2022 Reading Challenge

Book #3: Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe - Benjamin Alire Sáenz

This is another book that was required for college. I'm surprised that I read 2 books in a week, but both were YA so I guess the math checks out. This book really surprised me. I picked it from the list of options because I thought it sounded cool. I figured it would be about the real Aristotle and Dante. Plot twist, it's not, it's about two Mexican-American boys living in the 80s. There are intense, complicated family relationships that are explored, but arguably more importantly, the two boys fall in love and struggle with this, as in their culture being gay isn't a thing... 80s stuff, I guess. Maybe it was shitty of me to have very low expectations, but this book took me by surprise. I struggled with wanting to devour it and trying to slow my reading down because I knew it would break my heart. If you guys want an easy but beautiful read, seriously, pick this one up. I cried like three times.
 
sarcasticfairyprincess said:
I'm taking a contemporary poetry class this semester. If you'd like, I can send you some of the stuff we read.
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I'd love to see your reading list for that class! Be very curious to see whereabouts my own voracious poetry reading lies in relation to contemporary academia.

I'm hoping to put a list of recommendations together for @GritNGlitter as well, the last couple of days have just been a bit too full on and exhausting to set to it quite yet.

The Outlaw Bible of American Poetry is awesome! I was first introduced to it by a colleague during a residency at the Banff Centre a dozen years ago. It's criminal that I have yet to acquire my own copy.
 
avecigrec said:
I'd love to see your reading list for that class! Be very curious to see whereabouts my own voracious poetry reading lies in relation to contemporary academia.

I'm hoping to put a list of recommendations together for @GritNGlitter as well, the last couple of days have just been a bit too full on and exhausting to set to it quite yet.

The Outlaw Bible of American Poetry is awesome! I was first introduced to it by a colleague during a residency at the Banff Centre a dozen years ago. It's criminal that I have yet to acquire my own copy.
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The required texts:
American Journal: Fifty Poems for Our Time - selected/intro by Tracy K. Smith
Catalog of Unabashed Gratitude - Ross Gay
The Carrying - Ada Limon
A Writer's Guide and Anthology - Huey and Kaneko

The professor also handpicks poems to discuss in class that aren't in these. We've done a Heather Christle poem (Advent), and another by Tracy K. Smith (An Old Story).

eta: @GritNGlitter, I feel like you would like the aforementioned Heather Christle poem.
 
sarcasticfairyprincess said:
I'm taking a contemporary poetry class this semester. If you'd like, I can send you some of the stuff we read.
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Absolutely! Thanks!
avecigrec said:
I'd love to see your reading list for that class! Be very curious to see whereabouts my own voracious poetry reading lies in relation to contemporary academia.

I'm hoping to put a list of recommendations together for @GritNGlitter as well, the last couple of days have just been a bit too full on and exhausting to set to it quite yet.

The Outlaw Bible of American Poetry is awesome! I was first introduced to it by a colleague during a residency at the Banff Centre a dozen years ago. It's criminal that I have yet to acquire my own copy.
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You're an angel! When I first moved to San Diego (well over a dozen years ago, alas), I spent a lot of time on my friend's balcony in the dark, smoking and reading and writing poetry. I read the Outlaw Bible cover to cover in that time.
 
GritNGlitter said:
Absolutely! Thanks!

You're an angel! When I first moved to San Diego (well over a dozen years ago, alas), I spent a lot of time on my friend's balcony in the dark, smoking and reading and writing poetry. I read the Outlaw Bible cover to cover in that time.
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I'm sure I can come up with more (including, but not limited to, the rest of the list where these came from!) but, for now, here (in no particular order) are a dozen of my absolute favourite contemporary poetry books I've read over the past half dozen years - most of them more than once:

The Gospel of Breaking by Jillian Christmas
My Art Is Killing Me and Other Poems by Amber Dawn
Haiti Glass by Lenelle Moïse
Drunks and Other Poems of Recovery by Jack McCarthy
Homie by Danez Smith
A Fortune for Your Disaster by Hanif Abdurraqib
Re-Origin of Species by Alessandra Naccarato
The Problem with Solitaire by Lucia Misch
Magical Negro by Morgan Parker
Citizen: An American Lyric by Claudia Rankine
Still Can't Do My Daughter's Hair by William Evans
My Soft Response To The Wars by RC Weslowski

RC Weslowski in particular ought to tickle your love for weird shit. He is an absolute gem.

Hanif Abdurraqib currently has available another book of poetry, two books of essays and a full-length book that is a letter to A Tribe Called Quest - I recommend all of them very highly. He may well be my favourite writer going these days - I can find myself enraptured even by his long-form essays about bands I don't like or sports I don't watch. His debut picture book Sing, Aretha, Sing!: Aretha Franklin,"Respect," and the Civil Rights Movement is due out in a couple of weeks and it is easily one of the books I'm most excited for this year!


Not sure how you feel about concrete and conceptual poetry at all, but I've been dipping my toes deeper into those realms over the past few years too and could make recommendations there, if wanted, as well. And I'm happily here for questions or concerns if you've either.
 
I finally finished Know My Name by Chanel Miller. It was heartbreakingly fantastic... but as someone who is usually fine reading about difficult topics... this one hurt me.

I need to pick up something lighter now I think... but I am also enjoying all the poetry recommendations. My personal favorites I've read in the last few years that weren't already mentioned were Night Sky With Exit Wounds by Ocean Vuong (excited for his new collection and his novel is also great), and Hera Lindsay Bird by Hera Lindsay Bird.
 
avecigrec said:
I'm sure I can come up with more (including, but not limited to, the rest of the list where these came from!) but, for now, here (in no particular order) are a dozen of my absolute favourite contemporary poetry books I've read over the past half dozen years - most of them more than once:

The Gospel of Breaking by Jillian Christmas
My Art Is Killing Me and Other Poems by Amber Dawn
Haiti Glass by Lenelle Moïse
Drunks and Other Poems of Recovery by Jack McCarthy
Homie by Danez Smith
A Fortune for Your Disaster by Hanif Abdurraqib
Re-Origin of Species by Alessandra Naccarato
The Problem with Solitaire by Lucia Misch
Magical Negro by Morgan Parker
Citizen: An American Lyric by Claudia Rankine
Still Can't Do My Daughter's Hair by William Evans
My Soft Response To The Wars by RC Weslowski

RC Weslowski in particular ought to tickle your love for weird shit. He is an absolute gem.

Hanif Abdurraqib currently has available another book of poetry, two books of essays and a full-length book that is a letter to A Tribe Called Quest - I recommend all of them very highly. He may well be my favourite writer going these days - I can find myself enraptured even by his long-form essays about bands I don't like or sports I don't watch. His debut picture book Sing, Aretha, Sing!: Aretha Franklin,"Respect," and the Civil Rights Movement is due out in a couple of weeks and it is easily one of the books I'm most excited for this year!


Not sure how you feel about concrete and conceptual poetry at all, but I've been dipping my toes deeper into those realms over the past few years too and could make recommendations there, if wanted, as well. And I'm happily here for questions or concerns if you've either.
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Thanks for the recommendations!
 
Book 2:

The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Murakami

I finished reading my first Murakami book earlier today. I have been wanting to read one of his books for the past year but had such a backlog of books to read that I never went out and bought one. Over Christmas, my fiancée sister brought this copy for me to read (she also has the Norwegian Wood book as well which I will borrow at some point) and I started it as soon as I finished my last book. Last night my fiancee asked me what The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle was about and I really struggled to explain it as it's so unlike anything I have read before. There is a central 'spine' to the story but it also includes dozens of random shorter stories, some of which are directly related to the main story and others which are isolated. It's the kind of book that I struggled to put down and would be thinking about it when I wasn't reading it. If anyone has any recommendations of his work which is worth reading, that would be much appreciated!

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Selaws said:
Book 2:

The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Murakami

I finished reading my first Murakami book earlier today. I have been wanting to read one of his books for the past year but had such a backlog of books to read that I never went out and bought one. Over Christmas, my fiancée sister brought this copy for me to read (she also has the Norwegian Wood book as well which I will borrow at some point) and I started it as soon as I finished my last book. Last night my fiancee asked me what The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle was about and I really struggled to explain it as it's so unlike anything I have read before. There is a central 'spine' to the story but it also includes dozens of random shorter stories, some of which are directly related to the main story and others which are isolated. It's the kind of book that I struggled to put down and would be thinking about it when I wasn't reading it. If anyone has any recommendations of his work which is worth reading, that would be much appreciated!

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My favorite of his that I've read so far was A Wild Sheep Chase. It's technically the third book in a series but there's almost no connection between it and the first 2 books except for a reoccurring character and a few quick references so it can be read as a standalone. It's less weird than some of his other stuff, but it's a fun mystery set in Hokkaido.

If you like his weird stuff, I read Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World last year and while I didn't like that one quite as much it was definitely an engaging story in the way you described.

Norwegian Wood was good too but I didn't like something that happened towards the end. It's definitely the least weird of his books that I have read plotwise.
 
Selaws said:
Book 2:

The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Murakami

I finished reading my first Murakami book earlier today. I have been wanting to read one of his books for the past year but had such a backlog of books to read that I never went out and bought one. Over Christmas, my fiancée sister brought this copy for me to read (she also has the Norwegian Wood book as well which I will borrow at some point) and I started it as soon as I finished my last book. Last night my fiancee asked me what The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle was about and I really struggled to explain it as it's so unlike anything I have read before. There is a central 'spine' to the story but it also includes dozens of random shorter stories, some of which are directly related to the main story and others which are isolated. It's the kind of book that I struggled to put down and would be thinking about it when I wasn't reading it. If anyone has any recommendations of his work which is worth reading, that would be much appreciated!

View attachment 125469
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Definitely 1Q84.
 
Doing a count, I’ve read eight (eight?!? How the heck did I read eight?!?) Murakami’s and would mainly recommend Kafka on the Shore. I also enjoyed Hard-Boiled, and while I’m more ambivalent about Colorless Tuzuki, I remember devouring it over a weekend. The early novels are inessential but pleasant, a lot less surreal.

I love a long book, but I’ve been too much a coward for IQ84.
 
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In other news, I finished book 2 this weekend, Nightmare Alley by William Lindsey Gresham. A really good noir yarn, pretty grim and gritty, especially for the 40s. It dragged a bit near the middle, and I’m a bit confused by the ending (maybe this is in the new movie so I’m including it here): especially the way the psychiatrist manipulates Stan into stealing from the tycoon, steals that money from Stan, then marries the tycoon. What’s the point of stealing money just to marry into it?

Gonna check out the 1947 movie this week, then try to catch the new Del Toro one before it leaves screens.
 
Novel 1/ 2022

Ulrich Alexander Boschwitz „Menschen neben dem Leben“ („People parallel to life“) originally from 1937

Ulrich Alexander Boschwitz, whose two novels (this one and „The Passenger“) haven't been released in Germany during his lifetime and just got re- discovered in recent years, was a writer with Jewish roots, who had moved to Sweden in 1935 after receiving a draft order by the Nazi military. He kept on escaping through various European states, till he was in England, when WWII started in 1939. He was interned as an „enemy alien“ in a British camp. After the British government decided to deport all male internees overseas, he was shipped to Sydney, Australia, where he was taken to a camp in New South Wales. During his return trip to England, on 29 October 1942, he was on the MV Abosso ship, which was torpedoed near the Azores by German Submarine and sank. Boschwitz only got 27 years old, and his last manuscript probably sank with him.

This 300 pages novel (which doesn't seem to exist in English translation yet) represents the life in Berlin at the start of the 1930s. It's after the Wall Street Crash and during the time of Great Depression worldwide. The number of unemployed people in Germany has risen from 1 million to over 6 million from 1927 to 1932. His novel focuses on people often forgotten by society, like homeless, unemployed, beggers, prostitutes and shows us a diversity of different characters and illustrates their fears and hopes. Though partly funny, it's also thoughtful and shows how easily people can drop out of society.

If you're interested in this author, I can recommend „The Passenger“, which is available in English. I've read it a few years ago. Silbermann, a respected German- Jewish business owner living in Berlin who, with his wife, have to flee their home in the immediate aftermath of the Kristallnacht pogrom of November 1938 as Nazi German soldiers pound on their door in the middle of the night. Silbermann and his wife escape from his business through the back door and travel on several trains within Germany in an attempt to flee the country. Silbermann's travels bring him to a number of individuals, some of whom are outcasts of the Nazi regime, while others embrace its ideology wholeheartedly.

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+1 on Murakami. Started w Kafka on the Shore back when it came out. Great read. Then Wind Up also fantastic. Also read Hard-Boiled last year. Not as good as the other two but still great and has that Murakami style that is enchanting and, at times, delirious.

I, as well, have a copy of 1Q84 on the shelf that I need to dig into one of these days.
 
I've been unable to get good reading time in this week, hopefully wrapping up my first book (Zen/Motorcycle) by the weekend though.
Next up, I'm not sure...you guys are adding so many titles to my 'to-read' list. 100 Years of Solitude was already on my radar and has some huge love from some of you, but Murakami is entirely new to me and I'm intrigued. Plus I have a big stack of unread books waiting for me.
 
ranbalam said:
I've been unable to get good reading time in this week, hopefully wrapping up my first book (Zen/Motorcycle) by the weekend though.
Next up, I'm not sure...you guys are adding so many titles to my 'to-read' list. 100 Years of Solitude was already on my radar and has some huge love from some of you, but Murakami is entirely new to me and I'm intrigued. Plus I have a big stack of unread books waiting for me.
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How have you enjoyed Zen/Motorcycle? I read that one last year and struggled with parts of it.

I'd throw another vote in for 100 Years of Solitude. It's a fantastic story and so well written. I read it while on vacation in Chile, so it triggers great memories and probably makes me like it even more.

I just started Angle of Repose by Wallace Stegner the other day.

The Wind-Up Bird Chronicles is also in my stack of books. I'll get there this year. These long books are going to make the 2022 Reading Challenge goal tougher!
 
Indymisanthrope said:
You guys are a bunch of literary big brains who are apparently able to concentrate on actual ideas.

Me, I've just finished Book 7 of a paperback fantasy series about a king's private force of magical bodyguards. Dave Duncan was a middling but prolific author who wrote a series of books about the "King's Blades." The gist is that juvenile delinquent boys show up at this academy/fraternity that trains them to be the best swordsmen in the world. At the end of their education, the king visits, the boys swear an oath to him, and they perform a magic ritual that involves him taking their sword and running it through their heart (it heals immediately). This ritual turns them into enchanted guards who are attuned to their wards with enhanced instincts and abilities (for example, they don't need to sleep anymore), and will go to superhuman lengths to protect the person they're bound to. The king can also 'gift' Blades to private individuals.

There's a trilogy (sort of, it's hard to explain), followed by a YA trilogy that was collected in a single volume (and also is heavily dependent on the reader being familiar with the previous volumes, so I'm not sure why he went the YA route with them at all), then five standalone novels set in this world. After the 'rules' for how all of this works are established in the first book, all of the subsequent installments are about exceptions to the rules that put a twist on the reader's expectations. Lots of swashbuckling and traveling to distant lands for various reasons.

Anyway, it's paperback garbage and it's fun. I read the first book after stumbling across it in the library almost 25 years ago (remember what it was like to just go to the library and randomly pull books off the shelf to figure out what you wanted to read?? WILD), and am just now finishing the whole series for the first time, up to the last novel that was published posthumously in 2020. The first book, The Gilded Chain, can be read as a self-contained story, and it's by far the best one. After that there's a lot of strange left turns and narrative dead ends. They're loaded with interesting ideas, but again, Duncan was not the most sophisticated writer, so he often introduces an idea and then fails to explore it, or gets bogged down in flashbacks that are not completely relevant to the story. There is lots and lots of worldbuilding, sometimes at the expense of just moving the damn plot along. It feels like the kind of thing that could have been a successful anthology series for other writers to come in and spin off concepts or characters that Duncan introduced in the main series. This last stretch of books feels like it suffered from inferior editing as well (use of modern phrases like "you can't fight City Hall" that don't belong in this medieval setting, or introducing a stand-in for Tenochtitlan and literally calling it El Dorado).

Overall, it's by turns fun and frustrating. It's fascinating to think about how much time and effort he put into designing this entire world across 9 (or 11, depending on how you're counting) books and four different decades, only for a lot of it to go unexplored and just sort of evaporate into the ether.

It's, um. It's not Murakami.
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The great thing about books is that they don't have to always be high-level ideas and stuff. I finished Murakami and moved on to "Lost In The Vaults" which is a book of collated jazzwise articles by Daniel Spicer. I think I'm then going to move on to Jazz In Detroit by Mark Stryker, then maybe a Jack Reacher. So a varied mix really.

I visited my parents over the Christmas period and found my old beat up copy (held together by an elastic band) of Mossflower by Brian Jacques, which is part of the Redwall series. Im going to read that at some point for nostalgia as well. Medieval mice fighting medieval foxes, whats not to love? :ROFLMAO:
 
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