Book of the Year

 We are back...and I'm going to start with what I tried to read but didn't like.  I started Black Spartacus and couldn't get into it.  I read the first 2 pages of Midnight's Children about 4 times and then closed the book.  I finished The Crying of Lot 49 and then wondered why anyone has anything good to say about Pynchon.  But in the words of Joel Plaskett "Every note we sing can't be solid gold" (brief aside - Joel seems to be conjuring up Ricky Bobby in this video as he has no idea what to do with his hands). There were plenty of good books...let's talk about them. One that I read parts of, but was still good was The Divine Conspiracy.  After finishing, I asked my personal trainer to compare this book to number 1. I found those insights helpful as I had a rough idea but struggled to articulate the connection I felt (both find a path to inner peace and moral clarity...in different ways).  My personal trainer also drew me a map of Texas that had 2 Au...

Most of the things that I do are tied to music in some way.  Every year I set 100 resolutions, which includes the 15 or so books that I want to make sure that I read.  Why 100 resolutions?  It’s a nice round number and there’s a song about it     On my list, I had 15 books that I wanted to read.  I generally get most of them done (and a few others).  This year I read 14 of them, the only miss was A Walk on the Wild Side (Nelson Algren)…I wonder how that one made the list?  I tried, but couldn’t get into it, so I gave up.  It took me two attempts to read The Bell Jar, but I got that done and enjoyed it, even though it didn’t quite make the top ten.  That book also reminded me of a song, but there’s only so much we can get into here…it’s probably time for the list.   Number 10 is Working by Studs Terkel…well, kind of.  I thought that I reserved this book at the library, but I actually reserved a graphic novel based on the boo...

 A bunch of stuff happened in 2023.  I went to Omaha twice but didn't see Warren Buffet in a monastary-themed steakhouse, impersonated an Uber driver in Sioux Falls (accidentally), had a hip problem and a rotator cuff problem (both healed, but I'll never hit 95 on the radar gun again...or ever), and I read some books.   One of the highlights of my 2023 was seeing the band Jawbreaker.  This band broke up in 1996 and then decided in the last few years to try to get along and play some shows.  They might be old and struggle to get along with each other, but they put on a really good show.  Which is a lot like the the murder-solving-olds in The Thursday Murder Club .  Four friends in a retirement community outwit/manipulate the police and solve a murder in a pretty fun who-dun-it (or is it who hath done this? ).  I say pretty fun because I rank it number 10 for 2023, but I don't have any plans to read the other 6 or 20 books in this series. On t...

 I set out to read 15 specific books this year…I read a couple of extra ones and didn’t finish two that were on my list.  I don’t like giving up on books, but these were tough to get through.  I was determined to finish Chronicles from the Land of the Happiest People on Earth , but (spoiler alert) after a bomb went off in a main character’s house and we learned about a ring of organized crime selling body parts for profit…and I was still bored, I finally gave up.  I think if you truly understand Nigerian politics and culture, there is some clever parody happening here, but I don’t.  Wole Soyinka has one more Nobel Prize than I do, so I guess he isn’t too upset about me giving up.  I also gave up on Sinclair Lewis’ It Can’t Happen Here .  Very clever, lots of parallels to the modern world, and just really hard to make it through.  I could only make it through about 3 pages at any one sitting.  I would totally watch a movie adaptation, so let ...

 Book of the year 2021   10.  Elanor Oliphant is Completely Fine – No, she is not. 9. Interior Chinatown – Pretty creative structure to this book - written in screenplay form with a TV show within the book.  Our main character tries to advance from Generic Asian Man to Kung Fu Guy on the set of the TV show.  A lot of themes about prejudices and feeling like you are living in the background of someone else’s story 8. On The Road – Really interesting from a period piece perspective.  Long car trips in the late 40s/early 50s.  Things were different then.  Especially for our crew of renegade pre-hippies. 7. The Half-Drowned King – Vikings, family issues, violence, and revenge.  What else do you want? 6. Jane Eyre – Really impressive that this story was written with a pencil.  All sorts of tropes – which aren’t tropes if you invented them. 5. Things Fall Apart – Yes, yes they do. 4. The Brief Wonderous Life of Oscar Wao – Our hero i...