Now reading...

[Brad]

Recently finished this. It’s excellent. Now in paperback.

Now reading:

Edited September 28, 2022 by Brad

[jlhoots]

Laura Warrell: Sweet, Soft, Plenty Rhythm

[Bluesnik]

After finishing Simon Reynolds book on post-punk today I started this, which collects all of the Bandini novels by John Fante.

On 9/28/2022 at 11:19 PM, Brad said:

What is this? It reminds me of that great Iggy Pop song, inspired I think by his many train travels with Bowie in the late 70s. I listened to it once in the 80s on a walkman on a train blasting through Europe. And it was the perfect soundtrack. I remember it very vividly.

Edited October 24, 2022 by Bluesnik
typos

[Brad]

15 hours ago, Bluesnik said:

After finishing Simon Reynolds book on post-punk today I started this, which collects all of the Bandini novels by John Fante.

What is this? It reminds me of that great Iggy Pop song, inspired I think by his many train travels with Bowie in the late 70s. I listened to it once in the 80s on a walkman on a train blasting through Europe. And it was the perfect soundtrack. I remember it very vividly.

It has to do with a Jewish businessman trying to escape the Nazis after Kristallnacht and he keeps taking train after train but can’t escape them. 

[Bluesnik]

5 hours ago, Brad said:

It has to do with a Jewish businessman trying to escape the Nazis after Kristallnacht and he keeps taking train after train but can’t escape them.

Oh, I see. So nothing to do.

[jlhoots]

Celeste Ng: Our Missing Hearts

[Brad]

8 hours ago, Bluesnik said:

Oh, I see. So nothing to do.

No, nothing to do with Iggy. 

[BillF]

[Matthew]

Tom: The Unknown Tennessee Williams by Lyle Leverich

[BillF]

2 hours ago, Matthew said:

Tom: The Unknown Tennessee Williams by Lyle Leverich

Read it some time ago, together with a re-read of many of the plays. Fascinating!

Now reading:

Just published. My local library bought me a copy.

My verdict so far: "Good in parts".

 

[Brad]

[felser]

[ghost of miles]

[ejp626]

I just finished rereading Rushdie's The Satanic Verses, partly inspired by the terrible attack on him a few months back.  😢😠  I'd say I liked it more this time around (not that I can really remember my reaction from the early 90s...).  Probably at least one of the subplots could have been excised, however.  (No, I'm not talking about the subplot that caused all the trouble in the first place...)

Currently, about one-quarter of the way through The Milkman in the Night by Andrey Kurkov. 

I suppose I was simply feeling that I should read some Ukrainian literature.  Kurkov is best known for Death and the Penguin and the sequel Penguin Lost, which I read a while back.  I'm finding The Milkman in the Night quite interesting.  One of the better novels I've read in 2022, at least so far.

On 10/24/2022 at 4:32 PM, Bluesnik said:

After finishing Simon Reynolds book on post-punk today I started this, which collects all of the Bandini novels by John Fante.

 

I have this same edition.  Been meaning to get to it forever...  I might tackle it next year.  I did manage to read some of Fante's short stories though.

[jlhoots]

Thomas Mullen: Midnight Atlanta

[BillF]

[ejp626]

On 11/15/2022 at 9:56 PM, ejp626 said:

Currently, about one-quarter of the way through The Milkman in the Night by Andrey Kurkov. 

I suppose I was simply feeling that I should read some Ukrainian literature.  Kurkov is best known for Death and the Penguin and the sequel Penguin Lost, which I read a while back.  I'm finding The Milkman in the Night quite interesting.  One of the better novels I've read in 2022, at least so far.

 

Enjoyed this, even if the ratio of happy to unhappy endings (for the 10 or so main characters) was suspiciously high.  One might almost say Kurkov had mellowed out...

Am just starting The Ministry of Utmost Happiness by Arundhati Roy.

[Brad]

By coincidence I just finished Kurkov’s Grey Bees.

Edited November 21, 2022 by Brad

[Brad]

This is based on interviews from the podcast One True Sentence where Hemingway experts and writers discuss Hemingway, his work, the man and the world he lived in.

The term “one true sentence” comes from his posthumous memoir A Moveable Feast where Hemingway wrote “All you have to do is write one true sentence. Write the truest sentence that you know.' So finally I would write one true sentence, and then go on from there.”

[Matthew]

Collected Plays of Tennessee Williams. Reading "Spring Storm", which wasn't produced until the 1980's. A very interesting failure, but you can see Williams starting to put his writing together.

[HutchFan]

Just finished:

[ejp626]

On 11/21/2022 at 9:17 AM, Brad said:

By coincidence I just finished Kurkov’s Grey Bees.

What did you think of this?  It looks like something I might try to get to next year.

After Ministry, I might read Cosmopolis by DeLillo and then probably Fall on Your Knees by Ann-Marie MacDonald.

[medjuck]

I believe that the New Waterford Jewish grocery store owner in Fall on Your Knees is based on my grandfather (though the chronology isn't entirely correct). 

[Brad]

20 hours ago, ejp626 said:

What did you think of this?  It looks like something I might try to get to next year.

After Ministry, I might read Cosmopolis by DeLillo and then probably Fall on Your Knees by Ann-Marie MacDonald.

I liked it. It’s almost picaresque as he tries to navigate the grey zone he lives in, then Ukraine and finally Russian Crimea. 

[Bluesnik]

On 10/24/2022 at 10:32 PM, Bluesnik said:

Today I finished Ask the dust, in my opinion the standout novel from the quartet. And I still have the last to read. But I dug a bit deeper and researched and found it's considered his finest work. And Bandini, his alter ego, something you notice just by reading (there's one novel, Wait until spring, Bandini, where the main characters are his father and his mother and he is just a small kid), but when you read secondary literature it all falls into place. It's just as he describes it. I don´t like to read anything about what I am going to read beforehand. Not even prefaces or texts on the back. I like to enjoy the work of the author as it was conceived to be enjoyed, without knowing anything about it. There's always time afterward. And I also didn't know he was an inspiration to Bukowski or Kerouac.