catcher, caught. sarah collins honenberger.

i first saw "catcher, caught" on amazon's daily deal and the houseboat which i thought was a trailer, didn't intrigue me (who wants to read about white trash?) so i didn't read the description of it.  then, it reappeared in the kindle store and i read it was the story of a boy with only a year to live that runs away to new york inspired by "catcher in the rye", hence the title.  due to my love of" catcher in the rye", i was disappointed with myself for not buying it when it was a 1.99 on amazon.  but as luck would have it, when my mom took my brother to the san juan capistrano mission, i opt out of paying to see the mission, and went to the library.  where oddly enough i spent more money on books than my mission admission, and one of the books i purchased for $1 was "catcher, caught".

since i just finished "the catcher in the rye" and was going to new york, i decided to read "catcher, caught" since i would be in the right setting.  of course i didn't have any time to read in nyc and fell asleep on my flight there but that was fine because sadly the running away part was at the end and not the whole story.

i was disappointed because i thought "catcher, caught" would pay homage to "catcher" by being the story of a boy trying to find himself by retracing holden's stops in new york.  i mean that is what the back cover claimed, but it wasn't about that.  the setting for majority of the story is virginia, where the main character, daniel who is dying from leukemia, lives with his family in a houseboat.  daniel does read and analyze "the catcher in the rye" throughout the book but i was less interested because i wanted him to be in new york, trying to be holden.

to be honest, i didn't care for this book. one reason being that daniel did not seem like a 16 year old boy to me, but more like an older woman trying to sound like a 16 year old boy.  i have never been a 16 year old boy nor have i ever been faced with dying in a year but there are still some things i expect a teenager to act like regardless.  there were times where his thoughts were too sensitive for an adolescent male.  and the way he talked about meredith's body was way too mature for a 16 year old boy, don't they just want see tits?  also who has sex for the first time and it be this amazing experience?!?!  daniel was a 16 year old boy from the backwoods of virginia, i mean he would have lasted like 3 minutes if he was lucky.  and they did it twice? i mean they went through two condoms, and i am going to assume that one of them was broken because they didn't know how to put it on versus having sex twice. and yes, daniel was dying but meredith gave it up quite quickly.  i mean don't kids experiment with oral sex before they have actual sex?  also who lets their 16 year old twin daughters stay out til 1 am?  other than parents of teen moms.

another issue i had was daniel's relationship with his kid brother nick.  nick was younger and competitive (this adjective was used every time this character was mentioned, we got the point collins honenberger) and obviously having issues with his brother dying but daniel didn't try to help him cope with it.  he just got annoyed with him wanting pizza all the time.  daniel was having deep 40 year old woman thoughts about life but couldn't demonstrate any sent sensitivity towards his brother.  phoebe was so important to holden and daniel recognized that but sadly didn't apply it to his life.  a nice story plot would have been daniel seeing holden's love for phoebe as an example of how he should treat his brother.

another thing i could not handle were the hippie parents.  they made no sense to me as characters. first and foremost, the mom does not send him to school for fear of germs but they live on a houseboat!  how sanitary can a houseboat be? especially one docked on a river, shouldn't she be concerned about malaria carrying mosquitos?  and i am all up for alternative methods of medicine, i mean i take garlic cloves over cough syrup to stop a cough but your kid has a couple of years of life and you don't opt for chemo? i don't know what year this was suppose to take place in, maybe the early 90s (there was a cellphone but no mention of internet) and i know organic food is a recent trend but i would have like to have seen hippie mom with some illegal garden and feeding her kids from that.  also i wish the dad had a backbone, i mean he obviously wanted daniel to have chemo.  

in the end, daniel runs away to new york and discovered that holden's new york is  no longer there.  he also discovered how rich holden probably was.  it's funny co as a kid, i didn't noticed but when i reread as an adult, i got it.  i thought the whole scene in trump tower was kinda bogus.  it was the 90s, era of heroin chic so maybe they saw daniel's luekemia-ridden body and thought dope fiend.  but a kid has a nosebleed don't you help versus kick him out of your building, wouldn't donald be worried about a lawsuit?

the story comes to an abrupt ending in which yay! daniel gets chemo thanks to the state of new york!  and by the way, the person i liked the most was the nurse in the er, she was the only one with common sense.  she was also the only believable character.

in closing, just like i said in my goodreads review, if you are want to read this based on your love for "catcher" don't, just reread catcher instead.

z: a novel of zelda fitzgerald. therese anne fowler. (113)

of course with the release of the latest film version of "the great gatsby", there would be a resurgence of interest in the fitzgeralds.  so when i heard about "z" by therese anne fowler, a novel about zelda fitzgerald, i had to check it out!

my interest in the fitzgeralds came via woody allen's "midnight in paris". the fitzgeralds especially zelda with her "lets go i am bored" demands were a delight.  and of course, all the myths about their partying intrigued me.  as a result, i read his novels (except the last tycoon) and hers plus a handful of their short stories.  and as a result of that read their wikipedia page to find out what was true in their books and it seemed like their novels were pretty autobiographical.  though intrigued by their life, i never picked up a bio or a book of their letters.  but i wish i had.

if i had read a bio, i would not have spent the whole novel thinking, did this really happen? i mean i know it is a novel but i hadn't realized zelda had called off their engagement though "this side of paradise" alludes to that.  i also didn't realize that the housekeeper from "the beautiful and the damned" was real.  also the squirrel coat really existed too!  or that the actress from "tender is the night" was based on lois moran, i knew the novel's affair was based on a real affair but didn't realize it was based on an actual actress that young (i had to google her, and she will only be famous for her literary counterpart).  i wanted to read nancy milford's bio of zelda which has been sitting on my bookshelf but since "z" is due back at the library on thursday didn't think i had the time.  oh well, this has sparked my need to read that, reread "save me the waltz" and another novel called "beautiful fools" about scott's last affair.

so back to "z", though interesting, i will admit that at times i did get a bit bored.  i mean i got it, scott was an alcoholic and as a result was a horrible husband.  in an afterword, fowler discussed how there are two camps "team scott" or "team zelda" when it comes to who was the victim in their destructive relationship.  i have always been team zelda, i mean, have you read a "tender is the night" and "save me the waltz"?!?! both novels discuss the same period in their life and i read scott as the destructive one.  sure nicole and alabama were instituationlized but its known some women were instituationlized for having "crazy" thought of independence and rejecting the cult of domesticity versus actual

illness.  

this point of view of zelda's bouts in mental institutions was interested and i appreciated fowler's presentation of it as such.  as i read about z's (i'll use z for the character in the book and zelda for the real zelda) time in institutions it demonstrated how she was not crazy but just rejected the traditional female roles society forced upon her.  she didn't want to stay at home and live a life of leisure.  she wanted to participate in the social sphere.  in addition to that,  she wanted to be seen as an individual from her husband.  and what did scott expect? the very spirit and personality he fell in love with was the same one he tried to mute later in life.  and plus with all the alcohol involved plus the partying its no surprised they had issues (see:  my life 2007-10).  also it was sad to see how writing was good therapy for z but she was not allowed to do it.  

in the afterword, fowler also mentioned zelda was probably misdiagnosed and today would be diagnosed as bipolar.  also her meds harmed her more than help.  though i think it was the time period that was against her versus any mental illness, it reminded me of the book "girl interrupted", these women were not crazy only had too progressive thoughts for the time period. z's "illness" was really just an unwillingness to conform to female gender roles.

though i did appreciate fowler's painting of z's institutionalization, there were some things i could have done without.  one being all the hemingway nonsense. i get that hemingway and zelda hated each other but that scene when hem made a pass at z was way too graphic for my liking.  z had her outlandish moments but that seemed really out of character.   also i did not enjoy all the fairy talk.  i know cole porter was questationable (i did see "de-lovely" and fairy or not he is one of my favorite songwriters) but did people really question ernest and scott's relationship?!?  and then the scene with scott's moaning?  i think that was all done in poor taste.

[author's note:  so i just finished reading in nancy milford's biography,"zelda", that the moaning incident did occur.  and there was talk of hemingway and fitzgerald being faires!]

and my last critique is that fowler's "z" wasn't as colorful as the real zelda.  zelda's works are always filled with clever little lines and musings but there wasn't too much of that in "z".  i mean fowler tried but didn't succeed.  also i got tried of z interrupting awkward moments with a comment about dancing.  though i guess she was the epitome of the flapper girl.

all in all, glad i read it since it sparked a new interest in the fitzgeralds.  but left me wondering what really went on.  and as a result,  i plan on reading alot more about f. scott and zelda.

ps i totally forgot.  so the book is divided into parts and have an epigraph.  all of them were quite delightful:

always be drunk:

thought this quite clever since scott was a wordsmith:

and of course how great was the dedication page:

the love song of johnny valentine. teddy wayne (98)

i can't remember where i first read about "the love song of johnny valentine" but the cover definitely caught my eye. you know me and shiny things. also the title reminded me of one of my favorite killers' song "the ballad of michael valentine". however, i quickly lost interest when they referenced justin beiber.

but when i saw it on emma robert's instagram, i decided to give it a chance. and though emma was spot on for "where'd you go bernedette?. she was way off based on this one. but maybe her celeb-status, resulted in it being a good laugh for her.

the novel is the tale of 11 year-old, johnny valentine who is a pop sensation was discovered via youtube and has great hair plus a fake romance with a famous latina tween actress (see: justin beiber). his mother is his manager, she loves to party, screws guys in the tour crew and i guess has a coke habit (see: lindsay lohan's mom). johnny's dad went AWOL when he was a kid, but what might be him pops up on random message boards (see: deadbeat dads that want in on the action.)

the book is the supposed to be a coming of age story. johnny's maturity comes via his search for his father. however, just like johnny lacked any depth, so did this novel. as a 30-year-old woman, i really shouldn't identify with 11-year-old boys, but this character was too shallow, naive and just plain stupid for anyone to sympathize for, let alone identify with.

i really have no idea how i finished it. i was intrigued about his father's message board posts because i was sure it was a child molester posting. but that story line wasn't enough to make this book interesting. johnny's life was so sad and boring, the most exciting parts of his days included passing levels on a video game and masturbating. maybe that was the point? to prove how depressing celeb's lives really are? but who wants to read about insanely rich first world problems? also it didn't provide any provocative insight on the music industry. thanks to behind the music, reality tv shows and entertainment magazines/tabloids, we know how the music industry is just screwing everyone over. they have also shown us how shitty celebrities are.

i guess i also kept on reading because the cover touted the author as the winner of some award. and the writing wasn't bad, it was just that context wasn't good. i mean he did have some random interesting insight and the hipster in me loved the latchkeys. but other than that the book was lame and i'm not sure how i finished. i'm actually getting annoyed that i wasted time reading it. it was so bad, i am going to stop here because i don't want to waste anymore time on this book.

where'd you go bernadette? maria semple. (97)

of course with a cute cover like that, "where'd you go bernadette?" caught my eye while browsing amazon. however, i didn't give it much thought until i saw it on emma roberts' instagram:

really emma roberts?!?! i haven't seen any of her tween movies but loved her in "it's kind of a funny story" and "celeste and jesse forever". and i know it sounds silly but girl is literary. she is always posting pics of books she is reading so i started to follow her instagram. and yes i plan on reading the books she posts. (ps she also has really good fashion sense, i purchased a pair of rhinestone cat ears because she posted similar headbands on instagram. i know i need help.)

but seriously i have nothing to be embarrassed about because this first book i read because of emma roberts was amazing!

to start the book was written by maria semple who wrote for "arrested development". and of course, anything associated with the show has to be brillant. i am not sure how important of a writer semple is/was (i'm a fan but not a fanatic). but i could totally see bernadette as a character on the show. bernadette would be an architect michael hired to redesign the homes.

anyway back to the story. so the title best summarizes the story. bernadette fox has disappeared and her daughter bee branch (real name: balakrishna, because she was born with a heart condition and was blue when she was born) is determined to find her. the book is actually a book written by bee and is a complication of emails, letters, and other paperwork bee hopes lead her to her mom..

there are a bunch of subplots that lead up to bernadette's disappearance. first, is the family trip to antarctica that bernadette and her husband, elgin branch, promised bee based on her grades. due to this, there is the virtual indian assistant that bernadette hired to help with organizing the trip; bernadette is a recluse (the story explains why, it's quite sad and broke my heart when i found out). there is bernadette's feud with the gnats (what she falls the moms at her daughter's
school), especially audrey griffin, who is one of those self-righteous my child can do no wrong that i absolutely hated at first. last there is soo-lin, audrey's BFF and elgin's assistant, and who by the end i hated though she was quite pitiful. all of their lives crash into one another and results in bernadette's disappearance. (i don't want to give too much away because i want you to read it!)

all in all, bernadette is such a delightful character, she is a bit of mess but that is part of her charm. i really want to be her best friend. she seemed like a great person to get coffee with and talk shit about what is wrong with the world. se goes on these random rants which annoyed her husband but i found hilarious. she is also this amazing architect that was green and a dumpster diver before it was cool! her best piece was "the twenty mile house" in which she had a plot of land and the house and the furnishings were made up of items that were found within a twenty mile radius and all the materials had to be source locally. what a cool idea! she won a genius award for it!

also she wasn't the only genius of the family. her husband worked for microsoft and had this super famous TED talk. his project is a robot and i won't give you details because the TED talk was one of my favorite parts.

i can't express how much i enjoyed this book. so many great pop cultural references in it too. it will have you smiling and laughing to yourself. if there is one book you read this year because of this blog, this is it! i absolutely loved and am sure you will too!

the casual vacancy. j.k. rowling (96)

i should have wrote that letter to j.k. rowling suggesting her next book be the story of harry potter but from the prospective of professor snape! it would give snape a chance to be the hero in his own words instead of via flashbacks. give him a chance to tell his side! but alas i never wrote that letter and even if i did and j.k. somehow read it, it would have never convinced her, because she was determined to write the anti-potter.

if you are a potterhead and looking to get a fix, look elsewhere. if you are a heroin addict, looking to get a fix, you should actually read this book because it will show you how heroin will ruin your life.

at first, i was hesitant to read "the casual vacancy" because i am not interested in politics. i am ignorant of what goes on in washington and the world because let's face it even if you are informed on the political affairs of the world, you are still ignorant. i believe the government only lets us know what it wants us to know. also i am one of those skeptics that believe that the masses can vote but it doesn't really count for anything. i vote for the sticker. so when i read the premise, i was certain that 500 pages of small town politics would bore me to death.

but guess what, it didn't. but also because it wasn't a political novel. well it was but in the sense that it is a novel about the class divide which is ultimately political. this novel actually reminded me of zadie smith's "nw" (amazon should consider doing a deal where you get both books for at a discount prices), both focus on the slums of england. oddly enough, i didn't like any of rowling's characters just like i didn't care for anyone in "nw". interestingly enough it was for the same reason, they were all horrible people who were selfish and only out for themselves. the only character i cared about was krystal weedon because she was dealt a bum hand by life. and yes there were some life choices she made that i didn't agree with but she dealt with her problems the only way she knew how.

quick digression. so the book is about the town of pagford and the divide within their middle due to the slums aka "the fields". interesting those those affected by the issue aka the lower class did not strive to keep their homes. this could a) be an analogy about how in politics the upper classes rule the lives of the lower without their knowing or b) the lower classes do not care about their own well being (which makes me question, why do the upper classes care than?)

this divide actually kept me interested in the book. my personal opinion on government assistance and welfare programs are that they have gone to shit. people abuse them. (see me on unemployment for 3 years). and there's no checks and balances on any of these programs. most people on assistance to not use the money properly. they buy iphones or ipads instead of what that money is allotted. plus a lot of time and energy is spent on people who would never spend the same amount of time and energy on themselves because let's be honest their lack of motivation in life is the reason why they need the assistance in the first place.

however, once i saw the story of krystal and how she could have a better life if she had the resources, i realized that life and assistance isn't so black and white. these welfare programs were put in place to help those in need. but sadly instead of doing that it has created a culture of dependence in which people abuse the aid. i have no real solution to this problem other than bitch about it. but i if i ruled the world, i would reform the programs to give assistance to those who truly needed it instead of junkies and teens that use their bastard children (sounds harsh but i am a bastard so it is kosher) as their meal ticket (krystal weedon planned on doing this).

at first glance, krystal seemed like the anti-potter. she was a girl born to a junkie mother who grew up in the slums. she skipped school, smoked, cussed, and had unprotected sex. but though rowling was trying to get away from her wholesome teen heros from hogsworth, krystal and harry both share a heart of gold. well krystal's was probably tainted a little, but she did try to sacrifice herself (via the attempt at pregnancy) to keep her family together. kinda like harry sacrificed himself for the world. also they are both searching for love due to lack of a home; krystal's single mom is a junkie and we all know what happened to harry's parents. both are also outsiders whose reputations proceed them, krystal is known as a hoodlum but she is actually a good kid. and well harry was a super star than a liar in the press about the return of he-would-at-that-time-couldn't-be-named and he really was the savior (not like blasphemous savior but he did save the world from evil.) so those rowling may have wanted her characters to be edgier, she still created a character you could care about.

however, her supporting characters were the opposite of the b-list characters in potter. whereas i loved ron, hermione, sirius black, remus, snape, and dobbie, i could have lived without all the other characters in "the casual vacancy". i absolutely hated simon and kept on wishing someone called the police about his abuse. he was such an asshole, i would have been okay with him dying. fats was another character i could not stand with his smugness and abuse of sukhvinder. (oh i forgot , i did like sukhvinder, she was a hero and had a heart of gold too.). i also couldn't handle gavin the coward. but everyone else were just sad.

also there were so many characters, it was overwhelming. like it was cool to see how they were all interconnected because that is how life is. but after a while, there were too many people. i could have done without knowing every detail of everyone's life.

overall, it was a good book but it wasn't great. i will not walk around singing its praise like i did once i gave harry potter a chance. i definitely would not recommend it to kids that read the series. this book talks about sex, drugs, affairs, and abuse, just to name a few. there is no denying that rowling is a good storyteller, she kept me interested with her plot twists. i was also shocked by her endings but without a person to truly care about or a cause to support, i did not get completely lost in the book. if you miss harry and the gang and looking for something to fill the void, just reread the series.

truth in advertising. john kenney. (93)

i can't remember how i found out about "truth in advertising", i want to say it was featured in a barnes and noble email or maybe a goodreads one. but i do remember that nick hornby was referenced in one of the reviews. (its actually a publishers weekly quote, i found it on the back cover: "a comic tour de force; fans of nick hornby and jonathan tropper will have a new author to watch for.") since i love, nick hornby, i had to check it out. figured it would be the "high fidelity" of advertising. and it kinda was.

*this entry will contain some spoilers. if you plan on reading the book, read it first than read this blog.

"the truth in advertising" is the story of finbar dolan, the name is odd but i like it, though he goes by fin (love the nickname too, reminds me of "adventure time" . . . and i just realized . . . "glee", hmm maybe not so cute, after all).  fin works in advertising (duh?) and is going through a mid-life crisis.  though mid-life crisis seems like a misnomer, he is only 40, but if you think about it, if the average man lives til 80, than 40 is mid-life.  it's weird because when i think mid-life crisis, i think kevin spacey "american beauty", but i didn't think of fin as that old.  it could be that i was in high school when i first saw "american beauty" and far from 40 and now that i'm a closer to it, think of it as young.  i imagined fin as someone younger, like a not-as-hot-bradley-cooper (though i just googled and cooper is only 38). 

anyway, back to fin's mid-life crisis.  it's not so much a mid-life crisis, but a "what i'm a doing with my life" funk, which i feel is not a product of age, but a side effect of being born after 1970.  i feel like my friends and i are constantly in this funk, not so much because of how old we are, but because we are part of that "everyone gets a gold star" generation.  (this is what klosterman discussed in "the visible man" if you read that entry.)  as kids we were never really awarded for hard work but were constantly given positive reinforcement, as a result our work ethic isn't the greatest.  plus we have always been taught that work should make us happy but the fact of the matter work should just pays the bills.  as a result we end up on this search for work that makes us happy but this search is frivolous because work is never fun no matter how much you think you love your job.  so though fin is in advertising, he is questioning, "is advertising really for me?"

so normally if your work life isn't stellar, it's okay because you can fault your home life.  however, fin's home life is non-existent.  he was engaged but he got cold feet.  about eight months prior to when we meet him in the novel, he had just called off his wedding.  it's kinda sad but really not that horrible because better cold feet than a nasty divorce.  there is also a beautiful story about him calling off his wedding and a gravy boat.  it was sad and lovely and could be a great short story on its own.

so this is fin when we meet him.  i would like to say that things get better for him, but since this is a novel, it gets worse before it all sorts out in the end.

lets start with the advertising, because the title includes the word advertising. fin is a copywriter and his big account is diapers, think huggies but not cos kenney prolly couldn't get the rights to use their name so came up with "snugglies" to use.  so the big news is that snugglies designed the first flushable, biodegradable diaper and decided to launch this new product with . . . a SUPERBOWL COMMERICAL!!!!  this is exciting for fin, cos it is the superbowl.  however, he has a family emergency that makes this even more of a challenge. but before that, a word on superbowl commercials.

superbowl commercials used to be great but now they kinda suck.    they used to be clever and funny and now they are just lame.  in the novel, they came up with two pitches.  the pitch i liked most was based on "an inconvenient truth".  the commercial would show babies being born all over the world but with al gore heads, to show how green they were.  i thought that was clever.  the other commerical, the one they went with, i thought was a horrible idea and would have never worked in real life.  it was based on the apple 1984 ad.  i mean why even try to mess with that?  that ad is classic and any kind of spoof or parody would be bad and should never be attempted.  i know this was novel but still no one in their right mind fictional or non-fictional would ever give this commerical the green light.  (do you green light commericals, like show?)

back to fin's family emergency, sadly his father dies.  well not really that sad because fin hadn't spoken to his father for about 28 years.  without giving too much away, the father was abusive and there was an incident with his mother.  but the bottom line is that fin does not view his father as his father.  to add to this, fin and his siblings are not that close.  this actually broke my heart, i have my ups and downs with  my family but i can't imagine being in contact with none of my family members.  it must be really lonely.

so fin's father's dying request was to have his ashes spread in pearl harbor, near the spot where he was when the war ended.  fin's siblings nor fin himself,  want to do it because they all hate him.  and i hate to sound heartless, but i get it.  i found it odd how all of fin's friends kept telling him that he needed to do it because it was dad.  but the fact is, it wasn't his dad.  i think it's hard for people who grew up with both parents to grasp how it is to have an absent parent.  that person is a stranger.  the only connection you have to that person is your DNA and maybe some facial features.  that man is not your dad.  he didn't look under your bed for monsters, or taught you how to ride a bike or took you to your first baseball game.  he is not a dad that was there to help you when scraped your knee or had your heart broken.  he is not that dad from the google ad that always makes me cry, a dad who sends his daughter encouraging emails when times get tough. he is simply a man who helped create you but didn't really want much to do with you after, kinda like god in the old testament.  he is essentailly a stranger?  would you do it for stranger?  probably not.  or you would but not out of love but respect for a person's dying wish.  but you get my point.  (please note i'm not bitter about living in a single parent home, i think i'm better for it.  but i just feel it's unfair to assume that i owe my dad something when he was never really there for me.)

to not spoil one of the main themes of the book, i will not tell you what fin ends up doing.  you have to read to find out.  i'm also not going to tell you how the superbowl ad went.  you have to read that for yourself.

when i first started reading, i thought fin would become one of my book crushes. he is witty and has a great sense of humor. he also did this cute thing when he first moved to new york. he read "here is new york" and "traced the steps". he then "reread 'catcher in the rye' and did the same." this was kinda perfect cos the last time i went to new york i read books with famous new yorkers (i found a list online). i read "franny and zooey", "stuart little", and "from the mixed up files of mrs. basil e. frankweiler." i also read "extremely loud & incredibly close" because it was set in new york. so totally fell in love with him for that. (i plan on retracing "catcher" on my next nyc trip.). however i didn't fall complete. sure he was hip, he referenced a bunch of cool things but he was weird at times. like i hated his sarcasm. i was annoyed reading it so i could only imagine having to deal with it in real life. and i'm sure it was some defensive mechanism but still would be a dealbreaker for me. also his whole internal dialogues of convos with talk show host was not attractive either. though i loved how he framed life like a commercial and how he scanned through life. like on his first date he goes through a whole life with her. it's a lot to type out here but if you read it, i'm allison to page 145. he also flashbacks about his dad and sister, he sees them doing all of these mundane things but realizing the beauty and simplicity of each thing. it reminded me of charlie from "the perks of being a wallflower".

though those last two things just really mean that i enjoyed kenney's writing. how he captured life in an instant  he was clever and had excellent pop culture references.  i mean he called gwyneth paltrow, mrs. coldplay, kinda cool.  he also quoted f. scott fitzgerald. there were some other references that made me smile but didn't mark them so can't share them but i am sure kenney and i could be friends in real life.

also if you are in advertising you should read this. you will prolly get a kick out of the rundown of fin's agency.

oh last but not least, in the story there is a character keita, who i adore. he is the son of this super rich japanese shipping company owner and in charge of fin's agency. he was sweet and kind and for some odd reason i pictured him in my head as PSY. lol

you lost me there. rosecrans baldwin. (72)

after reading and loving "paris, i love you but your bringing me down", i decided to read baldwin's debut novel. though i did not find it as delightful a read as "paris" (this subject manner was heavier), "you lost me there" was still a good book.

"you lost me there" is the story of a neuroscientist, whose research focus is alzheimer's, and his struggle to remember the details of his now-deceased wife and their marriage. it's ironic because as much as victor studied memory and the brain, he misconstrued the past and created false memories of his wife. his misconstruction also leads the reader to wonder if he has fallen victim to the very disease he is trying to cure/prevent.  the book moved randomly through victor's inner thoughts to present life to memories, which also make a reader weary of his mental health.  and of course, his meltdown episode on the rockerfeller's boat was a red flag  (his dead wife did speak to him from beyond the grave).

random digression while we are discussing memory loss/mental health. but one night victor's goddaughter cornelia brought up a case study H.M. that she studied in school. H.M. was a gentlemen who suffered from epilepsy as a child.  in an attempt to cure him, scientist removed parts of his brain.  though his epileptic seizures did stop, he lost his short term memory.  he could not not remember the present. his memory was restricted to twenty seconds.  something would be taught to him but twenty seconds later it would be gone, his mind unable to create new memories.  a extreme version of "50 first dates".  i was familiar with this case study because i saw a wonderful video installation of this case study at the whitney in nyc.  the piece was by kerry tribe.  tribe created a film, which she ran simultaneously side by side as a duplicate, but with a twenty second delay (the time frame of H.M.'s short term memory).  at inital watching, i did not understand the delay, but once i discovered the biography behind the man feature in it the film, it was quite profound.  it was sad how quickly he lost what had just occured to him, and how he was unable to create new memories.  luckily, his long term memory was not effected so he still had those memories and was not completely alone in his mind.  it makes one realize how much we take our memories for granted because life without it would be sad, lonely, and scary.  (to read more info on H.M. click here.  to learn more about the video installation click here.)

back to the novel.  i think why i lacked a connection to this work (and an indication of baldwin's great writing skill) was because victor was cold and distant.  he was a very difficult character to sympathize with because he was cut off from everyone.  all of his relationships seemed superficial (even his marriage) because he never was 100 percent there for the other person.  i often became frustrated with him because he never seemed completely focused when interacting with others (this could also be a sign of his alhezimer's).  he would balantly ignore others that were having conversations with him.  it was rude and i could not imagine how his wife survived this or why regina put up with it.  and sadly he was often forgiven for it because of his brilliance.

i will add that this book does hold a valuable lesson.  it demonstrates that regardless of how brilliant a mind can be, our minds create biased or flawed memories.  incidents in one's history may not have been accurately recorded by one's mind.  victor thought he knew his wife but in fact he did not know her at all.  and that is because at times we take bits and pieces of stories that better fit the perspective we want. when i think of all the arguments i have ever had, i can always restructure it so that i am the victim, even though i am the one at fault.  every memory we have, which we may want to call capital t truth, is in fact something that has been framed by our perspective.

it's interesting because victor shares how he had an epiphany one day of how he and his best friend may have different perspectives of the world.  this inspires him to study neuroscience, yet he is unable to apply it in his actual life.  he can't understand how his actions effect others or understand others may have a different point of view from him.  and as one becomes frustrated with victor's narrow-mindness, the reader discovers that they should strive to be more open-minded.  

before i close, i will say that as i read this, i casted the movie version in my head (every book is turned into movies now).  as i read about victor, i pictured colin firth especially scenes where he was in his lab.  regina would be played by olivia munn (she kinda played regina in "magic mike").  and his wife would be rachel weisz.

as a special treat for reading this, i included a came victor played with his wife.  they would describe a movie with just three sentence.  i got the first two but can anyone help me with the last?

southern lawyer has a way with kids. can't get an innocent off the hook. boo.

vito shouldn't buy fruit. michael won't talk business. diane keaton?

men embark on spaceship. spaceship disembarks men. sorry, dave.

caramelo. sandra cisneros.

since i planned on attending sandra cisneros' talk at csub, i figured i should read more than just one book so i picked up her second novel "caramelo" (and for a dollar!). though i did not finish it before her talk, it helped me understand her talk and life a little more.

to be perfectly honest, i didn't like "caramelo" at first. i kept thinking to myself, this is no "house on mango street" but i realized it shouldn't be. that is always the challenge with the sophomore novel (and also the sophomore album for bands). i once read an article about the yeah yeah yeah's sophomore album in rolling stone, which discussed the challenge of the sophomore album, especially when the first is a huge success. the audience wants the band to replicate their first work but then it can't sound completely the same or they will be upset by that as well. i think it's the same with books, the sophomore novel needs to replicate the first but not be the same. and to me it felt that cisneros at first was trying to replicate "the house on mango street" but then it transform into something completely different but still very cisneros.

i always think of "house on mango street" as a collection of poems however i would describe "caramelo" as an epic. this is cisneros' "one hundred years of solitude" (which i was reminded of as i read, in addition to being one of my favorite books of all time).  "caramelo" is the tale of three generations of the reyes family, grounded in cisneros' actual family history with a hint of mythical magic like garcia marquez' work.  as i discovered at her talk, cisneros' life served as the basis for this novel, she grew up in chicago, the youngest of seven brothers and her father was a upholsterer, just like celaya in the novel.  but like her wig analogy, the novel is real life stories mixed in with fiction so it is non-fictional fiction or fictional non-fiction.

i guess it is the historian in me but i love sagas.  i always have.  i hate to admit this but as a tween (though this term was not invented back then) my favorite sweet valley high books were the sagas because i loved discovering the family histories.  i loved seeing the sequence of events that caused life to follow a certain path; how moment a lead to moment b which explains how c ever came into occurrence.  and this is what i loved about "caramelo", reading how the stars aligned to form the life that celaya led.   for me, "carmaelo" did not become an interesting read until we traveled back into time to learn her families' history so we could understand celaya as a person.  and that was the lesson of the novel, to understand oneself the best and who one is, s/he need to understand her/his ancestors.

 cisneros' emphasis on the importance of knowing the past is not limited to personal histories but extended to capital h-history.  my favorite part of the book was the historical tidbits that cisneros included.  her characters randomly interacted with important cultural figures.  thanks to her i learned about josephine baker*, maria sabina , senor wences, tongolele, and cri cri.  i also learned that some famous hollywood starlets were mexican (see:  rita hayworth).  another fact that surprised me was the story of emperor maximiliano and empress carlota, i didn't know that they were puppet monarchs nor did i know that bette davis played her in the movie.  i also finally discovered the title of the song "cielito lindo".  as i read the lyrics to "cielito lindo", i oddly knew the melody from years of hearing it growing up though  i never knew it was called "cielito lindo".  the tidbits were great because aside from being an entertaining novel, it was also educational.

the novel was also filled with cultural observations.  for example, how taquerias smell like pine-sol.   or introducing the updated version of the aged old question, which came first real life or the telenovla?  there were also sad and harsh observations like how chicanos treat mexicans who claim their spanish roots.  another sad observation is how the INS treats veterans like illegal immigrants especially when those individuals gained their citizenships by serving in a war.  and lastly how mexican mothers can be overbearing and strict but that is really because they are lonely.  there was a handful of times i had ah-ha moments because cisneros shed light on mexican and mexican-american cultures or explanation to certain stereotypes.

in addition to sharing truths, "caramelo" was filled with cisneros' poetic flair, which i have come to love. my favorite were:

"a person of independence, who does not need nor want us, inspires our admiration, and admiration is love portion.  a person who needs us too much, who is weak with neediness, inspires pity.  and pity, the other side of admiration, is antidote to love."

" a dream is a poem the body writes.  even if we lie to ourselves in the day, the body is compelled to speak its truth at night."

"for a long time after, i'd just burst into tears, if anyone even touched me. [ . . .] anybody touched me, by accident or on purpose, i cried.  i was like a piece of bread sopped with gravy.  so when something squeezed me, i started to cry and couldn't stop.  have you ever been that sad?  like a donut dunked in coffee?  like a book left in the rain."

lastly, two of my favorite images included food; feet as tamales and mentions of clean towels that fresh tortillas are kept in.  both of which all made me extremely hungry every time i read about them.  also does anyone know where i can get a tamal sandwich?!?!?!

imagery aside, the most important aspect of "caramelo" is that it shares an experience that is not always told. during my last year at ucla, i took a seminar about the american immigrant experience and we read autobiographies. the class focused on autobiographies not only as a counter to the dominant history (or white male american history) but stories that need to be integrated into the dominant history so that it can be complete. america is not america without the immigrant experience. furthermore, since so much land of present america was once a part of mexico and with mexicans going back and forth across the border; the american experience would be incomplete without the mexican/mexican-american experience being told. and though things can be labelled as a specific racial, cultural or religious experience, at the heart of it all, it is simply a human experience. this is true of "caramelo", it can not be reduce to just mexican lit, chicano it or womens lit because it holds a valuable lesson for everyone regardless of how one labels oneself. that lesson being the importance of everyone knowing their family history and roots. though "caramelo" was filled with a very specific cultural experience, it still possessed universal truths.

like cisneros i will add una pilón.

i loved this part because it reminded me of my grandmother, not so much because we have had the same conversation.  but because my grandma bea, like ceyala's little grandmother, keeps it real.

when discussing her running away with ernesto, ceyala explained:

"-but i saw god when we made love."

to which the little grandmother responded:

"-of course you did.  you think that's a miracle?  smell a flower and you'll see god too.  god's everywhere. and yes, he's in the act of love too.  and so?  that boy's not the only one who can love you like that.  there'll be others, there ought to others, you must have others."

*josephine baker is amazing.  i googled her and read her wikipedia entry (click and read it!).  and she is simply amazing.  she started off dancing on the streets then became this international sensation.  then became an international spy during world war II!!!! and was the first angelina jolie and adopted 12 children from different racial/national background.  amazing right?!?!?

mr. penumbra's 24-hour bookstore. robin sloan. (68)

the first thing you need to know about this book is that it's glows in the dark! yes! glows in the dark! how cool, right?!?!

the second thing you need to know is that you need to read this book.

to be honest, when i first read the title and what flavorpill wrote about it, i thought it would be like "mr. magnorium's magic emporium" but with books. it wasn't as whimsy as that movie and quite different. but it was still great.

i don't want to spoil it for anyone so will not give too many details about this book. but i did thoroughly enjoy it. i think it is best described as "the da vinci code" for the google generation. it is about a secret society and how a newcomer attempts to crack their secret code using computers. reading about this made me wish that i was a more of a geek because computers are beyond me and it would be amazing to a hacker/programmer/super smart. i was in awe of the intelligence of all of the characters. though i will add that i thought clay cheated because he used computers. in this book, i believed that the journey is more important than the destination.

trying not to give too much of the plot away, i can share that the code they are trying to break will reveal the secret to immorality. and i am glad that clay shared my view about of immortality not being appealing. i personally think that living for all of eternity would be exhausting, imagine being alive forever and what kind of toll that would take on your body and mind. after a while would you just be over it? it would be tedious. i plan on resting when i die. so finding the secret to immorality would not be motivation for me if i was a character in this book. i would be game for any kinda secret society adventure.

i also loved clay as a character (and he must have been a gemini due to his resourcefulness and ability to connect people.) he was witty and smart and loved books. seriously, if i found someone like him on okcupid i would be all over it.

i can't really discuss more without giving things away but will add that i was disappointed that "the dragon song chronicles" and the gerritszoon typeface isn't real in real life. also sad that grumble wasn't a real site. i googled them to see if they exist and nada. but nonetheless, it was a great book, i mean it glows you can't go wrong!

ps "mr. penumbra's 24 hour bookstore" was also on that flavorpill fall forecast entry. but they also did a feature entry about it and listed 10 books for books nerds. so now i am inspired to read this list. (and yes they are right if you love books and your iphone, you will love this book.)

nw. zadie smith. (67)

  

i first came across zadie smith's "NW" in a must reads of september article on flavorpill.  then a recommendation was posted in their fall 2012 books forecast.  and being the flavorpill devotee that i am, put in a request at the library for "NW" along with a handful of others.  of all the books, i looked forward to smith's the most.  i hadn't read any of her prior books, but according to flavorpill, "NW" was her first book in seven years and her last novel "on beauty" was award winning.

maybe i overhyped it.  but the book fell flat for me.  there is no denying that zadie smith is a great writer. however, "NW" was not a great book. perhaps it was because i am not a londoner, at times i was confused because i could not locate the surroundings of the book. the reason i love reading books set in LA is because i can visualize where the characters are. however, my dislike can not simply be an issue of setting, that caused confusion but i think the issue was the characters.

i was not invested in any of the characters. it was "wuthering heights" all over again, where i could not empathize/sympathize with any of the characters because there was always one element of their lives that i didn't agree with. with leah, i was disappointed with how she lied to her husband and how she treated her body. with keisha, i couldn't stomach her double life, denial of her upbringing and obsession with the listings. i was rooting for felix, but even he had to be a guy and have farewell sex with his booty call which demonstrated he wasn't going to change. his fate was sad but by the time it occurred, i lost any faith i had in him really turning over a new leaf in life.

and i hate to be a cynic but did not buy the ending. really? leah suffering so much because she couldn't come to terms with the life she has? it lacked sincerity in my eyes. i wanted to tag her conversation with #firstworldproblems. you made it semi out of the projects, congrats, no need going around throwing yourself a pity party, especially because there are more serious problems in the world. instead of questioning why you didn't become a statistic, be grateful that you aren't one. also i hate to be heartless but if you are drug addict than you deserve the shitty stack that you dealt yourself. when it comes to drug addiction you do it to yourself. i would never see a drug addict and then have a meltdown like why me, how did i not become that? i didn't get leah's meltdown. when i do drugs i am aware of what i am doing to my body and it is choice. everyone has a right to say no, so sorry crackhead on the street you can't have my dollar. you chose to be a crackhead. (btw, please save your CIA giving crack to the project theories.)

i didn't grow up in the slums but delano is definitely low/working class yet i couldn't connect to "NW". this might also have to do with smith's modernist writing. leah's section was difficult to follow because it was all stream of thought. i guess it's like stein and woolf all over again, i need to get smarter to appreciate it.

i guess in the end it just all seem contrived. i am not sure of zadie smith's back story, but she wrote like an anthropologist would write about the slums versus someone that grew up in them.  the bio on the book's back flap explained she grew up in "NW" and i am not saying that in order to write about the slums, someone needs to be from them, but it surprised me because i felt she didn't know what she was talking about.  its like when oprah tries to talk like she understands the everyday woman experience, sorry oprah you don't, you're oprah, there is absolutely nothing "everyday woman" about you.  its the same with zadie smith, she may have grown up in NW but she is too far removed from it now to be able to write about it, without sounding insincere and elitist. ( also now that i think about it, with the name change and the anthropological lens through which she viewed life, so she could be keisha.)

i expected this book to be provocative but it brought nothing new to the table in terms of class.  regardless of your class, life kinda sucks and no one is really happy. because regardless of where you grew up, you are still human.  rich people's don't have it all and are just as immoral as the next class.  the individuals in a perfect marriage actually cannot stand each other.  the thug you think is a drug addict might be turning his life around.  that crackhead who is begging for money who you want save, probably enjoys her life. i think a more interesting viewpoint would have been a character who grows up disadvantaged in the slums who doesn't recognize it as a disadvantage. growing up in the slums was the crutch for all of the characters, their get out of jail free cards for poor life decisions. and perhaps i am too american at heart but you may be born into a lower class but you definitely do not have to stay there. and yes you may have some fall backs in life that lead you back to the slums but that isn't because you don't deserve more or better in life, it's because regardless the slums are your home and will always be a source of comfort.

though the class issues smith presented didn't interest me, the women issues did. i can admit that as a woman approaching her thirties and being single and childless, it was comforting to read leah and keisha's dealing with the same thing. smith pretty much nailed me with leah's inner monologue of:

"simply: i am eighteen in my mind i am eighteen and if i do nothing if i stand still nothing will change and i will be eighteen always."

is that not what i am currently doing with my life? trying to freeze time. put it on pause?

also this "return of saturn" era of life is even more difficult when you add in the biological clock too. as smith wrote:

"natalie blake and leah hanwell were 28 when the first emails began to arrive. over the next few years their number increased exponentially. photo attachments of stunned-looking women with hospital tags round their wrist, babies lying on their breast, hair inexplicably soaked through. they seems to have stepped across a chasm into another world."

this one doesn't get me too much because my peers have been having babies since i was in high school. actually come to think of it, if they grew up in the slums, getting these photos would not be as pressing. at the risk of sounding classist, it is in my opinion that lower classes have kids at a younger age. actually this is more of an issue of education than class. people with more education seem to wait in life to have kids because that education consumes majority of their time so having kids is kinda impossible. so i guess this an example of smith not being too realistic.

but i understand that smith was discussing the inevitable pressure as women get older that they need to become mothers to progress in life. for me personally, i have more pressure in terms of marriage than having a child. especially since everyone around me is now either married or engaged. but that can be saved for another time.

though i did not love this book, i plan on reading smith's "on beauty".  as i said before smith is an excellent writer.  there is no denying that.  she was very clever when it came to descriptions.  i loved how she would reference something pop culture-y, and versus naming it, she would describe it, kinda like a riddle. there were references to kurt corbain's suicide, friends, the wire and even chatroulette! though i totally missed the amy winehouse reference. and the heading about her was "beehive." i also enjoyed her literary references like "rabbit, run" about a vibrator. i appreciate smith's cleverness but even that could not save "NW" for me. i plan on reading her other books and hopefully will find the writer that flavorpill was so excited to read.

the magicians. lev grossman. (65)

like i mentioned before, i also check out books for grandma bea. grandma bea was running low on books by her favorite authors so i googled "if you liked harry potter, you should check out" to find books for her. (grandma bea is a huge potter fan, she got me into the series) i came across "the magicians" and decided to check it out. my friend saba had read it before and said it was supposed to be harry potter for grown ups. in fact that is what is says on the back cover.

i gave to grandma bea but she didn't like it. i think she read the first 50 pages or so and stopped because she couldn't get into it. even though it lacked her endorsement i decided to give it a chance.

unsurprisingly, i couldn't get into it as well. after 100 pages i wanted to give up. i didn't like quentin, he was too negative and an unlikely hero but not in charming endearing way but in a wow-this-kid-is-a-real-asshole way. he was and is no harry potter. i didn't want to read because i didn't care about him. but i couldn't give up for the following reasons: a) the junto diaz endorsement on the back, i loved "oscar wao" so i respected his opinion and thought that maybe i should wait it out, b) this blog, if i didn't finish it would i be able to blog about it (i decided i could, because occasionally i'll check out a stinker), c) i don't like giving up on books, even if i don't like it, i figure i should finish it so my hatred is at least founded. so i texted my friend juliana (who i saw had read it on good reads) for her opinion on my quitting. she said she loved it. but i should stop. since she loved it, i decided to continue. plus quentin was entering his fourth year and what occurred was cool so i thought it was on the up and up.

i was wrong. due to my already judgy-ness about this book, reading it was like pulling teeth. i wasn't interest in the plot, especially with their post-brakebills lives. don't get me wrong, i would have love to live their bohemian lives but as a magicians they could do so much more. (this was a huge subplot so maybe my restlessness with their lives was what grossman was trying to create?) i absolutely loved the story plot that penny introduced and was excited for what was to come but even that was a letdown. what it boiled down to is that i thought all of the characters were assholes, in addition to being useless. the only character i liked was alice and would have preferred the story from her perspective because she was the only one with integrity. and i get it. grossman was trying to be realistic. the teens and twentysomethings of this generation (and i guess any generation) are jaded, selfish, unmoral, and cowardly. it was hard to become invested in them when i thought they were all pieces of shit. i wish he had characters of better substance, like harry potter, i mean grown up harry potter probably had heart, these kids had nothing. in addition to having bad personalities they were also bad magicians. i admit that if i had to encounter all that they did in their adventure, i would have be unable to utilize my magic skills but these kids sucked. they couldn't do anything, which made their schooling seem pointless. and who wants to read a book about bad magicians? or bad teens? this book is a fantasy, but i still want heroes i can believe it.

but i guess the real problem was that grossman is a bad storyteller. i didn't get lost in his book like i did in the harry potter series. and i know that the first two potters were not all that and since this was the first of the magicians books there was a lot of set up, so i can't have too high of expectations. but those excuses aside it was still bad writing. i felt like i was just reading words on a paper instead of being transported to a different world. even the fighting scenes were a snoozefest. it was kinda like when someone tells a funny story but then they and you realize in order for it to be funny you had to be there. i felt like that while reading "the magicians", i had to be there cos grossman was not a strong enough writer for me get it via his words. i mean chatwin stories in the book seemed a lot more interesting and i kept wish i was reading those instead.

also i hated that this wasn't a book within a book. it would have been better if it was.

i mean with the right director this could be a great movie. the premise was good it was just the writing that was bad and a screenplay adapter can fix that right up. if they do make a movie, i would go see it but read the second book? probably not.

ps though i am an alcoholic, i thought their drinking was excessive. i mean i did my fair share of drinking in college but it was always fun and adventurous. their drinking was boring and sad.

most talkative: stories from the front lines. andy cohen. (63)

i adore andy cohen. i literally laugh out loud (by myself) every single time i watch "watch what happens live". i wish one day to get a tweet or retweet from him. and the foursquare badge i desire the most is the andy cohen one. so when i found out he had a new book, i put my request in. 20 something transfers later and it was sent to delano especially for me.

surprisingly, i did not adore the book. the issue is that his writing is a bit too much. i get it (we are both geminis), he writes the way he talks which comes off cheesy. i mean this as no offense. i am the same way, whenever my friends compliment me on my yelp reviews, i politely explain its cos they know me and the average reader would be annoyed. and though i feel like i "know" andy cohen, the book at times had campy-ish moments.

it just wasn't a page turner nor did it have me laughing out loud. i think the best thing about this story was his coming out story and how he dealt with his homosexuality. he was honest and it is a great testament not only to homosexuality being innate with individuals but also to how accepting his family and friends were, that things are getting better. reading it reminded me of my friendship with miguel, and i wonder if he was ever nervous about coming out to me. though we had long discussions about his homosexuality during our senior year, he didn't tell me til our first year of college. i hope that as he decided to come out that he knew that regardless i would love him. i did enjoy reading about how cohen's roommate was so supportive, and how his mom and roommate used to keep tabs on him.

another thing that is interesting to think about was how scared his friends were about him contracting AIDS. i have a lot of gay friends and have never been scared of that. i guess it is because we live in a society where STDs are openly talked about and all of my friends are responsible and get tested frequently. so i am thankful that i never had to worry about them. (i also realize that it is unfair, i should worry about my straight friends too.)

i guess the issue is that i wanted it to be a bravo tell all and it wasn't. i love bravo, i even have a bravolebrities album on fb. however, the best part read like a bravo special because it was one. the chapter on the housewives reunion was pretty much that countdown of real housewives best reunion moments.

i wanted more dirt though i did learn that padma's husband was salman rushdie. it was interesting how the shows came together. it was nice to have light shed on russell armstrong's death but what about brandi in all that drama? also could have done without the oprah chapter but mainly cos i hate
oprah.

it was a nice brain break after reading "anna karenina" and it's good if you want a mindless read or something g to leave as a causal bathroom read.

you don't love me yet. jonathan lethem. (60)

this was one of the books flavorpill recommended to fill the girls' void. flavorpill admitted that it isn't totally "girls" cos it takes place in LA instead of nyc, but the LA was its selling point for me!

i love movies, shows, and books with an LA setting cos i love pointing out landmarks that i have been too. (btw: i give some legit "entourage" and "(500) days of summer" tours around LA). and joanthan lethem did not disappoint.

LA landmarks mentioned:

right of the back, i knew i would enjoy this book because the book opens in a museum and in my head it was the lacma. jeff koons' three ball 50/50 tank is alluded to which can be found in the bcam at lacma. though this is not a direct reference because the book was published in 2007 and the bcam did not open until 2008 but talk about a good prediction!

the happy/sad foot clinic sign on sunset is mentioned as well. it its an oracle for lucinda, she consulted it for directions with life's pressing questions (apparently beck believes in it's power to according to the sign's facebook. yes the sign has a facebook! when i told my friend danny about the mention in the book he told me about the facebook. check it out: www.facebook.com/happyfoot.sadfoot)

restaurants were also mentioned. hugo's restaurant in weho was a destination for its oatmeal fritters. i have been to hugo's for it's pasta mama (as recommended by susan feinger on the best thing i ever ate) but did not know about it's oatmeal fritters and googled and yea the book gave the exact description of that dish. neptune's net in malibu is where the book ends. and a great fish tacos place is mentioned and since this is pre-ricky's fish tacos, i am assuming it is "the best fish tacos in ensenada" on sunset. lastly lucinda has a cuban sandwich at cafe tropical and i've gotten a quick bite from there cos my friend karen lived down the street, they put abuelita in their mochas!  so being a true angelano at heart, i will say lethem did LA well.

the novel is the story of a girl, lucinda, her band and an odd affair she has with this older guy, in the late 90s. i assumed it took place today but one character is using this "new" thing called email and at one party (which i will detail later) people use walkman's instead of ipods.  but i mean life hasn't changed too much in LA so this book was pretty contemporary.

as odd as this may sound, i liked the "art" in the book more than anything else about it. lucinda works at a gallery for her ex, falmouth and he made some great art. he did an installation involving a complaint line. he put up flyers around LA with a hotline number and set up a gallery space where people took calls and accepted complaints.  i was hoping that the number would be real, the back cover had a flyer with a number, which i called but sadly nothing. but still a cool concept, i imagined an exhibit of the complaints.  complaints written up on cards and placed side by side on a museum wall.   the compliant that stood out to me was "nobody told me about aging/moisturizer/death". the complaint line is how lucinda meets carl but we will get to that later.

falmouth's second installation was a silent party called Aparty. so there are parties known as silent discos where attendees wear wireless headphones that are linked to the deejay so everyone is dancing to the same music but an outsider can not hear anything. cool, huh? falmouth's silent party was similar. but since it was back in the 90's, everyone brought walkmans and danced to their own music. i liked this idea more because then you get all kinds of dancing to all kinds of music. and considering this was pre-ipod days in which we can make playlists with a couple of drags and clicks, so that meant people had to make mixed tapes or CDs specifically for the party or could have cheated and used the radio. i like the idea of people moving to their own groove at a party.

the description of the party also captured the essence of hipster/silverlake/echo park parties. how you hear about some thing from a friend of a friend (or an email list) about a gallery opening or a free show and everyone shows up for the free booze. and then it turns into this huge thing with a long line and just chaos.  (i will say i have a pretty good track record in which i somehow magically get into places sans being on a list or standing in line for hours.) so that was a good description of LA-hipster life (not that i'm a hipster.)

the story in a nutshell is that lucinda meets a this older guy (who is really good and giving orgasms) via the compliant line and their conversations and his words become the songs for the band.  there are a bunch of other little side stories like lucinda's most recent ex kidnaps a kangaroo from a zoo, and the band is on the verge of "making it" after playing the silent party.  i think carl the complainer had some interesting theories on love which will be quoted below.  but did it fill my void?  not really, i didn't identify with lucinda like i did with the girls from girls.  but if you love LA and a music geek, i think you would dig this book.  so check it out.  

ps another LA-esque aspect was a radio deejay, Autumnbreast, who is an LA legend who plays all the "it" bands and used to hang with all the great bands of the 70s.  i think he is based upon kroq's rodney on the roq (the studio in the book was in culver city which is where kroq is).

quotations:

i will say that i was gross out by the older guy cos he seemed sloppy and fat versus hot old like dermont mulroney in new girl.  but he did have some great thoughts on love:

"I have this condition called monster eyes.  I find something not to like and it becomes enormous, it becomes the whole world." (how he finds fault with the ones he loves)

"Nostalgia, except it's not just regular nostalgia.  More like nostalgia vu. Longing for longing, instead of for the thing in question."

"'I don't think it counted for that much one way or the other.  We were only one another's astronaunt food.'
'What's astronaut food?'
' You know, stuff in little packets that you keep lying on the shelf.  Everyone has some lying around.  The people you imagine you might be with but you know you never will be.  The people who if you're in a couple but you're a little bored or restless you meet them for  a coffee alot and the other half of your couple isn't thrilled about it.  Or if you're single, they're the people you're keeping on a mental list just so you don't feel like there aren't possibilities.  Friends who are almost more than friends but really, they're just friends.  Astronaut food, bomb shelter provisions.  If you were ever going to have anything with them it would have happened already. Sometimes you even fall in bed with them but it doesn't count for much.  It's always a mistake to try to get any nourishment out of that stuff.  But not a big mistakes.  That's the beautiful part, the stakes are low.'"

"Only as a friend of mine use to say, you can't be deep without a surface."

"All thinking is wishful."

"Pour love on the broken places."

"'I'm not drunk.'
'Your eyes are X's.'"

the emperor's children. claire messud. (59)

have you seen girls?

if yes, omg! don't you love it?!?!

if no, it's a show on hbo. kinda like the urban outfitters generation version of sex and the city, but twentysomethings with a lot less money.

i'm new to girls and haven't seen the complete first season. my cousin apollo told me about it a while back but who has premium cable nowadays? well actually my cousin erin does, so i watched three girls episodes when i stayed with her. i will say that the first episode was kinda ehhh but by the third i was hooked, i even tweeted "all adventurous woman do. #girls". (though the best quote from that episode is one my friend markley always quotes: "what happens to the stuff around the condom?!?")

anyway since the series ended, flavorpill listed books to help fans fill the girls' void in their life. and yes i decided to add those to my reading list.

http://www.flavorwire.com/302791/10-books-to-fill-the-girls-shaped-hole-in-your-life

it was kinda kismet that i found claire messud's "the emperor's children". i was browsing the classic section trying to sort out what to read and was like why is this contemporary book in this section? fastfoward like a day or two and its on the list for girls so picked it up. (spoiler alert: if you have not read this, i do kinda spoil it for you. so stop here. well you can read this next paragraph but stop after that.)

"the emperor's children" follows the lives of three friends (danielle, marina, and julius) "on the cusp of their thirties" (the back of the book says this) who are trying to sort out life in nyc. it was comforting to see my fellow age group-ers with their shit not entirely together. marina was back at home with her parents (granted she did have a book deal) and julian wasn't settled career-wise and worked for a temp agency. though they still managed to live glamourous nyc lives on someone else's dime (marina on her parents and julian had a sugar daddy or a rice queen, julius was asian-who i pictured as my friend keith.)

the book has about six different story lines that intertwine and overlap. and they all involve marina's famous journalist/activist father, murray thwaite except julius, he was in this odd relationship in which he was domesticated like a chinese wife minus the bound feet. he also experienced this crazy gruesome fight in a gay club (which i visualizes as bablyon from "queer as folk.")

so marina's storyline involved her odd relationship with her father, the book she needed to write and her way too quick marriage to a horrible aussie that wanted to destroy her father via his new magazine. danielle has an affair with said father. which i found kinda hot but only cos i want an affair with an old man (though single and not my friend's dad.) then there is bootie ("like shake your?" as julius would say), marina's fat cousin who at first i cared for like one would a lost puppy. he had given up on traditional education and was going to educate himself by reading books from the library and writing essays. anyway in the end he ends up just going slightly crazy screwing over his uncle.

it was a good read, not great. the issue i had, was the use of 9/11 to resolve all of the issues in the book. i was left with too many questions. we never find out if the aussie was evil or was going to publish bootie's article. it also got murray off the hook with his affair. and i get that life paused for new yorkers but for me it felt like a cop out. maybe if i read it in 2006, i would be of a different opinion. also at the risk of sounding unamerican, it could also be because i was not deeply affected by 9/11. in my defense i was on the west coast. the distance can account for something. while reading bradbury's "the martian chronicles" i came across a passage that paralleled my indiffference to 9/11. father peregrine explains:

we heard about the wars in asia. but we never believed them. it was too far away. and there were too many people dying. it was impossible. even when we saw the motion pictures we didn't believe it.

i was unable to relate due to the distance. here all this was going on in nyc but life in delano, ca went on pretty much the same. furthermore, i was also young and at a very exciting period in my life. two weeks after 9/11, i was to start my first year of college so my life was full of hope not bleakness.

so did this fill my girls void? not really, it's kinda like hannah and the gang in 5 years. i could see hannah as danielle for some odd reason. it was a good read but i didn't fall in love with any of the characters except for julius (apparently i am a literary fag hag too). also julius
inspired me to read "war and peace" because he was always trying to sort out if he was a natasha or a pierre.

quotations:

"but he was already thirty, and the question was how?"

pride and prejudice and zombies. jane austen and seth grahame-smith.

this book has been on my bookshelves for a couple of years. i attempted to read it before but couldn't focus because my mind was constantly wondering how much of jane's original work was in it. (i hadn't read "pride and prejudice" at the time). so i put the book down and picked it up after i read the original. (ps there are some spoilers in this post.)

initially, i was impressed with grahame-smith's giving zombies killings and burnings as the reason for the militia being stationed in meryton. austen had them there just for kitty and lydia's amusement and i guess to introduce the wicked wickham.

when reading the original, i couldn't stomach wickham and lydia's return to netherfield after their marriage. lydia was so obnoxious and wickham a phony. i absolutely hated lydia; showing off her ring, taking jane's spot, and talks of helping her sisters marry (i will start a list of characters i dislike and lydia will be number 1). we all knew wickham was a sleazeball cos he had a gambling problem, but lydia was horrible simply by nature. i was upset with austen for not giving them an unhappy ending (i mean darcy did need a labor of love and sorting out lydia and wickham was a challenge). and i guess wickham having to spend the rest of his life with lydia is punishment enough. but i needed more . . .

so i absolutely loved it when grahame-smith had darcy give wickham a good ass whooping in his version. in my eyes justice (or karma) was served when wickham ending up an impotent cripple and lydia having to spend the rest of her life with him. those twos got the ending their horrible scandal deserved.

i also enjoyed the showdown between lady catherine and elizabeth. though i would have been happier if she "finished her", to steal a phrase from mortal kombat. but lady catherine did get her just desserts in austen's version.

at first i didn't like the charlotte-turns-into-a-zombie storyline. it was too far fetch that no one noticed her change. however her marriage to mr. collins made sense given her illness and his oblivion to life would have caused him not to notice. so given that text, her illness made sense. though it was sad she had to die.

i will say that i could have done without all of the ball and intercourse jokes. i mean it was clever cos they were words austen used but grahame-smith gave them their modern slang definitions. but it was out of place, i was too frat-boy humor for my tastes.

it was a fun read. and a nice twist on everyone's beloved classic. so check it out, but don't expect too much. it is still a great work but that is because he didn't butcher austen's story and kept majority of the story intact.

ps i would love to see a movie adaptation but then colin firth may be too old to be karate-chopping zombies.