Krapenina

Hey All,

I have a gripe with Leo Tolstoy.

What the hell do I care about the farming problems faced by 19th century Russian landowners?  Tolstoy goes on for pages and pages about this in Anna Karenina.  I'll grant that, to a point, it develops some of the character of Levin, in brief flashes giving us his insight and thoughts about farming.  But really, all his pinko babble is a universe away from my life today.  I really could not care less about the subject.  My point is, when I read a book, I want, or expect, to be able to relate to it in some way.  I get the love aspect in Anna Karenina fine enough.  But this farming?  Come on!  Sure, there is much value in being able to see the world from another's perspective, but Tolstoy, for me, takes it too far.

Perhaps I say what I'm about to because the view I take of history is a product of a movement in the latter half (more like the last four decades) of the twentieth century called Social History. Social historians, in some ways, seek to uncover the history of the more common, majority of people.  Many historians before this era in academic history (pretty much all history written or created before the 1960s, in fact) was about the big people, the leaders in history. A good example of this kind of history that might resonate with people today, though not exactly academically rigorous in it's historical detail, is a film that got a lot of Oscar hype, attention, and awards this year: The King's Speech.  It is also, to my great delight to point out, a piece of public history (that is, geared towards a mass, popular audience, as opposed to merely the academic community).  It's about England's King George VI, and his attempts to overcome his speech impediment.  It's quite a good film (though not my favourite film of the past year), and, if you get my drift, it's about the elite, the king, in fact, not the common people.  I'm not deriding this type of history, because it certainly has it's place.  But if I'm looking for History, not history, I want to know about more than just the big names of the era (I'll make a little aside here, and say that I realize that Tolstoy wrote a piece of fiction, regarded by some as the very first of it's kind, and not history, so in that regard, I'm being a little harsh on him.  But, given that I'm reading it about 140 years after it was written, it's hard not to look at it, to some degree, also as a work of history).

So, even if we take Anna Karenina simply for the historical framework it presents, and the picture it paints of the period in Russian history that it depicts, I dislike and disparage it.  The book barely gives light to the common man, but focuses instead on the few, very wealthy, aristocrats living in that time.  It certainly gives lip service to the peasantry, but I think that is mostly because of Tolstoy's own misgivings about having been born so privileged when he saw that so many around him suffered so much (Levin, the character in the novel who is most sympathetic to the peasants, who has inner conflict over whether he wants to live, is widely held to be the closest Tolstoy ever came to making one of his characters autobiographical).

Thankfully, I'm past the section on the farming, now, and we're back on track with the love and drama and gossip and blahblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblah.

To be honest, I'm tired of reading this book, and I'm tired of doing this writing.

Don't get me wrong!  I like both, but I feel like I've shackled myself to this project, and I'm passing up the opportunity to read other books that I really want to read.  I will not, however, give up.  I am committed, and that is part of the reason why I started this blog: to stick to something over the long haul, and see it through to it's end.  It's not something I'm very good at doing, and I need to improve that part of me.  So here I am, in all my glory.

Don't judge.

-Bryan

Oh Leo-oh

Hey All,

I really like Anna Karenina.  I know, right?  After all of my quibbling and complaints about it before I had even started reading it, I turn around and say I like it?  What gives?  Well, Leo Tolstoy gives.  History gives.  The weight of time gives.  Quite simply, a book doesn't last this long as a classic without due merit.  I kinda knew this all along, but was daunted by the weight of the book.  But Curtis, my dear friend Curtis Maloley, that cunning, handsome devil with the rapist's wit (points if you get the reference), knew what he was doing when he recommended this book.

It was written in the 1870s, and concerns the upper classes in Russian society.  Clearly, I have absolutely no connection with the lifestyle and mindset of Tolstoy's characters, but that really does not seem to matter.  Love is a large theme throughout the book, and, perhaps because of the age in which it was written, romance, and romantic notions of love, appear on many pages.  Silly things about romantic love, like men falling in love at the sight of a woman who passes them in a carriage.  As if that really happens.  I now blame Tolstoy for the existence of Cosmo and other such inane things (Rom-coms, diet pills, and nuclear war, to name a few).

It's a great book to be reading in the middle of winter, too.  Russia is cold.  Canada is colder (Of course; we're better at everything).  I don't want to put it down, and I don't have anything else worthwhile to write about it at the moment, so I'll end this post here, and get back to reading.

-Bryan

Lime(y)s for Everyone

Hey All,

The Englishman's Boy is, in my opinion, a good book.  Not great, but good.  For a while there, while reading it, I thought it was great.  And parts of it - most of it, actually - is great.  I told Chaz (Sullivan, who recommended it to me) that I loved it, when I was about half way through.  That wasn't a lie, Chaz, I was loving it.  But then it ended.  And the end just isn't for me.

The book is about two things, really: the struggle for one character, Harry Vincent to make his way in Hollywood during the 1920s.   The real story, however, revolves around Shorty McAdoo, and his involvement in the Cypress Hills Massacre (I won't testify to the veracity of that link, but offer it merely as a synopsis of what some people offer up as the history of that event).  Guy Vanderhaeghe is a glorious storyteller, and he weaves those two stories together in amazing fashion.  As one of my friends put it earlier this week, it's as if you aren't even reading, the words, paragraphs, and sections of the book flow together so seamlessly.  I did not ever want to put the book down and, magically, it is one of those books that has great depth of meaning, and great length to it; it never seemed to end.

Ah, the end.  My problem with the book lies in it's beginning, really, but I didn't know it until the end.  I don't want to spoil anything for anyone who might end up reading the book.  For those who have, I'll say this: while the beginning and end are tied, and while they anchor the entire story, I feel that they are too disparate from the rest of the novel to really work.  Throughout the entire time I was reading the book, I expected to the plot to eventually come back to those two Assiniboine, to relate that beginning part of the story to the overall narrative.  Vanderhaege does, but not until the very end, and not very well.  I hate myself for saying this, but if he had woven the beginning of the book back into Shorty McAdoo's tale, I would be much happier.  Instead, I feel as though I am being told a fable, one that I really don't get, and one that has nothing at all to do with the other nearly 300 pages I read.


If you've read this blog all along, you might know that I cherish an ending.  I was sad that this novel ended the way it did.  I really did enjoy it otherwise.  The characters are rich, the plot compelling.  Vanderhaege's writing is exactly the style that I tend to enjoy right now (great recommendation, Chaz).  Which brings me to one of my next two novels, The Cave, by Jose Saramago.


One of my favourite books ever is Blindness, by Saramago.  My friend, Ines Ortiz, recommended The Cave to me, knowing this.  I've started it, but already I am bothered by his writing style.  He does not use quotations when his characters speak, and paragraphs can go on for pages at a time.  This technique really worked in Blindness, as I think it helped put the reader in the mindset of the characters.  In The Cave, however, I just find it irritating.  I'll push through it, though, Ines.

I'm doing something new for this project again: reading two books at a time.  I said that I was going to start Anna Karenina after The Englishman's Boy, and I have.  I just don't want to carry it on the subway with me.  So my plan right now is to read The Cave throughout the day, and Anna Karenina in the evenings.  Obviously, this latter book will likely take me some time to read, and will carry over into other books besides The Cave.  Which is fine with me.  Curtis Maloley is a jerk for recommending it, anyway.  I know he had malicious intentions when he did.  But I'm also thankful for the recommendation, as it's a book that I really ought to read and, had I not put myself in this situation (and he not recommended it), there is no chance I would ever have read it on my own.

That's it for now.  Happy New Year.  Nine more months of this to go!

-Bryan

Chicago, Chicago

Hey All,

Whoa.  It's been too long.  No excuses.  I just haven't been into blogging.  I'm still reading, but couldn't get myself into writing.  In the interest of full disclosure, I have finished The Devil in the White City, and am now nearly finished The Englishman's Boy.  I'll write this post about the book I've already read, then move on to the one I'm reading in my next post.

I don't know if it's the book (The Devil in the White City), or the stupid Canadian weather.  I was pretty engrossed in the book while reading it, but I was grossed out by the weather (in early December).  This is the first book that I haven't blogged about while reading it.  I won't go into the reasons, but it's not because I don't like it.

There's certainly no shortage of things to write about with The Devil in the White City.  It's the most well-written piece of history I have ever read, and that's a lot of history.  As I mentioned in my last post, I majored in History while at university.  In my last undergraduate year, I wrote a thesis on a particular author's body of work, analyzing it from a critical historical viewpoint.  That author is Thomas Raddall, a Nova Scotian who wrote stories about that province in the first half of the twentieth century.  His books were not works of history in the academic sense, as his audience was more populist.  He didn't footnote, or cite references in his books, but he was very popular, and his body of work influenced the modern view of Nova Scotia and it's history, for better or worse.  Erik Larson, the author of The Devil in the White City, while not as popular as Raddall was in his time, is a much better historian.  In this case, I judge it from the academic viewpoint, and not necessarily from the sellable viewpoint.  What I mean by "sellable" is a work's value to the reading, and therefore buying, public.  I guess I could call it a work's marketability.  

My Masters degree is in Public History, which is exactly what Erik Larson has created in this book.  It is also what Thomas Raddall wrote when he wrote most of his works, but, I would argue, with a different scale and value to them.  Any book (or movie, or television show, for that matter) that purports to depict a part of history, with at least an attempt to be accurate to history, is a work of public history ("Public history" is a difficult term, in and of itself.  While in graduate school, we debated it, and many historians still can't come to a consensus).

What I like about The Devil in the White City is that Larson is both very accurate (I have no reason to doubt the veracity of his historical claims) and a really good writer.  I was drawn into the multiple plots that took place over the course of the book (one, about the Chicago World's Fair of 1893, another about a serial killer, and still another about a man in Chicago at the same time who was delusional).  Knowing how difficult it is to weave a story out of the bits and pieces of history, I marvel, too, at Larson's research and ability to spin those bits and pieces into such a cohesive tale.

That's not to say the book is faultless.  As a writer, he used the same writing tricks over and over (too complicated to explain.  Errrr, maybe I'm just too lazy.  Either way, you don't get an example this time), and, rather than flowing paragraphs, he broke up sections where he wants to change topics with paragraph dividers.  Weak.  Plus, the book went on a little too long for my liking, which happens a lot when you get into history. For one, with history, academically speaking, to be accurate, one needs to be thorough.  Thoroughness can lead to length, for sure, which, for many of us nowadays, can be tedious.  I count myself among the group of people who has a short attention span.  

I like history, but I'm not a history buff; I recognized a long time ago that what I like about history is the second part of the work, "story".  I have always loved being told, listening to, reading, and watching stories.  I am happy to go along on a ride, if that ride adds to the thrill of the story.  Often, however, there's lots of prattling on in history books (and other kinds, too) that doesn't add to the overall effectiveness of the story.  Larson did a good job of trimming much of the fat, in The Devil in the White City, but he didn't get all of it.  At over 400 pages, it's just too long for my taste.

Enough with that book.  Great recommendation, Keltie.  I'm glad I read it, and sorry I didn't blog about it more.  It gave me an opportunity to talk about my specialty, though, which was a nice change.  On to The Englishman's Boy, but not until my next post.

I have just two quick side notes about my blogging: first, I still, happily, have my bookmark.  Secondly, I'm way behind schedule now.  WAY.  And once I'm done The Englishman's Boy, I'm taking on Anna Karenina, which won't help.  But I should have a lot more time on my hands in the new year, at least the first few months, so hopefully I can catch up a little bit.

-Bryan

Friggin' Hornby

Hey All,

I'm miffed at Nick Hornby, or maybe it's his publishers I ought to hate right now.  I'm very careful, always, about having a book with me whenever there is a chance I could read.  Especially when I'm on public transit, which I take (if I'm not driving to work with my girlfriend) for about two hours each day.  Never do I want to be stuck on the dirtly hole that is the TTC without the distraction of a book to take my mind off the filth and stale air that lurks on the trains and buses I have to take.

So when Hornby's Songbook abruptly ended on me, with still about another fifty pages (it seemed) left, while I was on the TTC one morning this past week, well, I was beside myself.

A little explanation is likely in order, as you're probably asking yourself, "How can it end, with fifty pages still to go?"  It's like this: Hornby wrote Songbook as a number of chapters, each chapter about a song (or songs).  That's how the book was originally conceived and written.  The version of the book that I'm reading, however, has an additional five essays about albums.  I knew about the additional chapters before starting the book, as their existence is clearly stated on the cover and in the Table of Contents.  Still, it caught me off guard, as I took it as my right to stop this book after the chapters on the songs were over, since that isn't how he'd originally written the book.  Kind of like skipping the Afterword, if you will, or the notes the publisher (or writer) adds to a later edition of a book: they might be a nice addition to the text you've just read, but not absolutely necessary.  Plus, I feel that once a piece of art is completed and submitted (in this case Hornby submitted his manuscript to his publisher), that ought to be it.  No more additions.  When I wrote my essays in university, once I handed them in, that was the work upon which I would be marked.  So it is that a writer of fiction ought to be judged: on the work they first publish.  Certainly, Songbook doesn't fall under fiction, but it's not exactly the type of work that needs more added to it.

Reading this book just strengthened my opinion that the novel is a great format for reading.  I found Hornby's approach to his book new and interesting at first.  After about halfway through, though, I lost that interest, and just wanted the book to be over, which shouldn't have happened, considering my short attention span and the fairly short chapters that he wrote.  Those two factors, mashed together as they were, ought to have produced in me a quick read, and one that I enjoyed.  I found, instead, that I missed the long narrative, the arc, of a good tale.

I did not complete Songbook in it's entirety.  I was too mad and too bored with it to read the rest of Hornby's blather.  I've since moved on to The Devil in the White City, by Erik Larson, the book recommended to me by Keltie Neville.  It's a work of history, and so far probably the best such piece I've ever read.  Seriously.  This is the stuff I studied, in depth, while at university, and about which I wrote my thesis.  It's good stuff from a reader's perspective.

-Bryan

Grooveshark

Hey All,

Just a short post to follow up on my last one, about Songbook.

I am not (or was not) familiar with many of the songs about which Nick Hornby writes in this book.  Thankfully, about two months ago, my roomie Frank let me in on the secret glory of Grooveshark.  I went to that site and created a playlist of all of the songs in the book (save for those that did not show up in a search), and have been listening to it while writing all the posts about this book.  Quite helpful, and at times enjoyable.  It's a great site to listen to music for free.  Check it out!  You might even be able to find my playlist for Songbook on there somewhere, if you're canny.

-Bryan

Songs, Books

Hey All,

I will not admit to being a fan of Nick Hornby.  I didn't like either of the film adaptations of his books that I've seen (About a Boy and High Fidelity. I don't much care for Hugh Grant, and don't even get me started on that wanker John Cusack).  I have read one of his other books, though, How to be Good, and I enjoyed it.  Not that I think Hornby's a particularly good writer (he's not bad, either), which is why I was initially skeptical when Andrew Eaton had me add Songbook to this list.

I have since relinquished my skepticism.  I read How to be Good at the right time.  I'd needed a light, easy read after a particularly taxing time in my life (or maybe I had just gone through a bout of reading some very heavy reads) and, funnily enough, I found myself in a similar head-space when Songbook presented itself to me.  I finished The Stranger, which was preceded by Helter Skelter, so something uplifting was in order.  I looked to my bookshelf, asked a few people what they might read, and landed on Hornby's ode to his favourite pieces of pop music.  It's been a good choice, as it's definitely an easy read.

Moreover, I was once in a band, with dreams of becoming a popular musician in a group with my good friends (If you watch this clip, and skip to around the 8:10 mark, you can see Green Day playing my band's equipment on live Australian television.  That's me with the shaved head, big sideburns, and wearing a Maple Leafs jersey.  Some of the memories I have from that trip are still my most fond of all time).  I abandoned that dream, but am still very much in love with music of all sorts.

Perhaps one day I'll pick up a new instrument, as I've threatened to do a few times since quitting the music industry.  Chances are it will be a bass instrument, as I'm always drawn to them, and the sounds they produce.  The first instrument I played was piano, inspired by my grandfather's playing, a self-taught musician who, as my father tells, it, used to torture his family for years while learning the violin, until my grandmother made him take up a new instrument, one that he could listen to through headphones.  So he got an organ.

I think I begged my parents for a piano after sitting on my grandfather's lap while he played that organ, probably playing me Fur Elise, a song that I eventually half-learned, and still brings joy to my heart, no matter how overplayed it might be.  Thus, my family got a piano and my three siblings were also roped into taking lessons.  Poor suckers.  I'm sure they all hated it.  They might tell you differently, but I'm pretty sure they did.  And now the piano my parents bought us sits idly, prettily, in the Andrachuk household, awaiting the days when my newest sister-in-law comes over and regales us all with her tickling of it's ivories.

Following the piano, I took up the bass.  Electric bass, to be precise.  Actually, before that, I started a rap group in the seventh grade with three friends, which morphed into a band.  I was the only one with access to a bass guitar (I borrowed my uncle's beautiful 1972 Fender Jazz Bass), so I became the band's bass player.  In high school music class I played the tuba.  I think it was kind of a gag for me, to be frank, to be able to play an instrument in which no one else expressed interest and, more so, stood out so much.  Either way, I was drawn to it.  Plus, no one really listens to the tuba in a song, anyway, what with all the trumpets and trombones hogging all the spotlight, so I was able to fake my way through a lot of songs.  I sat pretty high up in the class, at the back, and would amuse my friends by blowing as hard as I could and rattling both the ceiling tiles and my teacher at the same time.  The next instrument in my lineup was a didgeridoo I bought while on tour with my band in Australia, but I still cannot perform circular breathing.  Coming full circle, I got my bass back about a year ago from my cousin, who had borrowed it for a couple years, and have only picked it up a handful of times since.

Ever since I first began to understand and play music back, in the eighth grade, the first thing I normally note in any song I hear is the beat, and, more specifically, the rhythm of the song.  The last thing I usually note, or remember, are the lyrics.  I don't know if it's because I played bass that I'm drawn to the rhythmic part of a song, or if I was drawn to bass playing and other bass instruments because I seek the rhythm in songs.  It's more likely that I chose the bass as my instrument, though, out of ease and laziness.  Less strings, fewer notes to remember.  Yet, I can't ignore the fact that I love the sound, even the FEEL of deep, bassy notes.

How did I get so off track?  Enough about music, back to the book.

The chapter in Songbook on Rod Stewart got me thinking about how I find new music through the music I like. It's similar, in some cases, to Hornby: through the record labels on which the bands I like are signed.  My latest amazement is a label called Stones Throw.  Delicious music.  (A quick nod, here, to my friend Marco Buonocore.  Over the years he's recommended more good - often great -  music to me than anyone else.  I won't name those bands here, but the man, in spite of his strange insistence that L'il Wayne is a lyrical and musical genius, has some damn fine taste, and somehow manages to find music before anyone else I know).  Aloe Blacc and Mayer Hawthorne are two musicians I found through the Stones Throw podcast, which I found by searching for other, similar music, online.  I highly recommend both, and most nearly anything Peanut Butter Wolf gets his hands on.

Songbook, I should clarify, is a book made up of thirty-one chapters, each with a single song as a starting point.  Some chapters barely mention the song named in it's title, as Hornby weaves a small story around each one.  It's a really neat idea, kind of like a mix tape (or CD, if you will), of his favourite songs, with the back story for each one included.

Overall, the book has reignited my desire for sonic pleasures, for seeking out both new music and revisiting the music of my past.  Two chapters in Songbook are dedicated to Teenage Fanclub, the band whose song, "Starsign", was the source for the name of my old band (the one with whom I toured Australia).  That in itself has launched me back into those awful, wonderful days of high school, post-high school fame, and band camaraderie.

Okay, that's enough for now.  Not much about the book, I know, but this blog is about my responses to the books I read, not just the content of the books.  I'll end with yet another plea for a recommendation for my next book.  Anyone?

-Bryan

Stranger Things I Have Not Seen

Hey All,

I finished The Stranger.  It's a fine book.  I understand why it's such a revered classic, for sure, but is not fully my style.  Which might beg the question, What is your style, Bryan?  Well, my answer to that is that my preferred style of book is fluid.  Which means what I like changes all the time, as I'm sure is the case with most of us (though I do know a few people who only like certain kinds of books, and that will never change).  Actually, I mentioned in an earlier post that I really only like fiction, so I guess that's my style.  But within fiction there are so many styles to choose from.  If I try to pin it down, I suppose I'd say I'm a fan of modern American fiction.  That's broad enough, no?  The authors with whom I am currently enamoured are Michael Chabon, Jonathan Ames, Joseph Boyden (Canadian, I know.  So we'll call what I like modern North American fiction), Jonathan Lethem, John Updike, Philip Roth, and their ilk.  Of course, there are lots of others, but that's where my taste falls right now.  Except maybe Roth; I might be over him, now.


I find that I can connect, in some way, shape, or form, in all of the above authors' books, but I didn't find that in The Stranger.  I'm sure that if I looked hard enough, I could.  But what strikes me about this book is that it, more than any of the previous three books I've read during this project of mine, has elicited thoughts about the world beyond it’s pages.  I have a whole bunch of examples of what I mean, but I've moved on to another book, so I don't want to write about them.  I'll just say that The Stranger is a worthwhile read.  It's short and easy, though challenging if you want it to be.

I will say one thing about The Stranger.  It wasn’t until I read the actual words “I told them I killed an Arab”, that I realized that this book is the source for the lyrics to The Cure’s song, “Killing an Arab”.  As the lyrics go, the narrator is “Standing on the beach / With a gun in my hand / Staring at the sea / Staring at the sand / Staring down the barrel / At the Arab on the ground / I can see his open mouth / But I hear no sound / I’m alive / I’m dead / I’m the stranger / Killing an Arab".  

Cool.  I remember hearing that song played on my older brother's stereo lots when we were kids.

As I said, though, I've moved on from Albert Camus.  He has been replaced by Nick Hornby, and his Songbook, as recommended by Andrew Eaton.  We shall see how they compare...

-Bryan

Stranger than Fiction

Hey All,


There are about six blog posts in me, I swear.  I have four in draft mode in Blogger right now, and I know I have more to come.  I've just been having a hard time trying to find time to write, is all.  So here's the latest.


The Stranger truly is a pocket book; it fits in almost any pants or jacket pocket I have tried it in thus far. A nice change from Helter Skelter, for sure.  Though, I'm glad I read that book before my current one, as it gave me some insight into the law, and courts, that actually helps me understand The Stranger on another level.  Interesting juxtaposition from Helter Skelter, wherein I read about a case strictly from the point of view of the prosecution. This time, though in astonishingly less detail, I am reading from the defendant's viewpoint. Quite different, indeed.

I don't want to turn this blog into anything reselmbling an English course paper; it's supposed to be about my thoughts and reactions to the books I read, not some objective ideas about the notions that arise in the books.  But it's hard to avoid getting into proper criticism with books like The Stranger, for a couple of reasons.  One is that I fear, much as happened with The Alchemist, and my friend Sasha who recommended it to me, that if I don't delve deep enough into the content, I'll be chastised for missing the point.  Secondly, books like The Stranger are simultaneously so straightforward and so complex, that to merely react to the story line can be a little too simplistic and boring.

The main character seems unable to not speak - let alone think - the absolute truth. Even in situations where a little lie might help him out, the thought never occurs to him. I don't want to give a whole lot away about the book, but he ends up killing a man. He seems completely without remorse, and accepts that his fate is to pay for his crime. Yet he isn't appalled with himself (as I would be), nor does he attempt to evade his punishment by, as I mentioned, perhaps telling a few little white lies. Because of this, I don't think he's a great character in the way of reflecting the actions and thoughts of a real human being. That might be what Camus sought to achieve.  But being a student of history, I can't help but this that it also has to do with the period in which the book was written. Compared to today's literature, like, for example, City of Thieves, where the character is very real and has very real flaws, this character is wooden. That's something that happened in literature and film of that era, I think.

So far the book is enjoyable, if frustrating at times (for the reason I mentioned in the paragraph above).  I'm excited to see how it all plays out, though it's pointing towards a pretty gloomy end.  I'm nearly done, and will read Nick Hornby's Songbook next, in the hope that it's a lighter read than these last two books have been.

-Bryan

Marque-Pages

Hey All,

This post is not directly related to any book I'm reading, but pertains to all of them.  It's about bookmarks.

What do you use for a bookmark?  I remember when I was a kid, I used to always have those bookmarks with the cotton string on the top that hung out of the book.  In the years since, I've used everything from pictures to postcards, coffeeshop stamp cards to leather straps.  I even went through a phase when, in an effort to improve my memory I didn't use a bookmark at all, and had to remember where I left off every time I reopened the book I was reading (I have a notoriously bad memory; ask anyone who has had to spend any amount of time with me).  I can't say that little experiment worked, but it lasted at least a year, and likely made my reading progress a little slower, as I know that I read passages more than once quite frequently.

My favourite bookmark I have ever used, however, is one that I made.  One Christmas, in a fit of inspiration, I designed, with a good friend of mine, bookmarks for all of my family members.  These weren't just any bookmarks, they were bookMarks.  As in, Mark, my little brother.  He's quite the colourful character when he wants to be, and there are a number of amusing pictures in my family's possession of him doing strange and funny things.  So I created six (there are six members in my immediate family) bookmarks with him on them.  I've no idea what the other members of my family have done with them over the years, but I get a chuckle out of mine every time I see it (yes, I made myself a little Christmas present that year).

Currently, though, and for the past two and a half years, I've used my business card as my bookmark.  I started using it because I had nothing else at one point, and then it just seemed to work well for me.  They are pretty dispensable, and readily available (I order them in packages of 250), so if I lose one, it's easy to replace.  And if ever I'm out somewhere and need to give someone my card, I can always count on having that one there as a backup, since I rarely go anywhere without a book.

For this little project I'm doing, though, this blog, my goal is to use only one bookmark for the entire thirty two books I will read.  So far so good, as I've used the same one for the three books I've checked off the list.  If I can keep that same one for the rest of the books, it would be quite the achievement for me, as I tend to lose these business cards fairly easily, precisely because they are so easy to replace.

Thus, I have come up with something that I think will help me keep this one bookmark, and also keep me honest (by that I mean, since the business cards are so easy to replace, I might very easily replace one if I lose it without even realizing it; if you don't follow what I'm saying, see my point above about my short, crappy memory): I gave Jenny, my girlfriend, the card I've been using, and asked her to write something, anything, on it.  It's in her handwriting, so I can't duplicate it.  If I lose that one, I'll know I've failed.

If ever we cross paths, ask to see the bookmark, and you can read what she wrote.  It's pretty cute.

Wish me luck.

-Bryan

Gone and On

Hey All,

I finally finished Helter Skelter last week.  I'll be honest, there was some skimming going on at the end.  I learned, over the 650-odd pages of the book, to discern where the author would make points that were critical to understanding the content of the book.  In the latter third of the book that amounts to about one paragraph per page that has any value to the reader.  That's not enough, if my opinion counts for anything.  The book was interesting, for sure, but I think if a better writer had managed to get their hands on it, Helter Skelter could have been a much better read.  

One aspect of Manson's whole story that irks me a little is the fact that he's still alive.  I am not advocating here for capital punishment; I have no opinion one way or the other on that matter, and I trust the legal profession and those who run our courts and governments to decide whether an eye for an eye is a suitable punishment when murder is the crime.

What creases me so is that Manson and his accomplices were convicted of murder in the first degree, and sentenced to die in January of 1971.  In 1972, however, all were spared their lives when the State of California abolished the death penalty.  I'm not so naive as to not understand the law (and even if I were, Vincent Bugliosi hammered the point home so often in his friggin' book, that anyone could understand it), but that such a sick individual as Manson, who did everything within his power to subvert the legal system and those who sought to penalize him appropriately for his crimes, did not receive the punishment for which he was convicted, is pretty sick.

That's about all I have to say about that one.  Done and done. Charles Manson, you're outta here!

I've selected (and already started) my next book: The Stranger, by Albert Camus.  I selected it in part because it is super short (120 pages), and in part because my cousin Danny is coming back from a tour of Europe, and he recommended the book to me.  If you're interested in reading about an independent musician's musings on the ups and downs of touring, check out Danny's blog.

My first impression of The Stranger: darker than I'd hoped for.  I wanted to read a nice, light book after all that death in Helter Skelter, but The Stranger starts off with a funeral.  Nice.  Great choice, Bry.

-Bryan

Two Forms of Judgement Day

Hey All,

Two weekends ago, a friend called me out for not stating on this blog what I truly feel about the books I'm reading; I’ll try to heed that advice.  That friend is also the person who recommended Anna Karenina, and he graciously gave me a copy that same night.  Thank you, Curtis; I still need you to sign it.  And also, f*&k you, Curtis, for recommending that behemoth of a book.  Saam Hashemi, you too get my one finger salute for recommending Of Human Bondage, for, as I learned this week, it too, is monstrous.  I'm having a hard enough time with Helter Skelter, I can only imagine what I'll be like when up against Leo Tolstoy and W. Somerset Maugham.  The one redeeming virtue for those two books is that they were written by people who wrote for a living, and not lawyers (as is the case with Helter Skelter), so I imagine neither of them will be as difficult to get through.  I hope.

Other friends have encouraged me to put up more posts.  Thank you, and fair enough.  I'll try to keep up with the demand.  In my defense, I will note that because Helter Skelter is so tedious to read, like any good procrastinator, I avoid it, and therefore have little about which to write.  There are sometimes days wherein I don't read a single page of the book.  Fortunately, though, Mr. Charles Manson finally appeared, and the book did, as a few people told me it would, get a lot more interesting.  Yet again, though, I've lost interest.

Sorry, Jocelyn (McEachern, who recommended this book), but it's boring at times.  Most of the time, in fact.  It is just detail after detail, as if the author, who is the man who prosecuted Charles Manson, needs to show the world what a great job he did in getting Manson convicted of murders he never - by his own hand, anyway - committed (I have no doubt that Manson was behind the murders for which he is accused.  But he never actually killed anyone, he just got other people to do it for him).

I admit, reading this book makes me want to know more about Charles Manson (though I imagine that by the time I'm done, I'll know a fair bit).  I'm tempted to go online and read about him, and to try to find interviews with him so I can hear him speak (what is the voice behind - or in front of, I suppose - this sick, warped mind?).  Maybe watch some documentaries or movies with and about him.  Not that I want to be part of the Manson Family (as they’re called); it's that he's such an intriguing character that I cannot help but want to know more.  I am holding back on doing that, though, as I don’t want to ruin what will come forth in the book, such as the details of the trial and how the case was made by the attorneys (I'm in the midst of that right now).

Because I'm reading Helter Skelter at a pretty slow pace, I'm behind schedule for my reading.  I'll be alright, though, as I plan to follow it up with a really light read. I think I'll need to. Any suggestions on what book should be next?  I still haven't decided if there will be a set plan on how I read through the list, or if I'll just go with what I feel like as I finish one book and start another. 

Here is the list as it stands right now:

1. The Power of One by Bryce Courtenay (Debbie Murphy)
2. Linchpin by Seth Godin (Kim Gardner)
3. Orange Crush by Tim Dorsey (Dan Pelosi)
4. The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho
5. Invisible Monsters by Chuck Palahnuik (Katelyn Foster)
6. Devil in the White City by Erik Larson (Keltie Neville)
7. Helter Skelter by Vincent Bugliosi and Curt Gentry (Jocelyn McEachern)
8. Josephine B Trilogy by Sandra Gulland (Erica Zeman)
9. Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen (Kristine Sorrento-Evans)
10. The Cave by Jose Saramago (Ines Ortiz)
11. Beautiful Boy by David Sheff (Nicole Callahan)
12. Confessions of a Shopaholicby Sophie Kinsella (Okame Musume)
13. Stroll by Shawn Micallef (Kris Williamson)
14. Songbook by Nick Hornby (Andrew Eaton)
15. My Sister’s Keeper by Jodi Picoult (Amy Bea)
16. Conversations with God by Neale Donald Walsh (Teena May Smith)
17. Still Alice by Lisa Genova (Aaron Stewart)
18. The Wind-up Bird Chronicles by Haruki Marukami (Mark Van De Ven)
19. The Englishman's Boy by Guy Vanderhaeghe (Chaz Sullivan)
20. Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert A. Heinlein (Scott Harmer)
21. Rant by Chuck Palahniuk (Graham Dalseg)
22. The Stranger by Albert Camus (Danny Gorman)
23. The Book Thief by Markus Zusak (Chris Roy)
24. The Golden Spruce by John Vaillant (Philip Wilson)
25. ‎Three Cups of Tea by Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin (Martina Smith)
26. The Shock Doctrine by Naomi Klein (Tim O'Connor)
27. Homage to Catalonia by George Orwell (Mariona Blanch)
28. Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy (Curtis Maloley)
29. Night by Elie Wiesel (Shauntel Jaclyn-Ann Daley)
30. The Aquariums of Pyongyang by Kang Chol-Hwan and Pierre Rigoulot (Robyn Nepean)
31. Of Human Bondage by W. Somerset Maugham (Saam Hashemi)
32. City of Thieves by David Benioff (Ann Sheldon)

-Bryan

A Small Reflection

Hey All,


I've realized through this process that I really only like - perhaps liked is a better word - to read fictional novels.  Helter Skelter is the first work of non-fiction that I can remember reading (aside from my university readings) in, well, I can't remember another non-fiction book I've read. 


Yet, in cruising through my book list, a few of the recommendations struck me by virtue of the fact that they are not fiction.  My initial reaction upon noticing each of the non-fiction books was, admittedly, anger.  Silly, I know, but my thinking went something along the lines of "Why would they recommend this to me?  Don't they know what I was looking for?"  Then, of course, it dawned on me that no, no one really knew what I was looking for, because I didn't explicitly state what I was looking for.  I put a pretty loose request out there for book recommendations.


I'm glad I did.  I'm looking forward to getting into these non-fiction books, and trying out some new things.  Some of them seem really interesting, and really quite relevant.  I won't mention titles right now, but you know which ones they are...


-Bryan

Into the Mind of a Killer

Hey All,

I’m slow-going with Helter Skelter.  It’s about the Manson Murders that took place back in Hollywood in 1969.

I have to admit, I am drawn into the story, but the writers are really dragging me down with details.  The book reads at times like a police report, and other times like a well-told story.  There are often too many details, and I’m tempted to skim.  But I can’t.  It’s part of the reason why I’m a slow reader, and I can’t help it.  

I’m less than 100 pages into the over 600-page book, and we’re still going over the crime scene and the backgrounds of the people involved in the murders.  Charles Manson’s name has not yet been mentioned once.  I guess I’ll change what I wrote above, and say that Helter Skelter reads like a court case, and the authors are trying to present a case, though that case is more like history, than one particular viewpoint.  Bugliosi and Gentry are not arguing for one side or another, but are, instead, giving me a pretty interesting, though sometimes tiresome, picture of the case.  The whole case.  Every single detail they could find.

Unlike City of Thieves, there is nothing funny about Helter Skelter.  It’s pretty gruesome, actually.  I don’t yet know, and I am dying to find out the reasons, why (I know, I could just go online and find the answer to pretty much any question I might have about this case in less than two minutes) someone would stab another person over forty times.  FORTY!  One person was stabbed over fifty!  What the f...!!!  Just try to imagine yourself stabbing someone even twice.  I can’t.  What the hell goes through a person’s mind when they’re doing that?  How can you possibly be that angry, have that much hatred, especially in such a washed out, vanilla (at least on the surface) place as Hollywood?  If this were taking place in a war zone, I might be able to better understand it.  But from what little I do know about this case, the victims did not in any way harm the murderers or their families.  Pure lunacy.  

And I love it.

-Bryan