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It was indeed a CD of just one track. I bought my copy used and it already came with the 11th disc, so I don't know when this was added (or indeed if it was shipped later after the missing track was discovered). I'm not sure why they didn't repress disc 10.

Wrapped up I.B. Singer's Enemies. I just couldn't get into it. I so thoroughly disliked the main character, who had no redeeming qualities whatsoever, but still was irresistible to several women. It was even more inexplicable than Woody Allen's magnetism in Manhattan. At least Woody was funny (then), which is attractive in its own way. I've been trying to read Musil's 5 Women, but have not made much progress. Maybe will shelve it for now and try again at some later date. A few random books on the horizon, but the one I am perhaps anticipating the most is rereading Melville's The Confidence-Man. I liked it a lot in grad school and wonder if I will still enjoy it (if reading just for pleasure).

Strongly disliked DeLillo's The Body Artist. I was tempted to just toss it, but it is so short (120 pages with wide margins) that I finished it. Will see if the used book store will take it. In addition to Vierci's The Imposters, I've got I.B Singer's Enemies on the bench.

More stories to go in White Walls by Tatyana Tolstaya. Right now am focusing on shorter works. Just finished Ethel Wilson's first novel (or really novella): Hetty Dorval. Then Lyudmila Ulitskaya's The Funeral Party (from Brad's list of 10 Russian novels, bringing me to 5/10). Also DeLillo's The Body Artist. Then Pablo Vierci's The Imposters.

Apparently, Terry Gilliam finally managed to shoot his Don Quixote film with Jonathan Pryce and Adam Driver. It's in post-production now, so maybe released at the end of the year or next year. Hope it lives up to whatever vision he's had of it for all these years.

Every so often I check in on what is going on with my favorite cancelled show. There was some Futurama Android game, which I haven't played (yet). And relatively recently (last Sept.) there was a podcast with a new episode of the show and they managed to get the original voice talent back together. It's pretty funny. Podcast is here: https://nerdist.com/the-nerdist-podcast-new-futurama-episode/

Thanks. Something to look forward to. The Assistant was interesting, but it probably should have been called Crime and Suffering. It's definitely a book with a bleak outlook on life.

Let us know how it is. I have it on request at the library, but probably won't get the book until the fall...

Wrapped up Wives and Daughters. Did feel padded in many places. Overall, I preferred North and South. In the midst of Malamud's The Assistant. Fairly depressing. Will probably wrap up tonight or tomorrow. Then onto Toews's A Complicated Kindness.

Just back from a trip to New York and Philadelphia. Saw many museums, including the Barnes Foundation for the first time (I did see the Highlights from the Barnes when it went on tour). Not that many special exhibits, however, aside from a small exhibit on Joseph Cornell's homage to Juan Gris at the Met.

I've moved things around a bit. Still reading some of the stories in Tolstaya's White Walls but my main reading is Gaskell's Wives and Daughters. It's essentially the story of how a middle aged doctor's second marriage impacts his daughter and step-daughter. It's pretty slow, even for Victorian era fiction. I like it better than Middlemarch, but that's not exactly a ringing endorsement. After this Toews's A Complicated Kindness.

The Sam Rivers Rivbea set has turned up on Apple Music (broken into three pieces). It may have been there for a long time, but I only stumbled across it recently when searching up Rivbea. The Tolliver hasn't as far as I can tell (at least not in Canada).

It's always a little disorienting to me to start reading a book, then suddenly (or gradually) realize that I have already read it. This just happened to me with Mahfouz's The Mirage. In this case, I suspect it is because I so strongly dislike the narrator (an immature, spoiled man-boy) that I suppressed the novel immediately after reading it. Since I have it checked out from the library, I think I'll skim along to get to the tragic events foreshadowed on the first page or so of the novel, then return it. It's not worth rereading the whole book. After this, Muriel Spark's Memento Mori, then Two Serious Ladies by Jane Bowles.

Wrapped up Old Wives' Tale. Overall a very solid novel. Sorry I didn't read it way back when. I just finished Rabindranath Maharaj's The Amazing Absorbing Boy, which was good. It's a novel about a young immigrant coming to Toronto from Jamaica. Maybe even a bit better than I expected, given his earlier novel Homer in Flight. I'm partway through Dionne Brand's What We All Long For. It's a good start, but I suspect the plot-twists are going to be too implausible for my taste. I don't do it often, but I am bailing on Bruno Latour's We Have Never Been Modern. It's very much in the vein of Michel Foucault but considerably less interesting or enjoyable.

Welcome to the extended neighbourhood.

As far as I can tell, Tiny Grimes' Profoundly Blue (Muse 1973) has not made it to CD. I don't know how great it is, but I'd like to hear it one of these days. It looks like I probably can pick up an LP for not that much lucre, so perhaps I shall do that. Also, there is a Status compilation called Guitar Soul where the two Grimes tracks ended up coming out on a Fresh Sound compilation, and the Bill Jennings/Jack McDuff track has been out on a couple of McDuff compilations. But there are three Kenny Burrell tracks that only appear to have been out on the Prestige LP The Best of Kenny Burrell, which also doesn't appear to have been out on CD. So odd. I may be wrong about this of course.

It is very sad to hear he has hung up his horn. I'm not terribly surprised, as I thought he had retired, though it really is a shame it is due to heath conditions. I'm glad I got to see him as often as I did -- I think four, maybe five times. FWIW, I thought this was a solid interview with some interesting insights into Rollins' mindset.

This is quite good. He's funnier than I expected, almost as sly as Austen at times. And is it possible that this is the first novel (1908) that really delved into the pain of childbirth, lifting the veil so to speak on what was definitely unmentionable in Victorian-era novels? I'm not sure this is the case, but I can't think of any other cases. (I can think of a very small handful that discussed abortions and abortificants but even most of these were from the 1930s or later.) Anyway, is this enough to inspire me to read his other novels? Not really, but I do rate this fairly highly.

I just finished Nina Berberova's The Tattered Cloak and Other Novels. These tales are mostly about Russian emigres living in Paris in the 1930s and 40s. There some interesting bits about living through war-time Paris, which I believe Berberova actually did. I'll be tackling White Walls (NYRB) by Tatyana Tolstaya soon. This includes all the stories from Sleepwalker in a Fog and On the Golden Porch. Currently, I am reading Takashi Hiraide's The Guest Cat (New Directions). It's a very short meditation on letting a cat into one's life. Tonight or tomorrow I should launch into Bennett's The Old Wives' Tale. In a way I am glad to finally have gotten to this one off my reading list. This was a book I was assigned literally decades ago in undergrad, and I had too many reading courses that semester, so I just skipped it (and sort of bulled my way through the discussion of the book that week). So it is a way of getting around to some unfinished business.

I finished Gaskell's North and South. It was an interesting depiction of a city very much like Manchester. She is probably one of the few writers of her era not to completely demonize union members, though apparently neither she nor Dickens liked professional union organizers. I've not read Hard Times, but I gather the caricature of Slackbridge is quite unkind. I didn't realize that North and South and Hard Times were serialized one right after the other in Dickens's magazine Household Words. I'll have to move Hard Times up in my reading list, though it will still be a while until I can get to it. I've just started Zweig's The Post Office Girl. Good so far. The blurb on the back promises some serious action (perhaps even proto-Fight Club action), so we'll see.

I finished Mitford's Love in a Cold Climate, and I'm halfway through the sequel, Don't Tell Alfred. I'd say Mitford is a bit of an acquired taste. It's very much like reading a novel written for the 1% (in terms of class position, not necessarily their bank accounts). Quite a change after this -- Gaskell's North and South.

54-40 Smilin' Buddha Cabaret A little hard to tell, but this is a sign that used to be displayed in Vancouver (this is probably a slightly rebuilt/refurbished version of the sign).

I read CYFH? and the rest of the Palliser novels, but it was a very long time ago and not much has stuck with me. I don't recall the scene you are talking about. About the only things I can remember are Lady Eustace and her diamonds and the unlikely promotion of one of the main characters to Prime Minister. It would be great to tackle them again, but it is so far down on my reading list that I can't predict when I would ever get around to them. In any event, I am 2/3rd through The Way We Live Now, and the plot is definitely thickening... I'm gearing up to read Mitford's Love in a Cold Climate and the other associated novels, like The Blessing and probably Don't Tell Alfred.

Was doing some poking around on on-line discography sites. Found out about an Al Haig session with Jimmy Raney - Special Brew. Never on LP. Sad... It is mentioned briefly here in a different thread more focused on Raney, but not the music that never made it to CD thread. Anyway, found a supposedly NM- copy on-line for $5. I'll post my thoughts on the not on CD thread when I can, but it will be a long while before I actually have it in my hands...

Almost halfway through Trollope's The Way We Live Now. There are a lot of people behaving quite badly (or at least selfishly) and traditional values have broken down, including several young near penniless minor aristocrats (it is tough-going for me when they are on stage, since they are so pathetic). It is interesting that Trollope does seem to slightly undercut the standing of the presumable "hero" of the book, Roger Carbury, by making him a bit too much of a prig. Still, this is a novel that I may admire a bit more than actually enjoy... Has anyone read Ernest Cline's Ready Player One? There is a pretty devoted fan base (mostly of nostalgic Gen Xers) but also some insightful negative reviews (that seem to have a lot of truth to them). I'm not sure which camp I'd fall into, though I suppose I'd know within a few pages. Anyway, since the movie was announced (and I'll probably end up taking my son), the demand for the book has gone through the roof, and it looks like it would take 4 or 5 months to get the book through the library, but there are a few other options I am exploring...