BOOKS THREAD

The U of Nebraska Press has been a great source for historical baseball books. I finally read "Glory of Their Times" over the weekend. I can't believe I waited so long, it's been out since 1966 or so. Now I'm readying "We Played the Game," an oral history by players from 1947-64. I swear I'm more familiar with those players than I am with today's.

 

Loved it. Read it in a day as soon as I got my hands on it.

 

The 40th anniversary of the murder of John Lennon has brought The Search for John Lennon: The Life, Loves and Death of a Rock Star by Lesley-Ann Jones (who wrote a good Freddie Mercury bio a few years ago).

Obviously there isn't a whole lot of new material to bring to Lennon's life (his music is not the main focus here) so Jones looks at his relationships with women (his mother, his Aunt Mimi, first wife Cynthia, Yoko Ono, May Pang), men (his father, McCartney, Brian Epstein, Stuart Sutcliffe) and children (his son Julian, Yoko's daughter Kyoko) and how his childhood shaped him into the person he became. Many of the "new" interviews are with people who have told their story many times (Cynthia Lennon, May Pang, Klaus Voorman, Astrid Kirchherr) but there is some good stuff, particularly the look at his self-proclaimed "house husband" years and the interview with guitarist Earl Slick, who played on Double Fantasy and talked about Lennon's desire to have him in his band for a planned tour in 1981. There is also some interesting speculation on what projects Lennon might have been involved with had he lived.

As far as Lennon bios go this isn't as good as Phillip Norman's The Life or as bad as Albert Goldman's infamous The Lives of John Lennon, it falls somewhere in the middle. Worth a look for the curious.

 

Really enjoyed this one. Thoroughly-researched, well-written life story of the Texas Ranger officer who led the killing of Bonnie and Clyde, though that episode takes up just a couple of short chapters late in the book. Being a lawman was all he ever did, and he wasn't perfect, which the author points out, but he (usually) tried to do the right thing. I'm glad I read this.

Joe Bob says check it out.

 

I found this in the clearance section of Half Price Books yesterday, so I invested $2. It's a collection of cartoon that were rejected by the New Yorker, and short bio sections on each cartoonist. Some made me really laugh out loud, some were duds (thus, they were rejected) and, like some actual New Yorker cartoons, I didn't get. Still, a good, quick read.

Joe Bob says check it out and laugh a little.

 

Book-related aside - If you're looking to just unload some books, and your local library isn't taking donations (mine doesn't a lot of the year), I use Paperback Swap. You still have to pay for shipping and a buck or two service fee, but basically, you can post all of your books, and people can request them. Each time they do, you get 1 credit. You can then use credits to request other books, or transfer them to their similar sites in their portfolio that do DVD Swaps and CD Swaps. There is also that feeling that, unlike when you dump a bunch of stuff at the library or Goodwill, that if someone requests a book from you, they're actually going to read it or want it.

 

Just finished The Body by Bill Bryson. It is a fun read - - as are all of Bryson's books - - and it is informative about the workings of the human body. Folks with medical training would probably call this a lightweight description of anatomy and physiology but for most people it will be instructive.

Easily readable over a long weekend. Highly recommended.

 

This book talks about the people behind the people, those who never got their proper due for helping those who were in the public eye. Many of the famous folks I knew: Lincoln, Andy Warhol, Alfred Hitchcock...many more. Others, I had never heard of of. Each sidekick is given two pages, one of copy and one for an illustration, each done by a different artist. I'm glad I read this one.

Joe Bob says totes check this out.

 

The cover image is a bit misleading. The title is Nine Inches, but it's got nothing to do with what is in the dude's pants, as implied by the photo.

Anyway....it was a collection of short stories that made for a good afternoon of sitting on the porch, and then on the couch when it got too cold outside. I enjoyed it.

Joe Bob says check it out, especially if you can find it on sale, which I'm about 100 percent sure that I did.