It doesn't affect my selection, but it makes me feel like I'm cheating even though I didn't intend that.

For example, probably half of the books I've read have been adolescent literature. I have been reading that because I had a class last semester on it and I got some favorite authors and other interests that I wanted to check out. I read a Gossip Girl novel, two Zusak novels that were short, The Pigman, and a couple others. They're so short that they don't take as long as something like World War Z.

It doesn't have any influence on my decision, but it does make me feel a little dirty. It's just pure coincidence though that most of what I've read lately has been shorter. I think I'll make the goal easily because I read a ton in the summer compared to when I have classes.


diddy, I read 35 from mid May (summer) to the end of 2007. If I can hit that again this year I can take a month and a half off. I just read a lot during the summers because I enjoy it. I only set the goal to make sure I didn't slack.

Plus, I have this overwhelming feeling that I need to educate myself on the "canon" more before I get into high school classrooms. That's a big part of why I read Steinbeck's Mice and Men again.

I just started reading "Lush Life," by Richard Price. So far, it seems quite intriguing.

I haven't read Richard Price for a long time, but I read all his early stuff, and he used to be really great. I'm curious if he still has what he used to have.

This is my first Price book, so I can't offer comparisons. But I really like it after the first 100 pages or so.

Did Price write 'The Wanderers'? That was pretty good.

Yes he did.

I have never heard of Richard Price. Wiki says he did the screenplay for Color of Money. Good enough to interest me.

He's been a tremendously well respected screenwriter in Hollywood for a long time because of his gift with dialogue and for making characters feel lived in and natural. He got there on the strength of his strong popular and critical reputation from his first few novels, all of which created really good working class characters. He was one of the writers I once gave the "read everything he has written" treatment to, but that was long long ago.

better by atul gawande

it's a collection of essays by this general surgeon who's a staff writer for the new yorker. most of them are previously published pieces about the medical world, with the tying thread that they all deal with ways of improving performance: how to better serve people in third world countries, how to better deal with health insurance in america, how to better protect against infection, etc. despite my description which, having read it over, may not seem all that interesting to a lot of you, it's a good book and reads quickly.

Our Man in Havana is definitely "whimsical." I love Graham Greene.

I was looking him up on Amazon and reading up on The Power and the Glory and the travel book he wrote which gave him some of his background material and it rekindled my interest in the guy. The only novel of his I think I read was The Human Factor.

Has anyone read The Brief and Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz (the 2008 Pulitzer Prize winner in fiction)? Recommend it?

I ask because I read some of his short stories from his collection Drown and didn't like them at all. Curious to see if the novel is drastically different from the short stories.

I'm not happy with the August:Osage County getting the Pulitzer for drama either. I saw it here in NYC and it's definitely not Pulitzer-Prize worthy...

Haven't read it, but it comes highly recommended from colleagues whose opinion I respect on such matters. The name "Oscar Wao" is based on the character mishearing "Oscar Wilde," for whatever that's worth.

Starting on Edmund Wilson's To the Finland Station.

Currently reading Genghis: Birth of an Empire, a historical fiction on Genghis Khan. Really really great read, I'm enjoying it alot. Recently bought a few books of Amazon:

Pillars of the Earth

The Lords of Discipline

Dawn of Empire

if anyone has read any of these feel free to comment.

I enjoyed the Lords of Discipline a lot. It's my second favorite Conroy book after the Prince of Tides. His other books: The Great Santini and The Water is Wide, Beach Music, The Losing Season and The Boo are all eminently readable. He seems to put a touch of autobiography in all his books though The Water is Wide is the only official autobiography. He does annoy a lot of family and friends when he comes out with a book unfortunately for him.

Maybe some of his writings have a little self-exorcism quality?

I ran across this quote by Conroy contrasting his mood when writing versus his wife's mood, novelist Cassandra King:

"I'll hear her cackle with laughter at some funny line she's written. I've never cackled with laughter at a single line I've ever written. None of it has given me pleasure. She writes with pleasure and joy, and I sit there in gloom and darkness."

Personally I'm reading a book that a friend recommended: The Undomesticated Goddess by Sophie Kinsella. I have to work my way through it fast since its a library book. My other current book is Proust's first volume of "In Search of Lost Time" which I am reading very slooooowly. I've found you can't read Proust when you're tired at all his sentences are just too long to be comprehended if you're the least bit tired.

I read Our Man in Havana just last summer. I enjoyed it, so I'll second or third the recommendation. It's short and fun.

For those interested, the book is set in Cuba in the 50s. The main character is a man named Wormold who is approached to become a spy for England. Eager of the extra money he accepts but doesn't really know how to actually *be* a spy. Hijinks ensue. The book is a good bit of satire.

One of the bits that sticks with me was when Captain Segura spoke about which people belong to the "torturable class" and which do not.

I've just recently finished:
The Master and Margarita - Bulgakov
Freakonomics
The Gambler - Dostoevsky

I liked each of them a lot. I'm not sure what's next.

Any thoughts on any of them Mark? I've read the last two you mentioned. I liked Freakonomics a lot, thinking it had very interesting snippets of analysis. It was pretty cool to apply economics to those questions. I thought the Gambler was good, but not great. It didn't seem that interesting a story (or way to tell it). Sounds like Dostoevsky being desperate for money made him rush that book.

I feel so utterly humbled when i read this thread and listen to people like Blarg and John Cole that I don't really feel like I have much to add. That's why I didn't say anything about those books, but since you asked...

Freakonomics

I read a fair bit of non-fiction. Currently my reading is at least 50/50 fiction/non-fiction. This is by far one of the best non-fiction books I have read recently. I mean, it's not "the best", if I was to rank it in some type of literary means. I have recently just finished "Gulag" by Anne Applebaum which won the pullitzer, but Freaknomics is SO FUN. It's so quirky. I couldn't put it down. I finished it in two days. I can't imagine anyone on 2+2 who would not find this book interesting. It feels like we are the perfect demographic for this book.

The Gambler

The book I have is two of Dostoevksy's novellas. The Double, and The Gambler. Earlier in this thread I talk about The Double, and initially I did not like it but after a while I got into it and began to understand his writing style and what he was trying to say and really began to like it. The Double is considered one of Dostoevsky's lesser works. I took some time off before starting The Gambler though.

Now that I have finished The Gambler, I will have to disagree with you. I thought it was great. I thought his character development was incredible. There were so many rich, fully defined characters in the story and all told from the first person. Again, it took me at least two chapters to get into this but once I did I read it fast. I really liked this a lot and I think he does an incredible job of describing the phychy of a degenerate gambler. The characters surrounding the gambler are also very interesting and I think it gives a nice little snippett of tsarist russian philosophy. Maybe I'm wrong. Like I said, I'm not a literary guy and feel immensely humbled in this thread.

Master and Margarita

Wow. Seriously, I think this is one of the better books I have ever read. Not the best, but defintiely top 5. It's fun, it's interesting, it has great characters and it's rooted in Faust which is terrific. When I was reading it I kept thinking to myself, "this will make a terrific movie!" Of course, the nudity may become problematic in that sense, but other than that wow. I think this will translate very well to the big screen some day. I will be reading more Bulgakov in the future for sure.

One thing to know is that Dostoevsky was a degenerate gambler himself. After being in prison in Siberia for 10 years and almost executed, he started gambling a lot in prison. It seems like when you have nothing to lose, the thrill comes from losing instead of winning. That was interesting in "The Gambler"

It's in my favourites too - I really ought to get round to re-reading. In case you're interested (having similar taste and all) other tops are Perfume by Suskind, Midnight's Children by Rushdie, A Fine Balance by Mistry and The Wind Up Bird Chronicles by Muarakami

You're right, it sounds like it might be dry. But articles of that type that I've read in the New Yorker have tended to be pretty good reading.

I read Gawande's first collection and it's far from dry. Gawande deals with problems common to most hopital patients and writes about his own education as a doctor. I also recommend Richard Selzer for another fine writer who is also a surgeon.

After trying to read Crime and Punishment I think if anyone in the world ever NEEDED a thrill it'd have to be Doestoevsky. Did he write his novels all before his visits to the gulag or after? He's considered to be a philosopher as well. Don't know if the philosophy is based on his literature alone or if he has philosophical treatises in addition to his novels.