I read constantly as a kid. I got in trouble for reading when my family had guests over and for holding a book under my desk during math class and for turning the lamp on after bedtime. As I got older, I read less and less. I read only what was assigned for class (if that) and a book or two when I was on break from school. I used to wonder and worry about why I was no longer a “reader.” But at some point, I concluded that it was just because my own life was finally actually interesting, and I wanted to live it.
I’ve read twelve books in the last three months. I’m not sure what that means. But I’m excited to write about them :)
Due to not having a library card (or a library habit) and being cheap, these books are largely ones I received from friends, bought at a secondhand store, or just found somewhere (hence the subtitle). There are a lot of books, and I have been told that I can be a little verbose (I know it’s true, too), so for this three part series, I’m going to write as little as I can bear about each of the books I’ve read since coming to San Francisco in July. Let’s see how I do!
We by Yevgeny Zamyatin
Why I read it: by the recommendation and loan of dear friend and Russian student Nell Fitts
Written in 1920-1921 (right before the birth of Soviet Union) and published in 1952, this dystopian tale is told to the reader by our descendant, D-503. D-503 is an engineer building a spacecraft for the One State, the nation that has solved it all, and he wants to tell us savages about how great it all is. Of course, it doesn’t quite go that way.
I didn’t find the book relatable. The rigidity, the rejection of individuality, the disregard for life — none of it seems realistic to my Western mind. But I couldn’t stop reading. A love letter to the chaotic and erratic side of our species (to what our narrator calls the √-1), this story is unsettling, thrilling, and unexpected. And it makes me curious about the cultural moment that inspired this work.
Verdict: read it if any of the above interests you.
Coraline by Neil Gaiman
Why I read it: it was on my sublessor’s shelf, and I wanted an easy follow-up to We.
I remember seeing the movie as a child and being so amazed by the singing and handspringing trapeze of the two old ladies, so spooked by the button-eyed Other Mother and her spidery Other World, and so charmed by Wybie, the sweet and awkward neighbor boy.
The book is different (no trapeze…no Wybie) but the same in all the most important ways. More than ten years later, I am still spooked and still charmed. It reminded me of what it felt like to be a child, all the frustrating and secretive parts, and what it’s like to discover your own strength. Gaiman got it just right.
Verdict: yes! It’s a quick and moving read.
Ishmael: A Novel by Daniel Quinn
Why I read it: it was on my sublessor’s shelf (part two), and I’d heard good things about it (lies).
This book is representing itself falsely. It’s not a novel. It’s a treatise or a manifesto or something like that, wrapped up with a small bit of curious but not very relevant plot and characterization. This wannabe Brief History of Sapiens is inaccurate and impractical, at times offensively so. If you are considering reading this book, I will provide a personalized suggestion of a book or activity your time would be better spent on. Watching paint dry, for example.
Verdict: no. If you want to read about the origin of humanity and our place in nature, there’s much better out there. I’ll find and share.
Rat Bohemia by Sarah Schulman
Why I read it: a cool girl was selling it at a yard sale.
While reading this book, I kept thinking it must be more memoir than fiction. In my post-reading research, I haven’t found much to support this theory. It’s true that like the main narrator, New York City rat exterminator Rita Mae Weems, author Sarah Schulman was a lesbian in the New York City’s Lower East Side during the 1980s AIDS epidemic. But not much else lines up. And besides, there are two other narrators, each of whose voice is equally believable, equally specific, equally suffused with its own private rage and thorny personality and warped worldview.
Here are some of the things this book is about: death, dying, the self-absorption of dying people, becoming desensitized to death and dying due to the sheer volume of it. Also familial rejection, governmental rejection, rejection by your own (at least in public), and poverty, self-pity, self-delusion, addiction, and urban decay.
So you would think the book would be miserable. But instead, it’s funny, beautiful and frequently lighthearted. It comes for everyone with a sharp but sensitive satirical touch. And above all, it celebrates the compassion, resilience, and clear-eyed humor of the counterculture, an example in itself of how community and chosen family can create a joy that almost eclipses the pain.
Verdict: absolutely, yes, 100%.
Enjoyed the reviews of the books you read recently. You have certainly inspired me to move away from the material I have been reading for the past 35 years. I need to get back to fiction, humor, period type of writings.
Best wishes...