Currently Reading (continued)

[Wilfrid]

On 9/6/2025 at 11:33 AM, Wilfrid said:

It was because the Strand had (has?) a stack of discounted copies of for colored girls who have considered suicide/when the rainbow is enuf (I read it a while ago but had not owned it) that I was prompted to see what else of Ntozake Shange's work was in my library. Oh, they have four novels (including a long one co-written with her sister).

Start at the beginning: Sassafrass, Cypress & Indigo. It's really good, especially the character of Indigo, a strange young girl who is an improbable self-taught violin prodigy -- a bit of magical realism there. Why is Shange really only known for that one poem/play? You can get used copies of these novels online for pennies.

And look, the Strand had three of the four novels on a bottom shelf (I had to order Betsey).

[Wilfrid]

Not planned at all, I was reading Nikki Giovanni "Make Me Rain" and hey...

[Wilfrid]

On 6/7/2025 at 11:46 AM, Wilfrid said:

Meanwhile, Norwegians everywhere. Not just Jon Fosse: Norwegian women writing really unusual, quirky fiction. I read Dorthe Nors' Mirror, Shoulder, Signal a while back (yes, features driving lessons). Recently I worked my way through everything in English by Vigdis Hjorth (except House of Norway which is not in my library). Now Hanne Ørstavik. Love is remarkable, unbearably tense. My library has The Pastor, so that's next. There are at least three more novels translated into English, but I can't keep buying books. Can I?

My trip next week (weather and TSA permitting) will feature Norwegians. I really didn't plan that, but the new Jon Fosse, Vaim, showed up at Book Culture and a new Orstavik, Ti Amo, at the Brooklyn Book Festival.

Two short books for two short flights. And if I have delays, I have a month of Middlemarch on my Kindle app.

 

[maison rustique]

Just finished James and loved it.  Highly recommend it if you haven't read it.

[Wilfrid]

I must check again to see if it's in the library. It has been very popular.

Meanwhile, residents of my building like to leave books in the lobby if they want to be rid of them. Occasional treasures there (I found a copy of Marcus Aurelius). From that source I am now reading Peter Guralnick's immense biography of Sam Cooke. As with his Elvis bio, almost overwhelming detail on gigs and recording sessions, but he makes it all interesting. And of course plenty of interesting people in the background; just introduced to a very young Dionne Warwick.

From the same source, Ferrante's My Brilliant Friend. I have been avoiding those novels due to my usual suspicion of anything popular, but it was pretty good. I have the second volume of the quartet arriving Monday.

[MitchW]

27 minutes ago, Wilfrid said:

From that source I am now reading Peter Guralnick's immense biography of Sam Cooke. As with his Elvis bio, almost overwhelming detail on gigs and recording sessions, but he makes it all interesting.

I recently attended an interview (at the Brooklyn Library on Grand Army Plaza), where Peter was interviewed about his most recent book, The Colonel and The King.  It was streamed as well, and for posterity...

 

Edited November 6, 2025 by MitchW

[Wilfrid]

Cool. Will check that out.

[Wilfrid]

A little sad this afternoon. As I finished "Blood Will Tell," the third novella in Rex Stout's Trio for Blunt Instruments, I reflected that I have now read every Nero Wolfe story. I do need to double check, but I think so.

I had read Nero Wolfe novels randomly growing up, the occasional novella in EQMM. Some years ago, quite likely prompted by the outstanding 2001/2 TV adaptations, I decided to read who whole series in order.

That done, I missed Nero and Archie. And even Cramer. Then it occurred to me, I had not read any but a handful of the novellas. I started on them, but to give myself a good run restricted consumption to three per year; on my birthday, on Thanksgiving and at Christmas.

Now I'm done.

I bet one day I will start at the beginning with the novels again.

[Wilfrid]

Another recommendation and I think this is my book of the year. Xiaolu Guo made her reputation with books written in the voice of a young Chinese woman, both in China and newly arrived in the UK and challenged by the language and culture.

The last thing I read by her was My Battle of Hastings, a memoir of a year on the Sussex coast, entranced by the story of the 1066 battle there. Same voice.

Now, miraculously, she has brought that same, irresistible voice to a large-scale re-imagining of Moby-Dick. The central character is a teenage girl from Kent who re-invents herself as a young boy to go to sea -- ultimately to go whaling. Despite the Kent angle, I can't help hearing her as a young Chinese girl. It doesn't matter. Call Me Ishamelle gives us new, re-named versions of Ahab and Queequeg, and in a real departure from Melville, a Taoist monk on the boat.

It's a page-turner. The whaling scenes are thrilling. Unmissable.

Now I need to start Patricia Lockwood.

[maison rustique]

Recently read Miss Eliza's English Kitchen and thoroughly enjoyed it. The food/cooking was interesting, but even more than that was the attitude about women and their roles, as well as poverty and status.

[Wilfrid]

Uncertain about the new Patricia Lockwood (Will There Ever Be Another You). I read a review that queried whether it should really be categorized as a memoir than a novel. The dustjacket calls it a novel and there is even the blurb about resemblance to real people being coincidental.

What nonsense. The narrator is clearly Lockwood, Jason is her husband in the book and real life--with the same medical problem, and we even get reacquainted with her mum and dad from Priestdaddy. A memoir.

Maybe none of that matters; maybe it has deep significance. The thing is, it's all so fragmented. There's a long commentary on Anna Karenina which is a slightly crazier version of one of her LRB essays. There's a rather tedious detour around the craft of making jewelry.

I think this is intended: holding up a mirror to the chaos of COVID and Lockwood's own long COVID. It might be true to life. Is it true to literature?

@AaronS Did you get around to reading it?

[AaronS]

I had basically the same reaction although I think I enjoyed her rambling a tiny bit more than you did. parts of it are engaging enough, but I don't see why people like it so much and it doesn't have the charm a lot of recent auto-fiction does. how did covid change auto-fiction? it made it worse, at least for her.

high hopes for the new helen dewitt and a new to me paul murray, which are next.

Edited December 10, 2025 by AaronS

[maison rustique]

This made me so sad. I can't imagine growing up without knowing the joy of losing myself in a book. 

[Wilfrid]

Takes me back to my long ago student days. I was present when my doctoral supervisor assigned some reading to an undergraduate. She responded, "Is it long?"

He said, "I can't promise that you can learn philosophy without reading a long book."

[bloviatrix]

On 12/12/2025 at 2:43 PM, maison rustique said:

This made me so sad. I can't imagine growing up without knowing the joy of losing myself in a book. 

There are few things that give me more pleasure as the parent of a preteen than watching him gobble down a book. Now, there are  times when he has no interest in reading, but when he finds something that excites him he gets so immersed. 

[Wilfrid]

I finally got around to Elena Ferrante's so-called Neapolitan novels. I've been dipping in and out for a while and will finish the fourth volume tonight.

I say "so-called" because (as the author herself has pointed out) this is simply one novel, published in four volumes because it's something like 1700 pages. In the original Italian, the novel is called L'amica geniale.

Wikipedia says: "The Neapolitan Novels, also known as the Neapolitan Quartet, are a four-part series of fiction..." What? I cynically wonder if this is a ruse by the English language publishers to encourage people to start with any volume, which would be a huge mistake.

Anway, I'd avoided these for a while because of my suspicion of anything that's really popular, but they are certainly highly readable. I did tire occasionally of the endless romantic flings with indistinguishable local boys (Rino and Nino and Marcello and Michele and so on...) but the main female characters are interesting. And to my surprise, the fourth volume is the best. Very long novels can exhaust themselves.