Literary musings

I figure it's time to open up the ol' blog to book reviews! Yay - I know you're stoked. As my brother said when I told him about this post, "I don't even read books, why would I want to read about them?" Either way, I'll let you know what I've finished, and what I'm reading currently.



"Breakfast at Tiffany's and Other Short Stories" by Truman Capote - I was given this book for Christmas by a dear friend and read it in little bits here and there. My friend had realized that everyone had seen the movie and no one had read the book. My husband and I had seen the movie at the Paramount last summer (get in on this, it is such a fun place to see a movie), so she figured I could be the first. First off, while the character of Holly is pretty much exactly the same, although not much of the rest of it is. "Fred," the narrator is just a writer and not a kept man in the same vane as Holly is a kept woman. The very end is different as well - I won't spoil it, though. However, I'm glad to have read it. Mr. Capote's way of writing Holly is very endearing and her character is compelling, as flawed as it is. You feel like everyone else in her periphery - a bystander drawn in by her personality, an acquaintance consumed by pity at her naivete, and a friend that she has hurt in her whirlwind of a lifestyle. I remember that the movie "Capote" suggested that Mr. Capote was not thrilled by the casting of Audrey Hepburn in the lead - I can't really separate the two - and at this point in pop culture, they are synonymous. While "Breakfast at Tiffany's" is the star story (and the longest), the other 3 are no slouches. My favorite was the last one, "A Christmas Memory." It recounts the story of a 7-year-old boy and his best friend, an aging female relative. They spend their days together with an old dog, save their money to make fruitcakes for all of their acquaintances (and the President) and love each other fiercely. The other two stories are about a reformed prostitute in the Dominican Republic and about an old man in prison. Both are told with such great imagery, that my mind's eye can picture the setting and the characters as I type this. The only other work I have read by Truman Capote is "In Cold Blood," and reading these stories made me want to get ahold of more of his fiction. Recommended!



Confession time...I read "Twilight" by Stephanie Meyer, and even worse, I liked it! As far as easy to read and compelling - this book is it! Once I got going, I didn't want to put it down. Yes, it's silly, and yes (like the Vanity Fair profile pointed out) Meyer describes Edward's perfect beauty way too often, but it is still good old vampire fun. One thing I will say about Meyer's writing (and I read this somewhere else, but I can't recall where) is that she evokes that feeling of teenage like/love as accurately as when I felt it all those years ago (haha). She brings back that crazy tension of "do I like him? does he like me?" and sitting so close to someone that you just want to touch them, icy vampire or not. I liked her interesting setting of the Pacific Northwest, as it is something I am way not familiar with. It's not as edgy as the vampire literature I read as a teen ("The Last Vampire" saga by Christopher Pike, I have re-read it since and it's still good), but it was still a lot of fun. I am looking forward to reading the next one (one my co-worker's teenage daughter finishes it), and I may even cave and rent the movie (don't tell my husband!).

I'm currently reading "The God of Small Things" by Arundhati Roy. I first became familiar with Roy while watching a documentary she was featured in in my Hinduism Seminar in college. The documentary was about damming one of the main rivers in India - by damming it to use the energy for a wealthy dwelling up river, they were depriving poor communities downstream of fresh water and livelihood. Fascinating. This book is pretty upfront about poverty, the residual caste system, and colonization in India, and I've had to put it down to take a break, but that doesn't mean it's bad. It's just real, and some times you have to take that in small doses.

There are two other books I would say I'm reading right now as well. One is "How I Became Stupid" by Martin Page. This is my husband's favorite book and I'm doing all I can to read it (after all, he read my favorite book - "Bunny Bunny: A Sort-of Love Story" by Alan Zwiebel - on my recommendation), but I can muster up no feelings of warmth for the main character. He is a self-important French college graduate who thinks that stupid people are happier, since he is so tortured by his intellect. I bet I have read a chapter a month (and it's not that long) - so we'll see when I finish. I feel like it has to get good because my husband loves it so much, but it hasn't happened yet. The other one is "Chuck Klosterman IV: A Decade of Curious People and Dangerous Ideas." I have pretty much read all of Chuck Klosterman's collections pretty voraciously - I think he has a biting wit and I appreciate his nerdy honesty. However, Part IV of this book is a fiction novella. I'm used to reading his non-fiction essays, reviews, and interviews - so it's been hard to switch the brain over to fiction. I need to since his newest work ("Downtown Owl" is a fiction book. I think I'll get this one finished before "How I Became Stupid."

To read is always an interesting list...there are a ton of books I'd like to read, but I'm not as good as getting around to them as I used to be. Of course, "New Moon" is at the top of the list once I get my little paws on it (I decided to not buy it at Best Buy this weekend - it seems more like Half-Price Books purchase). From there I have "The Brothers Karamazov" by Dostoyevsky hanging around along with Marx's "Communist Manifesto." Don't be impressed, ask me how long those have been on my bookshelf unopened. I'll probably get distracted by the 2 for 3 table at Borders again before I get to those.

Are you reading anything interesting? Or anything at all?