Home Comforts

eeek! It's a reference book! And about homemaking no less. As virtually everyone reading this blog knows, I'm not know for my tidiness. This book, by Cheryl Mendelson (a lawyer living the dream of not practicing law) is pretty cool. Whether you want to know how to fold a fitted sheet or get gum out of your carpet (ahem, just an example) this book has the answers. There is a huge section on food safety which is vastly helpful for figuring out if that slightly moldly cheese is safe once you cut the mold off (answer if its a soft cheese pitch it, if it is a hard cheese you can try to save). This is a really helpful book and when I first bought it, I was inspired to clean my house A LOT. Sadly, that wore off but this book still has much to recommend it. (PS, for God's sake, buy a hardback, you'll split a paperback spine in seconds)

High Fidelity

After breaking up with Laura, Rob goes back to visit his "top-five breakups" in order to get some insight into his romantic life in Nick Hornby's wonderful novel. Rob has never quite grown up and his job as a record store owner lets him hang out with his friends and co-workers Dick and Barry as they discuss music and pop culture and compose endless top-five lists. Rob's quest to visit his exes is funny and cathartic but the record store scenes are really the novel's highlights. Hornby's book was Americanized brilliantly for the movie starring John Cusack and Jack Black. Rob is such a great character--a little immature, a little narcissistic, a little obsessed with music, a lot messed up but very lovable. In Hornby's world, it is not necessarily who we are, but what we like, that helps to determine compatibility. I think I'd get along with most Nick Hornby fans just fine.

Kindred

Kindred is Octavia Butler's time travel classic. I first heard about it in an interview with the author on NPR about ten years ago. Dana is an African American woman living in America in the 1970s who is married to a white man and has just moved into a new house, when she begins to time travel back and forth to the antebellum south. She realizes that each time she being called there to save the life of Rufus, a white boy who she comes to find out is her ancestor. Her husband begins to time travel with her and each trip into the past is progressively more dangerous. The book has a lot to say about race, gender and power, and has become a bit of a period piece itself (Dana is referred to as Black, rather than African American, for example). Interesting and worthwhile.

What's That Guy Reading?

I have a half hour commute that really isn’t too bad when Mother Nature cooperates. I would love for a public transportation option, though, so I could use that time to read. Oh and to check out what other people are reading too! I can’t pass by someone reading in public without craning my neck at unusual angles to catch a glimpse of the title. Unfortunately, although I read in public all the time, I don’t really see that many other people with an open book. I can be a voyeur at this site—and people are reading some very interesting things.

Lolita

I read this many years ago and really liked it but am listening to it again on audio now for book club. It really is amazing how Nabokov is able to write so beautifully while telling such a disturbing story of Humbert Humbert and his nymphette. The moving language is even more evident as a book on CD in Jeremy Iron’s creepy voice. I’m not very far in so far, but I really appreciate the beginning “notes’ where the narrator says that offensive is often just another name for something unusual, and, because a quality of art is originality, it is often considered offensive. Just a great book.

Jarhead

Anthony Swofford is bracingly honest in this memoir of "the first Gulf War", as my copy calls it. He talks about all the emotions he passes through as part of a spotter-sniper unit in the Marine Corp, from fearful to bored to stir-crazy. He also is honest about the behavior of the Marines, which like any group run the gamut. He talks about how many Marines (at least the male marines of his acquaintance) cheat wildly on the women at home whenever given the opportunity, and are obsessed with thoughts of the wives and girlfriends cheating on them (sometimes with reason, sometimes not). He talks about the good and bad sides of life as a Marine (don't call them soldiers, they are Marines) and how his father's service during Vietnam shaped his own life and choices. A well written memoir that is better than the movie.

Fortress of Solitude

1970's Brooklyn comes vividly to life in Jonathan Lethem's The Fortress of Solitude. Dylan and his parents, hippie Rachel, who soon leaves them, and artist Abraham, move into the mostly black Boerum Hill neighborhood in Brooklyn. Dylan has a rough time adjusting until he befriends his neighbor, Mingus Rude, the son of a jazz musician. Dylan's childhood in Brooklyn with Mingus grows from games of scully to graffiti tagging to discovering a ring that gives them magical abilities. As they grow older, they grow apart, until one final meeting between the friends where the ring comes into play once again. A few posts back, Shuttsie talked about a book that killed her book club. I was the only one of my group to finish this book, but I absolutely loved it. I saw some of the flaws they did, but I also saw a book that was more evocative of time and place that just about any I had ever read. The book also explores gentrification, art through Abraham's work, pop music and much more. It may be a little slow going at times, but stick with it and you will be rewarded.

Awhile back, Shuttsie posted a link to book sale finder, which lists libray book sales across the country. My local library semi-annual book sale ended last week and, as usual, I came home with lots of loot, which I finally entered into LibraryThing. Regular dailybookbuddy readers might detect a few familiar titles. I have fond memories of going to this sale with Shuttsie and then coming back to our dorm, uh residence hall, rooms and showing each other our finds.