I don’t understand everything that happens in Murakami’s Hard-Boiled Wonderland (1985), but I love this novel. I love it because it puts into a tangible art form the way I feel in my guts about our confusing and beautiful existence on earth. A sample, about a guy chilling in the park, watching a family feed birds, and getting hit with the profundity of living: Wide shot: Pigeons, fountain, mother and child. I didn’t want to leave this scene…I closed my eyes, I felt a ripple run through my […]
We’re Goin’ Space to the Wild, Wild West!
Book four of the sci-fi series The Expanse, Cibola Burn, is my least-favorite book in the series thus far. While I read the previous three books in a matter of days, this one took me several weeks to finish. Book three also took some time to get going, but ended up being fantastic. I mentioned in a previous review of this series that it seems like each book takes on the flavor of a different genre. Book one was a mystery, book two was a political thriller, […]
“I am the least difficult of men. All I want is boundless love.”
My first exposure to Frank O’Hara’s poetry was on season two of Mad Men. Don Draper mails a book of poems to someone, and over the scene Jon Hamm’s smoky gravel recites a few lines from “Mayakovsky”: Now I am quietly waiting for the catastrophe of my personality to seem beautiful again, and interesting, and modern. What gorgeous brooding was this? I looked up the book, drove to Barnes & Noble, and bought Meditations immediately. I skimmed it once and let it sit on my shelves for […]
Quick, Helpful Advice on Being a Better Husband
Like eleven million other Americans (literally!), I bought Gary Chapman’s 5 Love Languages at some point in my relationship. The gist of the book is that there are five “love languages” and everyone prefers one of them: time, touch, gifts, service, and words of affirmation. I remember liking it when I read it several years ago, but I was engaged at the time and it didn’t really stick. I remembered what it said about me (quality time!), but unfortunately not enough about what it said about […]
A Fun and Humane Romantic Comedy
While I enjoy romantic comedies on the big screen, I know very little about the romance genre and its myriad subgenres. The good folks at CBR have made some solid recommendations for me in the past to help me get into romance books (ex. The Hating Game) and were able to fine-tune those recs even more based on my feedback. That’s how I got to Rainbow Rowell’s Attachments. Well done, CBR! This is my kind of book! I enjoyed Attachments because it was approachable, relatable, and […]
A Fun Collegiate Literature Course in a Book!
It’s CBR10, YAY! At work, we often have informal lunchtime book exchanges. What a lucky guy I am to work where I work! Knowing my bookworm status, one of my friends handed off How to Read Literature Like a Professor to me, telling me it would change the way I read. She was right, in a very good way! While I have been a lifelong reader and writer, most of what I know about literature comes via osmosis. Besides some very basic freshman-level courses, I don’t […]
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