Chris Craddock > Recent Status Updates

Text book for my class. What if Bach's 2-Part Invention format was used for a conversation between a lesbian and a gay man? Random excerpt I picked up upon purchasing it. The Pink Flamingo on the cover is a flaming friend of Dorothy. Bending Genre? More like Bending Gender. NOT THAT THERE'S ANYTHING WRONG WITH THAT!!!!!

I have been reading this book and I have gotten to the really interesting parts where she meets Grandfather Peyote and delves deeper into Native customs. She also uncovers interesting facts about her family history, some fierce and accomplished warriors--men and especially the women. She is trying to find her path as a teenage woman negotiating between academia and the party girl lifestyle. Geronimo!

Is this an oxymoron?

One Book One Bakersfield. Memoir and Native American culture and politics.

I read it and enjoyed it. I might be pendantic was a blog where someone annotated it, and I followed the helpful notes. Fowles drops a lot of referrences, so the notes really help.

Really good. Twain level humor, a time capsule for the 60's and relevent pontification.

Dorothy Allison wrote what I consider to be a thinnly veiled semi-autobiographical memoir. She turns out to be -- spoiler alert -- a lesbian, like several of my ex-girlfriends, causing me to speculate whether I was the cause or catylist for their abrupt change. It is the white trash elegy that JD Vance wishes he could have written. Dorothy takes you deep inside Bone's world -- even if you aren't a friend of Dorothy.

Dorothy Allison wrote this, what I assume is a semi-autobiographical novel. She is molested by her step father, and spoiler alert -- she becomes a lesbian. It's a white trash elegy that JD Vance wishes he could have written. Actually, it is really well written, and Dorothy takes you inside Bone's world, even if you aren't a friend of Dorothy.

I finished this book a long time ago. It was made into a film starring Sean Connery. Not a great film, or so I hear. Enjoyed the book. A poet is quite the jerk. Is his poetry any good? It's hard to say, but once he seduces his shrink's wife, instead of a bottle in front of me, he gets a prefrontal lombotomy.

I didn't remember the movie but Sean Connery is the main character, Samson Shillitoe, a pompous poet. I wasn't picturing him because the poet is so stubborn and antisocial--he seems like an unattractive man. Like, an ugly man, like Charles Bukowski. Don't think the movie was very good but I like the book. So far, so good. Samson is not posing as a poet--he can't help it. Success at the poetry game is a crap shoot.

I am going to read this library book. Read first chapter. Tibetian buddhism with a Western slant. Oooooops. Goleman and Tsoknyl Rinpoche.

Bone has a giant grappling hook and she used it to rob a Woolworths. Her Aunt Ruth died and she has not been caught for robbing WWs. She had a friend who was an ugly albino girl named Shannon Pearl, but they had a fight. She invited Bone to a BBQ, but just as Bone was about to greet her she had an accident with the lighter fluid and was burned. The Pearl family was involved with Gospel, but only by Whites.

I am starting to admire Allison's prose style. She uses colorful similes like saying someone is ugly as a muddy road (not sure exactly but there was something similar) and also she observes body language that reveal the character's thoughts.

I was uncertain if this book was my cup of tea but now I'm hooked. Only problem is there are so many characters and relations I've lost track. Maybe I should use an index card for a bookmark and write down the names and who's who? Bone is the bastard out of Carolina, and she admits her fantasy is being tied up in a barn and covered with hay--and the barn is on fire!

Goal is to read 20 pages per day. So far it is about a girl who is illegitimate and her mother tries to get a certificate but can't because her father died before she could get married.

I read 30 pages a day and I enjoyed Capote's prose style and the way he would describe people without making blunt judgements or insults but nevertheless you were aware of where they stood on the bell or bella curve. This was before In Cold Blood and Breakfast At Tiffany's so he wasn't spoiled by too much fame and acclaim, not to mentiion champagne. He had fewer laurels to rest on, and couldn't just coast.

Truman Capote wrote this in 1956 -- before Breakfast at Tiffany's or In Cold Blood. Truman goes on a trip to Russia with a production of Porgy and Bess. He describes the cast, traveling by train to Leningrad, and the Russians they encounter. Truman's prose style is witty and at this point unspoiled by later success where he rested on his laurels while dining out on the promise of manuscripts to come.

I finished this book. I enjoyed it until the penultimate chapter which was a bit maudlin. I knew that at the time of publication, the death of little Nell went viral, but I felt like it was emotional manipulation. I enjoyed the prose of Dickens a lot until the end. The ending was a bit much. CD uses a lot of words but they paint a picture. Also, there is a lot of subtle nuance between the lines.

Somehow finished the book I was reading and saw it lying around. Thought it was corny at first but really enjoy the prose and story telling. Nell and her grandfather have been evicted by the evil dwarf Quilp and go off on a journey of unknown destination. They travel with a puppet show until Nell suspects they mean her harm. They take off and now are employed by a lady who owns a waxworks. Great fun.

Don't get your panties in a bunch. Only going to read 2 or 3 chapters. Tesla, Newton, and Keppler?

Been reading a few pages per day. Liked Cider House Rules a lot. This one is good, too. Owen Moody is quite a character. The narrator, too, Johnny Wheelwright, also quite a character. The armadillo on the cover is one of many quirky details in this tale of growing up in a quiet New England town during the Viet Nam war. Johnny wants to know who his father was, & Owen, a devout dwarf, says God will reveal in due time.

kind of convoluted plot but I am following it through different timelines and locations. Malta and Africa and New York. Like this novel and it is Pynchon's first. Others are better known but this one is very enjoyable.

There are two or more time lines and lots of characters. Some overlap or are parent and offspring. Nevertheless I am finding it interesting and inspiring for my own writing. I am in San Jose for a summer vacation.

I am enjoying this book.

Actually finished.

This book was interesting but I kind of put it on the back burner. I am going to finish it soon.

I like this book. Ray Bradbury was a great writer that I really liked when I was younger. My friend Portia had an autographed copy but she still hadn't finished it years later. Good advice on writing similar to Stephen King's On Writing. Ray's book is more esoteric, like Zen koans, but nevertheless I found it to be good.

Last chapter/essay to go. Love this book. My friend Portia went to Los Angeles High and has a signed copy but has only read the first chapter. Ray went to LA High also and so met a group of students at a reading he gave about 15 years ago. I got a copy from the library. I am going to make her show me the autograph so I can pick up Ray's vibrations.