01 October 2008

{Read More Books}



Everyone should. Not enough reading goes on 'round here. And by here, I mean, the general populace. But this isn't an order, or a judgment, just a suggestion. Like therapy, ice cream, laughing, and friends, you always have room for more books in your life. Plus, Polyvore, where I made this little bunch o' books, is so fun...like collage online. I love it and have just gotten into playing with it, thanks to Creature Comforts. 'Kay, for the list o' books...it's just random. Some are my favorites of all time, some are favorite recent reads, and one is one that I want to read. Plus, we've got some art and clothes in there, too.

1.0
This is from designer Jean Jullien's "Don't Protest (Please)" poster series.
2.0
I don't care how popular this book is, nor do I care that someone out there actually threw Alice Sebold into the classification of "factory" writers, this, The Lovely Bones, is a complete and utterly beautiful, tender classic for all ages, and should be popular. Even this writer's name, though, in day-to-day conversation, will most likely not be instantly recognized, like say, somebody on television. Just sayin'.
3.0
Oh, this fabulous t-shirt can be found on Shana Logic, a place that specializes in cute.
4.0
David Sedaris is my hero. He spent his thirties on drugs and performance art. Was a voracious smoker and drinker for many years, and doesn't drive a car. There are so many reasons to love this brilliant man, including his latest collection of brilliant personal essays, gone a little more tender and dark than his earlier works of staggering genius, titled When You are Engulfed in Flames.
5.0
Carson McCullers is one of my favorite all-time writers and The Heart is a Lonely Hunter is one of my favorite all-time novels. When you never forget the story, when the characters stay with you for years, when what those characters saw and felt become part of what you see and feel from then on out, you know you've read something straight from the heart of the divine. So tender. So rich. So vast and kind and knowing and sad. An absolute masterwork.
6.0
Well, there are many reasons to read this book. It's a must-read, isn't it? If only to find out why, as Eef Barzalay of Clem Snide sings in the brilliant "The End of Love," pop gem, "the first book every killer reads is Catcher in the Rye," or as my dad penned in a copy to my brother, to take, "a step into the world and apart from it." Go on. You know you want to.
7.0
Another classic. Much myth surrounds Sylvia Plath. Because of that whole head in the oven thing that ended her life. But, for me, it's the work, not the myth, that keeps me entranced, and The Bell Jar is an incredible testament to many things, including the amazing corset of conformity breaking the breath of every artist alive in the 1950s, as well as the incredible paths Plath blazed for the serious women writers to follow her. A brilliant, fiery poet, Plath's passion carries this fine work of biographical fiction along like a comet or something. Also, it's not her only work of fiction.
8.0
Cormac McCarthy is just terrifying in every way. His language, his force, his imagination, and his power. Awe. The Road, amazingly enough was an Oprah favorite, and this post-apocolypse rendered so masterfully by McCarthy is terrifyingly realistic, and stark, and insanely fucking brilliant.
9.0
Haven't read this yet, but it's by Geraldine Brooks and won the Pulitzer Prize. It's probably pretty good. Not as good as Danielle Steele, but up there, you know? According to Dave at Powells.com (p.s. shop online at Powell's or other independent bookstores online instead of Amazon...trust me), this is what March: A Novel is all about: In her follow-up to Year of Wonders, Geraldine Brooks has taken historical fiction to another dimension altogether. Using America's Civil War as her frame, she plants a famous (but deeply mysterious) literary figure at its center: Mr. March, the absent father in Louisa May Alcott's classic, Little Women. The result is a wholly original novel, a rich re-imagining of the nation's political and literary foundations, and arguably Brooks's finest work to date(Dave, Powells.com).
10.0
This was made into a fine film by director Sofia Coppola. But before The Virgin Suicides became a film, it was an even sweeter, softer, impossibly aching novel by the Greek Jeffrey Eugenides. One of my favorite books ever, ever, ever.
11.0
I picked this book up at the library when I was in high school, thinking it was a love story about geeky people, not the people who eat chicken heads, which is what this story's talking about when it talks about geeks. It's all about a family of self-made circus freaks. I had the incredible pleasure of seeing this book's adaptation performed life in Atlanta...a performance as equally powerful and unforgettable as the book, Geek Love by Katherine Dunn, is itself.
12.0
Again, yeah, sure, Atonement was an amazing movie. But the book's way, way better, because you get to see inside the mind of one of the best-written characters in modern history, the narrator, the little girl, the storyteller, the liar, the innocent who ruins lives. You totally don't get that in the movie. I have an incredible affection for this character, and Ian McEwan is a genius writer.
13.0
The third in a series of hilarious, thouching meditations on author Anne Lamott's wayward paths into faith and love, this is another book I want to read...have read her previous two, Traveling Mercies: Thoughts on Faith; Plan B: Further Thoughts on Faith, as well as her brilliant Bird by Bird writing companion plus all her novels (I want her to be my best friend). It's called Grace (Eventually), in it she writes, "I wish grace and healing were more abracadabra kinds of things, that delicate silver bells would ring to announce grace’s arrival. But no, it's clog and slog and scotch, on the floor, in the silence, in the dark."

fin.

I Have Dreams, Too

Such as, covetations pour:

1.0
Adorable kitties from adorable Penguin + Fish blog.
2.0
Good idea for cheap + beautiful window dressing from the gorgeous Plus d'idee que d'argent blog.
3.0
Gorgeous purple dream bedroom (surrounded by books, oh, my!) from James Mohn Design.
4.0
I already have a kitteh, but I love these "flat pets"...so clever, literally flat pets for your flat, i.e., apartment. From Chris Ratcliffe at garudio studiage.

30 September 2008

{Various Pretties + Happies + Heartstopperies}



Feeling balanced again, which is so pleasant. Enough sleep. Enough food. Enough breath. Fewer cigarettes. Less caffiene. Now, if I could just get that hulahooping thing to be a regular element of my day, all might be well. So, just a little bit of stuff:

1.0
My cat, she clawed my eyelid in an attempt to open it. Not a massive injury, but startling nonetheless. Now, I sleep more cautiously.
2.0
I finally got the new Jenny Lewis, Acid Tongue. Excellent. Still growing on me. Godspeed, Acid Tongue, and Carpetbaggers are my current favorites.
3.0
Finally saw Control. Good stuff. Brilliant stuff, actually. No one can demystify a man like his wife. Joy Division, You Cunt, and all that. Now listening to all the Joy Division possible and have regained a slight Ian Curtis obsession much more voracious than that of my teenage years, which is quite alarming, actually.
4.0
Finished the Twilight series. Amazing. The first vampire series I've read/been in love with since Interview with The Vampire, et al. Holy Lord. Just read them!
5.0
Still not writing. Somebody please help me!
6.0
Ignoring all economic and political news unless its on the Onion or Jon Stewart Show.
7.0
Still not calling people back, but still loving them.
8.0
Checked out the "Original Laugh-Out-Loud" cat. Very educational.
9.0
Reading Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro. Happy to return to literaryness.
10.0
Will possibly be harboring a teenager on my couch for a week or two.

Next post will me much more interesting, I promise.