These are not particularly in the order read....
John LeCarre, Running in The Field. There are some authors you just pick up everything they write. This was a good one. Oh, well, all of LeCarre's are good. This was followed by Absolute Friends, another LeCarre I had not yet read that was lying about the library. (That was the day I got talking to a man in the library who was grousing about outliving all his favourite authors....)
And there are some books that you pick up because the concept intrigues you. Benet Bandereth, The Assassin of Verona. This is, I would have to say, an adventure tale, with Shakespeare and several of his players as the main, well, actors, if you will. It is full of random quotes from everything from the sonnets to Macbeth to Titus Andronicus (unattributed, of course, part of the fun) as if they were randomly running through Sakespeare's head. Too much fun. Apparently, he's written another one (Bandereth, not Shakespeare), which I will have to scout out...
Amanda Quick, Tightrope. Just trash fiction, but well written, and with a satisfactory ending (so often books that may have been a good read don't have a satisfactory ending..)
Judith Fiorst, Nearing 90. I am not much of a poetry reader - poems don't much speak to me - but I can understand Fiorst, and her thoughts on aging rang true.
Kate Shakleton, The Body on the Train. There seems to be a great revival of mystery writers of the 30's and 40's (or who write as if they were), gentle who-done-its that engage without shocking. Generally speaking, I like them. Simenon falls in this category. I read two more of his in this period: The Lodger, and Maigret and the Burglar's wife, both charming. And last, but not least in the cloying department, two more by Alexander McColl Smith, whose names escape me at the moment.. The books were from two different of his series, but in both he seems troubled by the emasculation on men in the various forms in which it occurs.
Lots of non-fiction, of course. Rachel Maddow's Blowout, an expose of the oil and gas industry, truly shocking (and extremely well written, not always the case in important books). Passionate Spirit, a biography of Anna Mahler by Cate Haste. Not so well written (based on Anna Mahler's early diaries, how could it be), but interesting none-the-less. Robert Reich, The Common Good, about, as implied, America's loss of consensus about what the common good is. Depressing, I thought, but a must read. And I've started reading for my upcoming Economic's class, an article by David Autor, called Why are there still so many jobs?. And have just started a book by Oren Kass called The Once and Future Worker: A vision for the Renewal of Work in America. (Should be an interesting class; I'll keep you posted. )
One more non-fiction, by William Mann, called The Contender: A Biography of Marlon Brando. I have never been much of a Brando fan, but this book may have made me one. I certainly want to go back and see all of his movies again. (I think I might have mentioned in an earlier post that I recently saw On the Waterfront in one of my movie classes. I had forgotten how wonderful a move it was, and how great he was in it.)
We're getting near the end. Ian Rankin (another favourite), In a House of Lies. Odd Partners, a book of short stories written by (collected by?) Ann Perry. This was an interesting concept; they were all stories about very different souls coming together to do what is required. The stories in these collections are not uniformly good, of course, but enough were to make it worth while.
Katherine Chen, Mary B. This is one of the many books that seem to be coming out now which are take - offs (or extensions, if you will) of old classics. This one is Pride and Prejudice from the point of view of Mary Bennett, the ugly sister. I liked the concept, and I liked the book.
Ann Cleves: The Long Call. Another book with a most satisfactory ending, which I won't spoil by revealing it here.
And last but not least, Lucy Ellman, Ducks, Newburyport, This one won the Mann Booker prize in 2019, but when I first took it from the library, I returned it unread. It a thousand pages of stream of consciousness (a la James Joyce, except in Ohio), and I just couldn't get into it. Well, I came across it again, and on the second try, I wasn't able to put it down. Go figure!
So you guys can see what I mean when I say I live in my head. Any number of things can be relied on to make me happy; good food; good friends; good bridge. But good books are right up there....
So, that's all my advice for now.
Nothing much going on since I spoke to you last - the usual round of the gym, zumba, and, of course, bridge. I did notice a flyer for a "salon" on David Hockney, a painter of whom I am quite fond. It was being put on by Butch Epps, the instructor in many of my movie classes at Osher Life Long Learning Institute (most recently in the course on the Wannsee conference previously mentioned), and was put on at the Mizell Center. Friend Sue joined me; we dashed from bridge to the Monsoon, a nearby Indian restaurant to Mizell, and it was an interesting evening. Butch gave a little preliminary talk, and then we saw a documentary film on the painter's return to his Yorkshire roots, and a new style of painting.
There is so much to do here....
Ta ta for now. I'll try again, with pictures, next time.
John LeCarre, Running in The Field. There are some authors you just pick up everything they write. This was a good one. Oh, well, all of LeCarre's are good. This was followed by Absolute Friends, another LeCarre I had not yet read that was lying about the library. (That was the day I got talking to a man in the library who was grousing about outliving all his favourite authors....)
And there are some books that you pick up because the concept intrigues you. Benet Bandereth, The Assassin of Verona. This is, I would have to say, an adventure tale, with Shakespeare and several of his players as the main, well, actors, if you will. It is full of random quotes from everything from the sonnets to Macbeth to Titus Andronicus (unattributed, of course, part of the fun) as if they were randomly running through Sakespeare's head. Too much fun. Apparently, he's written another one (Bandereth, not Shakespeare), which I will have to scout out...
Amanda Quick, Tightrope. Just trash fiction, but well written, and with a satisfactory ending (so often books that may have been a good read don't have a satisfactory ending..)
Judith Fiorst, Nearing 90. I am not much of a poetry reader - poems don't much speak to me - but I can understand Fiorst, and her thoughts on aging rang true.
Kate Shakleton, The Body on the Train. There seems to be a great revival of mystery writers of the 30's and 40's (or who write as if they were), gentle who-done-its that engage without shocking. Generally speaking, I like them. Simenon falls in this category. I read two more of his in this period: The Lodger, and Maigret and the Burglar's wife, both charming. And last, but not least in the cloying department, two more by Alexander McColl Smith, whose names escape me at the moment.. The books were from two different of his series, but in both he seems troubled by the emasculation on men in the various forms in which it occurs.
Lots of non-fiction, of course. Rachel Maddow's Blowout, an expose of the oil and gas industry, truly shocking (and extremely well written, not always the case in important books). Passionate Spirit, a biography of Anna Mahler by Cate Haste. Not so well written (based on Anna Mahler's early diaries, how could it be), but interesting none-the-less. Robert Reich, The Common Good, about, as implied, America's loss of consensus about what the common good is. Depressing, I thought, but a must read. And I've started reading for my upcoming Economic's class, an article by David Autor, called Why are there still so many jobs?. And have just started a book by Oren Kass called The Once and Future Worker: A vision for the Renewal of Work in America. (Should be an interesting class; I'll keep you posted. )
One more non-fiction, by William Mann, called The Contender: A Biography of Marlon Brando. I have never been much of a Brando fan, but this book may have made me one. I certainly want to go back and see all of his movies again. (I think I might have mentioned in an earlier post that I recently saw On the Waterfront in one of my movie classes. I had forgotten how wonderful a move it was, and how great he was in it.)
We're getting near the end. Ian Rankin (another favourite), In a House of Lies. Odd Partners, a book of short stories written by (collected by?) Ann Perry. This was an interesting concept; they were all stories about very different souls coming together to do what is required. The stories in these collections are not uniformly good, of course, but enough were to make it worth while.
Katherine Chen, Mary B. This is one of the many books that seem to be coming out now which are take - offs (or extensions, if you will) of old classics. This one is Pride and Prejudice from the point of view of Mary Bennett, the ugly sister. I liked the concept, and I liked the book.
Ann Cleves: The Long Call. Another book with a most satisfactory ending, which I won't spoil by revealing it here.
And last but not least, Lucy Ellman, Ducks, Newburyport, This one won the Mann Booker prize in 2019, but when I first took it from the library, I returned it unread. It a thousand pages of stream of consciousness (a la James Joyce, except in Ohio), and I just couldn't get into it. Well, I came across it again, and on the second try, I wasn't able to put it down. Go figure!
So you guys can see what I mean when I say I live in my head. Any number of things can be relied on to make me happy; good food; good friends; good bridge. But good books are right up there....
So, that's all my advice for now.
Nothing much going on since I spoke to you last - the usual round of the gym, zumba, and, of course, bridge. I did notice a flyer for a "salon" on David Hockney, a painter of whom I am quite fond. It was being put on by Butch Epps, the instructor in many of my movie classes at Osher Life Long Learning Institute (most recently in the course on the Wannsee conference previously mentioned), and was put on at the Mizell Center. Friend Sue joined me; we dashed from bridge to the Monsoon, a nearby Indian restaurant to Mizell, and it was an interesting evening. Butch gave a little preliminary talk, and then we saw a documentary film on the painter's return to his Yorkshire roots, and a new style of painting.
There is so much to do here....
Ta ta for now. I'll try again, with pictures, next time.
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