Summer Reading

[Rahsaan]

I don't get a chance to read many actual books that aren't for work, but my most recent subway reading is Homer & Langley by E.L. Doctorow. So far so good. Certainly zippy enough to fit what most would call 'summer reading'.

 

[Ian Fitzsimmons]

Master of the Senate is a fine read for long journeys. When is the volume on the presidency due?

Now reading Dostoyevsky's The Idiot. Crazy Dostoyevsky! Unique and a good way to end the day.

Michael Dibdin's Aurelio Zen books are reliable good fun; three volumes were made into a decent television series earlier this year.

This morning heard an NPR interview with Michael Harvey, who wrote the screenplays for The Cold Case Files. Harvey sounded interesting enough that I'm going to buy one or two from his Mike Kelly detective series for the upcoming Michigan trip.

 

[VLM]

originally posted by Zachary Ross:
Kafka on the Shore is excellent. My favorite Murakami titles are Hard-Boiled Wonderland and The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, and I also quite like Norwegian Wood.

So if Kawabata is an easier Mishima (whom I adore), where does Murakami fit in?

Do they not deserve to be grouped together at all?

If so, I highly recommend The Master of Go by Kawabata and have added Murakami to my list.

 

[VLM]

originally posted by Ian Fitzsimmons:

Now reading Dostoyevsky's The Idiot. Crazy Dostoyevsky! Unique and a good way to end the day.

Fuck Dostoyevsky. I could never even manage to finish Crime & Punishment.

 

[Odd Rydland]

I could never even manage to finish Crime & Punishment.

Yes, this site is a good substitute.

 

[Scott Kraft]

originally posted by Odd Rydland:

I could never even manage to finish Crime & Punishment.

Yes, this site is a good substitute.

Strange. The VLM Translucency Report often reads as if written by Raskolnikov.

 

[Zachary Ross]

originally posted by VLM:

originally posted by Zachary Ross:
Kafka on the Shore is excellent. My favorite Murakami titles are Hard-Boiled Wonderland and The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, and I also quite like Norwegian Wood.

So if Kawabata is an easier Mishima (whom I adore), where does Murakami fit in?

Do they not deserve to be grouped together at all?

If so, I highly recommend The Master of Go by Kawabata and have added Murakami to my list.

Not sure as I have not read any Kawabata. Murakami is a western-influenced postmodernist (at times almost magic realist) with little in common with more "traditional" Japanese literature, like Oe or Mishima.

I've really liked Oe's novels.

And thanks for the Kawabata recommendation.

 

[Oswaldo Costa]

Last night finished Vargas Llosa's The Bad Girl, liked it very much, and found it quite the page turner.

 

[Jay Miller]

Thank you Jonathon! Despite Lisa's repeated recommendations I had never read the Palliser novels (though I read a few others from Trollope). The revival of this thread and the discovery that they were available for the very reasonable sum of $0 each on the Kindle led me to download them.

I've finished Can You Forgive Her (the character of Aunt Greenow was a delight) and Phineas Finn and have just started the Eustace Diamonds.