns and bars and the people in them and the moving forward of lives even amidst the background of such industrial decay that draws the reader in. Entire family histories have been affected by the mines, with tales of men and the accidents they’ve survived and sometimes survived only at great cost. The coal mine is indeed a silent but awesome force that sits at the center of the plot of the book and at the center of these characters’ lives. The main character’s sister provides counterpoint to our main character’s self-destructive tendencies. And in the end, O’Dell, herself a native of these Pennsylvania coal towns, shows the hope that smolders on in the land even after the mines have been relegated to another time and place.

30 Books in 30 Days: 8.17.11

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The New York Regional Mormon Singles Halloween Dance by Elna Baker

The title got me. I picked it up off the shelf at the bookstore. When I was reading this book, I kept thinking that the stories were good but that they seemed kind of “thin” to me. I couldn’t put my finger on it. They seemed like they were funny but that they also kind of sped along. It was only after I looked up Elna Baker online that I realized that she is a stand up comic. Her stories in this memoir are like little stand-up vignettes! They go for the punch-line pretty quickly. And, as she reveals in her book, she did work for the David Letterman show. Part of me thinks that this might account for the fact that she got this published. But, on the other hand, more power to her!

Elna’s life is the perfect material for stand-up or memoir. She is a fish-out-of-water for much of her 20s as she tries to navigate being a Mormon in New York. What I liked about the book? Her accounts of being an overweight person and dealing with various diets and other procedures are not the focus of the book even though this is something she struggles with for a good deal of her life. This book could very well have tried to capitalize upon these weight-loss ups and downs in an attempt to sell copies on the heels of hits like “Biggest Loser” etc. But instead, this book really is about a woman’s attempt to find herself period. Dating, religion, weight-loss, career–all of these are components to her very funny memoir. And, if you get a chance, check her out on her website. Watching some of the videos of her doing actual stand-up, I got to see her comic delivery which was good in the book and even more hilarious in person.

30 Books in 30 Days: 8.10.11

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For my latest post, I thought I’d bend the rules a bit. Instead of a book, I’m going to discuss a recent magazine issue:

Spin Magazine: August 2011 issue–dedicated to the 20th Anniversary of Nirvana’s Nevermind

The other night, I found myself in Penn Station with 45 minutes to wait until my train. Surrounded by Saturday night’s best, I headed to Hudson News to check out the magazines. I bought the latest issue of Spin, an issue dedicated to the 20 year anniversary of the release of Nirvana’s Nevermind. Ok, so, seeing this issue and then buying it was surreal. Spin as a magazine has gotten decidedly thinner, as have most magazines and newspapers that are lucky enough to still be in print. I haven’t bought a music magazine in a while. Back in high school and college, Rolling Stone and Spin were the only magazines I would buy. What happened to those days? Now, I read The New Yorker and O! omg.

It was most bizarre seeing this cultural moment from my youth loudly proclaimed as an anniversary–the 20th, at that. And so, enveloped in a two-fold nostalgia, I absorbed this commemorative issue, cover to cover, as I sat in the Penn Station waiting area, surrounded by the drunk, the high-heeled, the leopard printed and the camped out.

It was nice. Good. Good to be so absorbed by reading about bands. Like rifling through a CD store, enjoying the references that lead to other references that lead to others–a web of musicians and albums and personal associations of the music lulling me into a comfortable stream of consciousness. I read quotes and accounts by other musicians as they weighed in on where they were when Nevermind came out. It’s that kind of cultural event, or at least Spin treats it this way in this issue. “Where were you when Nevermind was released?”

But what is up?!? Where did the 20 years go? You mean, my generation is no longer the focal point of youth and coolness? You mean, that was a long time ago? You mean, my friends and I matter, perhaps, a little less than we did back then? Just a smidgen less?

Sometime, long ago, I learned this. I’ve known this for many, many years.

But, suddenly having one of my cultural reference points referred to as something so far in the past has caught my inner 18-year-old unawares. I mean, not to belabor the point, but, I can see a 10 year anniversary. But 20th? That’s something for parents and grandparents. Not me. Not us.

OK, thanks for that. Back to the issue.

Some of the quotes in Spin I enjoyed the most were from the musicians or pop culture icons who said that Nevermind never hit them at the time (or now!) as some great musical moment. Not that Nirvana wasn’t big. But that Nevermind as an album was more poppy and slick and produced, and so, never really felt that revolutionary. These quotes were fun to read, because, in some ways, they are the more important and interesting. They show the complexity of this time period–more than the hyperbolic, grand endorsement that a 20th anniversary edition seems to ask for, almost require.The real question with something like Nirvana and Nevermind and Cobain and Love and all of the things that go along with their whole coterie of moments is not what did you think of that big album release, but, when did Nirvana come to matter to you? Most likely it’s not something that we felt at that moment when an album was released or when the news proclaimed Cobain’s death or when we saw Nirvana do something even more boundary-pushing onstage than the concert before. Most likely, the authenticity of Nirvana or grunge lies embedded in our memory, stitched together through a series of mundane moments, joined with those one or two times that the song hit you just at some crucial emotional instant of connection or just breaking through. Singing along in the car. Letting out anger about something going on in your life by putting on Nirvana. Hearing it in the background when out with friends. Seeing a music video in your dorm common room when you were wasting a Sunday after being out all Saturday night.

When I do see or hear the band now on the radio or on TV, I look and listen for the rawness of the time period they evoke. It’s not the rawness of their music that hits me. It’s the raw newness of my own life then. 20 years ago. Before I even knew about 20 year anniversaries.

30 Books in 30 Days: 8.7.11

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A Gate at the Stairs by Lorrie Moore

Those of us accustomed to Moore’s short stories and her whimsical, witty and word-playing ways were delighted to read her newest book, this one about the world post 9/11. As I said in my last post, this novel reminds me of Jennifer Egan’s Look at Me because of the way it too covers truly 21rst century issues and also because of the way the characters interact across an American landscape that includes both east coast cities and the midwest.

It is a difficult challenge: how to write about events of the present, when we are still so very close to the events of September 11, 2001 and the subsequent effects? Jonathan Safran Foer has done this in his book Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, which I have yet to read. Regardless, Moore tackles this post 9/11 topic, and I was drawn in. She sets her novel in Wisconsin, a setting familiar to Moore because of her teaching post at University of Wisconsin, Madison. Writers on this post 9/11 topic seem to delight in placing their tales in the midwest, if only to show that it is truly America that was affected by 9/11, not just New York. Indeed, it is this midwestern setting’s very out-of-the-way location that makes it a strong lure for characters trying to escape the imbroglio of the eastern cities.

OK, so, here’s what this book delivers: richly lyrical, vibrant imagery of setting. Honestly, some of the descriptions are so densely layered with physical description of color and flora and fauna and scenery I would linger over them, delighting in their almost taste-able richness. The main character has some appeal. And the parents of the main character along with her brother provide scenes of family bonding as well as disconnection that can be poignant. Moore also brings in the topic of adoption which provides an interesting side-focus for the main character’s own search for happiness. There are several times when Moore uses the technique of listing dialogue between groups of people as a sort of microphone for Americans’ various reactions to 9/11 and the various versions of xenophobia that resulted. This felt a bit transparent and forced. I was like, “OK, here is where Moore is acting more like an anthropologist/journalist than a novelist.” But, on the other hand, I appreciate that she gets this panorama of sentiments down on paper. She is, after all, making a record of the points of view in our current 21rst century world. It is when Moore brings all of the pieces of her novel together that she provides us with the “zinger” of the plot. Because it is such a zinger, I almost wanted her to go on longer, to truly draw out all of the ramifications of the story she had portrayed. She leaves the reader with an ending deeply poetic in imagery and description. I simply wanted a bit more in terms of her filling in of the “so what”.

30 Books in 30 Days: 8.4.11

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Look at Me by Jennifer Egan

This is one of my favorite books of all time. There are a couple of elements that make this so. First, Jennifer Egan writes about intellectual issues that I care about–issues that could be covered in a nice non-fiction essay–but puts them in the form of fiction. This is a really interesting way to make topics that I might expect to read about in a grad school class relevant and palatable to the fiction reader. For example, this book is rich in description of the fading historical landscape. Descriptions of crumbling old signs for factories and stores where real goods were made are contrasted with the increasingly non-tangible world of the internet and virtual communication. I have long held a fascination with fading industrial towns and have enjoyed photographing the ghostly and beautiful images left by manufacturers signs. Egan in fact shows that this is not just a phenomenon for photography but that these fading industrial worlds have real impact upon the ways we see ourselves and understand each other. The loss of the real and the invasion of the virtual is one of the major themes of her book. Other elements that make this a great book: detailed writing evoking a range of very different characters, all who come alive on the page. From a super model to a restless midwestern teenager to a brooding intellectual to a terror suspect, Egan shows the dangerous and intriguing ways in which these lives intersect. Truly a book of our times and of the future, I recommend this wholeheartedly. (NOTE: this book has some similarities to Lorrie Moore’s A Gate at the Stairs, a novel which I will cover in a future post.)