Favorite Magazine

"Paste Magazine is one of the fastest growing independently published entertainment magazines in the country, recently named "Magazine of the Year" at the 2006 PLUG Independent Music Awards. We pride ourselves in being the premier magazine for people who still enjoy discovering new music, prize substance and songcraft over fads and manufactured attitude, and appreciate quality music in whatever genre it might inhabit-indie rock, Triple-A, Americana, folk, blues, jazz, etc." http://www.pastemagazine.com/

This is how Paste describes themselves, but this magazine is so much more. There are tons of film and book reviews as well as free DVD's and music CD's attached to each issue. I enjoy the online connection, but nothing beats the actual real deal when it comes to this particular magazine. An enjoyable launch of subchannels exists and are worth checking out.
Paste Radio http://www.accuradio.com/paste/



Here are some articles worth reading in the newest issue of Paste:
The Walkmen announce Spring tour
Guggenheim Grotto kicks off first US tour
Griffith lights up road with Ruby's Torch
Dungen announce new album
Killers announce world tour
The Shins change your life again
"Born to Rock" exhibit opens on Feb. 2nd
Land of Talk tour, release mini-album
Ry Cooder uses iTunes to master new album
Wilco's Sky Blue Sky on the horizon
Madeleine Peyroux tours US in February, March

Week Five, Book Five

Seamus Heaney- District and Circle
*I read this book in one sitting before bed. I couldn't put it down without completion and I challenge you to!

Review: Heaney, an Irish poet, who was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1995 has come full circle with his latest collection of poems. His writing has spanned a good 40 years starting with his first book Eleven Poems (1965) and his latest District and Circle (2006). The volume includes not only new poetry, but "found prose" and various translations as well. This is by far a treat to the Heaney fan of old. If you haven't read his work yet, you should start with Seamus Heaney: Selected Poems 1966-1987. I first became engrossed with Heaney after reading this book in a college English course and haven't put him down ever since.

On a personal note:
I feel lucky to have had the privilege to hear him speak about his poetry in general and this book in particular, a little less then a year ago at the 92nd Street Y in New York. http://www.92y.org/ He read some of his older poetry which was a real treat and the theater was packed to the gill. I have been going to the Y for a few years now and have seen quite a few artists there and have never had to sit in the balcony for an event other then that night. Wow, what a night and if you ever have the chance to see him live, run, do not walk, you will not be disappointed.

Here are a few links that I have recently checked out about Heaney:
http://www.ibiblio.org/ipa/heaney.php -Internet Poetry Archive
http://irena.blackmill.net/heaney/- The Seamus Heaney Portal
Seamus Heaney - Audio clip at the BBC
Video clip of Seamus Heaney at MIT World
Irish Poets

Literary Gems

As I was reading the latest issue of Pages Magazine (Jan./Feb 2007), I felt the need to share some engaging website links. If you check out this issue you must read the cover story on Martin Amis, the renowned literary bad boy and an article entitled In Other Words.

Turning the Pages: http://www.bl.uk/onlinegallery/ttp/ttpbooks.html

Little Black Shirts for the Classics Flirt: www.printmojo.com/LiteraTease

Book Browse: http://www.bookbrowse.com/

Blog of Choice: http://www.nealpollack.com/

Week Four, Bonus Review

The Polysyllabic Spree by Nick Hornby

Wow! I cannot tell you how much I have been enjoying this author. This is the second book (Songbook being the first) I have read by Hornby and he once again did not disappoint me. If you have seen the movies High Fidelity, Fever Pitch and/or About a Boy then you have already been exposed to the storytelling of this modern British author. I usually do not read books that a movie was based on after I have seen the movie, but I think that after my last two reads of Hornby I just might give it a whirl.


Review: The Polysyllabic Spree is a collection of fourteen months of book review columns he wrote for "Believer" magazine. http://www.believermag.com/ I was initially drawn to this book because 1) I am obsessed with buying books and 2) I read only about half the books I buy. I felt as I read this book that Hornby knew me personally and felt my pain. The main reason I have started this blog is not only to read a book a week, but also to read books that have been stacked all around the house, that I have recently purchased and probably wouldn't have read without a little push. In Spree each entry is formatted with a list of books Hornby purchased for the month and then a list of actual books he read, whether finished or entertained. The summary for his monthly quest is full of dry wit and pure honesty. I highly suggest this book to anyone who loves to surround themselves in books.

Week Four, Book Four

Fun Home by Alison Bechdel
I finished this graphic novel in just 3 short sittings and wished that it didn't end. Slightly under 240 pages this memoir of Alison Bechdel was tragically comic. If you are a fan of Augusten Burroughs, Edward Gorey http://www.edwardgoreyhouse.org/and classic literature then you will devour this light dessert.

Review: This autobiographical tale deals with the authors "coming out" as a lesbian and her parents crumbling marriage. Her father(a high school English teacher and funeral parlor owner) is a closeted homosexual that likes younger men. This is only revealed to Alison after her own "coming out" to her parents in college. She struggles with the thought that this triggered her fathers bizarre death. Shortly after the "coming out" and talk of divorce her dad is hit by a truck, which she connects to his likeness of "the hero" in classic literature. A must read if you are looking for something out of the ordinary.

She even has a blog worth checking out.
Enjoy! http://www.dykestowatchoutfor.com/index.php

Week Three, Book Three

Dedicated to Lisa,a fellow Anglophile

Edgar Allan Poe & The Juke-Box is a group of uncollected poems, drafts and fragments from Elizabeth Bishop. There are 108 poems, some prose, notes she took, some sketches, facsimiles of her papers, and other pieces that I am not sure how to label. Obviously this is a book that will appeal most to people who are already Elizabeth Bishop fans. I am not a long time fan of Bishop, but just have recently started researching her work.

A few years ago there was a reading of her work in the city that I tried to get last minute tickets to and was shut down. It has been a long running joke between a friend and myself. We are both English teachers who were not at all familiar with Bishop and when it seemed everyone and their mother were going to hear the reading we thought surely we must be missing out on something amazing.

Review: So hear I am on the one book a week quest and decided it was time for Bishop. This book is huge (367 pages) and really spectacular. I think that if you do not know anything about Bishop this is a great place to start. I totally was able to get a clear sense on her range of writing, style and influences. This particular book was edited by Alice Quinn and was created from 3,500 pages in the Bishop archive. http://specialcollections.vassar.edu/exhibits/bishop/essay1.html

One poem worth mentioning,that had multiple drafts in this book and was published in The New Yorker on April 26, 1976 is One Art.

One Art
by Elizabeth Bishop
The art of losing isn’t hard to master;
so many things seem filled with the intent
to be lost that their loss is no disaster.
Lose something every day. Accept the fluster
of lost door keys, the hour badly spent.
The art of losing isn’t hard to master.
Then practice losing farther, losing faster:
places, and names, and where it was you meant
to travel. None of these will bring disaster.
I lost my mother’s watch. And look! my last, or
next-to-last, of three loved houses went.
The art of losing isn’t hard to master.
I lost two cities, lovely ones. And, vaster,
some realms I owned, two rivers, a continent.
I miss them, but it wasn’t a disaster.
—Even losing you (the joking voice, a gesture
I love) I shan’t have lied. It’s evident
the art of losing’s not too hard to master
though it may look like (Write it!) like disaster.

Poet Tribute

Did you know that Walt Whitman can be celebrated in Long Island and New Jersey? Image going to Camden, east of Philadelphia and visiting the home and burial site of the man.

For details, visit http://www.visitsouthjersey.com/
(click on "tours & itineraries") or call 1-877-333-2400.

Walt Whitman Birthplace. http://www.waltwhitman.org/

I have never been to Camden, but loved the house in Long Island and suggest it to any lover of poetry. Here's one of my favorite poems, enjoy!

A noiseless patient spider by Walt Whitman
A noiseless patient spider,
I mark'd where on a little promontory it stood isolated,
Mark'd how to explore the vacant vast surrounding,
It launch'd forth filament, filament, filament, out of itself,
Ever unreeling them, ever tirelessly speeding them.
And you O my soul where you stand,
Surrounded, detached, in measureless oceans of space,
Ceaselessly musing, venturing, throwing, seeking the spheres to connect them,
Till the bridge you will need be form'd, till the ductile anchor hold,
Till the gossamer thread you fling catch somewhere, O my soul.

Week Two, Book Two

Winkie by Clifford Chase
"Of all the anti-Bush books out there, none is as wonderfully strange as Chase's debut novel."- Entertainment Weekly

If this book is anti-Bush then I obviously wasn't in on the joke. This was one of the worst books I ever read in my life. If you think that this is really not a fair statement, your wrong, it is an understatement. I picked this book up because I saw it everywhere for a period of time and figured that it was calling to me to try it out. http://www.freewinkie.com/
I spent at least a few nights this week reading a few pages at a time and then all of Mon. cramming to get it in with the last 40 pages left for Tues. morning. What a relief I had when I put this ridiculous book down.

Review: I am so fed up with this book that I do not think I will even do the summary justice. Here is a review from Amazon:

From Booklist
With the recent controversy over domestic spying, the literary world is ripe for skewering America's unwieldy War on Terror--but good. In this wryly comic, paradoxically touching first novel, Chase delivers a cleverly original allegory on the absurdities of our terror-obsessed culture. After suffering years of neglect by children who have grown and moved on, a tattered teddy bear named Winkie miraculously discovers the power of movement and runs away to the forest to begin a new life. Unfortunately, this particular forest has been pigeonholed as the hideout for a notorious terrorist, and militant FBI agents quickly surround Winkie with drawn weapons and whirling helicopters. Unsure quite what to make of the diminutive quadruped--Is he a Middle-Eastern midget or a bizarre genetic experiment?--the authorities nevertheless trot out their standard interrogation techniques while charging the little bear with unparalleled barbarism. In the surrealistic courtroom circus that follows, Winkie faces a gauntlet of bizarre witnesses from the trials of Socrates, Galileo, and Oscar Wilde--an ordeal he endures by retreating into memories of the early years that nurtured his awakening. Inspired by a stuffed animal from his childhood (photographs of the bona fide Winkie are sprinkled throughout), Chase turns in a masterfully measured social critique featuring a protagonist as endearing as any from the classics of childhood literature.
Carl Hays Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved.

Final Note: The back flap of this book has a quote from a musician Stephin Merritt of The Magnetic Fields who says he is seriously considering getting a Winkie tattoo. Is he nuts? Yeah, and here is another nut who devoted a whole blog to Winkie. http://www.freewinkie.blogspot.com/

Recommended Author

I recently spoke on the phone to a fellow reader/friend and his newest favorite author is worth sharing. He sent me a link and which books to read in order.

Straight from the mouth of Jim Wilson:

Start with Et Tu, Babe, and The Tetherballs of Bougainville. An epic saga of a leather-clad rebel youth writing a screenplay about his father's impending execution under the New Jersey Discretionary Execution Program, and his torrid love affair with his father's warden. F***ing crazy.

Here's his Wiki entry:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Leyner

Newest Book Club Selection

The book club met today and we decided to read Lipstick Jihad by Azadeh Moaveni. I am so stoked about this selection because I have owned this book for over a year. Here is a link to an interview with the author. Enjoy! Look for a review in the near future.

http://www.motherjones.com/news/qa/2005/03/moaveni.html

Book Club

I am meeting my book club in 2 days and I came across an interesting book that I recently just ordered. The Book Club Companion. This guide is full of reading lists, tips on creating a group, discussion starters, recipes and theme party ideas. Reason #1 to read this has to be the quick summaries it gives of each book highlighted. Diana Loevy wrote this book from the perspective of a book club member. I just love the layout and plan on bringing it to the meeting eventhough I am not the next person in the group to recommend.

Week Two, Magazine Review

"The Magazine For People Who Love Books" That is what Pages is all about. I had discovered this magazine a little over a year ago and can not stop reading it. When I get the new issue in my hands I think back to the days when the Sears Wish book would arrive in the mail and I would dog ear every other page. A must read for the book lover and a great resource for those in a book club. Enough said, run to the closest Borders or Barnes & Noble and rip through a copy today! But if you long for nostalgia, here are some Sears Coupons and wish away!

Week One, Bonus Review

I didn't plan on writing about two books this week, but I couldn't resist. This book was a very easy read and required little effort from me. Since, it is the first weekend of the NFL playoffs I have a lot of time on my hands. The book I polished off is small is the new big.

Review: Here we have eight years of blog posts from an influential business thinker and bestselling writer Seth Godin. I have never heard of him before, mainly because I can care less about business, but was blown away by his humor, honesty and unbelievable "life" tips. I picked this book up at the local library thinking I would learn a little about small businesses and how to set up a proper blog and was satisfied in both areas. I think that Seth convinced me to write this blog and I thank him. I also plan on reading more of his books such as Purple Cow and also checking out his blog http://www.sethgodin.com/ and web sites Changethis.com and Squidoo.com. Enough said, check his work out, you will not be disappointed.

Week One, Book One

Every new year I make a few resolutions that I never fulfill. It usually involves diet and exercise. This year I decided that I would read a new book a week. Sounds easy for those of you that are voracious readers, but for those of us who work and play on a daily basis it is not an easy task to complete. So here we are in the first full week of the new year and I am done with my first book. Yippee!

I have selected Animal Farm for various reasons. First, I am currently teaching it to my students. Second, it is my favorite book of all time.

Review: A must read for anyone who loves history, politics and good classic literature. In a time of war and with the elections creeping up on us, this book is a must read. I have read this book at least a handful of times and never laughed as loud as I did this time around. The roles of "leaders" and "followers" in this novel make me think of the world we live in today and how history really repeats itself. Although this story is suppose to be an allegory/satire about the Russian Revolution it really applies to revolutions in general. Enough said, pick it up and let me know what you think.