Another Book Meme
I don’t have a lot of time to write actual content today. My mother and I are heading to the deep East Texas woods to take care of some unfinished business with my grandmother’s estate. But rather than have an entry-less Monday, I’ve stolen this list from a forum post and turned it into a meme. Because we all like to show off how well-read we are, right?
Okay, maybe that’s just me.
Below is the list of Entertainment Weekly’s 100 “new classics.” Bold the ones you have read. Place an asterisk next to the ones you have loved. Italicize the ones you want to read. Strike the ones you hated with a fiery passion. And always, if you are so inclined, post this meme on your own blog and leave a link to your answers in the comments.
1. The Road , Cormac McCarthy (2006)
2. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, J.K. Rowling (2000)
3. Beloved, Toni Morrison (1987)
4. The Liars’ Club, Mary Karr (1995)
5. American Pastoral, Philip Roth (1997)
6. Mystic River, Dennis Lehane (2001)
7. Maus, Art Spiegelman (1986/1991) *
8. Selected Stories, Alice Munro (1996)
9. Cold Mountain, Charles Frazier (1997)
10. The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, Haruki Murakami (1997)
11. Into Thin Air, Jon Krakauer (1997)
12. Blindness, José Saramago
13. Watchmen, Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons (1986-87)
14. Black Water, Joyce Carol Oates (1992)
15. A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, Dave Eggers (2000)
16. The Handmaid’s Tale, Margaret Atwood (1986)
17. Love in the Time of Cholera, Gabriel García Márquez
18. Rabbit at Rest, John Updike (1990)
19. On Beauty, Zadie Smith (2005)
20. Bridget Jones’s Diary, Helen Fielding *
21. On Writing, Stephen King (2000)
22. The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, Junot Díaz (2007)
23. The Ghost Road, Pat Barker (1996)
24. Lonesome Dove, Larry McMurtry (1985)
25. The Joy Luck Club, Amy Tan (1989)
26. Neuromancer, William Gibson (1984)
27. Possession, A.S. Byatt (1990)
28. Naked, David Sedaris (1997)
29. Bel Canto, Anne Patchett (2001) Note: not strike-worthy, but I didn’t love it
30. Case Histories, Kate Atkinson (2004)
31. The Things They Carried, Tim O’Brien (1990)
32. Parting the Waters, Taylor Branch
33. The Year of Magical Thinking, Joan Didion (2005) *
34. The Lovely Bones, Alice Sebold (2002)
35. The Line of Beauty, Alan Hollinghurst (2004)
36. Angela’s Ashes, Frank McCourt (1996)
37. Persepolis, Marjane Satrapi (2003)
38. Birds of America, Lorrie Moore *
39. Interpreter of Maladies, Jhumpa Lahiri (2000)*
40. His Dark Materials, Philip Pullman (1995-2000)
41. The House on Mango Street, Sandra Cisneros (1984)
42. LaBrava, Elmore Leonard (1983)
43. Borrowed Time, Paul Monette
44. Praying for Sheetrock, Melissa Fay Greene (1991)
45. Eva Luna, Isabel Allende
46. Sandman, Neil Gaiman (1988-1996)
47. World’s Fair, E.L. Doctorow (1985)
48. The Poisonwood Bible, Barbara Kingsolver
49. Clockers, Richard Price (1992)
50. The Corrections, Jonathan Franzen (2001)
51. The Journalist and the Murderer, Janet Malcom (1990)
52. Waiting to Exhale, Terry McMillan (1992)
53. The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay, Michael Chabon (2000)*
54. Jimmy Corrigan, Chris Ware (2000)
55. The Glass Castle, Jeannette Walls (2006)
56. The Night Manager, John le Carré (1993)
57. The Bonfire of the Vanities, Tom Wolfe (1987)
58. Drop City, TC Boyle (2003)
59. Krik? Krak! Edwidge Danticat (1995)
60. Nickel & Dimed, Barbara Ehrenreich (2001)
61. Money, Martin Amis (1985)
62. Last Train To Memphis, Peter Guralnick (1994)
63. Pastoralia, George Saunders (2000)
64. Underworld, Don DeLillo (1997)
65. The Giver, Lois Lowry (1993)
66. A Supposedly Fun Thing I’ll Never Do Again, David Foster Wallace (1997)
67. The Kite Runner, Khaled Hosseini (2003)
68. Fun Home, Alison Bechdel (2006)*
69. Secret History, Donna Tartt (1992)
70. Cloud Atlas, David Mitchell (2004)
71. The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down, Ann Fadiman (1997)
72. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, Mark Haddon (2003)
73. A Prayer for Owen Meany, John Irving (1989)
74. Friday Night Lights, H.G. Bissinger (1990)*
75. Cathedral, Raymond Carver (1983)*
76. A Sight for Sore Eyes, Ruth Rendell
77. The Remains of the Day, Kazuo Ishiguro (1989)
78. Eat, Pray, Love, Elizabeth Gilbert (2006)
79. The Tipping Point, Malcolm Gladwell (2000)
80. Bright Lights, Big City, Jay McInerney (1984)
81. Backlash, Susan Faludi (1991)
82. Atonement, Ian McEwan (2002)
83. The Stone Diaries, Carol Shields (1994)
84. Holes, Louis Sachar
85. Gilead, Marilynne Robinson (2004)
86. And the Band Played On, Randy Shilts (1987)
87. The Ruins, Scott Smith (2006)
88. High Fidelity, Nick Hornby (1995)
89. Close Range, Annie Proulx (1999)
90. Comfort Me With Apples, Ruth Reichl (2001)
91. Random Family, Adrian Nicole LeBlanc (2003)
92. Presumed Innocent, Scott Turow (1987)
93. A Thousand Acres, Jane Smiley (1991)
94. Fast Food Nation, Eric Schlosser (2001)
95. Kaaterskill Falls, Allegra Goodman
96. The Da Vinci Code, Dan Brown (2003) Note: there are not enough strikes in the world.
97. Jesus’ Son, Denis Johnson (1992)
98. The Predators’ Ball, Connie Bruck
99. Practical Magic, Alice Hoffman (1995)
100. America (the Book), Jon Stewart/Daily Show (2004)
‘Fess Up Friday
Time for another exciting edition of ‘fess up Friday.
Writing: Much better this week. Freewriting resulted in less whining, more novel notes, so I’m pleased with that. I managed to do my freewriting almost every day. I missed Tuesday, though, and ended up reading for most of the day. I’m thinking of doing some writing this weekend to make up for it.
Revising: I tried something new with a revision this week. For months I’ve had this one particular story that I didn’t know what to do with. Originally, the story received a lot of praise, but somewhere in the gazillion revisions, I started to hate the story. So earlier this week I reread the original draft of the story, opened my computer and, starting with a blank screen, started writing the story again.
This may not be groundbreaking to anyone else, but it was for me. We were never given any advice on how to revise in grad school and so my system never changed. I always used the latest draft as a basis and just marked the heck out of it from there. The revisions were extensive, but they were always based on the previous draft.
Starting from scratch is . . . freeing. It’s a lot more time consuming, but it also gives me room to wander away from the the last draft. I don’t feel locked in to choices I made. At the same time, when I get stuck, I know the next step of the story, so if I want to keep it, I just start working my way there. Ultimately, the process will be judged by how well this revision goes, but so far like the system. I’m halfway through the revision and I like this version of the story much more than the last revision. It will be interesting to see what my writing group thinks of it.
Submissions: Nothing yet. The mail hasn’t come today, though. I didn’t submit to any new markets this week. Again, when I have a story out at 10 places I start panicking about putting it in more hands. Maybe next week.
Overall: Productive week, but I feel like it could have been more productive. I’ll try for better next week.
Operation Domesticity
We interrupt this writing day to bring you … bread.
A few months back, I decided to put my domestic skills to the test and bake a loaf of bread. But, even I know that my domestic skills suck, so I went with the easiest bread recipe ever. The results were okay. It was tasty, but my bread ended up much less substantial than expected and, frankly, a little airy and chewy. That, however, did not stop Hubs and me from eating every last crumb.
When I mentioned that I tried the recipe, my friend Karin told me that Cook’s Illustrated had improved it and so I proceeded to badger her for a copy until she finally brought it last week. Turns out it’s available on the internet. Whoops.
So, feeling the urge to be domestic again (and looking for any excuse to avoid a painful revision), I decided to test the 2.0 recipe. The result was much better. Not at all airy and completely substantial. It had more flavor and the crust was slightly thicker and crispier, which is just the way I like it. From now on this will be the recipe I use to impress people with my mad baking skillz.
Here’s what you need:
A couple of modifications on my part. First, the Cook’s Illustrated version calls for all-purpose flour, but why use all-purpose when you have bread flour? I’m not sure there’s that much of a difference, so if you only have all purpose on hand, use it.
Second, the recipe suggests using Budweiser for your mild-flavor lager. I’m not much of a beer drinker, but I simply will not buy Budweiser. Too many bad college memories. I chose the Sierra Nevada Summerfest Lager. It wasn’t bad, but I’m open to suggestions.
Here’s how ridiculously easy the recipe is. Once you’ve gathered everything up, mix up your dry ingredients in a large bowl and then pour in all your wet ingredients and combine until you have a shaggy ball of dough. So easy. After that, cover the bowl with plastic wrap, finish the rest of the beer, and wait 18 hours. At this point, I probably should have gone back to the revision, but instead I read a book.
Anyway, the rest of the recipe is just as simple as the first part. Place a sheet of parchment paper in a shallow skillet (I used my Lodge 10-inch skillet) and lightly spray it with cooking spray. Then remove the dough from the bowl and knead it into a small ball. Put the ball in the skillet, cover with plastic wrap, and wait another two hours.
With all this waiting you would think I could be doing a lot of writing. You would think that, wouldn’t you? You’d be wrong.
About 30 minutes before you’re ready to bake the bread, set your oven at 500 degrees and put your dutch oven in to heat up. The recipe suggests using an enameled cast iron, but I used my trusty Lodge. Then find every potholder you ever owned and get them ready. You’re going to need them. After the pot is heated, transfer the bread to the pot by using the parchment paper. Genius idea, really. Just don’t burn yourself. Then reduce the heat to 425 and bake with the lid on the dutch oven for 30 minutes. Remove the lid and bake for another 20 minutes.
Using your gazillion potholders, remove the bread from the oven and let cool on a wire rack.
And here is were I worry that the Cook’s Illustrated editors are smoking crack. You’re supposed to let the bread cool to room temperature for about two hours. Two hours!? Seriously? Have you smelled warm bread? Do you think it’s possible to resist the craving to taste warm bread once you have smelled it. Let my clue you in, it isn’t. Wait as long as you can, but I only lasted 10 minutes
That small disagreement aside, I think this recipe is a huge improvement over the New York Times version. Very tasty and much less complicated. (Not that the NYT version was complicated, just that this one is so much easier.) Also, cleaning up for this recipe means washing one bowl. That alone is enough to win my loyalty.
A note about the beer. When I first read the recipe, I was concerned about the beer addition. My mother occasionally makes beer bread and the combination is just not my thing. I was pleased to note that this bread was not beery at all, but that the beer did seem to boast the flavor. You can use non-alcoholic if you so choose.
So Operation Domesticity was a success this time around. Operation Revise that crappy story, not so much.
Source: Cook’s Illustrated.
Linkage: Why Writers Can’t Go It Alone
(via Matt Bell)
This Guardian article gets a big amen from me:
The literary world only bestows acceptance, it seems, on those who are published through the traditional avenues. Independent and small presses get short shrift – national newspaper supplements seem loath to review indie books, the big high street sellers won’t stock them, unless the books are about the tough lives of mill girls or histories of public house names, which can be shoved on a shelf marked “local interest”.
<…snip…>
But there’s a sea of dross in the worlds of pop music and movies, too. Quality rises to the surface there, so if the literary industry can relax its perceived inherently snobbish attitude to the output of anything other than the established, traditional publishers, perhaps the same will happen with independent, small press and even self-published books.
Someday I’ll be brave enough to publish my rant/bitch/whine about the stigma of self-publishing in the literary writing world. I think it’s becoming clear that in the current book market, traditional venues are losing ground. In the meantime, read the The Guardian’s take on the subject.
Confessions of a Book Hoarder
Ladies and gentlemen, may I present my to-read shelf.
And that’s not counting The Yiddish Policeman’s Union or Crossing Brooklyn Ferry, which are currently on my nightstand. Those were put on hold yesterday so that I could devour Michelle Richmond’s No One You Know (book rave coming soon, I hope).
Some of the books on this shelf have been on the list for years. For instance, I bought The Little Friend shortly after reading The Secret History somewhereabouts 2004. A Prayer For Owen Meany probably moved with me from New Mexico in 2000. On the other hand, Alternatives to Sex and The Night Journal were picked up yesterday when I got No One You Know. Yes, I have a book buying problem.
And while I was typing the last paragraph, the mailman arrived bringing with him the latest Paperback Swap book I ordered.
I need help.
So You Think You’re Well Read…
For those wary of clicking on random links (and who can blame you) the above link will take you to a free interactive spreadsheet of Peter Boxall’s 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die. Fascinating stuff.
I’ve read approximately 7.39% of the list, or 74 books. Should I actually want to complete the entire list, I have 19 books to read per year. Probably not going to happen. And, for the record, I didn’t check off all the books that I started and never finished. It was tempting, but I stayed true. I did, however, wish that there was a way you could mark books that you weren’t ever going to read. In my case, that would be Infinite Jest. I don’t think I would regret going to my grave without reading it.
I have to make the obligatory gripe about some of the book choices, however. For instance, there are three Jose Saramago titles and not one of them is Blindness. And how did Camus’ The Stranger manage to be overlooked? Where is A Tree Grows In Brooklyn? And The Iliad? The Odyssey?
Regardless of my griping, it’s interesting to see the choices and find out what percentage of them I’ve read. If you’re so inclined, leave your results in the comments.
‘Fess Up Friday
Someone in the blogosphere came up with the idea of ‘fess up Fridays, which I am shamelessly stealing for my own use. The premise is that you report what (if any) writing related activities you accomplished during the week. It’s my belief that eventually I’d get tired of saying “hey look, I did nothing” and actually start doing things to report here.
Or I’ll become a better liar. Let’s try it and see.
Writing: Writing-wise, this week sucked. Most of my freewriting resulted in lots and lots of pages of whining. I didn’t write anything creative, though my novel has been on my mind a lot.
Things got a little better on Thursday. I revisited a story that I feel is ready to go out into the big wide world of lit mags. I may just be tired of fussing with it, but I really feel that it has gone as far as it can go for now.
Submissions: I haven’t received any updates from the stories that are currently making the lit mag rounds. Duotrope tells me that one market has held on to one of my stories for 218 days. Three years ago, this same market took six months before responding with a very nice personal letter saying that they almost published the story. The optimist in me is hoping for a similar result (except, you know, this time they actually publish it), but the pessimist says that it’s been lost in the mail. I should query, but I’m rather enjoying the fantasy that the story is currently thisclose to publication.
I do feel horribly shamed after reading the blog of another author whom currently has her stories at 50 markets. I got panicky when I noticed I have 15 outstanding, so I think I need to bump up my mailings a little more. Maybe I’ll try for 20 next week. Maybe.
Living in a Powder Keg and Giving Off Sparks
Hubs finally got a Playstation 3 last weekend. I say finally because before we started dating, the man had aspirations of getting a PS3. Three years ago he bought his entertainment center specifically so it could eventually house the PS3. But all the fun in shopping for Hubs is spending years looking for the best deal and agonizing over whether the price will drop or a new version will be released and so he waited and waited and waited. Well, the wait was over last weekend when he decided that there wasn’t going to be a better deal before Christmas time and his desire to play Lego Indiana Jones and Assassin’s Creed outweighed the need to wait for another price drop. He came home on Sunday night with both the PS3 and the Indiana Jones game.
So of course, I ran out the next day and bought SingStar.
For those of you who are not familiar with the goodness that is SingStar, it’s essentially a karaoke video game. You sing along with the song and score points for timing and pitch. All the while, the music video plays in the background. The game is so friggin’ addictive that we already have SingStar 80s, SingStar Rocks, and SingStar Pop for the PS2 and SingStar for the PS3. We need help, people.
But by and large, the most fun thing about SingStar is the WTF?! factor of some of the lyrics and videos. To that end, I submit Bonnie Tyler’s “Total Eclipse of the Heart” video. Now, keep in mind that I came from a household that did not have MTV until the 90s. The only videos that I got to see were the ones that eventually made it onto NBC’s Friday Night Videos and I’m pretty sure I never saw that one because when we played the Bonnie Tyler song, I lost 2000 points simply because I could not stop laughing. Ninjas, high school swimmers and some freaky angel looking guy… this video has it all.
Enjoy.
P.S. My utmost respect to whomever can tell me what that video is supposed to be about.
Memeage: The Magic MASH Machine
I am so thankful for my wonderful friends who find glorious online time wasters and share them with me. Today’s find: The Magic MASH Machine.
For those of you who were not blessed with playing MASH in junior high (i.e. boys), it’s a wonderfully silly game where you list all your crushes (plus one or two duds), all your dream jobs (plus one or two duds), all your car choices, kid choices, dream city choices, etc. and then wait for the hands of fate to determine your future. And by hands of fate, I mean, the girl that sits in front of you in Social Studies who counts out the answers and who may or may not be cheating thereby making you end up married to the class clown, Sammy Melcheck, instead of to Alan Peterson, for whom you KNOW you are truly destined.
Ahem. . . No hard feelings, Laura.
Anyway, there is now an online version of the hands of fate. I believe it only slightly less biased than Laura Dyer. My results:
You will marry Freddy Rodriguez. [1]
After a wild honeymoon, you will settle down in Deluth in you fabulous Apartment.
You will have 0 kid(s) together.
Your family will zoom around in a Seafoam Green Chevy Nova.
You will spend your days as an Acclaimed Air Guitar Champion, and live happily ever after.
If you are so inclined, leave your fate in the comments.
________________
[1] It totally came down to either Freddy or Meatloaf. Whew!
Austin Literary: William Gibson
Austin peeps: William Gibson will be at the Barnes & Noble at the Arboretum on Wednesday at 7 p.m. to promote his newest book Spook Country.
Planning on going? Comment accordingly.
See ya there!
