All About Books discussion

I'm doing this today as I will be on a plane tomorrow, and then will have a busy, busy day at work. I will reply when I get to the hotel.

To imagine the year my reading journey began would indeed be a difficult feat. I would have to crawl back in memory all the way back to Where the Wild Things Are when what was more alluring were the pictures of oafish, horned monsters with sharp, pointy teeth and a little boy in a white wolf’s costume. Everyone has a first book, similar to a first love. For me, that was Where the Wild Things Are as it is what I most associate with childhood as much as GI Joe and Chutes and Ladders. It was the first book turning on the spring of my imagination. "Brer Rabbit" was another. My Grandfather used to read to my sister and I as kids. We used to howl with laughter at his acting shenanigans and overblown voice. That is the memory I have of him. He passed when I was five. Confusion over his death at that young age is a slippery memory I still have. A child’s lack of understanding—perhaps is why when, for the first time I saw television, the Lone Ranger was on and I cried when people got shot thinking it real.

Fast-forward to age ten or eleven—lots of Agatha Christie. Then, S.E. Hinton. My family and I spent long summers in Virginia, traveling from the Marshall Islands where we lived. My grandparents had a house on the Piankatank river where we’d fish, crab, and play along the river’s muddy berms. We’d shuck corn on picnic tables with pitchers of iced tea in sweaty jugs and conversation would pour out from around the table. We’d suck the seeds out of snap beans and we’d laugh. The adults would tell stories of Jimmy Kerby, the littlest kid in the neighborhood who’d whip bullies. They’d speak of sandlot baseball and the old neighborhood and how times had changed. I’d go inside and read The Outsiders and be transported to the past to the world of Greasers and Socs—Pony Boy, Soda, Dallas, and Two-Bit. I read about rumbles, young love, and how enemies could become friends. Cherry Valance might have been my first love.

Fast-forward to Kwajalein High School (in the Marshall Islands) and Frank Shoemaker’s English Lit class with As I Lay Dying—thirteen points of view—an unforgettable chapter—Vardaman’s "My mother is a fish." Mr. Shoe (as he was called) drove me to find metaphor and meaning in writing, to find hidden secrets and buried treasures of wisdom. He made me realize the writer’s job is to evoke emotion, whether it be anger, fear, happiness, sadness—anything but apathy and indifference. I found comedy and satire in Babbit (Sinclair Lewis still in my top ten favorite authors). In Crime and Punishment, I found all of the elements—love, hate, hubris, salvation, redemption, mystery, psychology—Raskolnikov the epitome of complex character, embodying the darkness and light of the flickering human spirit. Dostoyevsky, to me, is the marionette of emotion.

I could iterate through a host of other influential high school books, but let’s fast-forward to college in California where I discovered The Bluest Eye where pain, invisibility, negation became color. Toni Morrison the poet taught me lyricism, alliteration, point of view. She is simply brilliant, but I tired of her subject after three books. Slaughterhouse-Five was another college novel I’m now re-reading for a book club presentation. Vonnegut—the king of wit. In college, I would read between four hours of classical guitar practice each day, but I hadn’t yet been bitten by the bug. Back then, reading took a backseat to my goal of being a musician. Other college notables were The Sound and the Fury, The Call of the Wild, One Hundred Years of Solitude.

Fast-forward to Portland, Oregon where another teacher stole my heart by the name of Geo Staley. It was a short story class, and we read "Cathedral" by Raymond Carver. Again, it was a reawakening of my love for literature. Close to that time, serendipity struck, and Charlie Boodman knocked on my door with a guitar in hand. "Hey, I heard you playing. Do you want to play sometime." Charlie lived three doors down on the 2nd floor of 2210 NW Everett, and him and I became quick friends. Charlie was a writer and would hold candle light vigils with a bottle of Maker’s Mark mounted like a flag at the center of the table which would empty as participants would hold their notebooks and read their stories. I was hooked. I started writing and was absolutely horrible at it for the next few years. Stories formed, however, and one of them would eventually be published in Straylight in 2009. But these were the years (2000) I dove headfirst into the classics. I became a reading machine. Many of the classics I respect, but don’t like. Joyce and Virginia Wolfe fall into this category. I fell in love with Steinbeck, Hemingway (again), Nathaniel Hawthorne, Heller, Tolstoy, London, Sherwood Anderson, and Chekov. Then the Portland office of the company I was working for got dumped, but I was offered a position in England. The world is an oyster, you can’t find the pearl unless you open the shell.

I jumped.

I read Roald Dahlshort stories and cruised the country hillocks and hamlets of England finding similarity to his tales. Meanwhile, Charlie was searching Yakima watering holes where Carver frequented. I roamed to different countries and sucked in the European air hoping osmosis and condensation would leak some of it to the page. From the pikeys in Hemel Hempstead, I moved to London in Holloway right across from a woman’s prison (no, I never tried to scale the walls). I moved into a flat with international roommates and lived the London highlife for a few months before moving to Geneva, Switzerland. I had a Hitchcockean (Michael Symons Roberts) moment, and one morning I dropped my cereal bowl and bolted.

Fast-forward.

Geneva—French immersion—finding a flat, friends, adjusting to a new culture consumed my time. But here I found Frankenstein(set in Geneva), The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, The Road, 1984, Brave New World, Midnight's Children, The God of Small Things, Diary of a Bad Year, The Evolution of Bruno Littlemore, Anna Karenina, Underworld, Freedom, Life of Pi, Snow, A Tale of Two Cities, The Things They Carried, too many to list. For nonfiction, The Shadow Factory: The Ultra-Secret NSA from 9/11 to the Eavesdropping on America and In Cold Blood. For fiction, Adam Johnson’s The Orphan Master's Son. It is up there with Crime and Punishment with Jun Do one of the most intriguing characters I’ve seen in years. Toscanelli's Ray was a Pulitzer quality novel I thought went unnoticed in 2013. I was so adamant about it I wrote a review which was published on the Ploughshares blog (http://blog.pshares.org/index.php/tos...). My love of books took me to Goodreads, and I started my own GR group called Trauma novels (now Fiction Threads). I get a kick out of discussions, listening to other's views. So I hope to see all of you with similar spirit out in the GR community.

I don’t give many books 5-stars as I don’t think many books deserve it. I also rate according to the time frame I read it. I recently reread All Quiet on the Western Front and was disappointed from my earlier memory. I feel if I went back and read S.E. Hinton, it would kill the magic of that memory, so I avoid it. My bookshelf is missing many books I attempted, but never finished. If a book isn't grabbing me, I’m not afraid to set it down. I also read at a turtle pace, mainly because I don’t want to miss the magic the author is using to put me under his/her spell. I think if you speed read you miss it. Generally, when I begin speed reading a book, it tells me two things: a) it’s not 5 stars b) the author is boring me and forcing me to skip to get to the underlying plot.

I recently signed my first book contract with Roundfire books (titled "The Cause", literary dystopian). It will be my first published novel, but not my first attempt. I’m looking forward to seeing it wander out into the world. But 2014 hasn’t been special simply because of this. It has also uncovered some other treasures from a reading perspective. Waiting for the Barbarians, "The Invisible Man" and my current read The Collector by John Fowles are this year’s best.

If you've got this far, a special thanks to you for spending your time to listen to my favorites. I look forward to connecting with you out here in the wonderful world of books! :-)

Rod , I was touched by the beautiful memory of your grandfather acting out the books he read to you . It's wonderful that you had such good teachers who inspired you to read and write .
I loved Anna Karenina and was really moved by The Things They Carried. I have read a number of the books you list and will be adding Toscanelli's Ray to my tr list .
Your journey is beautifully written and I'm looking forward to reading your book .
Thanks for sharing this . I really enjoyed reading it .

Toscanelli's Ray was already on my list . I remember now that I added it when you mentioned it on GR a while ago . I'll move it up now !

Thanks Angela! I think you'll really like "Toscanelli's Ray", especially the story of Farina and Milli. It will be on eBook soon so I'm told.

Keep us posted .

Rod, it's been a pleasure to read this and thank you for introducing us to your family. The power of the written word: I have a vivid image of all of you fishing by the Piankatank river and it's a lovely (if possibly entirely inaccurate) one.
I am envious of your English classes in Kwajalein High School. I had a wonderful teacher for German lit, but she was no Frank Shoemaker. Gutsy that!!! To read As I Lay Dying and Crime and Punishment? I loved As I Lay Dying (and adore Crime and Punishment) when reading it last year, but it certainly is a very challenging read. And one that can get your head spinning of reference and metaphor.

I held my breath there for a second when reading about your Grandfather as I felt my grandfather mirrored by it. My grandfather used to live in the house with us, and everyday he'd read to me (mind you, we'd never heard of 'Where the Wild Things Are' in the East-Bloc desert), mostly fairy tales, making all kinds of odd voices and twisting his face into shapes you wouldn't believe physically possible. He died when I was still pretty young and left me in a state of terror about the mystery of death. And yes, I too took a very long time to get the concept of 'acting dead'. In fact watching movies I would always ask myself who'd be so stupid as to agree to being killed for a movie?!!

A lot of your favorite books are books I love as well. You mentioned 'All Quiet...' and got me a bit worried as it's one of my all time favorites which I have read about 3 times already but haven't touched in the last 12 years or so. I am planning to read it again this year and now I can't decide whether I'd rather keep my impression of it intact, or find out what I think of it now.

I knew you were writing from peeking at your profile when joining Trauma Novels. I am really glad it's going so well for you and hope that your novel 'wandering out into the world' will be a catalyst for many more great things to come.

Oh, and this is officially the third time that 'Waiting for the Barbarians' is mentioned in a reading journey (Gill and I both mentioned it at favorites), I believe that's a record!

Hi Jenny,

I really appreciated you sharing your story of your Grandfather. It's those fond moments sticking in our memory that helped draw us to books.

I don't want to demean the message in 'All Quiet...' as it is a powerful one. So use your own judgement there. For me, it just didn't hit like it did when I was in my teens.

'Waiting for the Barbarians' I thought was a very special book. It's now the third Coetzee book I've read, and he's never been a disappointment. Disgrace is next on my list.

Did you get the Hitchcockean reference in there? :-) It's my favorite poem in the last five years, and I have you to thank you that....so a huge thanks!

Roderick, your reading journey is so awesome! I love the writing tip that your high school teacher Mr. Shoemaker imparted on you! How lucky you were to get such an invaluable tip at such an early age! Living and working in so many different places sounds like fun too.

1984 and Anna Karenina are two of my favorites. I've promised myself that I'll start on Crime and Punishment some time this year! I loved the movie of Life of Pi but never read the novel. And I'll add Toscanelli's Ray to my to-read list!

Best of luck with your debut novel!

Roderick wrote: "Did you get the Hitchcockean reference in there? :-) It's my favorite poem in the last five years, and I have you to thank you that....so a huge thanks! "

LOL, no I had missed that the first time around!! Lovely image, and I am glad you bolted into a less manic direction than in my interpretation of the poem ;)
I keep forgetting you live in Switzerland, it's the francophone part of Switzerland though isn't it? Any attempts at Schwizerdütsch so far? ;)

And apologies for making your novel 'wonder' rather than 'wander' in my initial post

Roderick really great journey! A lot of books we have in common and a lot of others that I want to look at closer ...

Great journey. A few books I want to add to my reading list. I think you'r writing style is brilliant

Don't you just love it when a book can take you to particular time of your life? Like you, I shy away at re-reading some novels because yes, I do not want to spoil that magical first time feeling of a book.

I know for myself, books have definitely shaped my life in certain directions. Do you ever feel that way?

I, too, first met you in the Gatsby discussion pages. I loved reading your journey and thank you for sharing it; we share lots of same books. Hoping your novel brings you all you deserve!

Roderick, you write well and it is no surprise that you have signed for the publication of your first novel. Your ability at creative writing is very much visible in your reading journey.

Reading is subjective. And so, having read just two books by Virginia Woolf I can say that I love her writing. And ALL QUIET ON THE WESTERN FRONT is also one of my favourites. We are a company in liking/loving Hawthorne and FRANKENSTEIN.

Thanks Alice! I liked "Life of Pi" the novel better. If you have a chance, check it out. I don't think it will disappoint you.

@Jenny, I live in Geneva. I haven't tried the Schwizerdütsch yet, but from what I understand, not even Germans can understand it :-)

@Laura, Heather...Thanks!

@Bette, You said, "Don't you just love it when a book can take you to particular time of your life?"---That's why I found this thread so interesting. In was a nice moment of reflection. Books have definitely shaped my direction. They challenge me to think, and can even change a view I previously would have thought solidified. I love finding that book that surprises me. And yes, we did meet in that Gatsby discussion. I thoroughly enjoyed that!

@Dhanaraj...I couldn't agree more. Reading is really subjective. Gatsby was one of those that didn't hit me as much as it did Angela and Bette. Each of us stated our case, but the fun of it was the discussion. Can you suggest a Virginia Woolf book? Perhaps I should give her another try.

I will suggest the V. Woolf book that I am currently reading (I am about to finish) - To the Lighthouse. I have not read many of Woolf's works. Having read only three of her books, I somehow love her writing.

Roderick, we might end up reading her A Room of One's Own in August/September if the poll result doesn't drastically change until tomorrow. Maybe an essay by her might set the ground for another try of her novels?

Jenny wrote: "Roderick, we might end up reading her A Room of One's Own in August/September if the poll result doesn't drastically change until tomorrow. Maybe an essay by her might set the ground f..."

A great book; it'd be interesting to know what you think about it

@Jenny and Laura, sounds good to me!

Roderick - I too loved the first books you mentioned, and yet your second paragraph describes a childhood so very different from my own! A vivid portrayal too, and a pleasure to read :)

I've probably read about half the books you mention, the missing ones usually being the American ones, so I will take note of a couple of yours... it does amaze me how you guys can so often be up on both the literature from your own country and the English stuff and more!

You are reading John Fowles's first book? Oh you have a treat in store when you read this author - his later ones are all very different from each other. Try The French Lieutenant's Woman or The Magus if you haven't already done so :)

I had one of those "someone's looking over my shoulder" moment myself as I read your Hitchcockian moment in Geneva. I have just read and commented on another reading journey, referring to Endless Night. Oh wow - the spooky coincidence! :O (that's supposed to be a frightened face, but I don't know if there's a symbol! LOL!)

Yes! Roald Dahl - master of the dark short story! Forget the children's books. They came so much later didn't they. I always have to think they were by a different writer to appreciate both!

And yes, I had that same difficulty between what was real and what not. I love the Lone Ranger, but cried at the film "Bambi" (view spoiler)[ where Bambi's mother gets shot (hide spoiler)]and had to be taken out of the cinema as I was inconsolable.

"I also read at a turtle pace, mainly because I don’t want to miss the magic the author is using to put me under his/her spell. I think if you speed read you miss it." I agree totally. Also about star ratings, "I don’t give many books 5-stars as I don’t think many books deserve it."

Are we twins separated at birth and placed on different continents, do you think?!

P.S. I laughed out loud at the "pikeys of Hemel Hempstead" quip. Somehow I don't think the residents of that town would appreciate that description!

:-)

Glad I got a laugh out of you, Jean. There was a pikey bar near the main bus stop in the town centre where I used to live. Lots of fights going on there. But the stories I could tell of my little jaunt in Hemel...well, let's just say I enjoyed being next to the women's prison in London better :-)

Roald Dahl--That's what makes him so terrific. He had such wonderful range of story telling. As a short-story author, he's one of my favorites.

I just loved "The Collector" and John Fowles. I've marked the other ones you suggested as to-read. I'll start with "The French Lieutenant's Woman" as I'd be interested to see the movie.

Is Nathan Filer a Brit? I'll be trying him real soon too.

We could very well be twins, Jean :-) We share a lot of the same tastes. All the best.

PS> Going to the Plymouth area in August. Looking forward to seeing some other English towns and villages I haven't been to. Hopefully, we get a bit of sun.

Apparently so, yes, although I've never read him. Browsing through the threads in your group - it looks an interesting mix and I may join when I have a bit more time :)

Hey Jean, we'd love to have you if you have the time. We're very open to putting things on the poll that people might like as well.

Have a great weekend!