Mara Naselli: The New New Journalism, a book of interviews edited by Robert Boynton, an essential reader for people interested in studying the craft of reporting nonfiction, and (rereading) John Hersey's
Hiroshima, a classic in of the narrative nonfiction form. Also, just arrived on my doorstep, a purchase inspired by a superb and hauntingly vivid article I found in VQR by John Ghazvinian--
Untapped: The Scramble for Africa's Oil.
Summer Block: I'm studying short stories and how they work, since I've been embarking on writing some myself. I'm reading or re-reading stories by Tolstoy, Checkhov, Somerset Maughm, Thomas Mann, Kafka, Borges, Hemingway, you name it. One interesting anthology I picked up is
Children Playing Before a Statue of Hercules, compiled by David Sedaris.
Robert Birnbaum: Big Girls by Susanna Moore,
Heyday by Kurt Anderson,
The Custodian of Paradise by Wayne Johnston,
The Lisbon Crossing by Tom Gabbay,
The Age of Betrayal by Jack Beatty,
Black and White by Dani Shapiro,
The Ministry of Special Cases by Nathan Englander,
Endless Things by John Crowley,
The Second Coming by Walker Percy,
The Paris Review Vonnegut interview, Paul Wolfowitz profile in
The New Yorker, Charles Murray on Jewish Genius in
Commentary, Brendan Bernhard's appreciation of George ws Trow in
The New York Sun, Tom Englehardt at TomDispatch.com on Seymour Hersch
Matt Borondy: I'm migrating the bulk of my reading habits to the online world while trying to avoid obnoxious, agenda-pushing opinions about the Va Tech shootings. Yesterday I picked up my copy of
On the Road and re-read the first chapter and realized I pretty much have that book memorized despite having only read it once, about ten years ago. Mainly I'm trying to figure out how to make this blog better.
What do you think?Labels: fiction, interviews, journalism, short stories
posted by Matt Borondy at 4/19/2007 04:39:00 AM
I'm amid "The Species Crown," short stories by Curtis Smith (Press 53), who is from Pennsylvania and therefore to be trusted. Picture postcards, these stories are, from the mind of Smith, intricate sketchings on the backs of matchbooks. The second-person abounds in a way that normally makes me uncomfortable, but Smith pulls it off, for the most part, and I find myself looking forward to returning to his pages. This is quite a collection.
I was sick over the weekend, a bad cold, and spent time revisiting Ann Beattie's "Park City" collection. This has been the year of the winter that would not start and then would not go away and that whole reality seemed to just infuse this weekend. "Park City" shot off my shelf and into my hands on Saturday and it was a good choice.
William Trevor is a favorite of mine, but to date I have not ventured beyond his stories (so much there, why go further?). But I went to the Newtown Used Book Exchange this afternoon and picked up two slim Trevor novels: "Felicia's Journey" and "The Silence in the Garden." Thus armed I shall see this ridiculous month out.
-
Christian BaumanLabels: short stories, used books
posted by Matt Borondy at 4/09/2007 11:15:00 PM
I've been on a great short story kick, and it seems to be continuing. I used to be a fairly exclusive novel reader, in it for the investment, the sloppiness, and the grandeur. Stories were nice, I thought, but easy. Fool that I was. Now I'm learning that stories are anything but easy and that they're even better when read in an organized bunch. Some collections that have grabbed me recently include Lorrie Moore's
Birds of America, David Gates's
The Wonders of the Invisible World, Lydia Davis's
Samuel Johnson Is Indigant, and Mary Gaitskill's
Because They Wanted To.
Too much to say about
Birds of America: the dark humor, the pathos, the surprise of the perfect animal metaphor. (In one story, a dead bat, with its wings folded "like a packed tent," is compared to a mouse in backpacking equipment!) Every story contains a bird, and every story is, in some sense, about our failure to communicate. Why else do we joke?
The Wonders of the Invisible World is a great Gates book -- smart, substance-abusing people in the Northeast (often with rustic country houses) undoing themselves through thought and memory (and substance abuse) alone.
Samuel Johnson Is Indigant. Well, the title -- taken from one of Davis's shortest and worst pieces -- is terrible, but the book is nonetheless brilliant. Davis is more of a European storyteller than an American one, dabbling in existentialism and brain teasers, and often in exhilaratingly short form. Are they stories? Are they poems? Does it matter? Her newest book,
Varieties of Disturbance, is out this May.
Finally, Gaitskill gets erotic and perverse and really on-target in
Because They Wanted To. Why do we fall for odd, unattractive dentists? Why do we sleep with and entangle ourselves with people we don't even like? The title is Gaitskill's non-answer, but it is an endlessly intriguing one. After this, I can't wait to read
Veronica. Even if it is a novel.
-- Katherine Hill
Labels: erotic, Katherine Hill, short stories
posted by Charlotte at 4/03/2007 06:20:00 AM 
