Monday, November 21, 2011

Recently Read

First, thanks to all of you and your kind comments. The loss is great, but your nice thoughts are making it easier to get through.

Now, let's do some Recently Read. Yeah, that's all I got. Skip it if you wanna.

1. Moll Flanders by Daniel DeFoe. This was supposedly one of the first "novels", and this dude really could have used an editor, because the sentences run on and on and ON. And it's boring - he couldn't even make a brother/sister incestuous relationship interesting. Hell, even V.C. Andrews knocked it out of the park with THAT subject matter. I didn't finish it.

2. The Bucolic Plague by Josh Kilmer-Purcell - Memoir about two hipster guys who buy a farm. It starts out funny, then turns into an ad for their business about a third of the way through. Then it gets better at the end. An okay read.

3. Fanny and Sue by Karen Stoltz. Novel about twins growing up during the Depression. Charming, full of period details, and G-rated. Give it to your grandma for Christmas - she'll love it. Very good.

4. Good Grief by Lolly Winston. Novel about a woman whose husband dies unexpectedly - meh. I gave up about halfway through.

Let's do a movie review! Burlesque with Cher and Christina whats-her-face. Frankly, I wasn't paying that much attention, but what I saw seemed awfully derivative of "Chicago", which was a much, much better movie. Watch that instead.

Another movie review! Ballou is a documentary about a high school marching band going for the championship - ahh, memories. Really good if you're into that sort of thing - which I am.

5. All About Lulu by Jonathan Evison - Novel about a teenage boy with a crush on his stepsister. It got good reviews but I didn't find it that interesting.

6. The Night Train by Clyde Edgerton. Novel about growing up in the sixties in the segregated South. A quick read.

7. In Zanesville - Novel about an adolescent girl growing up in the seventies. I could relate. Good book. The description of the slumber party - Well, I could have been there. Heck, maybe I was there.

Okay, anybody reading anything good?

2 comments:

fmcgmccllc said...

I agree on the Bucolic Plague, expected more but okay. Watched Burlesque on a 13 hour flight as it was the only movie I had not seen, can barely remember much of it.

Becs said...

I searched my shelves last weekend and nothing satisfied. Recently on NPR, I heard Nathaniel Philbrick talking about his new book about Moby Dick. I think I was way in the minority when I read this in college - I loved it. I took it down from the shelf but realize now I need a good annotated, unabridged version.

Am successfully paring down my library. So little satisfies these days.