What I Read Last Year--An INCOMPLETE List for 2007, the Common Era

EVERY SO OFTEN I start keeping a list of books that I've read. Once I even tried an annotated list. Trouble is, I never manage to stay interested in these lists, and the one I began last January in the foolishness of my new year's optimism was lost along with my little moleskine notebook.

So, this list will be incomplete, but I'm having fun looking at Lee's list for titles I also read, going through the bookcases, and remembering other books that have been returned to the library or loaned out. One book leads to another, both in time and in the mind, so I've remembered a lot, but not all, of them. Blogging about some--like the Stephen King and the Margaret Atwood--has made them stick in my mind better, which reminds me of Aidan Chambers' saying: "All writing is memory," which speaks both to how we write from memory and remember what we've written about.

The lists are in no particular order. Books that made a really strong impression on me are in bold, and are followed by a one word description.



Though I just started it, Jess Walter's The Zero blew me away in the first sentence, paragraph, page, three pages. Shelter, by Beth Cooley, (another Spokanite) also has a strong beginning. Titus Groan is a slow starter, but I can't wait to really get into it!

Read in 2007

1. Raymond Chandler: The Big Sleep


2. Fyodor Dostoevsky: Crime and Punishment (Pevear and Volkhonsky, trans.) *tortured


3. William Faulkner: Sanctuary *whiskeyjar


4. Stephen King: The Dark Tower VII *hile!
   


5. Philip Roth: Everyman *compression


6. Ian McKewan: On Chesil Beach


7. Barry Lyga: The Astonishing Adventures of Fanboy and Gothgirl


8. Robin Brande: Evolution, Me, & Other Freaks of Nature


9. Aidan Chambers: This is All: The Pillow Book of Cordia Kenn *fearless
   


10. Auralie Sheehan: History Lesson For Girls


11. Jennifer Bell: High Maintenance


12. Kevin Brooks: Candy *breakneck
    


13. Denis Johnson: Tree of Smoke *truth?
    


14. Pamela Des Barres: I'm with the Band *love . . .
    


15. John Green: Looking for Alaska *Alaska.


16. Nick Hornby: How to be Good


17. Joy Nicholson: The Tribes of Palos Verdes


18. Jeff Eugenides: Middlesex *epic


19. Margaret Atwood: Alias Grace
    


20. Carrie Jones: Tips on Having a Gay Ex-Boyfriend *real


21. Alex Richards: Backtalk *snarkvoiced


22. Erin Hunter: Warriors: Into the Wild (r/a=read aloud)


23. JK Rowling: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (r/a) *finale


24. JRR Tolkien: The Lord of the Rings ( r/a) *favoritest
    


25. ibid: The Sillmarillion (r/a)
    


26. Laura Ingalls Wilder: Little Town on the Prairie (r/a ) *growing up:/


27. Julie Andrews Edwards: The Last of the Really Great Wangdoodles r/a

I read part of these, but drifted away from them and want to get back-- includes short stories & essays:

1. Anton Checkov: Stories (Pevear and Volkhonsky translation)


2. Margaret Atwood: Surfacing


3. Joan Didion: The White Album *true


4. Peter S. Beagle: The Last Unicorn

Currently Reading:

1. Beth Cooley: Shelter


2. Jess Walter: The Zero *amazing
   


3. Cynthia Voigt: Dicey's Song


4. Mervyn Peake: Titus Groan

Just bought or received:

1. Jess Walter: The Zero


2. Peter Cameron: Someday this Pain will be Useful to You


3. Calvin Peake: Titus Groan


4. Henry Miller: Tropic of Cancer


5. Robert Penn Warren: All the Kings Men


6. Dostoevsk: Notes From Underground


7. Jonathan Ames: Wake Up, Sir

I'm going to read a lot more this year--starting tonight.

Happy reading and Happy New Year to you!

Love and Peace . . .

New Ink; Next Gig; Spokane Notes; Coronado, North Central, and Barker High Schools

FIRST OF ALL, here are links to a couple of new things out there:

• My longest and most in depth interview so far: Authorlink Interview


• Another, different, interview: ETC Interview


• More good ink: South Florida Sun-Sentinal Teenlink Review

NEXT GIG:

• My fall micro-tour is over, but I'm doing one more event in town before the close of the year:
  
  
  
  • Barnes and Noble @ the Citadel, on Academy Blvd.
    
    
    
    • December 15, Saturday @ 1:30-3:30ish.
    
    
    
    
  
  
  
  


• I hope to see some of the new friends I met today in Chapman's creative writing class at Coronado High School. What a great class. You guys really know how to make an author feel good: laugh a lot and at the right places and say, "Read more!" It was also fantastic to see old friends Mr. "Stay Black" Ken, Tiffany, Kara, and Emily. Love you all.

WASHINGTON NOTES:

Spokane was amazing--what a cool city. But it helps to hang out with the best people:

• My incredible friend Sam Ligon, author of the great novel Safe in Heaven Dead and editor of Willow Springs

• Sam's wife, Kim, and kids Jane and Paul, who are all brilliant.


• His friends, Kelly Chadwick, who introduced me to some fantastic wine, and


• poet Renee Rohl, who introduced me to her students at Barker Center.


• Other friends, novelist Jess Walter and his wife


• Ann, who used to live in my fair city and write for our hometown newspaper The Gazette. (Both she and Jess worked for the Spokane Spokesman-Review until former Gazette editor Stevie Smith came on board and began running ruining it.)

I had a great day visiting with creative writing students at Barker with Renee's class and also with Jim Creason's groups at North Central High School. Special thanks to Dylan, Pauline, Cassie, and (your dad-burned name slips my mind, but you're the best) who I met in class and who actually came out to the reading that night at Auntie's Books.

This event was a little different for me, with the reading showcased up front and with microphone, even, which made the power of the poet's voice truly tremendous.

Then it was a weekend of hanging out with my daughter who is the same age as Sam's girl, Jane. Or the girls spent time together, mostly, and Sam and I stayed up until three or four every night listening to music and talking. And talking. And talking. It's funny to think that I'm still friends with the guy I pulled a desk out from under in Mr. Johnson's actor's workshop class when we were in high school. But that he's still the most brilliant person I've ever met is no surprise.

Not Your Mother's Book Club and Spokane Bound . . .

I never got a chance to do a write up on my last trip, but the hostess with the mostest has done a better job here Literaticat on the Mandabach, Hopkins, Asher, & Lyga gig
with the San Francisco portion.

Here's silly me reading:

Tomorrow I'm off for the last stop on my fall 2007 micro-tour, Spokane, WA.

That where my best old friend Sam Ligon lives, and where I'll appear at Auntie's books on Friday night. I'll also be visiting two creative writing classes at two different schools, North Central and Barker Center. This is is my favorite part, I think, becuase it's so energizing to talk with the kids about writing. I'll miss my own students, of course, but the new groups are refreshing.

It's cold and snowy over in Spokane today, but looking at this pic from the area makes me wish I was going to be there in fishing weather. (Though I have fished in the snow!)



Peace, and wish me happy trails!