I didn't love the ending but it was very good overall.

The Diaries of Emilio Renzi by Ricardo Piglia who described his journal "my own story, as if written by someone else." Some threads back I linked an essay about the work in the NYR. As much or more Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man as strict journal. The first and last chapters are in the third person and are written in 2015 as he sat dying of ALS. Very readable, as he struggles to find his way as a writer. This first of three volumes depicts him barely out of high school, his love affairs, his friends (like the upscale burglar Cocho), his thoughts on writers including many Americans who influenced his literary hardboiled detective stories to come. The bars he wrote and cavorted in. And especially his grandfather and his experiences in WW1. This is as much novel as diary and is both for readers, serious and other, and writers.
Early on he recounts his first experience with a book. He was three and had seen his grandfather often reading...he takes a book outside and sits on the curb and opens it. A shadow of a man looms over him..."little boy you have the book upside down." In later years he liked to think that man was Borges.

I really liked Bosch on Amazon Prime so I'm currently mainlining Michael Connelly's Bosch novels.

i was a big fan of the bosch series as well and bought an audiobook which I'm super stoked for as its narrated by titus welliver who I've loved since deadwood but haven't got around to listening yet, how are you enjoying the books?

I've read all the Bosch books and liked them. Also, books about Elvis Cole and Joe Pike by Robert Crais are kind of similar. Michael Connelly and Robert Crais know each other and Bosch and Elvis Cole cross paths in a couple books. Not really part of the plot and not mentioned by name so you have to have read both to recognize them.

Listening to 2018 Booker winner Milkman. Multiple reviews suggested it was a 'hard book', perhaps easier to listen to than read but I'm not so sure. It's tough going. A first person quasi stream of consciousness style - the narrator has a tendency to duplicate, stating essentially the same thing consecutively in multiple different ways - I find this annoying and suspect it would be less so had I the option to quickly skip over the repetitions. A particularly jarring example is when she lists all the name Catholics (during The Troubles) were 'banned' from giving their babies. They took a couple of (tedious) minutes to list but if reading I'd power through them all in ~10 seconds. Not sure if I'll finish this, haven't listened for a couple of days and not feeling the urge to dip back in. We'll see.

Reading Stephen King's The Long Walk. I read it years ago but wanted to re-read it. One of his most underrated books imo, written as Bachman earlier in his career. It's a short, brutal book, and an absolute page-turner that can be read in one sitting. Feels like it was inspired by Shirley Jackson's The Lottery. The action starts with page 1 and never relents. I've recommended it to many friends who don't even like King, and they have all thought it was great.

This has been in my on-deck list for a while. King mentions it in his book on writing, which I recommend.

Rereading Jacob de Zoet, so GOAT.

Reading John Cleese's autobiography, and it's great....halfway through and we still haven't gotten to Python yet, but his writing is so charming and detailed, that it's a pleasure to read.

Finished Snare by Lilja Sigur∂ardóttir. An extremely well told genuine noir story (everyone is corrupted in keeping with Otto Penzler's definition of noir) with a good plot. In translation the writing is very good, not quite excellent. One of those difficult to put down novels.

Reading Ridley Walker by Russel Hoban.

Anyone else read this? I'm not far into it yet and the fact it is written in a form of English that is different from the one we use means it's taking me a bit of time to get through despite not being a big book.

Young Men in Spats. A subversive collection of twisted tales full of demonic undertones.

The Revenge of Geography, by Robert D. Kaplan. I found the book interesting and useful thought I doubt some of the basis and thesis of his synthesis world overview, derived mainly from other thinkers. But it is well written and a worthwhile read and gives grounding in historical perspective(s). A thing lacking in many such undertakings. He even mentions Thucydides. A shocking reference. I would only recommend this book to people who think humanity is an important and serious topic. It is not of course.

I only read the book because someone gave it to me as a gift. The title is somewhat silly - obviously concocted to help sell the book.

I read it a long time ago. You tune in to the language after a while, IIRC. Then there's a part in the middle where normal language reappears briefly, which was slightly moving, I thought.

I have 3-4 Mitchell books in the rotation every year. Just kee looping back to beginning

Re read this one this year

It’s so good

I tried listening to Brave New World on cd, that just wasn't happening, my brain rebelled. Gonna try Walden now, Thoreau gassing on and on about nature crap I can probably take. Those bestselling chick thrillers I find are perfect for listening, maybe nature books will be the same.

Reading The Beastie Boys Book, by Adam Horovitz and Mike Diamond, and it is great fun. Has other people chiming in, too.

It's big! And colorful, with a ton of pictures. Had no idea Ad-Rock was the son of of playwright Israel Horovitz. Love the stories of the three Beasties hanging out in an NYU dorm with Rick Rubin, learning how to rap after being in a hardcore band together.

Finished Trap by Lilja Sigur∂ardóttir. The follow-up to Snare, it is very noir and very good. If you read Trap and like it, you should read this. Not available in the U.S. until April 1, 2019, but worth the wait.

Finished Bonfire of the Vanities a couple of weeks back. Forgot how good Tom Wolfe was. His prose just sings! The way he draws characters and scenes is incredible.

Reading numerous books on Hollywood Romantic Comedy, including a BFI imprint on When Harry Met Sally . . .

Just read Killing Comendatore by Marukami- if you like him, you’ll like this.

Command and control, by Eric Schlosser(?). It's a freaking miracle that we've not accidentally launched a global thermonuclear war. Terrifying.

Just finished Born a Crime by Trevor Noah.
Highly recommended, aside from the comedy it's also very informative about south africa's history/culture. It will definitely make you laugh at times and one of the better biographies I've read.

Because of the editorial project that has had me tied into knots, I've mostly been lurking (and commenting on the posts of others from time to time), but I haven't been posting about my own reading. I have continued to read and now that I'm finally finished, I want to start posting again -- beginning with what has really impressed me among the new (i.e 2018) novels I read.

First on my list is Randy Kennedy's Presidio, a rare merging of literary writing and noir. It's a compulsively-readable tale of a Texas car-thief on the road one last time and of two people his life intersects with. (I picked it up because the NY Times gave it such an enthusiastic review.) One of the characters is a young girl the protagonist finds himself trying to help. She has the vividness of Mattie Ross in Charles Portis’s True Grit!

Also high on my list was Esi Edugyan's Washington Black, the 2018 Giller winner (you might think of that as the Canadian equivalent of the National Book Award), her second Giller for her second novel! (Washington Black was also short-listed for the Booker.) An interesting take on the slave narrative with a touch of Jules Verne-like adventure as its driving force.

And no matter how much you may feel you've had enough of identity politics, I strongly recommend Tommy Orange's There, There, as an extraordinary riff on urban indigenous existence in the US.

On the poker narrative front, I was somewhat disappointed by Anthony Holden and Natalie Galustian's short fiction anthology He Played for His Wife and Other Stories (also 2018)--though the first story is solid. [41] Here are my two favourite lines: and