July Books
1. Behind the Scenes at the Museum by Kate Atkinson (333 pp.) - The people who like this book tend to absolutely adore it, but I'm really not sure why. It's a fine read, but there's nothing memorable about it. The main character traces her own life from the moment of her conception, which is a fairly fun concept, and there's this whole big "secret" that you only find out about in the very end, but it's actually a bit of a disappointment. But that last part applies to the whole novel.
2. The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell (280 pp.) - This, on the other hand, fits right in with all the other amazing nonfiction I've read this past year. The Tipping Point is this brilliant, little eye-opener to the ways of the world, and after reading it, nothing really looks quite the same. Gladwell composes these brilliant examples of how little changes make a big difference, with examples ranging from lowering crime rates in NYC to increasing suicide rates in Micronesia to god knows what else. And he does it all in such a perfectly-organized way, so clearly and rationally, that it's ridiculously difficult to poke holes in his argument. He writes with such clear confidence that you kind of just want to elect him President and see how he can fix the world. I highly recommend it.
3. The History of Love by Nicole Krauss (252 pp.) - Another fantastic novel - my only complaint, if any, is that it is so fantastic, so beautiful, that it seems almost a little too self-aware of that fact. Parts of it - my favorites parts - remind me strongly of Italo Calvino's Invisible Cities, except that those parts are about (you guessed it) love, rather than cities. The novel employs a lot of the tricks you see in Everything Is Illuminated, which had made some chauvinistic and ignorant readers complain that Krauss is clearly stealing material from her husband, but according to what I've read, both books were in the process of being published when Krauss and Foer met, so... quit your whining. Tangent aside, if you like Milan Kundera, Jonathan Safran Foer, or Haruki Murakami, you will like this book. It's in that same vein of whimsical-but-serious, poetic-and-tragic, philosophical-but-down-to-earth writing that sets those other authors apart, and Krauss performs every bit as well as the others.
4. Nine Stories by J.D. Salinger (198 pp.) - Well, compared to The Catcher in the Rye, I found most of these stories entirely uninspiring and fairly uninteresting. The first and the last are by far the strongest, but nearly every single story left me wondering, "Well, what the heck was the point of that?" Maybe I expect too much of short stories, but even though I could appreciate the way Salinger captured essential moments, the way he said so much with so little "happening", that spare storytelling seemed a little too bare to me, too uneventful. I suppose I'm glad I read them, but once again, this is a case of a book I cannot recommend to others.
5. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J.K. Rowling (759 pp.) - Oh. My. God. I'm almost afraid to write anything about this at all, because it'll be too inadequate. I already spent so much time discussing every last aspect of this book with anyone who would listen, and reading up on every single Rowling interview to fill in whatever gaps might have been left. Suffice it to say, I was a little obsessed with this book. And that said, I thought it was great - aside from a few little things that bothered me, but that I'm willing to excuse, I thought it was brilliantly-crafted and an extremely appropriate ending to the series. I locked myself in to read it, and every now and then I just had to flail my arms with excitement, so overjoyed that the book was turning out to be so good. Of course, I'm as devastated as the next person that this is the end, that all those years of looking forward to the next installment are behind me, but if something so great had to end, I'm just thankful that it ended so well.