I’m always drawn to those authors that publish a monthly catalogue of what they read and buy in any given month. Nick Hornby does this with Believer Mag (or in novel form with The Polysyllabic Spree). In general, I like these kinds of things – personal, private records and mental tallies made public. And since I like to fancy myself a younger, female Nick Hornby, I’ll go through the exercise for myself, though my list is quite a bit shorter:
BOUGHT
Terrorist by John Updike – on clearance for $1 at Half Price Books. One of my favorite weekend pastimes is scouring the back room for these finds!
READ
Terrorist by John Updike – Good, this + seeing Charlie Wilson’s War over the holidays were a good, humanizing antidote to the other side of the binoculars known as US foreign policy.
The Agenda by Bob Woodward – About Clinton's economic policies. On my bookshelf for years but I haven’t felt ambitious enough to tackle it until now. This was an extremely valuable read for me personally because it banished any lingering desires to “get into politics someday.” An interest is just an interest, sometimes. It also altered some of my preconceptions about the Clintons. I have never been a Hillary supporter, but I came out with a more favorable view of her. Her experience with Congress, policy-making and Washington is real – and her discipline/toughness superceded her husband’s by a long shot in his own administration.
The Dante Club by Matthew Pearl – This was my ‘trash read’ for the Christma break, suggested to me a while ago by an old friend when we were commiserating together about peers who’ve been published before us. My friend and the author were teaching fellows together at Harvard. Great so far, and makes me want to go pick up Dante.
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1 comment:
man, i tore through dante club. that was a fun read, and i didn't feel guilty :)
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