32 posts tagged “362”

• My password worked and I remembered it
• I found the bathrooms
• By the time I got back from the HR hullabaloo, they had discovered my Twitter feed
• There was a cute new MacBook on my desk when I got there
• It's not quiet, which is awesome, because I was worried it would be too quiet
• I have to remember to bring my good headphones tomorrow
• It's so weird to talk about blogging and being the Blogger, like I can't even say it without cracking up
• Also, they are all very excited to have a Blogger to do the blogging for the blog
• Blog
• Can you believe it? Because I can't.
  

I am lifting the ban on books read in 2008 for this list. Why? Because I read quite a few stinkers this year.

• Downtown Owl by Chuck Klosterman -- pure, unadulterated bullshit
• Twilight by Stephenie Meyer -- pure, sexist vampire bullshit
• The Wedding by Nicholas Sparks -- So much bad, cliched writing that my eyes hurt from rolling so much
• The Secret Life of Bees by Someone Whose Name I didn't Bother to Remember -- Predictable crap
  
• LAMB: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal by Christopher Moore -- Jesus said fuck is funny once, maybe twice tops -- but not for 300 pages
• Candygirl by Diablo Cody -- I'm a quirky stripper bullshit
• Things I Learned from the Women Who Dumped Me - Should be called things I learned while I should have been attending English 101
  
• The Boy Who Cried Freebird by Mitch Myers -- Ought to be called "they let me put out a book because Shel Silverstein is my uncle"
  
• Jane Eyre by One of the Brontes -- Wah! I'm an orphan and bad stuff happened to me
  
• Until I Find You by John Irving -- See this big book? It's about my penis, which is also large.
  

For this list I am going to avoid the collected works of a single author types of books -- because really how can anyone compete with the collected works of Joyce Carol Oates, or F. Scott, Nabokov? Also, I am skipping the masters (Raymond Carver, Tim O'Brien, Flannery O'Connor) and anyone who has won a Genius Grant (sorry George Saunders and Stuart Dybek) because, well, duh.

Okay, got it? Here we go.

• Birds of America by Lorrie Moore
  
• Throw Like a Girl by Jean Thompson
• Because They Wanted To by Mary Gaitskill
  
• The Point and Other Stories by Charles D'Ambrosio
  
• How to Breathe Underwater by Julie Orringer
  
• The Best of Tin House edited by Dorothy Allison
  
• Drown by Junot Diaz
  
• Here's Your Hat, What's Your Hurry by Elizabeth McCracken
  
• Dead Boys by Richard Lange
  
• A Blind Man Can See How Much I Love You by Amy Bloom
  

Okay, I have to confess that non-fiction is one of my weaknesses. Generally, I'm not a big fan because oftentimes the writing is boring. I want beauty and story-telling not dry facts. However, sometimes the beauty and "the truth" come together and it's magic.

Also note that I am leaving off Elizabeth McCracken's An Exact Replica of a Figment of My Imagination because of the "no books read this year" rule I made. However, it will make the list come 2009.

• A Good Life: Newspapering and Other Adventures by Ben Bradlee (I went through a weird Watergate phase post-college, and this was my fave of all the books I read regarding the topic. I  like to add that my weird Watergate phase was no where near as weird as Ericka's really fucking weird Watergate phase)
• On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft by Stephen King (this remains the only book I've ever read by Stephen King as well as the only writing book I've read in its entirety)
• Fargo Rock City by Chuck Klosterman
• The Professor and the Mad Man by Simon Winchester (it's a book about the making of the Oxford English Dictionary, and it is interesting as hell)
• Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi (I thought of doing a different list of graphic novels, but I haven't read enough)
  
• Autobiography of a Face by Lucy Grealy b/w Truth and Beauty by Ann Pachett (two different books but they should be read together)
  
• Naked by David Sedaris (because this is the one where he introduces Rooster)
  
• The Federalist Papers by Hamilton, Madison, and Jay
  
• The Replacments: All Over But the Shouting, an Oral History by Jim Walsh
  
• All The President's Men by Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein
  

I was just telling CarrieNation that The Giant's House by Elizabeth McCracken is one of my Top 10 favorite novels. This is a thing I throw around all the time about, approximately 21,384 books. I'm a liar. So I thought it might be a good idea to try and document My Top 10 Favorite Novels*.

In no particular order:

• A Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving
• The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison
• The Giant's House by Elizabeth McCracken
• Written on the Body by Jeanette Winterson
• Geek Love by Katherine Dunn
• Motherless Brooklyn by Jonathan Lethem
• Cat's Cradle by Kurt Vonnegut
  
• Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov
  
• An Invisible Sign of My Own  by Aimee Bender
  
• The Minotaur Takes a Cigarette Break by Steven Sherrill

How do you feel about the results of the election?

Elated by Obama's win.
Infuriated by California's voting on prop 8.
Intrigued by what's going on with Franken v. Coleman
Stunned that Bachmann was re-elected.
Pissed off that none of those campaign promises included a cure for the common cold.

Show us a picture of your all time favorite President.

James-madison-2

What's your favorite saying?
Submitted by Dylan

“To be nobody-but-yourself — in a world which is doing its best, night and day, to make you everybody else — means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight; and never stop fighting.”
–ee cummings

October has been a tough reading month for me. My book-reading seems to wan a bit when I have writing class. Each week we have to read two student-stories (twice) and one story from the anthology, effectively meaning that I read five short stories a week. It cuts into the books. So my list is a bit sparse.

BOOKS ACQUIRED:
The Gargoyle by Andrew Davidson
The Best American Short Stories ed. Salman Rushdie
The Best American Non-Required Reading ed. Dave Eggers
A Fan's Notes by Frederick Exley
Winesburg, Ohio by Sherwood Anderson
Twilight by Stephenie Meyer (audiobook)

BOOKS READ:
What Was Lost  by Catherine O'Flynn
This is a great mystery that features a 10-year-old girl, a 30something record store assistant manager, a mall security guard, and a mall. I really, really enjoyed reading this book but never be able to find the words to convey that. Why? Because as soon as I finished this book I read the McCracken memoir and it blew mind. Read my full review on MN Reads.

Dear Everybody by Michael Kimball
This is an epistolary novel told through a series of suicide notes weatherman Jonathan Bender wrote in the two weeks leading up to his death. At turns funny and heartbreaking, Kimball skillfully crafted a character that even though you know what happens (Jonathan's obituary is the first page of the book) you are still hoping for a different ending. Read my full review on MN Reads.

Indignation by Philip Roth
I have to admit that about 30 pages into this one I was really doubting Philip Roth. I wasn't sure how this story about an over-protected Jewish kid going to college in Ohio during the Korean War was going to work or if I was ever going to care. And then KABOOM! Roth comes to life and rocks my world. Read my full review on MN Reads.

The Wordy Shipmates by Sarah Vowell
I was a little disappointed by Vowell's book on the Puritans who helped settle America. Vowell's great when she's putting history in context for the reader, telling us why this all matters. There wasn't enough of that for me and I really missed it. This book starts well and ends wonderfully but it gets a little term-papery in the middle. Read my full review on MN Reads. 

An Exact Replica of a Figment of My Imagination by Elizabeth McCracken
My favorite book of the year (so far). Read my full review on MN Reads.