100 Books to Read in a Lifetime: Part Two

I will be continuing with the 100 books to read in a lifetime per Amazon, which might just be the 100 books that will provide Amazon with the greatest profit margins. We have reached a sad point in our evolution when multi-national corporations now not only develop our culture but then decides what is artistically valuable.

Goodnight Moon by Margaret Wise Brown: I’ve never read this book or had it read to me to the best of my knowledge. However, I have heard Jack Ingram perform “Goodnight Moon” in concert so that should count for something.

Great Expectations by Charles Dickens: Oh, Kim is going to hate me for this one. Dickens is one of Kim’s favorite authors and when she finally goes for her master’s in English her thesis will be on his works. I however, despite at least three separate attempts, have never been able to get past the first fifty pages of Great Expectations. It’s embarrassing. I’ve read James Joyce but not Dickens.

Guns, Germs and Steel by Jared M. Diamond: I am very surprised that I haven’t read this book yet. This type of non-fiction writing now makes up a majority of what I read. Combination of history and science and sociology and grand claims about how society works that can never be proven out.

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone by J.K. Rowling: I assume that everyone has read this book. Also, I assume that everyone read about Rowling saying that she wishes she didn’t have Ron and Hermione end up together which makes me say, “Thank you for finally thinking this through.” I’ve always said that the epilogue should show, after talking about Ron and Hermione getting married, Hagrid and Ron spending long nights at the bar with Ron going, “She just never shuts up. It’s always one cause or another and she is always right and can’t a guy just go home and watch the damn quidditch match without worrying about the plight of the left handed house dwarves?” It should have been Harry with Luna and Neville with Hermione.

Yes, Neville with Hermione. Look, it is clear that Neville was the chosen one the entire time and Harry was just a diversion by Dumbledore in order to hide Neville in plain sight while he secretly trained him and put forward this façade that he was a failure as a student. Do you really think that Dumbledore would trust the Chosen One to a muggleborn and the least talented Weasley boy?

In Cold Blood by Truman Capote: The classic tale of senseless murder in Kansas. Not only is this book the invention of the true crime novel but it is also just a fascinating tale of what goes through the mind of desperate people who are blinded by greed and desire. I held off on reading this book for years but it is definitely worthwhile to read just to get a sense of Capote’s writing.

Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri Never heard of it.

Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison: Read this in high school and I have to admit that I wasn’t that impressed. It had an amazing prologue and first chapter but I could never get into the rest of the book. Maybe it just wasn’t the right time in my life to read it.

Jimmy Corrigan: Smartest Kid on Earth by Chris Ware: Props for this list to have a graphic novel on it (and a Jimmy Corrigan one at that.) I have heard nothing but good things about this series and I am kicking myself for not having it in my personal collection.

Kitchen Confidential by Anthony Bourdain: An absolute must read for anyone who either loves food, the restaurant business or just loves killer stories by a guy who has seen it all. After reading this you will never, ever, think that owning a restaurant is a good idea. Brilliant, funny and one of the most enjoyable reads on this entire list.

Life After Life by Kate Atkinson: Haven’t read it but I did buy it for Kim for Christmas. We tried to count but I think we gave more books as gifts than anything else. There were legitimate piles of novels under the tree this year. If you want to know why the two of us are together just understand there was no present more enjoyable to give the other than a book that they weren’t previously aware of.

Little House on the Prairie by Laura Ingalls Wilder: Is it sad that this is one of those books that I didn’t read as a kid because I figured that it was for girls? Like I read Treasure Island instead of this just because it had pirates in it?

Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov: I’m a little surprised that this book is on the list. It is clearly one of the best novels of the 20^th century but it is also controversial, disturbing and not the most straightforward read in the world. Still, one should at least make one effort to enter the twisted and unstable mind of Humbert Humbert.

Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez: Definitely on my list of books to read in the relatively near future. Not sure why I’ve always been scared off of Marquez’s work given that I typically enjoy the magical realism genre in general. I’ll be sure to add this to my list.

Love Medicine by Louise Erdrich: Never heard of this one either.

Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl: Another blank from my end. I guess I have never had much desire to search for meaning.

Me Talk Pretty One Day by David Sedaris: I had to check my booklist but I have no record of ever reading this book. I have read almost everything else that David Sedaris has ever written but I’ve completely missed this one. I have no idea why. David Sedaris is great and you should at least give one of his essay collections a try.

Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides: Another one that I should add to my list of books to read. I have read “The Virgin Suicides” though so I am a fan of Eugenides’ work. This one fell off my radar though.

Midnight’s Children by Salman Rushdie: I don’t know if I have ever met anyone who has actually read Salman Rushdie. I’ve known people who have bought his books and can discuss his life story but he is one of those authors who is better known than read and this comes from someone who is a huge fan of David Foster Wallace.

Moneyball by Michael Lewis: Awesome baseball book and a great look at how data and statistics can be used to change the way we look at the world. As someone whose entire adult life has revolved around spreadsheets and trying to figure out what numbers mean this is a great example of what I am trying to do at any moment in time. Sadly, I don’t have reporters following me around chronicling my every move. Not yet, anyway.

  

Of Human Bondage by W. Somerset Maugham: I tried to read this book a few times and could never make it through more than thirty pages. Some books just don’t connect with you no matter how hard you try.

On the Road by Jack Kerouac: I am not a huge fan of the beats but you should read this book just to get a sense of what it was like in that moment of American history. You’ll also come away with the feeling that Kerouac is a jerk and you should never lend him your car. Also, you will be amazed at how easy it was to travel the country by hitchhiking back then. There would be no way to write this book today without having multiple references to picking up serial killers.

Out of Africa by Isak Dinesen: When was the last time you heard someone reference this book (or movie)? Seriously, it has been probably thirty years since I have seen anyone even bring up Out of Africa. I’m pretty sure that if you are only going to read 100 books in your life you should at least try to read something that will remain in the public eye.

Persopolis by Marjane Satrapi: Another graphic novel, which is awesome. Surprisingly this list doesn’t include Watchmen or any of the Sandman books which are my clear choice for the best graphic novels of all time. Feel free to substitute those if necessary.

Portnoy’s Complaint by Philip Roth: One of those great American novels that is constantly described as a great American novel to the point that I have no real desire to read it. Anyone have any real opinions?

Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen: Yeah, I am horrible at reading Austen or the Brontes or anyone in that genre of authors. It is a huge blind spot in my literary collection.

7 for 25 today and 16 for 50 so far. Not a good start.

This post brought to you by the Cruise World Order

This might be the strangest piece of graffiti that I have ever seen. I understand the idea behind graffiti. You get to show your artistic abilities in an urban environment, engage in self-promotion and stick it to the man by defacing helpless walls. But this one is pretty stunning. Now there is the possibility that Tom Cruise himself did this and this is his tagging style, which would be rather low key and refined. If not, then I am at a loss as to what this means. If it said “Rulez” or “Suks” afterwards then it would at least be a critique. Here it is just a statement. Maybe it is a part of some urban marketing campaign to raise overall Tom Cruise awareness to new heights. Or maybe some guy just thinks that Far and Away is a really, really great movie and wants us all to bask in the majesty that is the words “Tom Cruise”.

My fun Ticketmaster comment for the night. In a case of target marketing gone berserk over the course of twenty four hours last week I received emails informing me that I was eligible to pre-order tickets to two concerts. One was for Morrissey because you can’t keep me away from concerts by Englishmen who have been depressed for twenty years. The other was for Social Distortion. I am really, really trying to figure out how I got on both lists and whether I am the only person on the planet who is equally likely to be in the pit at a Social D show as he is to wear black on the outside because black is how I feel on the inside at a Morrissey show. I’m pretty sure I’ve broken whatever algorithm they are using as a part of their recommendation engine.

So I was at another concert tonight, this time to see Jack Ingram. Night started out the way a lot of my nights have recently with an abysmal opening act. That’s not quite fair on my part. The guy had talent and since it was a country show I should have expected country music but I do expect opening acts to sing their own songs. Not “Here’s a Travis Tritt cover, here’s a Brooks and Dunn cover, here’s a Big and Rich song” until I start banging my head against a wall because it is more pleasurable than listening to any of those bands. That’s the problem with lounging in the alt-country gutter, occasionally I find myself forced to listed to mainstream country and it is just god awful. Also, I just have an issue with people wearing cowboy hats in a non-ironic manner. Unless for some reason there has been a cattle stampede in the past few weeks there really is no reason for anyone to wear a cowboy hat in this town and consider a good look in anything but a retro hipster manner.

Anyway, Jack performed better than expected and I was only tempted to yell “Sell out” and “Traitor” once during the show. I’ll have to explain this. I first saw Jack back in 1999 when he opened for Kelly Willis. I’ve seen Jack play when there were maybe thirty of us in the crowd. He’s a talented musician and songwriter and I’ve talked to him after shows and he is a nice guy who really appreciates his crowd. Well, a year or two ago he cashed in his Nashville card and got on Toby Keith’s label and was able to have a number one hit. This means that he is now popular and playing bigger venues and opening for people like Sheryl Crow and Brad Paisley and making people like me wonder “What the hell just happened?”

It’s not that I fault the guy’s success because he sure has hell earned it. It’s just that by making that leap he lost some of what made him special. I’ll give him credit because even in a bigger venue his show was similar to when I’ve seen him in the past. He played a lot of his great old songs and his new material is pretty good. It’s poppy and has a Nashville sound but that sells discs. What kills me is that on his new disc (which he even said sold more copies last week than Electric sold in five years) he covers Hinder’s “Lips of an Angel” and uses it as his first single. I don’t care how he tries to push the idea that he thought it would sound good as a country song. Nothing Hinder does will sound good in any format. They are just a horrible excuse for a rock band. And covering them seems like such a sell out move.

That and the dancing girls who came on stage at one point. Actually, I doubt those were Jack’s. They were probably supplied by the record station promoting the show. While I certainly have no problem with scantily clad women dancing in front of me there is a hell of a lot of unintentional comedy watching them dance to a song called “Barbie Doll”. A song which has the lyric, “She’s really good looking but she’s got no heart at all.” It was a very meta moment. Still, he has remained the same appreciative, nice guy and while I’m stunned that someone I like has actually become popular it’s nice to know that it hasn’t changed him.

And as long as he closes his shows with Goodnight Moon I’ll always leave happy.