Loves books and cats

Reading classics is so hit or miss. Will I like them and understand what all the fuss is about, or will I be one of the one's scratching their head and thinking "So what?"   And yes, I did enjoy this novel, but I would need to read it again just to get all of the subtle references that I missed the first time around.  There are so many times that I was basically wondering what the hell was going on.  Then the next chapter (and of course, someone else’s perspective) would clear things up.  Maybe and then again maybe not.  Sometimes I still didn’t know what some character was referring to.  <!--?xml:namespace prefix = "o" ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" /-->

The different viewpoints really do help to figure out the story, although some are pretty much just distracting instead of helpful, like Vardaman’s.  Darl is supposed to be the son that is different and everybody thinks is crazy, but my vote is for Vardaman.  Anyone who thinks that their mother turned into a fish after she died isn’t quite right.  Possibly he’s just very young and the trauma of losing her makes his imagination run wild, but we are never told his age so I think he’s just not right in the head. 

The whole Bundren family is several cents short of a dollar when it comes down to it. Trying to take a dead body through a flooded area in a mule-drawn cart with all of the local bridges washed out is the first example of utter stupidity.  Pouring cement onto the recently broken leg of the oldest son because riding in the rickety cart is pretty unbearable, despite his protestations that it isn’t really any bother, is another.  Of course they didn’t have time to take him to a real doctor to get the leg set because they were in a hurry to get eight-days-dead mama buried.  All of this stupidity is irritating, but it is all really just the fault of the no-good, piece of shit husband, Anse, who will not even consider burying his wife at home.  He promised her he would bury her in her hometown with her family and he will stick to that promise no matter what.  He insists the entire time that the promise is the reason he has to take her back to her family’s hometown, but it’s really because of what he will get when he gets there.  He puts his entire family through all of that shit because he is such a lazy, selfish bastard.  You just have to read it to see what I mean.  Even with all of the stupid things done by this family, you just can’t help but feel really bad for them.  They are about as pitiful a group of people as you’ll ever read about.

This is the second consecutive book I’ve read in the stream of consciousness genre.  As I Lay Dying was much easier to get through than To the Lighthouse.  Lighthouse has all the philosophical musings that take time to parse whereas this novel is much more of each person relating what he/she did or said and far less of each character's thoughts.  Except for Vardaman's thoughts which are just crazy.  And then there is Addie’s chapter which is full of her personal philosophy about words and that's fun to read because she is the dead mother.  Even though I enjoyed this novel,  I won't be coming back to this genre for a while because it is never really that easy.

I enjoyed this collection of short stories, but it reminds me so much of The Red Garden by Alice Hoffman that I just read a couple of weeks ago.  Both contain stories that all take place in the same town over a period of years (except one in this collection) with most characters only showing up in one story although they may be mentioned or play a tiny role in an additional story. News from Heaven does not span several centuries as The Red Garden does; it only takes place over about 90 years or so in a small coal mining town in Pennsylvania.

I listened to the audiobook version which was narrated by several people.  It is amazing to me how the narrator can have a tremendous impact on the enjoyment of a book.  Although I enjoyed all of the stories, there were a couple in which I just did not care for the voice of the narrator.  One story, the only one set not in Bakerton, but in Las Vegas was narrated by a man who sounded like he was lowering his voice the way someone does when they are trying to sound tough.  I don’t think that’s what he was actually doing since the character wasn’t trying to be tough, it’s just the way this man sounds.  It just irritated me though and I almost skipped that story because of the irritation.  The only reason I didn’t was because the story was set in Las Vegas where I lived for several years.  It was about the old Vegas in the 60s that I never got to experience.  So I finally forgot to hate his voice and enjoyed the story.  Same thing with the narrator on the last story.  At first I wasn’t sure if the narrator was a woman (which she was).  It sounded very much, to me, like the voice of the Munchkin mayor in the Wizard of Oz.  Very bizarre.

 Other than these issues with the narrator’s voices, these stories were nice with nothing especially to recommend or dislike about them.  They are nice way to spend a few hours, but I don’t think any of the stories will stick in my head for very long.  I was unaware that Bakerton is the setting of a novel by Jennifer Haigh and that some of the characters in the novel are in these short stories as well.  I may have to check out Baker Towers since I would generally prefer the more fleshed out characters in a novel better.

I had never heard of this book until I started researching books that are considered the best novels of the 20^th century.  I think I know why I’ve never heard of it.  It is not great.  Not good even.  It started out okay, but it turned into a bunch of rambles that don’t even make much sense.  Yes, I know it is about a young girl who grows up to be given in marriage to a man, and then she ultimately descends into madness.  But the book seems to descend into madness as well.  Starting in Book 2, I couldn’t tell sometimes whether it was her speaking or her husband or her thoughts we were reading or his.  I just don’t have anything positive to say about this novel except that it is mercifully short.

It is hard to understand why this novel is so engaging, but it is engaging nonetheless.  Not much happens really.  Ptolemy Grey, a 91 year old man suffering from dementia, lives in a squalid apartment, alone and cared for once a week or so by a great nephew, Reggie. He is so confused about people that he can hardly figure out who Hilly is.  Hilly is another great nephew who comes to help Ptolemy out because Reggie has been killed in a drive-by shooting, but Hilly doesn’t tell Ptolemy this.  He simply takes Ptolemy to Hilly’s house where the wake is being held and lets Ptolemy find out that way.  At Hilly’s house is a 17 year old young woman, Robyn, a friend of the family who is now living with Hilly and his mom. Robyn finally takes Ptolemy home and discovers his apartment should be on an episode of “Hoarders”.  She takes a few weeks to clean things up and gets very close to Ptolemy in the process.  She is one of the only people who seems to value him as a person and doesn’t just care for him because he is family. 

Ptolemy is finally taken to a doctor who offers him a chance to get his mind cleared of the dementia, but only for a short time and Ptolemy will pay a big price.  Ptolemy jumps at the chance because he has known in the back of his mind for a while that he has something very important that he needs to remember in order to help his family.  It works and Ptolemy’s mind is now better than it ever was before.  He can remember essentially everything that has ever happened to him.  He and Robyn get even closer; she has moved in with him and takes care of him even though he doesn’t even need it so much now.  Truthfully the relationship between these two is kind of creepy because they develop a kind of love for each other like lovers.  He considers her his new adopted daughter, but he also tells her that if he was 50 years younger and she was 20 years older that he would marry her.  And she tells him she would have his children and they would move to Georgia and grow peaches.  So Ptolemy is able to help his family by remembering the thing he needed to remember.  That’s just about all that happens – not really any action, just a lot of an old man, his memories and a budding relationship with a young woman.

Walter Mosley has a wonderful way of spinning out stories, and I have enjoyed the two books of his that I have read; however I have gotten tired of how evil white people are primarily depicted in his books.  I know Walter Mosley’s history and I understand the race relations present in his own life have not always been the best, but I don’t want to read books that portray only one race negatively.  Ptolemy doesn’t seem to regard Reggie’s murder as a race issue even though it was a black man who killed him.  He simply sees it as a love triangle kind of thing.  I know I’m not the first to criticize this issue and I won’t be the last.  It doesn’t make Walter Mosley any less of a great writer, it is just a personal peeve of mine. I’ve never read an Easy Rawlins book, and I’ll probably try that next and see if they what they are like in this regard.    

Pretty good. Absolutely harrowing adventure Jan Baalsrud had to endure, and it is almost inconceivable how he managed to survive so much time alone in the Arctic weather when he was so sick. The story gets a little tedious toward the end, but still well worth reading. 

Kind of astounding to read how isolated the people in the northern regions of Norway were.  They really knew hardly anything about the war and how it was going because they weren't allowed to have radios and the newspapers were allowed to say only what the Nazis allowed.  I didn't know prior to reading this that Norway was occupied by the Germans.  This just isn't a country that you ever really hear about in relation to WWII. 

I was impressed by the risks that the Norwegians were willing to take to try to save Jan's life since it didn't seem as though he would live.  So many men in these tiny villages put their families welfare and their own lives at risk just to save this one man whom they knew nothing about and might never see again. Makes you wonder if anyone would do something similar if people were faced with the same situation today.  I kind of doubt it, but I hope I'm wrong.

Apparently I am in the minority in the opinion that this is mostly pretentious bullshit.  Of course Salman Rushdie writes well.  Anyone can see that he has an amazing ability with words and descriptions that describe situations and places to a T.  But, but, but it so unbelievably boring to read this prodigious flow of words for almost 650 pages.

I guess I am just a troglodyte when it comes to "great" literature.  This is not the first Booker winner I have read this year that I pretty much hated.  At least the The Remains of the Day was short enough that I didn't get angry about the time I spent on reading.  One reviewer on Goodreads said that Midnight's Children is like Rushdie is telling us a dream that goes on long past the time that the listener can even feign interest.  I definitely agree since MC wanders around and abruptly changes scenes like dreams typically do.  

I can't say that the entire book bored me.  Book I almost made me give up, but it got better with Book II and Book III was better still.  However, I was so irritated at the kind of lack of resolution to the end.  I have never read any Rushdie novel before and if this is indicative of his writing, I never will again.  Maybe if I had any real knowledge of Indian/Pakistani history (or any interest for that matter) this novel would have been a much different experience for me.  Almost certainly so since I understand very few of the historical references.  Oh well, I'll just have to make better picks for my reading in my personal troglodyte cave in the future.

Apparently I am in the minority in the opinion that this is mostly pretentious bullshit.  Of course Salman Rushdie writes well.  Anyone can see that he has an amazing ability with words and descriptions that describe situations and places to a T.  But, but, but it so unbelievably boring to read this prodigious flow of words for almost 650 pages.

I guess I am just a troglodyte when it comes to "great" literature.  This is not the first Booker winner I have read this year that I pretty much hated.  At least the The Remains of the Day was short enough that I didn't get any about the time I spent on reading.  One reviewer on Goodreads said that Midnight's Children is like Rushdie is telling us a dream that goes on long past the time that the listener can even feign interest.  I definitely agree since MC wanders around and abruptly changes scenes like dreams typically do.  

I can't say that the entire book bored me.  Book I almost made me give up, but it got better with Book II and Book III was better still.  However, I was so irritated at the kind of lack of resolution to the end.  I have never read any Rushdie novel before and if this is indicative of his writing, I never will again.  Maybe if I had any real knowledge of Indian/Pakistani history (or any interest for that matter) this novel would have been a much different experience for me.  Almost certainly so since I understand very few of the historical references.  Oh well, I'll just have to make better picks for my reading in my personal troglodyte cave in the future.

Apparently I am in the minority in the opinion that this is mostly pretentious bullshit.  Of course Salman Rushdie writes well.  Anyone can see that he has an amazing ability with words and descriptions that describe situations and places to a T.  But, but, but it so unbelievably boring to read this prodigious flow of words for almost 650 pages.

I guess I am just a troglodyte when it comes to "great" literature.  This is not the first Booker winner I have read this year that I pretty much hated.  At least the The Remains of the Day was short enough that I didn't get any about the time I spent on reading.  One reviewer on Goodreads said that Midnight's Children is like Rushdie is telling us a dream that goes on long past the time that the listener can even feign interest.  I definitely agree since MC wanders around and abruptly changes scenes like dreams typically do. 

I can't say that the entire book bored me.  Book I almost made me give up, but it got better with Book II and Book III was better still.  However, I was so irritated at the kind of lack of resolution to the end.  I have never read any Rushdie novel before and if this is indicative of his writing, I never will again.  Maybe if I had any real knowledge of Indian/Pakistani history (or any interest for that matter) this novel would have been a much different experience for me.  Almost certainly so since I understand very few of the historical references.  Oh well, I'll just have to make better picks for my reading in my personal troglodyte cave in the future.

I think I might like this okay to read but the audio version just can't keep my attention.
Finally finished with the hardback. Good book that has too many characters too easily keep straight.  Still it has lots of action and was enjoyable.

I read The Great Gatsby many years ago, probably in my late teens or early twenties.  And I have to say that I remembered virtually nothing about this book.  Jay Gatsby - rich young socialite, obsessed with some woman, not sure of her name.  Narrated by some male character.  This is all I could remember.  So I was right about those things, but it was definitely time to reread this classic and I'm glad I did.

Of course, like most everyone else, I disliked most of the characters. They are rich, young, self-absorbed people.  All they want to do is party.  Yes, Nick works in the city as a bond broker, but he doesn't really have to.  He just wanted to make his own way in the world rather than depending on his family's money.  He is probably the least objectionable character in the book but that isn't all that hard since everyone else is easy to dislike.  Even Tom's girlfriend, who is not at all rich, doesn't really care about anything except having a good time regardless of who she hurts.

Tom and Daisy truly deserve each other.  He cheats on her and acts as if it doesn't mean anything.  She doesn't really want to leave him, she just wants him to stop his little flings.  That's why she takes back up with Gatsby, to get back at Tom.  It's pretty much a game to both of them.  And Jay Gatsby is the one to pay the price.

And of course Gatsby is just a big fraud.  He is rich from illegal activities and throws parties for huge groups of people he doesn't even know.  All to see if Daisy will ever show up and he can get her back.  Then when she does show up, the reality of Daisy doesn't match the five-year fantasy of Daisy.  It probably wouldn't have lasted if they had gotten together because he had built her up in his imagination to something she couldn't be.  However, even though he is a fraud, he truly loves Daisy and wants to be with her and protect her.  He pays the ultimate price in protecting her since he won't let anyone know that she was driving the car when Myrtle was killed.

We aren't meant to like all the characters, we are only meant to see how flawed they all are.  Fitzgerald does an amazing job of depicting the phoniness and greed of the era.  And how the lives of the newly rich were terribly different from those with the established wealth.  Jay Gatsby was rich but really had no class.  He wore tacky clothes and had ostentatious furnishings while Daisy and Tom wore understated clothing and had a tastefully furnished house.  No one was really friends with Gatsby, they just used him to have a good time.  Tom and Daisy would never have let themselves be used in quite that way.

There are so many things to say about this novel that have been said quite well by others.  Whether you end up loving it or hating it, it is well worth reading.

This novel is nothing like I thought it would be based on the cover of the book and the book’s description on Amazon. When I see “based on a true story” when going to a movie, I know that the story may have only the tiniest aspect based in reality and the rest is not only embellished but possibly completely made up. I don’t typically expect that in a book. So the alternating chapters that take place in the afterlife were completely unexpected. It is heartbreaking to read about Trek’s diagnosis and to know that that part of the book is not fiction.

This is only the second book I've read about hiking the PCT. I enjoyed much of this book although I got tired of his depictions of women as many others have already noted. However he wrote a travel narrative, not a treatise on men's attitudes toward women. I also got confused occasionally with all the people on the trail and how he would mention someone many chapters after they were first introduced. Just couldn't remember much about them. But I definitely felt the struggles he had with the cold and the weight loss. Pretty sure I would never attempt a thru hike of this trail although I would love to try the AT.

I enjoyed this less than The Snowman, but I think Jo Nesbo is a good author.  Like many others I am not reading these books in order.  This is only the 2nd I've read, and I'm sure I'll try more, but I want the story lines to be a little less convoluted.  I don't want some easy mystery that I've figured out in 100 pages, but neither do I want something that goes all over the place.  If you read my review of The Snowman, you'll see that I got tired of the numerous red herrings.  This novel doesn't have that problem, it simply wanders around, never quite letting us get near the killer or Jon, the intended victim for a long, long time.  I guess I just enjoy a tighter plot.  Maybe it's just me but I feel like Nesbo wants to create lots of tension which he does, but it just takes too long.  I found myself rooting for the killer.  Like, come on, just kill Jon already and let's get on with it.

I'll try The Redbreast or the Devil's Star next since I've read many positive reviews of those.