Two: Yale grad student builds tiny house. (Madeline, I think you especially would like this.)

I told a good friend that I’d read and liked it, and she was a little startled. She had read it at 17 and “violently disliked it,” and knew several others who had similar reactions. I am pretty sure one of the other English classes read it my freshman year at high school and responded similarly as well. I don’t really get why, but I can guess. It took me a long time to loosen up to assigned reading and not resent those books, and it’s much easier to take frustrations out on an assigned book than one you read for pleasure. That said, I’d read four of Morrison’s other novels already and knew this was her first. In some ways I sort of felt that the book gained its footing as it went along, but some of that could have been me, since these days I’ve been reading most often just before bed. I warmed up more and more to it as I went along, which was nice. And the moment I finished I wanted to reread it, which–I was about to type “which is what happened with Paradise,” but although it happened most fiercely with Paradise, that’s my typical reaction to finishing one of her books (although thus far I’ve only read Paradise, Jazz,, Song of Solomon, The Bluest Eye and Sula). And as a slight tangent, I’m going to put in one more plug for Paradise, which made strange and explosive things happen in my head.

I think I’ve sort of burnt myself out on reading, though, after this summer. Which is depressing, because mostly what I want to be doing is reading–I have so many books piled around the place which are full of amazing things I haven’t yet read. But I’m putting into action a self-imposed block on starting anything long for the next couple days. Instead I’m going to go to short stories when I want to read, because up next on my list is Dante, and I really don’t want to do him a disservice by reading him poorly. It should be fine; I have plenty of other things to do, like baking, watching movies, and oh yes, packing.

(Brief note of frustration: I started this book Friday night and only just finished it this evening. Where has my focus gone? Towards the end of spring semester there was a night where Stephanie was napping on the empty bed in my room and I was sitting on my bed reading The Habit of Being for three, almost four hours. Same deal first summer session (I read four books a week, I kinda had to), slightly less second session… And now I can read for not quite an hour before I just sort of fizzle out. I hope this ends soon.)

But anyway, The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao: I really liked it, and I want to re-read it as soon as I get my focus back so it doesn’t get chopped up so much. And I felt like a total nerd for catching as many references as I caught (Captain Trips and triffids being my two favorite). I’m not at all surprised the book won the Pulitzer. Toward the beginning, I was a little frustrated with the narrator and his footnotes; I’m on a big sincerity-and-authenticity kick recently, and it had a tinge of postmodernism about it. But the narrator is eventually brought into better perspective, and the book has a very real heart. (It may be only my opinion, but I find that postmodern or texts that get too ‘meta’ tend to lose their heart or their humanness. This is probably a continuation of my preference for sincerity and something I need to just get over.) I guess I don’t have a whole lot to say about the book yet, but I can recommend it. I’m probably too sleepy right now to really think right, but I want to make a start at writing something up here every book I finish, so there it is. Next up, The Bluest Eye.

Barry Hughart, Bridge of Birds
Barry Hughart, Eight Skilled Gentlemen
He wrote a third, The Story of the Stone, which I have not been able to get my hands on. They’re quite good, fantasy set in ancient China; the writing is clever but not too clever, the ride is enjoyable but has a heart. And they can get seriously unnerving at times, which I happen to like.

James Alan Gardner, Expendable
James Alan Gardner, Hunted
James Alan Gardner, Ascending
James Alan Gardner, Vigilant
James Alan Gardner, Radiant
James Alan Gardner, Trapped
James Alan Gardner, Commitment Hour
James Alan Gardner, Gravity Wells
All sci-fi but really, really well done. Soft SF so there’s aliens and such but the books are very human, which I like. There’s a lot of contemplation of morality and humanity and where thinking beings fit into things, but throughout everything he stays light-hearted enough that it’s never a chore to read. The last, Gravity Wells, is his short stories, which are usually pretty accessible and fun; one of them is available on his site, here.

David Mitchell, Number9Dream
I like this better than either Ghostwritten or Cloud Atlas by him, although I understand Cloud Atlas received a lot of approving press (as I recall I found it gimmicky and full of unfleshy tropes). This is, according to me anyway, stronger than those two, although he isn’t really my favorite author.

Robertson Davies, Fifth Business
Robertson Davies, The Manticore
Robertson Davies, World of Wonders
(Or, as one book.)
Robertson Davies makes me really happy; unfortunately, this is the only full trilogy of his that I’ve read (but I have read it three or four times through). I don’t exactly know how to describe his writing except that it is exact and eerie and very true. He has a way with characters. I like him a lot.

M John Harrison, Viriconium
This deserves a little explanation, I feel. I received it as a Christmas present during my last year at Carver, from one of my classmates with whom I’d never had a particularly good relationship. It was only in our last two years there that we could have a conversation without sniping at each other. Normally I try to just avoid people who I don’t get along with, but I genuinely liked this guy, and he was in my lit class, so it wasn’t that simple. Our last Christmas there I got presents for everyone in our class and I tried to make sure they were decent ones. I wasn’t really expecting anything back from people, but Matt gave me this and I gave him this, which he totally flipped over. And I ended up really liking Viriconium as well as being really touched, so it was a good Christmas all over. It’s in the vein of China Mieville’s stuff, weird sort of steampunky, surreal fantasy-sci-fi, lots of bizarre imagery. As I recall it starts doing fourth-wall-breaking things like the world starts breaking down because the characters become aware of the writer, or something. I haven’t re-read it in a year or so.

Nancy Farmer, The Ear, the Eye, and the Arm
This is one of my best-loved books from childhood (along with Calvin and Hobbes, which I’m re-reading again). Actually, I loved anything Nancy Farmer had to offer, but this was always my favorite; preternaturally sensitive detectives in a futuristic Zimbabwe? Awesome. Plus it’s a really quick and rewarding read.

I am about halfway through Oscar Wao and really loving it; the stack of books next to my bed which I have to read is growing precipitously, though. We’ll see how things go.

Edit: Why have I lost my blogroll? Hmm.

This agitation was really only exacerbated this time; because there’s some work being done on the family room downstairs and my parents’ bathroom upstairs, all my stuff that had stayed peacefully in the den for years has been moved up into my room. So it’s a struggle not to freak out a little; clutter bothers me. It’s fine in spaces I’m not responsible for, and often charming when it’s someone else’s. But when it’s my clutter in the room where I spend most of my time, it truly grates. So today and tonight will be an ordered frenzy of deciding what I don’t need. Incidentally I have more blank books than the population of some small countries, so if anyone needs any…

I had a carefully sketched out plan of what I was going to read during my four week break before fall semester starts up again but I’ve already broken it. I came home to a copy of The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao on my desk and to my shame have already started it. But The Bluest Eye is really next, really really, I promise.

One great perk to being home (and what originally brought me to post here) is that I’ve got access to my library now. So here is a poem from Lia Purpura’s The Brighter the Veil which I truly love.

Today On My Walk

Today on my walk I kissed the cold air.
The pursing up was familiar, dear.
The store window caught and held the trace
of a shrinking, foggy moon on glass.
When I turned, the wind lifted a crazy bouquet–
it took and rode my breath away.
Today on my walk, I kissed the cold air.
I made a bouquet because you were not there.

—
EDIT: Was doing a quick proofread and wow. Ordered frenzy? Careful sketch? Milton really has rubbed off on me.

01. Elbow - Weather to Fly
02. The National - The Geese of Beverly Road
03. Amy Annelle - Will Try
04. Wintersleep - Jaws of Life
05. Sea Wolf - The Garden That You Planted
06. Nick Drake - Road
07. Sunset Rubdown - A Day in the Graveyard
08. Sparklehorse - Gold Day
09. Apples in Stereo - Beautiful Machine Parts 3-4
10. Joey Ramone - What a Wonderful World
11. Wolf Parade - This Heart’s On Fire
12. Eluvium - Prelude for Time Feelers

Hopefully there’s something on there most people can find to like. We’ll see.

Telling stories, you do get to play God a little bit. (And here is one continual item of frustration: spring semester, in Contemporary American Fiction, Professor Stewart gave an eloquent little talk about why God doesn’t tell stories, we tell stories. And now I can’t remember any of it but I know it was good and would help out here. So frustrating!) But when you start to tell enough stories, you begin to make them, well, better. Fuller and wholer. It’s like doing anything enough: as long as you put a certain amount of your head in the process and as long as you persist, you begin to get better at it. Keep doing it and you’ll find, looking back over what you’ve written, that things loop up the way they should. Seeds were planted before you knew you needed the tree, I guess. Things come to fruition in a more natural way. (What is with all the vegetative metaphors? It’s leaking through from my paper, I guess…) Anyway, seeing this, it’s a little easier to think about things as God makes them, at least for me. Sometimes you just have to plant things and wait a while before they sprout.

And er, does anyone know the correct way to cite a quotation from Paradise Lost? I’m slightly unsure…

If you place a fern
under a stone
the next day it will be
nearly invisible
as if the stone has
swallowed it.

If you tuck the name of a loved one
under your tongue too long
without speaking it
it becomes blood
sigh
the little sucked-in breath of air
hiding everywhere
beneath your words.

No one sees
the fuel that feeds you.

Naomi Shihab Nye
Fuel

You decide to bring her flowers even though it’s
your first date and you’re scared you’re coming
on too strong and you don’t even know if it’s a
date-date or just a date but you decide to bring
her flowers even though you think maybe she just
wants a new friend though you remind yourself
she’s the one who called and asked you out to
dinner but she can’t really have a crush on you
can she, so you decide to take the risk and bring her
flowers because all your life you’ve tried to
second guess everyone else’s feelings and deny your
own so you decide to bring her flowers because
anyway if you looked in the mirror you’d see
desire written all over your face as soft and
fragile as the purple petals of the iris she is now
holding with such shy pleasure in her eyes that
your stomach lurches with the wanting of her and
you decide your biggest fear is that she’ll say yes

Leslea Newman
Love Me Like You Mean It