A Year in Books/Day 230: Lonelyhearts The Screwball World of Nathanael West and Eileen McKenney

Posted on May 4, 2013 by maedez

Title: Lonelyhearts The Screwball World of Nathanael West and Eileen McKenney
Author: Marion Meade
Year Published: 2010 (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt)
Year Purchased: 2013
Source: Half Price Books
About: He was a commercially neglected writer with celebrity friends. As the inspiration for My Sister Eileen, she was mildly famous for being mildly famous. Continue reading →

Daily Diversion #121: Book Review Queue

Posted on April 21, 2013 by maedez

Still no functioning Internet connection, thanks to ye olde goblins. Here’s a pile of books waiting to be reviewed upon its return.

Bonus Book Review: Dorothy L. Sayers: The Centenary Celebration

Posted on February 18, 2013 by maedez

Since I do not own a copy of Dorothy L. Sayers: The Centenary Celebration, this entry qualifies as a bonus review.

Title: Dorothy L. Sayers: The Centenary Celebration
Edited by: Alzina Stone Dale
Year Published: 1993 (Walker and Company New York)
Year Purchased: N/A
Source: This book is on loan from my dear Momma.
About: Let me begin my confessing that I have, at most, read one Dorothy L. Sayers book. I cannot be sure, because it was a long time ago and I have nothing to compare it against. Did it feature Lord Peter Wimsey? Likely, as I know it was a mystery novel. I have a near perfect memory when it comes to everything I’ve read as an adult. Thousands upon thousands of books, and I remember them all. Except, it seems, the one in question. Perhaps I am thinking of something else, and have never really held a Sayers book in my hands. I specialize in dead female writers-not as weird as it sounds, rest assured-but remained in near total darkness about one of the quintessential queens of mystery until a couple of weeks ago. Continue reading →

A Year in Books/Days 228-229: Frontier Madam/Amedeo Modigliani

Posted on February 13, 2013 by maedez

FRONTIER MADAM THE LIFE OF DELL BURKE, LADY OF LUSK

Title: Frontier Madam The Life of Dell Burke, Lady of Lusk
Author: June Willson Read
Year Published: 2008 (A Two Dot Book)
Year Purchased: 2012
Source: Half Price Books
About: I really wanted to like this book. It has elements that make it ideally suited to my weird tastes. The narrative focuses on an interesting period and place little discussed elsewhere, and the heroine is something else: strong, fearless, unconventional, and largely forgotten. All things that make my heart flutter with anticipation. If the whole was as good as any of the components were in life, it would be a great read. Instead, it is unsatisfactory. Not bad or shoddy, but oddly flat, simplistic and bloodless. Dell Burke was a girl from a solid working class background, with a loving family but few prospects. A tale as old as time, of course. She turned a pragmatic foray into prostitution into a decades-long career as a powerful, wealthy, fair, civic-minded madam in Wyoming. The contents of her life could probably fill several books. Unfortunately, the lady was something of an enigma. The material for an interesting, complex biography just isn’t there. What we are given is a civic history of Lusk, Wyoming filled with third and fourth hand anecdotes about its most notorious resident. Many of the brief stories are entertaining, but they add little to the flow and structure of the book. The passages of imagined dialogue, which are mercifully few, are stilted and unbelievable: a great idea poorly executed. The conjecture used to fill in the gaps between anecdotes and facts is boring and without colour. I wish I had bigger things, nicer things, to say about this book, but the story is paper-thin. The biographer tries hard. Hailing from the same part of Wyoming as her subject, she is genuinely connected to the legend of Dell Burke. It’s obvious that she is excited to share this remarkable woman with the rest of the world. Perhaps that is the problem: whilst the shell of the legend is intact, the substance of the real woman is long gone. There’s nothing left but a disjointed jumble of local in-jokes worn threadbare and a vague memory woven into the collective subconscious of the town’s residents. It’s no wonder that this book reads like a padded-out pamphlet for an annual town festival in Lusk. Continue reading →

You Have Been Warned

Posted on February 12, 2013 by maedez

Starting tomorrow, it is going to be raining Project 366 reviews!

Like this, only with books:

Rain by Hans Baluschek, 1917

A Year in Books/Day 227: Swearing

Posted on January 19, 2013 by maedez

Title: Swearing A Social History of Foul Language, Oaths and Profanity in English
Author: Geoffrey Hughes
Year Published: 1991/This Edition: 1998 (Penguin Books)
Year Purchased: 2003/2004
Source: A bookstore in Buffalo
About: A book about swearing sounds titillating, eh? Actually, the word titillating sounds titillating, but that’s another train of thought. If you think that this book is just an excuse by the author to use words like piss and fuck with impunity, like some naughty school-boy, you’re wrong. (You didn’t really think that, did you?) Swearing by Geoffrey Hughes is one of the many books that make up a larger-than-you’d-expect canon on the subject of the history of impolite language. This late 20th century work is one in a long line of books that date back hundreds of years. It’s a fairly sedate entry, but it offers a fascinatingly detailed history of the origins and subsequent variations of bad words in English. You don’t have to be word mad to be entertained by the fluid nature of profanity. It makes for seriously fun reading, even if the scholarly tone isn’t your normal cup of tea. The best part of the book revolves around religious oaths and how they have become bastardized (ahem) and watered down over the centuries. If you come across this book, it’s worth taking a gamble on; the worst thing that can happen is that you will have a more measured understanding of the words and phrases you use, and a richer vocabulary to inflict on the people around you.
Motivation: Words. I love them, in all of their magical, maddening, changing variety. I like to get to the bottom of why things are as they are, and discover, if at all possible, how or what they once were.
Times Read: 1
Random Excerpt/Page 22: “It might be useful to bring into play at this point two observations which raise swearing above the prosaic. G.K. Chesterton commented that ‘The one stream of poetry which is constantly flowing is slang.’ (From The Defendant 1901, cited in Partridge’s Slang (1960), p. 24). Louis MacNeice comes closer to our themes in his poem ‘Conversation’, 1929. ‘Ordinary men, ‘ he writes, ‘Put up a barrage of common sense to baulk Intimacy, but by mistake interpolate Swear-words like roses in their talk.’”
Happiness Scale: 9

A Year in Books/Day 226: The Decline of Sentiment

Posted on January 13, 2013 by maedez

Title: The Decline of Sentiment American Film in the 1920s
Author: Lea Jacobs
Year Published: 2008 (University of California Press)
Year Purchased: 2011
Source: Half Price Books
About: I like film criticism that comes with a healthy side of broader cultural and intellectual analysis. It is, admittedly, how I approach the subject, and view the world in general. Before proceeding, know that this review comes with a Warning. Lea Jacobs’ writing is from the crumbling cracker school: dry and without any excess flavour. If you cannot reconcile yourself to the mere thought of reading 313 pages of humourless but acutely insightful commentary, or this review about it, then move on with your bad self. No, really. I won’t be offended. As long as you promise to come back for #227. We’re still cool, right? For the 3 of you left, where were we? Ah, yes. Her writing. If you’re passionate or curious about silent cinema, The Decline of Sentiment is worth your time. Your head will eventually fall into rhythm with her writing style, and by the end of the book you will have a more comprehensive view of the subject even if, like me, you have studied and written about it for years. Continue reading →

A Year in Books/Day 225: Egon Schiele

Posted on January 11, 2013 by maedez

Title: Egon Schiele
Author: Sandra Forty
Year Published: 2012 (TAJ Books International)
Year Purchased: New Year’s Day 2013
Source: Half Price Books
About: Another day, another review of a small book with generous appeal. Sandra Forty’s seven pages of text get the party started. With such limited space, she tells the Austrian painter’s story well and with much-needed concision. There’s no room for depth, but she does what needs to be done and does it admirably. The star of the book is, of course, Schiele’s art. There are eighty-two chronologically arranged plates, each one contributing to the riveting aesthetic harmony of one of the most astonishing artistic outputs of the 20th century. The reproductions may be tiny, but they are stunning.
Motivation: Egon Schiele is one of my favourite artists. I find inspiration from hundreds of sources: kooky, disparate, and not all word related. Art, photography, silent cinema, and fashion history all serve me well when, throwing off the shadows from my mind, I head out into the wider world in search of creative focus.
Times Read: 1
Random Excerpt/Page 4: “Furthermore, he subverted the usual approach to portraiture and instead explored unusual angles, asking his models to twist and turn into unconventional attitudes and stare back at the observer with baleful, unblinking eyes.”
Happiness Scale: 10+++
Egon Schiele, Self-portrait, 1912 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

A Few Words About My Project 366

Posted on January 9, 2013 by maedez

You may have noticed that I slacked off on 2012′s Project 366. Earlier today, I posted entry #224. Never fear, I’ll power through until the series is finished. Or will I? Yes, and then some. After #366 is up, the series will continue under a different title. With 1000+ books (and rapidly growing) I have enough material to keep this baby rolling for years.

Remember this? Yeah, it is even bigger now.

A Year in Books/Day 224: Nancy Drew’s Guide to Life