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[B. Goren.]

[Jazzmoose]

After years of being a Clarke fan, I concluded that none of his novels are as good as Childhood's End.

I haven't read too many novels by him; that's too bad. On the other hand, as good as Childhood's End was, it's understandable.

Actually, growing up I think there were times when I preferred his science fact writing.

That's the way I felt about Asimov, believe it or not.

[BillF]

[paul secor]

Michael Chabon: Telegraph Avenue

Just another Chabon entertainment. I'm through reading his stuff. I can think of a few people here who might enjoy this book much more than I did.

[jlhoots]

Julian Barnes: The Sense Of An Ending

[ejp626]

Just wrapping up Futility by William Gerhardie. This is an unusual book. It was written in 1922 by an Englishman who basically grew up in Russia. I believe this book is somewhat autobiographical, so it seems that in the aftermath of the Russian Revolution, he was sort of an Russian expert attached to the British army and saw some of the post-revolution chaos. The main plot centers on a man with an extremely complicated family -- by the end he has two mistresses and innumerable hangers-on who keep hoping that his gold mines in Siberia will actually produce anything (he has been borrowing on them all this time). I guess the best way to describe it is the lassitude of Chekhov's Three Sisters with some of the desparation of Dostoevsky's The Gamblers, but all played for comic effect. Nonetheless, it is a bit exhausting (despite being a short novel), and I certainly don't care for any of the characters. It is basically a curiosity, but probably worth reading if one likes Russian literature. There is one small moment that I like quite a bit, however, where the narrator is talking to one of the Uncles, who says that rushing around makes one feel that life is purposeful (even if nothing at all is accomplished). I think I fall victim to this from time to time -- rushing around to avoid thinking about the void...

Am about halfway through Murakami's Sputnik Sweetheart.

After that, I will finish up with Mill on the Floss (stopped right when the mill ownership is transferred). Then Faulkner's The Reivers. So things are looking up a bit from the last couple of months when I really didn't enjoy what I was reading.

[Matthew]

Michael Chabon: Telegraph Avenue

Just another Chabon entertainment. I'm through reading his stuff. I can think of a few people here who might enjoy this book much more than I did.

So, you would not agree with this blurb off Amazon:

"An intimate epic, a NorCal Middlemarch set to the funky beat of classic vinyl soul-jazz and pulsing with a virtuosic, pyrotechnical style all its own, Telegraph Avenue is the great American novel we've been waiting for. Generous, imaginative, funny, moving, thrilling, humane, triumphant, it is Michael Chabon's most dazzling book yet."

I'm still debating about getting this one, it would be a nice trip down Memory Lane, to relive my six years in Berkeley, but I'm not overly fond of Chabon, I completely gave up on The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay (in fact, threw it in a dumpster, I was so frustrated by it), might go into a used book store in a couple of months and buy it -- bring back memories of Telegraph from back in the day, and when I was much younger.

[paul secor]

Michael Chabon: Telegraph Avenue

Just another Chabon entertainment. I'm through reading his stuff. I can think of a few people here who might enjoy this book much more than I did.

So, you would not agree with this blurb off Amazon:

"An intimate epic, a NorCal Middlemarch set to the funky beat of classic vinyl soul-jazz and pulsing with a virtuosic, pyrotechnical style all its own, Telegraph Avenue is the great American novel we've been waiting for. Generous, imaginative, funny, moving, thrilling, humane, triumphant, it is Michael Chabon's most dazzling book yet."

I'm still debating about getting this one, it would be a nice trip down Memory Lane, to relive my six years in Berkeley, but I'm not overly fond of Chabon, I completely gave up on The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay (in fact, threw it in a dumpster, I was so frustrated by it), might go into a used book store in a couple of months and buy it -- bring back memories of Telegraph from back in the day, and when I was much younger.

I guess if you were there, the book might bring back some memories. I wasn't, and the book didn't do much for me. I wouldn't even recommend it to soul/funk jazz afficianados. What's written about the music is fairly superficial, imo.

[BruceH]

After years of being a Clarke fan, I concluded that none of his novels are as good as Childhood's End.

I haven't read too many novels by him; that's too bad. On the other hand, as good as Childhood's End was, it's understandable.

Actually, growing up I think there were times when I preferred his science fact writing.

That's the way I felt about Asimov, believe it or not.

Oh, I find that VERY believable. Asimov was always more convincing in the non-fiction category.

[jlhoots]

FWIW, I liked Telegraph Avenue.

[T.D.]

I've been reading Philip Kerr's "Bernie Gunther" series. Very interesting concept: a noirish and hard-boiled detective's progress and survival through Germany in the 1930s and 40s (with everything that entails), and subsequent globe-trotting exile. I'm on the seventh of eight (so far). Unusually for such a series, the writing generally improves book to book. Kerr took a 15-year sabbatical from the series at one point. I recommend these unless you have an aversion to or are tired of Nazi-related books.

[BillF]

Just finished the latest Tom Wolfe. Very entertaining.

[Brad]

[B. Goren.]

[jazzbo]

[jlhoots]

Jo Nesbo: The Phantom

[ejp626]

Close to wrapping up The Mill on the Floss. My initial impression still holds -- a novel that you sort of admire but don't actually enjoy that much. Tom is still such an insufferable prat, and the father is, to his dying day, a man determined to make the wrong choice from what life has to offer him. I just want it to be over at this point.

I happened to grab the graphic novel version of J.B. Priestly's An Inspector Calls (with the full text, they declare proudly). Boy, am I glad that I read this in this format, rather than paying to watch it on stage. For me, time has done it no favors. The speeches are so over the top. Look, look at the uncaring industrialist. Step right this way to see the selfish children of the rich. Look at the charity society woman who has no "soul." And so on. G.B. Shaw and Brecht can sometimes pull off the trick of writing politicial or politicized speech without seeming like they are pulling pages out of a sociology textbook, but Priestly sure can't.

And then the "twist" or rather double-twist at the end is, to me, an infuriating cheat straight out of the pages of G.K. Chesterton, maybe copped directly from The Man Who Was Thursday. I certainly know people who love the Father Brown stories, but I found them unbearable (atheists who kill simply to make The Church look bad, I mean really). I'll be steering clear away from this in the future and probably all of Priestly's work.

Edited November 24, 2012 by ejp626

[BruceH]

Captain Vorpatril's Alliance - Lois McMaster Bujold. Best new Miles novel in many a year, and Miles isn't even in it.

[aparxa]

Joseph Kessel - La passante du Sans Souci

[ejp626]

Really disappointed in the last 100 or so pages of Mill on the Floss. I particularly disliked the actual ending. It seemed like it was heading to a downbeat but "organically consistent" ending, i.e. one that made sense given what had happened before. The actual ending is almost totally random and stupid.

I am totally showing my age, but one of the newsmagazines (probably Time) ran little inserts on how to improve one's writing as well as reading comprehension. I think there was Bill Cosby discussing speed reading and so on. Anyway, some comic writer decided to give some advice and said that endings were easy: Everyone got run over by a bus. And if you wanted to change it up a bit, you could use Everyone was run over by a truck.

That's kind of how I felt at the end of this novel -- I honestly feel cheated -- it's such a long book for such a terrible payoff.

All that said, there is one semi-brilliant passage in the novel, which I will copy out gratis to spare you from making my mistake.

For the tragedy of our lives is not created entirely from within. ‘Character’ — says Novalis, in one of his questionable aphorisms — ‘character is destiny.’ But not the whole of our destiny. Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, was speculative and irresolute, and we have a great tragedy in consequence. But if his father had lived to a good old age, and his uncle had died an early death, we can conceive Hamlet’s having married Ophelia and got through life with a reputation of sanity notwithstanding many soliloquies, and some moody sarcasms towards the fair daughter of Polonius, to say nothing of the frankest incivility to his father-in-law.

[Christiern]

Amazingly good read. What a character !

Does not surprise me. I used to work with him.

[jlhoots]

Larry McMurtry: Custer

[A Lark Ascending]

First read this 35+ years ago. Still holds up.

[BillF]

First read this 35+ years ago. Still holds up.

My experience, too. Have read it three times - first at the age of 15 and last about 5 years ago. One of the truly great books for me.

Amazingly good read. What a character !

Does not surprise me. I used to work with him.

Did you! Any stories to tell?

[A Lark Ascending]

My experience, too. Have read it three times - first at the age of 15 and last about 5 years ago. One of the truly great books for me.

Orwell was the first 'proper' writer I got obsessed with whilst reading 'Animal Farm' for 'O' Level.