Take off the 10 from the Last Man series and 63 books were finished. You do the page count. Anything three stars and up were better than average. Not much really stood out this year to be honest. Brendan Halpin was my discovery, and he's not a new writer. I'm interested in seeing if Pollack can jump to a long narrative. I have no idea what's coming ( Read more... )

Off in a bit. Should be a fun road trip ( Read more... )

French novelist Jean-Marie Gustave Le Clezio has been awarded this year's Nobel Prize for Literature.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/7661079.stm

Anyone ever read this guy?

Anyone?

You'd think Forever Changes is a book that an old man of my age would not relate to. While the Love album is mentioned frequently it's about a teenage girl dying of cystic fibrosis. Sure, every high school has the dying girl, the kid in the wheelchair. But Brendan Halpin makes this school come to life and bypasses the chiches that can dominate the ( Read more... )

Going to be that kind of a day. He even took a nap yesterday. He's 40 pounds of total energy.

An American sportswriter moves to England, becomes a Portsmouth fan, writes a book. The one flaw of the book is that Culpepper fails to acknowledge any aspect of soccer in America. Not one word about MLS, and that's not right. The rest is a good primer ( Read more... )

Ethan Canin's 'America, America' is a political coming of age story. Canin's writing his version of All the King's Men. Not sure if he's capable of pulling off anything close to it.

While reading the first fifty pages, I noticed some similarities in style to Richard Russo. Then I looked at the back cover, where Russo's blurb was right on top.Doh

Whiny rich kids make indie music, are not happy about any of it.

100 pages in and I swear not one person involved has smiled once.

I'm not saying it is a bad book though, but no one appears to be appreciating what they do.

Ingrates.

I think laughingrat mentioned this book was coming out a few months back. It's called "Frames" by Loren D. Estleman. He's a rather prolific crime fiction writer, not usually my genre. This one's about a film archivist who buys a run down theater in LA, finds a skeleton and reels of Von Stroheim's "Greed". Now he has to save the film and solve the old murder. ( Read more... )

"When he read articles in the newspapers about taxis suddenly swerving onto sidewalks and killing a half dozen pedestrians, it was always himself he pictured, holding Monika and Maya by the hand. Or he imagined a wave at Jones Beach, where he had been taking them once a week during the summer, dragging one of them down, or a pile of sand ( Read more... )

I do not remember which one of you recommended "The Contortionist's Handbook" by Craig Clevenger to me, but thanks. Good stuff about a six fingered forger in L.A. I have no idea why, but it reminded me of The Usual Suspects ( Read more... )