icons next to the entries here.
Reading now: Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything, Steven Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner
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2012/01/30: Launching The Innovation Renaissance: A New Path to Bring Smart Ideas to Market Fast, Alex Tabarrok:
I agree with what he's saying and somehow didn't learn too much; but I can't complain about such a short essay.
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2012/01/28: The Great Stagnation: How America Ate All The Low-Hanging Fruit of Modern History, Got Sick, and Will (Eventually) Feel Better, Tyler Cowen:
An interesting perspective that I'd gotten plenty of from the blogosphere before reading this
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2012/01/22: The Overflowing Brain: Information Overload and the Limits of Working Memory, Torkel Klingberg:
You might not guess that a book about working memory would be much fun, but this was fairly informative and enjoyable. Contrary to my expectations, it really is almost entirely about working memory.
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2011/12/27: Disciplined Minds, Jeff Schmidt: Somewhat thought provoking, but mostly unsatisfying. Most all of the author's complaints about PhD programs don't seem to apply to top computer science programs; I don't know how accurate they are elsewhere. I was surprised by this book's tone when I started reading it; somehow, when I first added it to my "to read" list, I hadn't realized that the book is targeted to "radicals" and "activists." The author doesn't spend any space trying to explain why the reader might want to become such a thing, so that was another serious turn-off for me. |
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2011/12/08: From Two Cultures To No Culture, Robert Whelan: A big old pile of meta-discussion about who said what about whom |
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2011/11/30: Neurodiversity: Discovering the Extraordinary Gifts of Autism, ADHD, Dyslexia, and Other Brain Differences, Thomas Armstrong:
Lots of really interesting stuff in here, but the special education angle didn't appeal to me.
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2011/11/24: Comfortably Unaware, Richard A. Oppenlander:
This was an aggravating book. On the first page, I noticed a typo, a horrifying font/spacing convention, and the clumsy, patronizing, and preachy prose style. However, the core of information in the book seems very worth knowing. The way it is presented leaves me wondering how much I can trust in its accuracy, but I haven't yet seen a reason to doubt it. It would be nice to find a better, less emotional presentation of the same essential facts about the costs of animal-based food production and consumption.
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2011/11/20: Everyman, Philip Roth:
I went into this one not realizing that the focus would be aging, illness, and death. Doesn't sound so enjoyable, right? It turned out to be a fun read.
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2011/11/10: Falling Man, Don DeLillo:
At first I wasn't very optimistic; 9/11 is a pretty heavy subject for DeLillo. However, he wound up pulling it off very well. The usual surreal elements crept in eventually.
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2011/10/20: Triumph of the City: How Our Greatest Invention Makes Us Richer, Smarter, Greener, Healthier, and Happier, Edward Glaeser:
Fun to read, though perhaps a bit of preaching to the choir, in my case
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2011/09/26: Bowling Alone, Robert D. Putnam:
Definitely got me thinking, though the focus on particular archaic-feeling forms of social involvement seemed undermotivated.
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2011/08/18: The Social Animal: The Hidden Sources of Love, Character, and Achievement, David Brooks:
The first third or so was great. There's a very meta aspect to the later parts of the book, which was clever at first, but which I started to feel was being abused. I won't spoil the details of what I'm talking about. ;-)
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2011/08/05: The Long Thaw: How Humans Are Changing the Next 100,000 Years of Earth's Climate, David Archer: A reasonable description of how little we know about climate changes and our effect on them |
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2011/06/30: The Lonely Crowd, David Riesman:
Thought-provoking, though it was often hard for me to get past the dated elements of the book. The last few chapters were especially unsatisfying, partly for that reason.
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2011/06/05: The Evolution of Cooperation, Robert Axelrod:
I've seen the executive summary of this material so many times in other books that it's hard to evaluate the worth of the full version.
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2011/06/05: The Revolution: A Manifesto, Ron Paul:
Largely agreeable, though not very novel
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2011/05/31: Imperial, William T. Vollmann:
Long enough that I often wondered whether it was worth finishing. Overall an enjoyable experience, raising interesting issues about how large populations of people can organize themselves in a modern setting.
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2011/02/13: The Death and Life of Great American Cities, Jane Jacobs:
Interesting ideas that I need to ponder more. It didn't always hold my interest in the particulars.
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2011/01/01: The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin, Benjamin Franklin:
It's hard to imagine a book written today being so explicit about a search for "moral perfection," but I found the approach really attractive. I wonder how thoroughly the author followed through with it.
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2010/12/17: Medieval Cities: Their Origins and the Revival of Trade, Henri Pirenne: This was enjoyable enough, but still on the low end of "good." |
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2010/12/08: The Genial Gene: Deconstructing Darwinian Selfishness, Joan Roughgarden:
Some interesting stuff, though I kept getting hung up on what exactly was the definition of "truth" of an evolutionary theory that this book was oriented around.
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2010/11/28: Founders at Work: Stories of Startups' Early Days, Jessica Livingston:
This was really fun and seems like a great extended pep talk for people considering doing the startup thing.
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2010/11/23: City on the Edge: Buffalo, New York, 1900 - present, Mark Goldman:
I seesawed between liking and not liking it. The not liking came from feeling that it was a "one thing after another" kind of history book without a broader message (and also from some poor copyediting and laugh-out-loud bad phrasing). The liking probably had most to do with the consistent anti-urban-renewal focus.
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2010/10/24: How to Win Friends and Influence People, Dale Carnegie:
It's unclear how useful this will be, but it was very entertaining. I'm glad I followed Paul Graham's advice and got my hands on an early edition, complete with content that doesn't follow today's rules for political correctness.
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2010/10/08: Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon, Daniel Dennett:
Well-written; I'm not sure exactly what I took away from it, but I enjoyed the ride.
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2010/10/02: The High Cost of Free Parking, Donald Shoup:
This was a long one, but it was a lot of fun to read.
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2010/09/03: The Future of Europe: Reform or Decline, Alberto Alesina and Francesco Giavazzi:
Interesting, though I'm not sure I got much out of it
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2010/08/29: Hierarchy in the Forest: The Evolution of Egalitarian Behavior, Christopher Boehm:
A very interesting perspective on the roots of political behavior
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2010/08/23: Schooling in Capitalist America: Educational Reform and the Contradictions of Economic Life, Samuel Bowles and Herbert Gintis:
A well-written presentation of an interesting perspective. I got a good chuckle out of the socialist elements, which stayed manageable until the last part of the book, which is entirely skippable.
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2010/08/19: Tomorrow's Professor: Preparing for Careers in Science and Engineering, Richard M. Reis: Like with the last one, I'm not sure if I got much out of reading this. In contrast, the prose here seemed overly preachy/condescending and generally didn't leave me with warm feelings. |
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2010/08/15: A Ph.D. Is Not Enough!, Peter J. Feibelman:
Quite well-written, and short enough that I don't feel bad about not thinking too hard about what I got out of it.
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2010/08/01: The Big Questions: Tackling the Problems of Philosophy with Ideas from Mathematics, Economics and Physics, Steven E. Landsburg:
Short and sweet, but with high enjoyment value per page
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2010/07/30: From Poverty to Prosperity: Intangible Assets, Hidden Liabilities and the Lasting Triumph over Scarcity, Arnold Kling and Nick Schulz:
Not bad, not great; for me, more like a cheerleading exercise than anything else.
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2010/07/23: Sex and Reason, Richard Posner:
Clear-headed and thought-provoking, though not earth-shaking
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2010/07/20: Midnight's Children, Salman Rushdie:
Entertaining enough. Too long and too much foreshadowing.
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2010/06/10: Free to Choose, Milton Friedman and Rose D. Friedman:
I forgot to log this book until some weeks after finishing it, so I don't remember details, but it was probably pretty good. :-)
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2010/05/12: Goodbye, Columbus, Philip Roth:
Decent
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2010/04/27: Winesburg, Ohio, Sherwood Anderson:
I read this because Henry Miller seemed to be a fan. It was all right, but somehow didn't quite do it for me.
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2010/04/03: The Evolution of God, Robert Wright:
Compared to my expectations, this was a lot more about politics and a lot less about evolutionary psychology. Near the end, though, the author brings in a really interesting message about the origins of morality in social evolution.
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2010/03/21: Fixing College Education: A New Curriculum for the Twenty-First Century, Charles Muscatine:
This book doesn't seem to have much to say about education in highly technical fields. Thus, while I agree with the book's criticisms, I'm not sure the proposed solutions are generally applicable.
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2010/03/18: Simple Rules for a Complex World, Richard Epstein:
Not always engrossing, but I feel more law-y already
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2010/02/18: Inherent Vice, Thomas Pynchon:
Different but fun
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2010/02/02: Why Gods Persist: A Scientific Approach to Religion, Robert Hinde: I had to bail on this one early on. It was clumsy stylistically and didn't seem to be painting any kind of big picture. |
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2010/01/24: The Colossus of Maroussi, Henry Miller:
Very lively
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2010/01/13: Democracy in America, Volume I, Alexis de Tocqueville:
Interesting, though the value per page didn't seem quite high enough. Still, it stands the test of time pretty well.
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2009/12/10: Guns, Germs, and Steel, Jared Diamond:
Interesting without really being riveting
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2009/11/27: Realizing Freedom: Libertarian Theory, History, and Practice, Tom G. Palmer:
Some insightful stuff, but also a few chapters that are too much about arguing against particular works; not enough convincing rational argument in general
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2009/11/18: The Center Cannot Hold: My Journey Through Madness, Elyn R. Saks:
Kind of harrowing, but a real page-turner
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2009/11/15: The Satanic Verses, Salman Rushdie:
Reminds me of Thomas Pynchon without the geek factor.
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2009/10/12: The Voluntary City: Choice, Community, and Civil Society, David T. Beito, Peter Gordon, and Alexander Tabarrok:
It didn't always have me on the edge of my seat, but there was still plenty of thought-provoking stuff.
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2009/10/01: Power, Sex, Suicide: Mitochondria and the Meaning of Life, Nick Lane:
Interesting and well-written, in that plucky British style
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2009/09/26: Sustainable Energy - Without the Hot Air, David J. C. MacKay:
A really enjoyable and informative read. There's definitely something to be said for the signature British writing style.
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2009/09/06: Amazons: An Intimate Memoir By the First Woman to Play in the National Hockey League, Don DeLillo:
Really well put together, like an extended poem
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2009/09/04: Ancestral Roots: Modern Living and Human Evolution, Timothy Clack: There was some interesting information and speculation in here, but too much of the book came across as moralizing. The copy-editing was also notably poor. |
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2009/08/21: Higher Superstition: The Academic Left and Its Quarrels with Science, Paul R. Gross and Norman Levitt: I didn't feel like I learned much from this book. The authors attacked particular quotations from a hand-picking of authors, so it's hard to tell which points are valid against the whole body of literature that they're dissecting. I don't know how it would be possible to do better, but that doesn't mean that this book is very helpful. The prose was also a little too purple for me. |
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2009/08/14: A Devil's Chaplain, Richard Dawkins:
Some decent material. I don't really like Dawkins's over-flowery writing style.
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2009/08/07: Mazel, Rebecca Goldstein:
This one ended up being a wild ride. The first few chapters seemed very promising, but the bulk of the book just didn't interest me.
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2009/07/25: The Mythical Man-Month: Essays on Software Engineering, Frederick Brooks:
For a light read, I enjoyed this well enough, more for the retro appeal than for the presence of much advice that seems relevant today.
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2009/07/23: The Mating Mind: How Sexual Choice Shaped the Evolution of Human Nature, Geoffrey Miller:
Some good information about what seems to be a really useful theory
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2009/07/16: Programmers at Work: Interviews With 19 Programmers Who Shaped the Computer Industry, Susan Lammers:
Good stuff. The earlier interviews (which were with the older programmers) I liked substantially more than the later ones.
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2009/07/11: Consider the Lobster, David Foster Wallace:
And I thought he couldn't push this footnote stuff any further....
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2009/06/21: The Stuff of Thought: Language As a Window Into Human Nature, Steven Pinker:
As usual, an enjoyable read, though it was often hard to figure out what exactly I had learned from each chapter.
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2009/05/25: Wealth and Our Commonwealth: Why America Should Tax Accumulated Fortunes, William H. Gates Sr. and Chuck Collins:
99% estate tax or bust!
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2009/05/23: The Broom of the System, David Foster Wallace:
I can see the germ of the good stuff yet to come, but this one just didn't hang together in the satisfying way of Wallace's later work.
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2009/04/19: Intelligence and How to Get It: Why Schools and Cultures Count, Richard Nisbett:
An interesting overview. I was most bothered by ignoring the extremes of intelligence.
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2009/04/08: The World Is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-First Century, Thomas L. Friedman:
Reading this, I get a sense of what religious folk might feel readin' scripture.
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2009/03/17: Weapons of Mass Instruction: A Schoolteacher's Journey through the Dark World of Compulsory Schooling, John Taylor Gatto:
OK, but I didn't get much out of it that I hadn't already gotten out of Gatto's past writings
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2009/03/16: The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time, Mark Haddon:
Totally identified with the protagonist....
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2009/03/14: Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal, Eric Schlosser:
Interesting, but not a page-turner
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2009/03/07: The Lexus and the Olive Tree, Thomas L. Friedman:
A really interesting synthesis of different aspects of globalization into a Unifying Theory
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2009/02/17: The Chosen: The Hidden History of Admission and Exclusion at Harvard, Yale, and Princeton, Jerome Karabel:
Some very illuminating information in here. The book was too long, but for some reason I followed through to the end anyway. There was good stuff appearing pretty frequently; there was just too much padding, too.
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2009/01/17: Excellence Without a Soul: How a Great University Forgot Education, Harry R. Lewis:
Plenty of thought-provoking stuff in here. My biggest point of disagreement had to do with the downsides of large-scale spectator-oriented athletics, regardless of if that kind of activity is "natural." I also don't feel encumbered by tradition in designing future educational institutions, so conclusions based on assumptions like the continued use of lectures aren't that interesting to me.
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2009/01/15: Quarterlife Crisis: The Unique Challenges of Life in Your Twenties, Alexandra Robbins and Abby Wilner: I think I've been spoiled by books that analyze topics and synthesize new hypotheses or recommendations. I couldn't stand to finish this book, which is a mishmash of quoted stories grouped by topic, with minimal connecting text. From reading the description, I got the impression that most of the big elements of "quarterlife crises" weren't occurring for me, and that seems mostly accurate, based on what I read. I should make a note to, in the future, avoid reading books based on that kind of curiosity when the books were featured on Oprah. |
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2009/01/13: 100 Million Unnecessary Returns: A Simple, Fair, and Competitive Tax Plan for the United States, Michael J. Graetz:
This seems like a pretty darned good proposal.
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2009/01/09: Exit Ghost, Philip Roth:
The End
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2009/01/02: The Moral Animal, Robert Wright:
More fascinating stuff, though falling off in interestingness near the end
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2008/12/25: The Age of Defeat, Colin Wilson:
This started out interesting but devolved into seemingly random mentions of different authors and their works.
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2008/12/22: Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, Anita Loos:
Nothing to write home about
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2008/12/21: The Age of Turbulence: Adventures in a New World, Alan Greenspan:
Got a little boring 'round the end, but interesting nonetheless
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2008/12/06: A Class Apart: Prodigies, Pressure, and Passion Inside One of America's Best High Schools, Alec Klein:
An interesting read. I couldn't help noticing how little creativity seemed to be involved in the hoops that these kids were jumping through to earn their special status.
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2008/12/04: Tropic of Capricorn, Henry Miller:
Too many spells of free association, but I forgive him. Final verdict: Rosy Crucifixion beats the Tropic originals, hands down.
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2008/10/14: The Space Merchants, Frederik Pohl and C. M. Kornbluth:
Quite well-written stylistically, and plenty of 1950's charm
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2008/09/28: What Price Fame?, Tyler Cowen:
There were some interesting spans of idea-sharing, but, in the end, I didn't really get what the point of the book was. Reading it kind of felt like standing in the way of a firehose.
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2008/09/19: The Third Policeman, Brian O'Nolan:
This reminded me of Alice in Wonderland. I checked it out because the Lost writers cite it as an influence.
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2008/09/19: Fort Wayne is Seventh on Hitler's List, Michael Martone:
One or two of the stories were enjoyable; the rest didn't work for me. I read this because David Foster Wallace mentioned it in "E Unibus Pluram: Television and U.S. Fiction."
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2008/09/18: Nonzero: The Logic of Human Destiny, Robert Wright:
Very thought-provoking
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2008/09/02: JPod, Douglas Coupland:
Entertaining enough, but it felt like too many gimmicks with too little form or substance
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2008/08/28: The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature, Steven Pinker:
No shortage of interestin' stuff
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2008/08/12: The Language Instinct, Steven Pinker:
Not quite what I was expecting; too much focus on nitty-gritty details. The last chapter leaves me realizing that I was more interested in something like The Blank Slate, so on I go to that!
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2008/07/30: Fortune's Formula, William Poundstone:
At no point was it especially clear what the "theme" of this book was, but it was enjoyable anyway.
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2008/07/26: The Last Samurai, Helen DeWitt:
This was so frenetic and nutty, in a way I've never seen before.
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2008/07/13: A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again, David Foster Wallace:
Heh heh heh.
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2008/07/05: The Turning Point: Science, Society, and the Rising Culture, Fritjof Capra:
I remember liking this book Way Back in the Day, but I can't stand it now. The author repeats the same hippie-targeted phrases over and over, with very prolix sentences that nonetheless fail to convey useful information.
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2008/05/24: Villa Incognito, Tom Robbins:
This one leaves me with the impression that Tom Robbins may be "Thomas Pynchon for Dummies."
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2008/05/17: Sabbath's Theater, Philip Roth:
Another raunchy ride from Roth
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2008/04/04: Hey Nostradamus!, Douglas Coupland:
There were a lot of loose ends. I didn't really get into it, but it was interesting and mostly well-told.
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2007/12/29: The Unbearable Lightness of Being, Milan Kundera:
Kind of rambly and weird, but weird is good
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2007/10/28: Letting Go, Philip Roth:
Kind of overdramatic
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2007/08/30: Girl with Curious Hair, David Foster Wallace:
More of the same, with more of a popular culture focus than the DFW stuff I read earlier
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2007/08/19: Carpenter's Gothic, William Gaddis:
My first impression was rage at the unconventional grammatical organization, where it's not clear what's a spoken quotation and what isn't. It got better further in, but not enough to make up for the confusion.
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2007/07/26: Licks of Love, John Updike:
John Updike doesn't disappoint.
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2007/07/19: Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture, Douglas Coupland:
Pretty slick, though I was less able to identify with the characters than for Microserfs
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2007/07/17: The Facts: A Novelist's Autobiography, Philip Roth:
He couldn't avoid sticking in more of this self-referential stuff, eh? :-)
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2007/07/13: Mysticism and Logic, Bertrand Russell: After reading the first few essays in the book, I asked myself what I was getting out of the experience. Failing to find an answer, I set out for greener pastures. (I picked up the book because Everything and More cited it, and the title sounded interesting; that should teach me to live on the edge!) |
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2007/07/11: Everything and More: A Compact History of Infinity, David Foster Wallace:
I'm left wondering how much of this is intended satirically.
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2007/07/07: World's End, T. Coraghessan Boyle:
It had its gripping stretches, but in the end it wasn't all that satisfying.
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2007/06/23: Microserfs, Douglas Coupland:
Far out. For some reason, I had formed an internal classification of this book as typical empty nerdstuff. "We generate stories for you because you don't save the ones that are yours." Recommended by mpnolan.
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2007/06/20: Limits to Growth: The 30-Year Update, Donella Meadows, Jorgen Randers, and Dennis Meadows:
Some interesting insights with solid experimental results
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2007/06/04: The Ancestor's Tale, Richard Dawkins:
Yay for evolution. The parallels between better ways of enabling evolution and better ways of building computer systems are interesting... and squirrels are cool.
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2007/05/23: Nexus, Henry Miller:
I wasn't disappointed.
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2007/05/15: The God Delusion, Richard Dawkins:
Going in, I was feeling kind of guilty, since this kind of "preaching to the choir" subject matter is so popular among hapless fanboys. Nonetheless, there were some interesting arguments in here, and it's always fun to read Dawkins's prose. Makes me want to read more science-y books, in fact.
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2007/05/06: The Man in the High Castle, Philip K. Dick:
There was some interesting stuff in here. It had a weird feeling of having been hastily written, like ol' PKD was under a tight deadline.
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2007/04/25: Against the Day, Thomas Pynchon:
Plenty of good stuff here, but not quite enough to justify the length
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2007/03/02: Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television, Jerry Mander:
Interesting, though not especially well focused
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2007/02/22: The Waterworks, E. L. Doctorow:
An all right book
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2007/02/13: Infinite Jest, David Foster Wallace:
Awesome. That footnote business required some out-of-the-ordinary place-saving apparatus for efficient reading.
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2007/01/14: Closing Time, Joseph Heller:
Kinda nifty
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2007/01/07: Tropic of Cancer, Henry Miller:
I see the germ of the endearing qualities of Rosy Crucifixion.
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2006/12/30: I am Charlotte Simmons, Tom Wolfe:
Agreeable enough, though it didn't have that special oomph.
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2006/12/24: Oblivion, David Foster Wallace:
Wild stuff.
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2006/12/04: Plexus, Henry Miller:
Now here's a ball of energy for you.
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2006/10/27: The Counterlife, Philip Roth:
More mind-blowing recursive fiction!
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2006/10/06: Billy Bathgate, E. L. Doctorow:
Mm, history-y.
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2006/09/22: Rabbit at Rest, John Updike:
So that's that.
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2006/08/05: The Plot Against America, Philip Roth:
Interestin'
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2006/07/12: Brief Interviews with Hideous Men, David Foster Wallace:
I don't usually like books of short stories or things of similar form, but this one was super. With such great power to think of twisted ideas comes great responsibility.
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2006/06/26: My Ishmael, Daniel Quinn:
More interestin' stuff
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2006/06/17: The Story of B, Daniel Quinn:
Some thoughts worth thinking
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2006/06/11: A Man In Full, Tom Wolfe:
Quite good, though suspiciously similar to Bonfire
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2006/06/02: Last Exit to Brooklyn, Hubert Selby, Jr.: The combination of the subject matter and the "experimental" disregard for English grammar and layout drove me away from this before I got very far into it. |
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2006/06/01: Rabbit is Rich, John Updike:
This was top-notch and a significant improvement over the first two Rabbit books.
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2006/05/10: The Late-Summer Passion of a Woman of Mind, Rebecca Goldstein:
Interesting but uneven. I do wonder if the author is satirizing philosophers with some of the sections or if she really thinks that stuff is the bee's knees.
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2006/05/03: The Bonfire of the Vanities, Tom Wolfe:
That was pretty swell. It reminded me of DeLillo and Heller in particular. Who knows who influenced whom!
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2006/04/24: David Copperfield, Charles Dickens:
Great, but perhaps a bit longer than I would have liked.
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2006/02/11: The Imaginary Girlfriend, John Irving:
Not bad.
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2006/02/06: Anansi Boys, Neil Gaiman:
It took a while to get started, but it ended up being reasonably good. It can't compare with American Gods, though.
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2006/01/18: Operation Shylock, Philip Roth:
This was quite good. I had to laugh when I finished reading it; the whole thing came together so well. I'm now nominating Philip Roth for Patron Saint of Paranoiacs. (Thomas Pynchon is the other main contender, as I see it.)
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2006/01/02: Until I Find You, John Irving:
Good, but not his best.
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2005/12/20: Sexus, Henry Miller:
They don't make 'em like this anymore, no sir. There sure was a lot of sex!
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2005/11/26: On the Road, Jack Kerouac:
Mildly interesting, but nothing too great. I guess I've been spoiled by all of the post-modern stuff that came later.
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2005/11/20: The Mind-Body Problem, Rebecca Goldstein:
Interesting and worth reading. At first I was put off by the seemingly forced and unnatural style of the writing, but it stopped bothering me.
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2005/11/14: Hocus Pocus, Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.:
Slightly above average quality. I think the non-linear narrative was too non-linear.
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2005/11/08: Something Happened, Joseph Heller:
Interesting and worth reading. Do/did most middle-class Americans really live like this?
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2005/10/22: Zuckerman Bound, Philip Roth:
More good stuff.
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2005/10/18: Lila, Robert Pirsig:
Some parts were very interesting. The "story" parts were pretty poorly executed. Altogether uneven and disorganized.
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2005/09/20: Radio Free Albemuth, Philip K. Dick:
Pretty good. My kind of paranoid trip. I see more PKD in my future.
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2005/09/11: Portnoy's Complaint, Philip Roth:
Soopah doopah pizzazz.
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2005/08/30: The Ghost Writer, Philip Roth:
Every journey has a beginning. (I liked it.)
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2005/08/18: The Great American Novel, Philip Roth:
OKish and enjoyable at times. This one was entirely comic without the authentic feel that so endeared the latest Zuckerman trilogy to me.
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2005/07/29: The Real Life of Sebastian Knight, Vladimir Nabokov:
Bleh. Some brief periods when it held my interest.
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2005/07/17: The Power and the Glory, Graham Greene:
Not bad. Not awesome.
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2005/06/28: The Picture of Dorian Gray (and three stories), Oscar Wilde: I wanted to give this well-known story a try, and I was hoping the Wilde-ishness I'd read before wouldn't be involved too much. It was, and the interspersing of serious stuff with wit-wars didn't work very well. I didn't have the stomach to stay for the three stories. |
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2005/06/09: The Mysterious Flame of Queen Loana, Umberto Eco:
Off-and-on gripping. Definitely unique and imaginative.
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2005/05/31: It Can't Happen Here, Sinclair Lewis:
All right-ish. I liked the feisty 1920's charm.
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2005/05/24: Life of Pi, Yann Martel:
It was pretty good, but uneven. Anyone who needed to wait for this one to "make you believe in the soul-sustaining power of fiction" has been living in a paper bag.
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2005/05/22: The Catcher in the Rye, J.D. Salinger:
Seal of approval granted.
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2005/05/20: The Human Stain, Philip Roth:
This was really good.
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2005/05/15: I Married a Communist, Philip Roth:
I like.
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2005/05/04: Great Expectations, Charles Dickens:
Top-notch.
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2005/04/03: American Pastoral, Philip Roth:
Hey, pretty good.
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2005/03/20: All the Pretty Horses, Cormac McCarthy:
Interestingly compelling, though I'm sure the double-quotes industry had a fit when they saw this one.
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2005/03/05: John Barleycorn, Jack London:
Pretty swell.
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2005/02/15: Rabbit Redux, John Updike:
I liked it better than the first book in this series. Definitely some good stuff here.
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2005/01/21: God Knows, Joseph Heller:
I gave up without finishing it. It was too loose and purposeless for me. Maybe I would have liked it if I had grown up with this biblical stuff.
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2005/01/05: Mao II, Don DeLillo:
Eh. Eh.
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2004/12/30: Trying to Save Piggy Sneed, John Irving:
Not bad.
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2004/12/28: Slow Learner, Thomas Pynchon:
Not bad. I agreed with the author's comments in the introduction, which said that the last story, "The Secret Integration," was significantly better than the others.
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2004/12/24: A Son of the Circus, John Irving:
Really good. Very different from his previous books, and yet very similar at the same time.
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2004/12/12: Portrait of an Artist, as an Old Man, Joseph Heller:
Not bad.
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2004/12/05: The Water Method Man, John Irving:
A grade-A good time.
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2004/11/26: The Body Artist, Don DeLillo:
Short and sweet. Neither great nor horrible.
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2004/11/24: Moloch, Henry Miller:
Very nice writing style, when he wasn't off in the Purple Prose Nebula. Definitely promising enough to warrant trying some of his better known books.
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2004/11/11: The World According to Garp, John Irving:
It didn't quite have the life of Irving's later novels, but it had a less intense version of their quality.
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2004/10/31: The Crying of Lot 49, Thomas Pynchon:
Worth reading, if only for another masterful treatment of paranoia. A few times I wondered if Pynchon had written a paragraph just to be confusing.
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2004/10/28: Oblomov, Ivan Goncharov: Not very remarkable. |
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2004/10/10: Ishmael, Daniel Quinn:
Interesting
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2004/10/02: Catch-22, Joseph Heller:
This is really something!
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2004/09/18: Americana, Don DeLillo:
Y'know, I really liked a lot of it, but it spent a lot of time dragging in Part 3. I also found a pathetically prolix style that DeLillo seemed to abandon immediately after this one.
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2004/09/03: The Cider House Rules, John Irving:
Great
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2004/08/29: Cosmopolis, Don DeLillo:
Pretty good
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2004/08/27: The Underground History of American Education, John Taylor Gatto:
An extremely illuminating book; highly recommended
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2004/08/22: Vineland, Thomas Pynchon:
My appreciation for this guy just grows and grows. This book is both more down-to-earth and weirded than his previous.
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2004/08/07: Rabbit, Run, John Updike:
It didn't always hold my interest, but in the end I liked it.
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2004/07/30: Picture This, Joseph Heller:
Just my luck; I picked up another nontraditional sort of deal. I enjoyed it all the same. It almost makes me angry that I've had no exposure to "Classics" in my formal education.
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2004/07/25: Now and Then, Joseph Heller:
I picked this one at random from the library shelves because the title sounded good, not realizing that it was an autobiography. It was pretty good, as autobiographies go. The writing was amazingly good. This man past age 70 had an amazing knack for writing pleasing English. So, I'm on to reading some of his fiction!
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2004/07/20: Old School, Tobias Wolff: Eh, mediocre. |
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2004/07/19: A Widow for One Year, John Irving:
Super duper as usual.
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2004/07/13: Libra, Don DeLillo:
Very good.
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2004/07/05: Slaughterhouse-Five, Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.:
Fairly good. I find Vonnegut's repetition of phrases and overfrequent references to his other books annoying, though.
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2004/06/29: The Fourth Hand, John Irving:
Pretty good.
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2004/06/23: Underworld, Don DeLillo:
Again, it grew on me as I read it. The idea of moving backwards in time as the book progressed was very effective.
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2004/06/05: A Prayer for Owen Meany, John Irving:
Another excellent book
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2004/06/03: An Outcast of the Islands, Joseph Conrad: I gave it a chance, but it just couldn't hold my interest, so I gave up. The writing was waaay too verbose. |
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2004/05/30: Keep the Aspidistra Flying, George Orwell:
A curious book. I think Orwell was trying to get across a social message, but it was generally unclear which of his characters and their views he agreed with.
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2004/05/26: The 158-Pound Marriage, John Irving:
Another good one, though a bit more erotic than expected!
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2004/05/21: Mason and Dixon, Thomas Pynchon:
Very enjoyable. The 90's Pynchon is much more organized than the 70's Pynchon. The sudden songs were kept to a minimum.
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2004/04/26: Players, Don DeLillo:
This was short but reasonably enjoyable.
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2004/04/24: The Hotel New Hampshire, John Irving:
Wow. This book is amazing. Need I say more?
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2004/04/22: Setting Free the Bears, John Irving:
This book was quite good, though the quality was inconsistent in places. I got the impression that this book was one of those attempts to merge several story ideas into one book. You'll see what I mean if you read it.
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2004/04/14: The Psychology of Computer Programming, Gerald Weinberg: I don't think I've really taken too much away from this book, especially given that most of what it talks about is based on the outdated computing conventions of the early 1970's. However, I have to say that Gerald Weinberg is one of the best nonfiction authors I have ever read. He has a very lucid writing style that keeps the reader interested. |
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2004/04/06: V., Thomas Pynchon:
Overall positive opinion, though I often felt like it lacked organization and coherence. There really wasn't any clear connection between the two parallel stories that got about equal time and merged senselessly near the end.
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2004/03/17: The Hero with a Thousand Faces, Joseph Campbell: I stopped reading this after the first of two parts. There were some interesting ideas, though somehow I feel like I would have gotten just as much out of a short article. |
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2004/02/19: Breakfast of Champions, Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.:
An interesting story, very reminiscent of Timequake, though I read them in the reverse order to that in which they were written decades apart.
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2004/02/18: God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater, Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.:
I liked this one a lot. Very good weaving of social commentary into an engaging story.
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2004/02/17: Cat's Cradle, Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.:
I thought it was mediocre. There weren't really any sympathetic characters for me in it, and the plot came across as somewhat disorganized.
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2004/02/14: Strange News from Another Star, Hermann Hesse:
As I would expect from a book alternately entitled "Fairy Tales," this one wasn't really my style. I hadn't realized that these short stories were written shortly before Hesse got into psychodrama.
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2004/02/08: Irrational Man: A Study in Existential Philosophy, William Barrett:
This was quite clearly written, and I feel like I understand the basics of existentialism much better now than before I read this.
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2004/01/27: The Names, Don DeLillo:
I really enjoyed this one. It was a little slow starting up, but I ended up appreciating it more in the way I would appreciate a poem than the way I would usually appreciate a novel.
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2004/01/14: Timequake, Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.:
I picked this one out expecting a novel. It turned out to be some weird unstructured autobiographical thing. Nonetheless, I ended up enjoying it.
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2004/01/13: Rudin/On the Eve, Ivan Turgenev:
Pretty unremarkable stories.
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2004/01/10: Ratner's Star, Don DeLillo:
Sometimes interesting, but not particularly satisfying. It reminded me more of Kafka's The Castle than the previous DeLillo books that I've liked. Instead of putting strange characters in believable situations, DeLillo puts strange characters in absurd situations for the entire book.
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2004/01/10: Running Dog, Don DeLillo:
The streak is spoiled. This one is very different from his two books that I read previously. Somewhat enjoyable, but too action oriented. Not enough improbable conversation. Too real.
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2004/01/05: Gravity's Rainbow, Thomas Pynchon:
Interesting book. Very 70's. If all your life you've longed for a novel full of spontaneous singing, then Gravity's Rainbow may be your deliverance.
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2003/12/20: Wuthering Heights, Emily Brontë:
Recommended by opet in #haskell. I ended up enjoying it. It didn't rock my world, but that's OK.
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2003/12/12: The Big Sleep, Raymond Chandler:
I read this on recommendation from Andrew Clausen, and I was pleasantly surprised. Seeing as how it's a detective story, I was expecting something much, much more pulpy than I got. The plot and behavior of characters were close to what I expected, but it was very intelligently written.
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2003/12/11: Great Jones Street, Don DeLillo:
This one ended up being pretty enjoyable. I think it got significantly better somewhere near its middle. OK, time to stop reading DeLillo before I overdose or something.
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2003/11/30: End Zone, Don DeLillo:
Another very good book from this author. Doubly impressive for being centrally about football and still being enjoyable for me.
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2003/11/27: Nabokov's Dozen, Vladimir Nabokov:
Mixed feelings. I liked the story about the crazy kid. :-)
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2003/10/20: The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald:
Not stupendous, but surprisingly good for something so often assigned in high school English classes
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2003/10/13: Forty Stories, Donald Barthelme: Abandoned because I don't like the format. |
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2003/10/11: White Noise, Don DeLillo:
:-) Good recommendation by dwb.
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