so i finished it today... how had i never read this book at an earlier moment in life? sometimes it baffles me how many things i haven't read or don't know or understand...
this may be the best snippet from a book ever:
I saw my life branching out before me like the green fig tree in the story.
From the tip of every branch, like a fat purple fig, a wonderful future beckoned and winked. One fig was a husband and a happy home and children, and another fig was a famous poet and another fig was a brilliant professor, and another fig was Ee Gee, the amazing editor, and another fig was Europe and Africa and South America, and another fig was Constantin and Socrates and Attila and a pack of other lovers with queer names and offbeat professions, and another fig was an Olympic lady crew champion, and beyond and above these figs were many more figs I couldn't quite make out.
I saw myself sitting in the crotch of this fig tree, starving to death, just because I couldn't make up my mind which of the figs I would choose. I wanted each and every one of them, but choosing one meant losing all the rest, and, as I sat there, unable to decide, the figs began to wrinkle and go black, and, one by one, they plopped to the ground at my feet.
i can't even count the number of times i've felt this way...
last winter britt got me hooked on jeanette winterson... i really loved her book boating for beginners a spin off the noah's ark story... i also really enjoyed the red tent and lamb... i love fiction that takes the familiar and just goes hog wild in the imagination category... you know? so when i saw david maine's book (as i was already juggling a pile of "must haves" in the book store) i decided i had to read it... it's also a spin off of the noah's ark story, a bit more real than winterson's (sometimes she's really out there) and not bad... it really gives you a vision of the full humanity of the characters... but i dunno, i finished it today and i was disappointed with the ending... i guess because i didn't feel like it took me anywhere... i was just reading reading reading, and then it was over... that's it... but i like the women in this book, they are witty and intelligent, and each chapter is from a different character's perspective... and the last chapter was my favorite chick... the young one everyone thought was stupid, but really she was quite observant... and full of heart.... but still i feel like maine left me hanging at the end, something was just missing, and that makes me sad, but overall an enjoyable read...
2.17.2006
the amazing adventures of kavalier & clay
i'm reading this awesome book by michael chabon... about halfway through, but i couldn't wait until i was finished to share two things thar i love about it... it's filled with footnotes that make me loaugh out loud, belly laugh style... like one that mentions a book being found years later in an ikea display in new jersey (chabon is brilliant, pays incredible attention to detail, and just makes me laugh!)... the other is his description of one of the main character's personality at work and at parties, i have to share it, because i feel the same way, and i love it when books can so clearly describe things i feel or have felt and have not been able to articulate... so without further adieu, a snippet from page 229 (for something more in depth you'll simply have to read the book yourself!):
Introduced into a cursed cirlce of jabber and jazz, he would drift helplessly behind a large plant... Put him in front of a roomful of people at work and he would be impossible to shut up; work was not work for him. Parties were work. Women were work...
ok, that was really a brief snippet, but i just can't even begin to describe to you how much i am enjoying this book... for little background, it's about two jewish cousins (one american, one czech) who write comic books during world war two... but really it's about much more than that... so there, go to the library (if you aren't afraid of them) or your favorite used bookstore and pick up a copy today-YAY!
somehow i haven't posted here in quite a while... i've been reading, but to be honest with you i think i did a lot of picking up and setting don books in the last few months... i did successfully complete the chronicles of narnia yesterday... mom bought it for me around the time the movie came out... suprisingly enough, in my 26 years, i'd never read these beloved books... i'm so glad i finally did. i love cs lewis... reading the great divorce in my early 20s helpe me come to peace with the ideas of heaven and hell... and well, i dunno, his work is just awesome. i loved these stories. i think the last one (the great battle, i don't know if it was the last one written, but it's the last in the preferred reading order) is my favorite. the picture he paints of heaven, well, it made me cry. i really like the discussion with the calormene soldier too, and the dwarf that was for the dwarf... that worrying about the details of heaven and how or why or whatever isn't anything we need to do. then i thought about the last book for a while, because the whole absence of susan disturbed me at first... but i started thinking about a great movie i saw with my folks the other night (the end of the spear) and a line from it: stevie boy asks his father if he will use his gun to defend himself if the Waodani attack... and his dad says, son, they're not ready for heaven yet, but we are... take this however you will, but something about it hit me, and in hearing that a few days before reading this last book, it just came to my thoughts, and they described the way susan was, but from the other books you know her heart, and i dunno, aslan is wise, and knew she wasn't ready for the true narnia, because she was still tied to a less perfect world... or something, maybe this makes no sense to anyone but me... i guess i love the description too because i think an important part of christianity is being in and loving the world we're in right now... not just looking ahead to the kingdom but seeing glimpses of the kingdom in our broken world... i thought that last book did a great job in displaying that... it was awesome! i think i could reread the last few chapters over and over again. if you are like i was and never took the time to read a children's series because you missed out on it as a child, cut yourself a break and pick up these books, you won't be sorry. SO GOOD!
remember anansi the spider? maybe a lot of people don't and my memoriy for folk lore stories comes from my librarian mother and all the characters she dressed up as for storytelling days at her school. anyways, anansi was a trickster. a god. a spider. in african folklore. so neil gaiman (i think that's his name), who happens to be one of rach's favorite authors, wrote this lovely book about anansi, but relly it's about his sons. if you read it, you will laugh your ass off. i promise. my favorite thing he does is the way he write inner dialogue, he's just really funny. and the book is exciting, and it's full of different dialects, personality types, locations, etc etc, and it's just a fast and quite enjoyable read. i highly reccomend you check it out when seeking some entertaining fiction.
an epistle from a dying father to his son... john ames is a seventy six year old preacher in iowa writing a letter for his six year old son to read when he grows up... the book is a little bit about everything... love, peace, tolerance, grace, forgiveness, redemption... it's just really really good... parts of it made me think of my family, things made me laugh (tying a piece of hot dog to a string to have a cat play chase with you), and things made me cry. i thought it was a lovely book and might post a few passages later once my folks have finished reading it.
what can i say? i'm a bit of a sucker for historical fiction (though i have to be in the right mood... i tried to finish the book longdon so many times before losing it...) I really like sarah waters (i think her name is sarah)... i feel like i can really get into the heads of her characters, and i dunno, i like an occasional mystery when reading too. so yes, i actually finished it about 3 days ago, so i thought i'd say something, though i find these are much more interesting when the book is still resting in my hands and fresh on my memories...