bookmarks

New York Times’ 100 notable books of the year

Marianne Wiggins reads more books than you, and she won’t let you forget it (via Galley Cat)

The literary legacy of Britney Spears (via Salon’s The Fix)

Jonathan Franzen, “The Discomfort Zone”

It’s a little easy to fall in love with Franzen in the first few chapters of his memoir. He grows up in the American heartland, doing nerdy pranks at his high school, going to a loosely Christian fellowship group and being too sensitive to get girls. It’s just as easy to take a few steps back at the end, when the boy who loves astronomy is suddenly an avid birdwatcher in his forties.
His elliptical storytelling style is a little jarring at first — it’s a bit like articles in The New Yorker (in which some of these stories appeared in some form) that go from being very personal to sweepingly broad in a paragraph. (And you’re left wondering if you’re just not smart enough to be able to follow the connections being made.) Franzen’s word choice was so perfect at times that it had me laughing out loud.

THE LOWDOWN
Published: 2006, 208 pp.
Obtained via: Library
Date started: 11.20.06
Date finished: 11.26.06
What I liked: The detail and word choice. I felt at times like I was living his childhood. Then I realized that the deja vu I was feeling was because I’d read some of this in The New Yorker before.
What I didn’t like: The brutal honesty about growing old. I’m just a wuss.
What I learned: How not to get a tire over the top of a flagpole, the general gist of Kafka’s “The Trial,” Texas is good for birdwatching.
Unresolved question: Is Franzen this self-absorbed in person?

Bret Easton Ellis, “Lunar Park”

I’ve got to make one admission: In spite of how often I used to make fun of his style, this is the first book of Ellis’ I’ve ever read.

I’m really glad I didn’t read this at Halloween, when “Lunar Park” starts out. But I was still thoroughly creeped out, in the lock-my-bedroom-door-at-night kind of way. I kind of feel like he’s literature’s Tarantino; I just can’t get into ultraviolence. The book’s about a guy named Bret Easton Ellis, who is a famous writer, battling demons while trying to fit into his sudden role of suburban father. He watches his world crumble around him in days while he’s haunted by his father and a number of characters he created. I loved the hints of connections that might have just been him going mad, but seriously, who did not see the resolution coming?

THE LOWDOWN
Published: 2005, 320 pp.
Obtained via: Library
Date started: 11.16.06
Date finished: 11.19.06
What I liked: The suspense was sustained throughout, preventing me from putting the book down or turning off my lights. The mix of reality and fantasy.
What I didn’t like: The gore.
What I learned: Never buy a Terby.
Unresolved question: What was that last word that showed up twice? Did I miss something?