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[jlhoots]

Ben Fountain: Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk

[BillF]

Really enjoying this.

1944-5. The D-Day landings have failed, Moscow and Stalingrad have fallen and Hitler's revived armies have invaded Britain. A story built round a small group of German soldiers who arrive in a remote Welsh village where only the women remain, the men having disappeared into the resistance. Beautifully evocative of the seasons and the impact of war on both the conquerors and the conquered. The counterfactual historic events are relayed lightly and at a distance, heard through rumour and occasional radio reception.

Very impressive.

The movie is great!

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1391116/?ref_=fn_tt_tt_1

[A Lark Ascending]

Didn't know there was a film.

[sgcim]

"The Letters of William Gaddis", new on Dalkey Archive Press.

[A Lark Ascending]

Having read the fiction of the D-Day landings failing I pulled this off the 'to read' shelves:

Very impressive. I've read 'Stalingrad' and his Spanish Civil War book. Might give his WWII overview a go in the summer.

When I read things like this I'm reminded just how lucky I am to have been born when and where I was. I cannot imagine jumping out of that landing craft.

***************

Read this one a week or so back:

I recall an earlier poster not caring for it but I enjoyed it. Especially the Vienna part - can't get enough of fin-de-siecle Vienna.

Edited May 12, 2013 by A Lark Ascending

[BillF]

Le Carré's latest - from the public library.

[ejp626]

Nearing the end of Lolita. Still not my cup of tea. Despite Nabokov's protests in the Afterword (and his obfuscations in the text itself), this is still basically pornographic lit. I can't see ever warming up to Nabokov, given that I haven't liked any of his earlier novels either. So the question is do I even bother to crack open the later novels in the Library of America series, or do I just take them to a used bookshop now. I am leaning towards taking them to the bookshop.

Next up is Steinbeck's The Short Reign of Pippen IV, which is somewhat out of character with his other novels. I think the Library of America made the wrong call in not including it in the volume of his later writings (the one with Travels with Charley in it).

[ejp626]

Next up is Steinbeck's The Short Reign of Pippen IV, which is somewhat out of character with his other novels. I think the Library of America made the wrong call in not including it in the volume of his later writings (the one with Travels with Charley in it).

Actually, Pippin IV is a quick read, and definitely a light-hearted romp. I've really enjoyed reading some of Steinbeck's later work where his basic decency shines through. About the only time he ever gets really riled up is after a trip to New Orleans where he sees the white mothers coming in to scream racist abuse at the Black girl who had the temerity to integrate a public school. Still sick at heart, he picks up a hitch-hiker who turns out to be a horrible racist. Steinbeck dumps him at the side of the road, while the man keeps screaming he [steinbeck] is a n***er-lover. Way to stay classy. And really, who doesn't have the sense to pipe down while catching a ride from a stranger? But emotions certainly ran high back then, overriding common sense (and certainly basic decency). And in some parts of the US today, emotions are just as high, with people who want America to live up to its better nature are called Muslim-lovers.

Anyway, I am clearly doing things all wrong, since the way my book pile worked out, I have all the really tough books coming up in the summer, so up next are Dostoevsky's The Idiot, Tolstoy's Anna Karenina, Mahfouz's The Cairo Trilogy, and topping it off with Proust! This will probably last me through the fall, but I'll have a lot of key works on my bucket list crossed off... I'm sure I'll have to add in a few shorter books just to cleanse the pallet as it were.

[John Litweiler]

One of the most accurate book covers ever. The book is a gigantic feast. I may decide to start writing like it.

[ejp626]

One of the most accurate book covers ever. The book is a gigantic feast. I may decide to start writing like it.

I've really tried to get into this a few times and decided it just isn't for me, at least for now. I do know that the recorded versions (Joyce reading some excerpts) are supposedly quite entertaining. There is even a Restored Version that just came out (http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/0141192291/ref=olp_product_details?ie=UTF8&me=&seller=), and I came very close to buying it (an impulse buy) but realized it would just sit on my shelves for ages. I might as well not add another book that is sure to gather dust until I am ready to read it.

[ejp626]

There have been enough negative reviews of the Restored Finnegan's Wake (with the worst decision being to completely reset and change the pagination of the work!) that I won't go that way. If I ever do get a new copy, I will probably go with the Oxford Press edition, which has some emendments and a better appendix at the back, discussing the editorial changes. But I am not super likely to get this any time soon.

I think the Library of America made the wrong call in not including it [Pippin IV] in the volume of his later writings (the one with Travels with Charley in it).

Speaking of odd editorial judgements, I just picked up this book:

It contains the text of America and Americans, which has long been out of print (basically since the late 60s), as well as a number of other essays. But it doesn't have any of the photos that accompanied Steinbeck's text. I believe in many cases, Steinbeck actually refers to specific images. I suppose this is a case where the rights-holder(s) couldn't be reached or wouldn't deal. And consequently it will be another 50+ years until the complete work can be released to the public. Very unfortunate, though I assume the essays are generally of more interest than the photos. It looks like the local library does have a copy of the original, so I'll borrow that (and probably scan the photos that grab me).

Anyway, I have finished both Lolita and Pippin IV and have just begun Dostoevsky's The Idiot, which will probably take a few weeks.

Edited May 17, 2013 by ejp626

[jlhoots]

Kimberly McCreight: Reconstructing Amelia

Edited May 17, 2013 by jlhoots

[sgcim]

"The Letters of William Gaddis", new on Dalkey Archive Press.

Just reviewed favorably in today's New York Times Book Review

[jlhoots]

Rachel Kushner: The Flame Throwers

[B. Goren.]

[BillF]

[A Lark Ascending]

Finished the Beevor D-Day book which was excellent. The chapter on the liberation of Paris brought a tear to my eye; at the same time making me think a lot about human nature - the jealousies of the military commanders, the determination of the French military to be first there regardless of any wider strategic concerns and the behaviour of the liberated towards one another. Having lived a life a million miles from what people experienced in those years you just wonder how you would have reacted.

Two new ones on the go:

That last one is full of fascinating details. Has a bit of a smug 'aren't we special' feel to it (I suspect most countries feel like that about themselves), but I do like its celebration of the irregular, slightly shabby.

Edited June 2, 2013 by A Lark Ascending

[A Lark Ascending]

I read a marvellous book by Dobbs on the Cuban Missile Crisis during the winter. Couldn't resist this one as I'm starting to teach the beginning of a Cold War course again in a couple of weeks. Just got the big three returning from Yalta - nothing particularly new but you get a real insight into the human drama (and the lack of bathrooms!), the very different personalities and the growing frustration of Churchill as he sees Britain falling rapidly into a very poor third place. Amazing the number of diplomats there who were carrying terminal illnesses yet still kept going.

Edited June 2, 2013 by A Lark Ascending

[BillF]

[jlhoots]

Adam Johnson: The Orphan Master's Son

[paul secor]

John Gregory Brown: Audubon's Watch

[ejp626]

On the final stretch of Dostoevsky's The Idiot (last 100 or so pages). I'm really not feeling it for a lot of reasons, mostly that everybody just sits around and has all these misunderstandings but Prince Myshkin is such a super guy (based on little more than his good nature, since he isn't called upon to actually, you know, do much of anything) that he tries to set things right. I am just finding it very, very boring. What worries me slightly is that I really enjoyed Notes from the Underground and Crime and Punishment as a young adult, and it would pain me to find that I didn't care much for his (very talky) style as an older (apparently grumpy) adult.

Also dipping into Pu-239 by Ken Kalfus. The title story is fairly brilliant. Not as interested in the other stories, and in fact I completely skipped over one after a few pages where I found the main character so terribly (and unbelievably) obnoxious that I didn't want to spend any more time in his company (even to see if he got his comeupance). I think I'll mostly end up skimming and discarding this one...

[JohnJ]

[crisp]

What worries me slightly is that I really enjoyed Notes from the Underground and Crime and Punishment as a young adult, and it would pain me to find that I didn't care much for his (very talky) style as an older (apparently grumpy) adult.

I read and "enjoyed" the Idiot as a young adult, also Karamazof and Crime and Punishment (twice). I wonder now if I was making allowances to bolster how clever I thought I was being.

I'm currently reading The Finkler Question by Howard Jacobson. Laugh-out-loud funny and very educational.

[ejp626]

What worries me slightly is that I really enjoyed Notes from the Underground and Crime and Punishment as a young adult, and it would pain me to find that I didn't care much for his (very talky) style as an older (apparently grumpy) adult.

I read and "enjoyed" the Idiot as a young adult, also Karamazof and Crime and Punishment (twice). I wonder now if I was making allowances to bolster how clever I thought I was being.

I'm currently reading The Finkler Question by Howard Jacobson. Laugh-out-loud funny and very educational.

I probably will reread Crime and Punishment in the next couple of years. I suspect that one will still grip me, but hard to say. All of Dostoevsky's novels are basically concerned with interior thoughts, so he spends scads of time telling you things that aren't apparent from the surface of conversations. (This is what I am reacting badly to.) I think, but can't entirely recall, that The Idiot is the most extreme in this regard.

Speaking of Jacobson, I never "got" Kalooki Nights at all. I'm also fairly sure I wouldn't like The Finkler Question, but his very latest (Zoo Time) looks interesting enough that I might give it a go.