this morning i was rereading a joan didion essay that appeared in the new yorker in the 70s— “why i write”. good stuff. hence the reread.

After having re-read All The Pretty Horses when I realised I remembered NOTHING about it, I've decided to do the full trilogy.

I dunno. I've loved all of Cormac McCarthy's works but this one isn't doing it for me. It started off great with the main character taking a wolf over to Mexico to set it free there. After that I'm just "meh" about anything that happens. I'll stick with it, mind.

Just finished The Swerve by Peter Greenblatt, about the rediscovery of Lucretius' On The Nature of Things, and how it helped shape our modern world.
http://rxttbooks.blogspot.com/2018/05/lucretius-and-man-who-saved-his-work.html

cheeto yr link is brokded, edit to fix/ remove the syg part

http://rxttbooks.blogspot.com/2018/0...-his-work.html

After I finished Neon Rain by James Lee Burke I tried to read Midnight's Children by Salman Rushdie, but it hasn't captivated me. I might go back to it, but meantime I'm reading The Great And Secret Show by Clive Barker.

Martin Amis - Money

This is at least the third time I've tried to read it and I've given up on it again. The idea interests me, hence why I've kept giving it another try. I really want to like it but there's just something about Amis's style that makes him unreadable to me

Me too. Almost. I did finish MONEY and maybe a few others.

Can't get through LONDON FIELDS, PREGNANT WIDOW and a number of others which have been collecting dust on my shelves for years.

Sentence by sentence, I usually find him great. String those sentences together, and I have trouble paying full attention. Weird.

But if asked, I'd say I like him.

This week, I've been dipping into a book of essays by him now and then actually.



He has stumped me entirely. Never got to page 100 in a single one of his books. Too dense: His prose style, my brain.

I find his essays slightly more tolerable but Money and London Fields (which I've never finished either) both seem like the work of a stylist trying to make some kind of social point about a world he clearly has neither an eye or ear for. And I just find his weird (what I can only describe as) transatlantic 'voice' too contrived to endure for any length of time. I get the whole 'an excessive book about excess' thing but I never get the feeling Amis has any real insight into the worlds he tries to satirise.

Ouch. His essays and even interviews demonstrate that he's a thoughtful person. Not being able to translate that into fiction is another story.

Although I have to say, my estimation of Amis went down a bit when I read an interview regarding TIME'S ARROW. The point of the book, it seems, is that the Nazis were wrong. Um, thanks for wisdom bro.

some ages ago i read flaubert’s parrot and the one about the... history of the world in... some number of chapters? wormwood and the raft of the medusa and the achille lauro was it?

i thought it was shit

I do read his essays and journalism but even there I find him essentially grating. It's all so self conscious, like he's trying a bit too hard. He always think he's a bit too much of a showman with everything he does.

He's popular enough in America, but I get the feeling he's super famous in England. I wonder how that messes with an author's head.


That's Julian Barnes. Easy to confuse them. Another great British stylist whose books I sometimes finish but more often don't.

oh yes yes yes julian fucking barnes ha ha ha.

thank you. i had them blurred in my mind. apparently for good reason.

I read a short story of his I really liked, but it feels like he's taking a long time weaving his story and nothing's really happened yet.

I don't mind Julian Barnes. I liked History of the World. He's less of a stylist than Amis, far more readable, although less interesting in terms of general subject matter.

Meanwhile Ian McEwan reinvented himself with Atonement and now writes novels for retired primary school teachers who make their own jam.

cant be a wildman in old age i suppose?

even bukowski switched from whiskey to wine

Hey Sev, Neil Gaiman talks about his 3 fave sci fi books, and Wolfe, Shadow of the Torturer is one of them. http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/arti...fiction-novels

True story: an 80 year old woman gave me ON CHESIL BEACH. I swear.

Is there one McEwan you'd recommend?

i know this wasn’t sent to me but after many years i’m starting to get back my appetite (thanks gradschool for ruining reading for me— ha!) and so this is a great reference for things i’ve missed

and keep up the good work @ the blog yo

Hard to believe over 27,000 people have read that Murakami review....