BOOKS THREAD

Just finished The Templars' Last Secret, book 10 in the Bruno, Chief of Police series. Enjoyable series set in France, authored by Martin Walker.

Bruno, Chief of Police Series by Martin Walker

 

I have one of those on my shelf, and his Robert Johnson book. I'll get to them soon.

 

The Final Shot, by Gene Wojehowski

Great read for coaches and ball players

 

What a fun read this book was. I know it's been discussed on here before, but I just got around to it. It talks about running, evolution, food...all kinds of stuff, but the author winds it all into a compelling story. I so enjoyed this...

Joe Bob says definitely check this out.

 

This column really spoke to me. I find my ability to truly focus on a book has become compromised unless I'm in a place where there are no distractions - reading in bed at night, away at a cottage, even a waiting room.

I have forgotten how to read

 

An oldie-but-goodie: "Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal" by Eric Schlosser. I bought this in paperback when it came out in 2001, and re-read it for the first time in at least 10-12 years.

It holds up great. The expose of brutal slaughterhouse conditions and slack government enforcement of food safety is what I remembered; what I forgot is how well-written it is. Schlosser did a great job of blending an avalanche of facts with subtle metaphors and imagery — right from the beginning, as he describes Domino's pizza being delivered to the hollowed-out hub of the military industrial complex, Cheyenne Mountain. He continues with on-the-scene reporting and interviews of fast food workers, overwhelmed francisees, independent ranchers who are literally a dying breed, and mostly Latino slaughterhouse workers.

Re-reading this has made me want to investigate if regulation of meat-packing plants and the agribusiness industry in general has improved at all in the 21st Century. As I recall recent outbreaks at Chipotle and other chain restaurants, my guess is no.

 

The Chipotle outbreaks were mostly limited to single stores and were a Chipotle problem, not because of the food. Employees were spreading the bugs.

 

Ban Johnson: Czar of Baseball by Eugene C. Murdock.

Started it this morning. Very interesting so far.

 

Just bought the Isaacson biography of Da Vinci and look fwd to diving into this. Still working through Lincoln in the Bardo which, as @typefitter noted, is extremely saddening. Similar in parts to Pilgrim’s Progress or The Divine Comedy, which for me were equally slow reads bc of the content, which lingers in your mind and gnaws at you.

 

Finished this finally after being sidetracked by my own writing and other interests. One of the more unique, ambitious novels I’ve read in a while, and because of it’s design — SPOILER ALERT — a kind of oral history of how Lincoln’s son died of TB early in the Civil War, while the family downstairs hosted a rousing White House party for political purposes; then of how his soul hopes to escape the Bardo, aka, purgatory — the material lends itself perfectly to the stage and I expect it will be made into a play very soon.

The rotating commentary is part description, part soliquoy, with sections of “historical” commentary interspersed. This for me is where George Saunders really elevated the pitch; the historical commentaries read to me like genuine excerpts from existing sources and I found myself checking Google against the content. Each time the top result of some “historical” commentary was the novel itself; he might have been inspired by other sources, but he still made the content up in believable ways.

The spirituality was a bit ham-handed for me, particularly the means for moving beyond purgatory to a final judgment. But it was indeed very sad at points, and I had to step away for stretches bc the content hit very close to home. I’ve never had a child die and I would never wish that on anyone. This novel is as close as I’d ever want to come to dealing the corporeal and ethereal aspects.

I would definitely recommend reading it. It’s at times sober and bawdy, an altogether nice mix of what makes us human and what makes us aspire toward something greater.

3.5 Boogies out of 4

 

I want to read so much more than I do but I am much the same way. If I don’t have quiet solitude for an extended period of time, I rarely bother.

 

As with time for writing, I have to fight to make time for reading. Which is why I’m up at 530 am, drinking my coffee and about to read the new Isaacson biogeography of Da Vinci for an hour before I have to roust my 9 year old and get her ready for school. My train ride has been halved with my new job, so in essence has my reading time. Gotta get it in somewhere or else I feel adrift.