April '24 Reading

 Continuing with the short story project and also taking on a daily poetry fix. By way of saying, another low number is predicted.

1. Tatlin! Guy Davenport. I hold Davenport in high esteem, and as I'm working through the 2,000 pages of letters, I thought this would be a good time to revisit. In context of his letters (and essays, which I've also been dipping into), these 'assemblages' come alive with his interests--Heraklitos, bicycles, the archaic, an orderly life, Greek love (and an otherwise obscure interest in air travel comes to the fore).
2. New Yorker of 8/29/2022. An archival issue full of treats like K. Tynan's long profile of Louise Brooks. 
3. The Visionaries: Arendt, Beauvoir, Rand, Weil, and the Power of Philosophy in Dark Times. A group biography of four women philosophers (or 3 + 1 influential fraud) all displaced by politics and war. The greatest flaw is taking Ayn Rand seriously. 
4. Marvel Two-In-One: Project Pegasus. While breaking one rule of the classic super-hero team up (which are typically one-and-done), this relishes in the others (early fight based on misunderstanding, an approximately 6:1 ratio of A-list to B-list stars, brief origin stories of those lesser-knowns, etc.)
5. Void Rivals by Robert Kirkman. Engages in numerous sf tropes, including the star-crossed lovers, we're just the same, etc. It incorporates the Transformers and, if promo material is to be believed, will find its way to G.I. Joe. 
6. Sex Criminals v. 1: One Weird Trick. The narrator Betty Page look alike, probably Matt Fraction stand-in for "This Fucking Guy," the last gasp of information scarcity, the taste of first romance and it's fading, the medicated generation, and so on. 
7. Semiosis by Sue Burke. It was okay, with some clunky passages. Probably should have been rewritten, but the basic idea--first contact with a plant intelligence (rainbow bamboo, to be precise) told across generations in what is essentially a series of short stories--is promising. Unfortunately, the overall arc is 'species destroys one ecosystem and travels across the galaxy to teach a tree about life."
8. Pure by Carol Frost. A lot of these poems in a flexible 11-line structure. Her line is generally pretty long so it breaks many times across these pages. I like this passage that uses a short line to focus intensity. A fisher(wo)man decides to "give up, walk to the lighted house, and join the others at a table/ to talk of life, love, logic and the senes, memory, promise, betrayal, character/ and fate--the driving notion /that around the river bend a magnificent fish waits, prickling the black water." This sequence of lines starts with16 words,  continues with 13, snaps to a sharp 5, and concludes with 13.
9. The Nation for March 2024. Kate Wagner writes a book review that incorporates a bit of personal experience of her life in cities. A potential model for an assignment. 
10. The Magic Labyrinth  Book 4 of Riverworld, written as the finale and it will be for me. A lot of explaining and rebuttals of anticipated objections. A real let down. 
11. NYer of 3/25/24: "The art of Gustave Klimt makes me feel as though I am face to face with God, if God is a charming, faintly trashy type who leers more than he enlightens and seems oddly desperate for my approval." Jackson Arn
12. Traffic by Gil Ott. Short, imagistic poem at top of the page, prose excerpt at the bottom. Varying white space in the middle, lines of communication with facing page (except for first and last of the 80... poems?) 
13. Thasos and Ohio. Poems and Translations by Guy Davenport. While a lyrical writer, the poem is not his forte. But still, "The Cookham dead began to rise/When God with April in his eyes/Ended in O its midst the night." And it ends "Dominions, thrones, and powers shout/Hosanna! Adorenus O/The silver C sharp trumpets blow."
14. Hole in the Wall: New & Selected Poems by Tom Pickard. Sharp, chiseled language infused with working class history and sense of history in place. Favorites" "Cowboy Is King," "Birthplace Bronchitis," "Spring Tide" (for Basil Bunting), "First Poem This Century," "Stinkhorn," "Labyrinth," many others. 
15. The Hollow Places by T. Kingfisher. Written in a light and sarcastic tone that calls to mind smarmy discussion fora of the early oughts. Clearly written by seat of pants--the repetition of points that don't matter (the abandoned mental hospital) and continued rep of those that ultimately do (corpse-otter carving).  Quick read, and bad. 

March 24 Reading

 This month I'm focusing on completing (hopefully) the Vander Meers' mammoth anthology The Weird, so likely it will be another month with a small total. 

1. NYer 2/26/24. Pretty good story about Afghan community in Sacramento by Jamil Jan Kochai. 
2. The Nation Feb. 24. The Desi community may be big enough to swing the election. 
3. Empty Theater by Jac Jemc. More a speculative dual biography than anything else.
4. NYer 3/4/24. "Eat" by Joy Harjo. 
5. The Scandal of Father Brown. GKC. I don't have a great memory (ha ha) but these are not the best, nor are they the worst FB stories. I liked the last ("The Vampire of the Village") the best (
6. The Weird by VanderMeer and VanderMeer. About 500 pages too long.
7. Chesterton: Man and Mask by Garry Wills. Thorough survey of his career, best is stand-alone essay on Thursday.  Very little on Father Brown, but considers "The Fairy Tale of FB" to be the most significant (last one before conversion). 
8. EQQM Nov/Dec 22. 
9. NYer 10/3/22. Owner of EDM nightclub in Ibiza sez "The problem with this kind of music is you have to take drugs to listen to it."
10. NYer 3/18/24.  Liberal arts curricula coopted by the right wing. 
11. The Arab of the Future. Vol. 1.  Didn't like the visual style, found the pacing to be boring, and children torture a dog. Will not be continuing. 

Feb 24 Reading

Only a few actual books last month, and February may be the same.

1. NYer 2/5/24. Rae Armantrout as finest living poet? 
2. NYer  5/23/22. The entire budget of the South Dakota Symphony Orchestra is less than the salary of the conductor of the Chicago SO. 
3. The Nation, Jan.24 Article on how early American families (Roosevelts etc) profited from opium trade. 
4. Invincible v. 12: Hmm, I don't remember this so well...
5. Invincible v. 11: Oh, that's why!
6. Redwall by Brian Jacques. "Jess [the squirrel] observed there was difference between slaving under a tyrant and voluntary cooperation that arose from determination and good fellowhip."
7. Best American Short Stories of the Century. (775 pages). Top="That Evenin' Sun," "Crazy Sunday" (FSF),  "That In Aleppo Once.." VN; The Farmer's Children (Bishop); "Where I'm Calling From"; "The Things Tehy Carried"; Mensetting (Alice Monroe); "Soon" (Pam Durban)
8. Questioning Minds: The Letters of Guy Davenport & Hugh Kenner. There's a lot. Over time Davenport's letters emerged as more humane, HK seems brittle and a bit pretentious at times. 
9. NYer 1/29/24 [Song dynasty poet Wei T'ai] said poetry 'should be precise about the thing and tericent about the feeling."

Jan 24 Reading

 My goal this year is one short story a day, but I'll only post the "book version" (anthology or collection). I'll continue to include New Yorker issues, simply because it helps with the backlog. Speaking of which,

1. NYer 12/4//23. (Teju Cole short story). 
2. NYer 11/13/23 (including a Clare Sestanovich ss, plus feature on Ridley Scott and review by Wood of House of Doors)
3. Superman:Space Age by Russel and Allred. Clever use of one of the Infinite Earths, including a "retcon" to well, when it happened. 
4. Fantastic Four by Ryan North: Whatever Happened to the Fantastic Four. Accentuates the Johnny (Jonny?) is the worst (or his least favorite) and Dr. Susan Storm-Richards the best (his favorite). Reed a verbose explainer and Ben a simple, kind man (as always). 
5. Richard Stark's Parker: The Hunter. Lots of text. Lots of pages with no text. Not great as a comic.
6. NYer 12/18/23. Gopnick on comedy: Marx Bros=optimism; Tati=pessimsim; Keaton=stoicism; Chaplin=humanism. Larger point: "Comedy has a range as large as human feeling"
7. NYer 10/17/22. Strange David Gilbert story "Come Softly To Me" plus Lydia Millet review.
8. Planet of Exile. Secretly the story of how a genetic mutation led to the exiled Far born being assimilated (though it's never said)
9. NYer 1/8/24. Next three all finished while travelling
10. NYer 9/19/22
11. NYer 3/21/22. Running count 7!
12. NYer 4/17/23. Emahoy, the musical genius Ethiopian nun. 
13. NYer 10/2/23. Featuring "Bruises" by Graham Swift. Veteran pointed in right direction home. 
14. NYer 3/13/23. "Terriers are deranged animals who could probably teach us a lot about how brains pointlessly track small movements and changes; these traits of theirs far exceed those needed to hunt small rustling prey." Rivka Galchen, "How I Became a Vet."
15. NYer 12/25/23. Games and comics. Longish comic on Patricia Highsmith. 
16. NYer 1/15/24. Smart double review of Frantz Fanon and Ian Fleming biographies. 
17. NYer 10/24/22. Wendell Pierce as Wally Loman.
18. Dinosaurs by Lydia Millet. Fave scene: "'you have a lovely house/'so do you." They agreed. They both had lovely houses. They had bought them with money."
19. NYer 8/15/22. Anthony Lane's review of Bodies Bodies Bodies: in most whodunnits you don't particularly care about who dies, but "I found myself actively willing the extinction of every single character, if possible in conspicuous agony."
20. NYer 10/10/22. Gotta go, my Mom jeans and Dad jeans are here.
21. NYer 1/22/24. Final count-16!

Dec 23 Reading

I'll have more time this month maybe?

1. NYer 10/23/23. Need to catch up.
2. NYer 11/6/2023. Remnick's Letter from Israel
3. NYer 11/27/23. New font for bylines? How dare they! New Haven pizza? Intrigued!
4. NYer 9/18/23. Emily Wilson (translator) is super annoying.
5. Babel by R.F. Kuang. 3 complaints and 3 concessions. Complaints 1)scene constructions 2)flat characters 3)anachronistic dialogue Concessions 3)It's well researched2)It's polemic, so 1)the magic system is cool
6. Lost Time by Jozek Czapski
7. Fante Bukowski by Noah van Scriver
8. How to Do Nothing: Resisting the Attention Economy.
9. NYer 12/11/23. John Adams reviewing book on memorials in music, includes discussion of his 9/11 memorial ("On the Transmigration of Souls")
10. How Proust Can Change Your Life: Not a Novel by Alain de Botton. The simple lesson is don't read great literature with your eyes, see the world with their eyes. 
11. The Dark Design (Riverworld v. 3). I mentally steampunk it as I read along, changing batteries to wood-fired boilers etc.
12. NYer 11/20/23. Sheila Heti wrote "According to Alice" with help of AI. It starts "My name is Alice and I was born from an egg that fell out of Mommy's butt."
    

Nov 23 Reading

Hopefully I can use the Turkey Break to do better this month, but numbers-wise I might be hampered by the two long books I'm planning to read.

1. Cop Killer--One of the better Martin Becks, despite a crazy coincidence bringing two plot lines together. A pointedly ironic title, as the titular character was only along for the ride. You can tell the authors are getting ready to wrap up the series, as they're bringing a ton of past characters back for a walk-on (even the killer from book 1).
2. The Terrorists--the conclusion to the ten volume series. Some dark comedy, like the assassinated preseidente's head propelled through the hotel window into Gunvald Larson's new suit.
3. The Tiger's Wife by Tea Obreht. A workshop novel, with its liberal political stances, polished prose (including redundant descriptions, often in triplicate), and detachable (workshopable) chapters. Not bad, but that's what it is. 
4. 101 Books to Read Before You're Murdered. Not well-written and not really trustworthy. But with that title I couldn't stop. 
5. Time Regained. Not that long (552 pages), but one of the reasons for the same number of books read this month. 
6. Curtain. The final Poirot mystery by Agatha Christie. 

In the end I only read one of the two long books, so this was a very disappointing month by the numbers. But hey, I finished In Search of Lost Time for a second time, so that's something!

Oct 23 Reading

 Continuing the continuance...

1. Creepshow v1. 
2. NYer 9/25/23. Fashion issue
3. Ninefox Gambit. I'm thinking about this in relation to Gideon the Ninth (science-fantasy set up), A Memory Called Empire, and to a lesser extent  Ancillary Justice. 
4. The Abominable Man which is another Martin Beck. The AbMan is a cop, and one of the comic relief cops is killed by a rooftop sniper! Uncool!
5. The Locked Room which is yet another Martin Beck. Martin solves a crime, but the criminal is sent up for another one, which he did not commit. 
6. NYer 10/9/23. Hanif Abdurraquib makes his debut (maybe) as pop music critic, as does Jackson Arn (maybe again) in art
7. Halloween Party Poirot investigates a child murder with the help of author stand-in Ariadne Oliver. Some creepy filligree around the complicated plot.
8. NYer 9/11/23. George Eliot lived in sin.
9. Tomb of Dracula. Gene Colan and diverse hands. The first half is the color comic, while the second is the first part of the Dracula Lives magazine run. 
10. The Fugitive. Marcel Proust. 
11. NYer 10/16/23. McPhee on Bill Bradley. He shredded the Persian carpet with nervous energy while working on his thesis. 
12. The Writer's Library by Nancy Pearl and Jeff Schwager. I like reading what writers have to say about reading. I do so enough that it takes away from my reader. 
13. NYer 10/30/23. 4 in, 5 out. Profile on Jim Jordan. Review essay on Bill Waterson.

A disappointing month, but ended with an auspicious number and I did watch 31 horror movies, so...