To Be Well-Read

It has officially been a year since I completed college. I haven't had any homework, exams, professors or study groups in the last year. My senior year was an apocalyptic struggle due to a broken right foot, a sprained left ankle, the stomach flu and a few other unplanned unpleasantness, but despite all that, I've really missed school. I've missed being challenged, and educated, I guess.

Bank-tellering has been challenging. It's a completely different beast from what I've spent the last 8 or so years focusing my efforts on. Working in finance and counting all day has shown me that I'm more well-rounded than I had realized, and I'm proud of that. I feel like I can do any job well if I just shut my trap and suck it up. I've done that pretty well for a year, but I still miss the ole' book report and research paper now and then.

Grub Street, Inc helped satiate my need for literary sustenance for a few weeks, but now that's done and I have no one handing me assignments anymore, and I don't have to face the weekly pressure of reading a freshly-hatched short story in front of a room of strangers. It was a huge challenge, but it felt very good.

So, until I save up enough $$$ to sign up for another writing workshop, I've decided to challenge myself. In the pursuit of becoming "well-read" I will attempt to read all of the books listed on The Modern Library's 100 Best Novels. I've already read a few thanks to Framingham High School's exceptional Honors English curriculum (...) but can't remember much of them.

I've dusted off my library card and will being my "Well-Read Challenge of Summer 2009" tomorrow. My college roommate has just moved home and I plan on enlisting her as well, because 1) she's already read way more of these than I have and 2) we technically have a 2-person reading group that unofficially disbanded last fall when she became a slacker and stopped reading the books we picked (bitch) but I'll let it slide. She knows her shit, and I like that.

Here's to a summer of words.
Books already read in red. Ha!

1. ULYSSES by James Joyce
2. THE GREAT GATSBY by F. Scott Fitzgerald
   
3. A PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST AS A YOUNG MAN by James Joyce
4. LOLITA by Vladimir Nabokov
5. BRAVE NEW WORLD by Aldous Huxley
6. THE SOUND AND THE FURY by William Faulkner
7. CATCH-22
8. DARKNESS AT NOON by Arthur Koestler
9. SONS AND LOVERS by D.H. Lawrence
10. THE GRAPES OF WRATH by John Steinbeck
11. UNDER THE VOLCANO by Malcolm Lowry
12. THE WAY OF ALL FLESH by Samuel Butler
13. 1984 by George Orwell
14. I, CLAUDIUS by Robert Graves
15. TO THE LIGHTHOUSE by Virginia Woolf
16. AN AMERICAN TRAGEDY by Theodore Dreiser
17. THE HEART IS A LONELY HUNTER by Carson McCullers
18. SLAUGHTERHOUSE-FIVE by Kurt Vonnegut
19. INVISIBLE MAN by Ralph Ellison
20. NATIVE SON by Richard Wright
21. HENDERSON THE RAIN KING by Saul Bellow
22. APPOINTMENT IN SAMARRA by John O'Hara
23. U.S.A. (trilogy) by John Dos Passos
24. WINESBURG, OHIO by Sherwood Anderson
25. A PASSAGE TO INDIA by E.M. Forster
26. THE WINGS OF THE DOVE by Henry James
27. THE AMBASSADORS by Henry James
28. TENDER IS THE NIGHT by F. Scott Fitzgerald
29. THE STUDS LONIGAN TRILOGY by James T. Farrell
30. THE GOOD SOLDIER by Ford Madox Ford
31. ANIMAL FARM by George Orwell
32. THE GOLDEN BOWL by Henry James
33. SISTER CARRIE by Theodore Dreiser
34. A HANDFUL OF DUST by Evelyn Waugh
35. AS I LAY DYING by William Faulkner
36. ALL THE KING'S MEN by Robert Penn Warren
37. THE BRIDGE OF SAN LUIS REY by Thornton Wilder
38. HOWARDS END by E.M. Forster
39. GO TELL IT ON THE MOUNTAIN by James Baldwin
40. THE HEART OF THE MATTER by Graham Greene
41. LORD OF THE FLIES by William Golding
42. DELIVERANCE by James Dickey
43. A DANCE TO THE MUSIC OF TIME (series) by Anthony Powell
44. POINT COUNTER POINT by Aldous Huxley
45. THE SUN ALSO RISES by Ernest Hemingway
46. THE SECRET AGENT by Joseph Conrad
47. NOSTROMO by Joseph Conrad
48. THE RAINBOW by D.H. Lawrence
49. WOMEN IN LOVE by D.H. Lawrence
50. TROPIC OF CANCER by Henry Miller
51. THE NAKED AND THE DEAD by Norman Mailer
52. PORTNOY'S COMPLAINT by Philip Roth
53. PALE FIRE by Vladimir Nabokov
54. LIGHT IN AUGUST by William Faulkner
55. ON THE ROAD by Jack Kerouac
56. THE MALTESE FALCON by Dashiell Hammett
57. PARADE'S END by Ford Madox Ford
58. THE AGE OF INNOCENCE by Edith Wharton
59. ZULEIKA DOBSON by Max Beerbohm
60. THE MOVIEGOER by Walker Percy
61. DEATH COMES FOR THE ARCHBISHOP by Willa Cather
62. FROM HERE TO ETERNITY by James Jones
63. THE WAPSHOT CHRONICLES by John Cheever
64. THE CATCHER IN THE RYE by J.D. Salinger
65. A CLOCKWORK ORANGE by Anthony Burgess
66. OF HUMAN BONDAGE by W. Somerset Maugham
67. HEART OF DARKNESS by Joseph Conrad
68. MAIN STREET by Sinclair Lewis
69. THE HOUSE OF MIRTH by Edith Wharton
70. THE ALEXANDRIA QUARTET by Lawrence Durell
71. A HIGH WIND IN JAMAICA by Richard Hughes
72. A HOUSE FOR MR BISWAS by V.S. Naipaul
73. THE DAY OF THE LOCUST by Nathanael West
74. A FAREWELL TO ARMS by Ernest Hemingway
75. SCOOP by Evelyn Waugh
76. THE PRIME OF MISS JEAN BRODIE by Muriel Spark
77. FINNEGANS WAKE by James Joyce
78. KIM by Rudyard Kipling
79. A ROOM WITH A VIEW by E.M. Forster
80. BRIDESHEAD REVISITED by Evelyn Waugh
81. THE ADVENTURES OF AUGIE MARCH by Saul Bellow
82. ANGLE OF REPOSE by Wallace Stegner
83. A BEND IN THE RIVER by V.S. Naipaul
84. THE DEATH OF THE HEART by Elizabeth Bowen
85. LORD JIM by Joseph Conrad
86. RAGTIME by E.L. Doctorow
87. THE OLD WIVES' TALE by Arnold Bennett
88. THE CALL OF THE WILD by Jack London
89. LOVING by Henry Green
90. MIDNIGHT'S CHILDREN by Salman Rushdie
91. TOBACCO ROAD by Erskine Caldwell
92. IRONWEED by William Kennedy
93. THE MAGUS by John Fowles
94. WIDE SARGASSO SEA by Jean Rhys
95. UNDER THE NET by Iris Murdoch
96. SOPHIE'S CHOICE by William Styron
97. THE SHELTERING SKY by Paul Bowles
98. THE POSTMAN ALWAYS RINGS TWICE by James M. Cain
99. THE GINGER MAN by J.P. Donleavy
100. THE MAGNIFICENT AMBERSONS by Booth Tarkington

Shit. But this will feel good.

What have you done for me lately?

I'm very inconsistent with this thing, and it has absolutely no focus aside from whatever youtube video or wandering thought I'm focused on for at least a minute. I have reviews of some restaurants and bars to do, but I need a little free time for that. Surprisingly, working inconsistent hours, writing/transcribing, the occasional nap, hair cuts and damaging my already dismal ligaments at the gym has left me with little time to sit down and play on the googlynet or watch a bit of tv.

There's also a lot of time dedicated to cats. I know for a fact I would be a happy cat lady because I have no problem telling my cats jokes and letting them claw at me all day.

This isn't my cat, but he is about 95% identical to my Binx Monster. Binx looks a bit more like a bat and his eyes are almost popping out of his head. He also has tufts of white hair on his chest, armpits and crotch. He matured so fast!

Anyways, I dropped a major bucket of change on my first writing workshop yesterday. This month I start a multi-week fiction workshop with Grub Street and I can't wait. I've been stalking this organization for over a year now, waiting for the right time to join. I thought maybe I would try for an internship there because then classes would be free, but it just doesn't work into my bank lady schedule. Bank hours are great. So easy. Wonderful. Home by 4. But internships are out of the question.

So I saved some green and called them up, and I'm one step closer to achieving my one goal in life: write awesome books, have publishers kiss the rings on my fingers and beg for my manuscript, have the awesome books turned into amazing movies starring whichever hunk I may or may not be interested in at that point, and then take my money and move to a mountain overlooking the ocean in Maine. If only a mountain overlooked the ocean in Maine. I'll be famous and wealthy by then so I'll just call up my (soon-to-be) friend Stephen King, and he'll lead me to/build me my dream Mainer Manor. I mean, we both went to UMaine. Our paths are destined to cross.

I don't really like his books though. But I bet he won't like mine either.

WHERE THE WILD THINGS ARE

Spike Jonze. Maurice Sendak. Monsters. Arcade Fire.

This gives me goosebumps!

Lauren Conrad: Trust Fund Tart, Designer, Intern, Reality Star, Author....?

My peer, Lauren Conrad of "The Hills" and "Laguna Beach" fame, has written a young adult novel "loosely based" on her own life experiences.

Plot: A 19 year old girl moves to LA and becomes the star of a reality show.

It's just too easy to mock this one.

The best part? L.A. Candy is the first installment in a 3-book series!

L.A. Candy is a reference to cocaine...right? Cute.

A trend I can sure as hell follow with my head held high high high

(Lisa Lutz, author of The Spellman series, and Julie Powell, author of Julie & Julia)

I've been reading a lot lately. I have an addiction to compulsively buying books. A compulsive addition. An addicting compulsion? Asante sana squash banana.

Tonight I visited ye olde B&N and traded a fat $20 for 3 more books. Two were from the bargain aisle, hence my most excellent savings. I've had really great luck at the bargain aisle/table/bin/box/corner (or whatever incarnation in which it may be.) If you dig, you will find.

My best bargain buy was The Spellman Files by Lisa Lutz (pictured up there.) B&N had a $1 table (!!!!!!) at their store in Hadley, MA and I was on it like a cat on cucumber. Like my cat on cucumber. I think I have the only cat in the world who prefers a crisp and juicy cucumber over a hot and bloody piece of steak. True story.

The book was $1 plus tax but thanks to my excluuuusive membership to the store, I got it for a slick 98 cents. Wow!

Anyways, this is almost completely irrelevant to this post's intended subject.

The Spellman Files was one of the best books I've read in the last few years, as was it's sequel, The Spellman Curse. I am sweating out the last few weeks until Revenge of the Spellmans comes out in March.

So off topic!!!!! Thinking about that damn cucumber-eating cat has completely distracted me.

I'll make it quick before I get lost again.

Lisa Lutz described herself as a chronic underachiever and permanent temp. Julie Powell, whose book is being turned into a movie starring Meryl Streep described herself in this same manner. Perma-temps, a little too miserable and unable to commit to any visible path. They were working to live but not really living.

Not really living...until...they wrote hit novels!

So you see, my problems are solved. This trend of somewhat-underachieving women who work dead-end jobs until their fingers gnarl and their high heels are ground to stubs becoming successful authors is a bandwagon I plan to jump onto.

Now now now, I'm not an underachiever. I achieve really hard. So effing hard my fingers are gnarling. But I'm great at the temp thing. That's all I've ever really done. In fact, I was hired for a second part-time job this very day! So even though I'm not in my desired industry and my career prospects are dead in the water, according to Lutz and Powell, I'm on the right track.

(another prospective temp job all aspiring writers should consider...)
(...cough cough, Flight of the Conchords...)

Hooray for inspiration!

Temp-4-ever.

A Renewed Effort!

As the days wear on, my career prospects get bleaker and bleaker. Or perhaps just further off course...publishing is going under and nobody need's a new writer, so I will recommit myself to this blog because being a bank teller only exercises half of my brain.

It exercises the half that is horribly under developed. Calculating and cash handling all day has literally given me head pains. The deep recesses of my cerebellum are throbbing in ways previously unknown to me.

I'm trying to think of it like exercising. The more times you get on that treadmill or lift that iron, the easier it will become and the less you'll feel like a cripple the next day. If I keep exercising my math head, my math head will get stronger and be able to run farther.

So, uhh...right right right. I'm going to do this thing more. Do it a lot more. I've been many places since my last post and I want to rip them apart and/or give them flowers. I'll make a list to remind myself:


*Big City: Brighton Ave., Allson
An alternative to the 80 minute wait you face at Sunset Tap on a Saturday Night. Less food, less beer, but more tables and toilets. What more can a gal ask for?
*Sanctuary: State St., Boston
I am by no means a nightclub person. Is that even the right term? Clubs. Hip joint. Hot Spot. Hot steamy room that charges you $5 to walk in the door, $3 to hang up your coat and $7 for a sip of vodka tonic. Maybe I started my foray into the land of the nightclubcrawlers at the wrong place. Maybe conceptual clubs aren't my thing. Three floors, the bottom is "hell" and the top is "heaven". All I know is that after walking from Beacon Hill to Sanctuary in a new pair of patent brown t-strap heels (meow), stomping down a flight of stairs to hang my coat in hell and then the two story ascent to heaven was painful enough to challenge one of Dante's circles. My blisters be damned.
*6B Lounge: Beacon St., Boston
Adjacent to Emmet's Pub, this place was just...blah. Dark and moody interior with some really excellent seating options in the windows jutting out onto the street, but the service was terrible and the food is your basic pub fare with a Beacon Hill price tag. Will any member of my 20 person party return? Not likely. We reserved a large table to fit our swollen crowd only to find upon arrival that the doorman had given it to another 20 member party who he mistook for ours. We were too hungry and determined to get drunk to bother finding another place that could fit us, so we parked it on their comfortable leather lounge seats and helped ourselves to a bounty of $5 drafts (none of which were comped despite the lounge's inconvenient faux pas, and the host's subsequent rudeness).

Tomorrow after my shift at the mine I'm going to Harvard with my brother to hear a lecture by Jonah Lehrer, author of Proust Was a Neuroscientist and How We Decide. Aside from wanting to skip down the halls of Harvard and pretend I'm a serious intellectual for a few hours, I have a secret motive for attending this lecture. Here are some hints:

Science
Poetry
Dr. Zhivago
Replacing a book of poems entitled "Lara" for the more appropriate title of "Sarah" ("r" is meant to be rolled and the first syllable grossly elongated. Think "saaaaaarrrraah")



To bed!

POTTER!

Oh my goodness! I know I some may look down at me for this, but you know what? I'm not ashamed. Not ashamed of the fact that I have been a rabid Harry Potter fan since I was in middle school. Not ashamed of the fact that I've read a few of the books 2-3 times. Not ashamed of the fact that I was young enough when I started reading them to think I had a chance being cast as Hermione Granger if they were ever made into movies. I had really frizzy hair back then! I actually still do have frizzy hair but age has graced me with the wisdom to know how to contain it. A bit.

So, a Harry Potter exhibition is coming to Chicago in April. Lucky for me, I have la famiglia in Chicago and I was already planning on visiting them early next summer. This makes those plans concrete.

Yay!


Also, I kept writing "Happy Hotter" instead of "Harry Potter". Hello, subconscious?

As the country moves ahead, my (semblance of) maturity travels back in time...

Note to self:

Talk about Twilight.

More specifically, talk about Robert Pattinson.

Even more specifically, talk about newly developed urge to find vampire lover.

Edit: Talk about newly developed urge to find vampire lover who looks like Robert Pattinson.

This is going to get very pathetic very quickly.

Edit II: Also will consider tall werewolf lovers.

Libros: Dead Travel Fast

Reading now: Dead Travel Fast by Eric Nuzum

I've been hunting down this book for MONTHS...literally hunting. I've approached countless booksellers at my local book establishments, my fangs bared and pupils dilated, asking why this book was no longer within reach of my claws.

Finally, FINALLY...after obtaining my first pair of contact lenses, I decided to reward myself with an iced coffee and a new book. Admittedly, I felt less bookish without my black-rimmed glasses, but I applied extra mascara so that my new eyes would still feel sheltered by at least one extra protective layer.

I found this book and hmm'd and haaa'd about whether I should spend the money, tossing it from one hand to the other and dropping my coffee because you can't catch a book when you're already holding a large cold coffee. I recovered from my blunder and remembered, hey, I don't have to spend money. I will just buy now and pay later, when I finally have a great job!

Perhaps to someone who was not familiar with this title, it would look like I was buying a book about the occult with intentions of becoming intimate with its ideals. The sales person at the register made an awkward crack about Count Chocula being a great vampire, and being quite caught off guard (probably due to the loss of my smart glasses) felt compelled to defend the book. In a tight voice and with my arms waving I squeaked something about it being a humor-clad cultural study of the international fascination with vampire lore and lifestyle and hoo and haa and whee baa boo. I was also walking away from the register, waving a vampire book in my arms and feeling temporarily blinded without my glasses the remembering I had tiny lenses on my eye balls that let me see and when it all hit me I made a run for it.

It all ended well because once I got into my car, I put on sunglasses comfortably for the first time, relishing the fact that I wasn't hiding my bulky lenses underneath and looking like a damn fool. I still ended up looking like a fool. But...I had a new book, new eyes, and a cold coffee bubbling inside me. All ended well.


**