Max's Bookshelf

(like everything else, it's under construction -- obviously.)

This month's book club selection

The Liars' Club, by Mary Karr
A disturbing recollection of a fucked-up childhood. Karr's command of the language is powerful; the images are vivid (too vivid), the metaphors startling and clever. A worthwhile read.

Last month's book club selection

Testaments Betrayed, by Milan Kundera
A thought-provoking nine-part essay, it includes recurring threads about translation, the rights of authors and composers both to privacy and to determine how their works are portrayed, the structure of modern art, and several of Kundera's favorite creators: Kafka, Janacek, Rushdie, Nietzsche. Really really good; made me think a lot.

* indicates I'd read it once before

1999

Naked, David Sedaris
The Art of the Novel, Kundera
Widow for One Year, John Irving

1998

Immortality, Kundera
Catch-22*, Heller
Tales of the City, Maupin
Angry Candy, Ellison
Ellen Foster, Kaye Gibbons
The Fountainhead*, Rand
Testaments Betrayed, Kundera
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas*, Thompson
Einstein's Dreams, Alan Lightman
Ship Fever, Andrea Barrett
Love in the Time of Cholera, Garcia-Marquez
The Joke, Kundera
Farewell Waltz, Kundera
A History of Warfare, John Keegan

1997

Lord of the Flies, William Golding
The Hotel New Hampshire, John Irving
Women in Love, Shere Hite
Secrets of the Temple, William Greider
Cannery Row, John Steinbeck
ADD: Another Perspective, ???
100 Years of Solitude, Garcia-Marquez
The Hobbit, Tolkien
Lord of the Rings
Snow Crash*, Stephenson
The Book of Laughter & Forgetting, Kundera
The Enchanter, Nabokov
He's Scared, She's Scared, ???
Streets of Laredo, McMurtry
The Unbearable Lightness of Being, Kundera
Trying to Save Piggy Sneed, Irving
How the Irish Saved Civilization, Thomas Cahill

All-time favorites

Fiction
To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee
Catch-22, Joseph Heller
The Once and Future King, T.H. White
A Prayer for Owen Meany, John Irving
Lonesome Dove, Larry McMurtry
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, Hunter Thompson
The Fountainhead, Ayn Rand
The Book of Laughter and Forgetting, Milan Kundera

Sci-fi
Stranger in a Strange Land, Robert Heinlein
The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, Robert Heinlein
Snow Crash, Neal Stephenson
Ender's Game, Orson Scott Card
The Gaean trilogy: Titan, Wizard, and Demon, John Varley

Non-fiction
The Discoverers, Daniel J. Boorstin
The Creators, Daniel J. Boorstin
A history of creative endeavor, from cave paintings through cubism; explores the development of painting, poetry, prose, music, sculpture. Fascinating. A tour-de-force. The only problem is Boorstin's over-focus (IMHO) on Western and Christian culture.
The Selfish Gene, Richard Dawkins
Warning! You should only ever read one Dawkins book, because they are all identical. One is worthwhile though.
The Right Stuff, Tom Wolfe
A fabulous history of Project Mercury.
Holidays in Hell, P.J. O'Rourke
Probably O'Rourke's finest work, a collection of magazine articles detailing his misadventures in the so-called Third World. Laugh-out-loud funny, morbidly true.

Kid books
The Mad Scientists Club, Bertrand R. Brinley
The Shy Stegosaurus, E.S. Lampman
A Wrinkle in Time, Madeleine L'Engle
A Light in the Attic, Shel Silverstein
The Chronicles of Narnia, C.S. Lewis

Since I saw the scam that amazon.com is running with it's "online bookstore", I decided that I should try to make a buck or two off it. So, if you click on a link and buy a book, I get a kickback. :-)

In association with Amazon.com enter keywords...


Last updated 17 Jun 98 by max