Tag Archives: Book Reviews

A Year in Books/Day 209: Lives of the Poets

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  • Title: Lives of the Poets
  • Author: Michael Schmidt
  • Year Published: 1998 (A Phoenix Paperback)
  • Year Purchased: 2004/2005
  • Source: Barnes & Noble clearance rack
  • About: Michael Schmidt takes approximately 1000 pages to cover more than 250 poets, briskly but rigorously dissecting their lives, influences, historical circumstances, and professional interconnections. Mapping out seven centuries of poetic genealogy is a gargantuan task, but Lives of the Poets is a surprisingly quick read, and as riveting as most of its subjects’ creations.
  • Motivation: The title + poets + biographies=bliss. Surprised?
  • Times Read: Cover-to-cover-1/Excerpts-Multiple
  • Random Excerpt/Page 11: “Poems swim free of their age, but it’s hard to think of a single poem that swims entirely free of its medium, not just language but language used in the particular ways that are poetry. Even the most pathenogenetic-seeming poem has a pedigree. The poet may not know precisely a line’s or a stanza’s parents; indeed, may not be interested in finding out. Yet as readers of poetry we can come to know more about a poem than the poet does and know it more fully.”
  • Happiness Scale: 8

A Year in Books/Day 208: Forgotten Films to Remember

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  • Title: Forgotten Films to Remember
  • Author: John Springer
  • Year Published: 1980 (The Citadel Press)
  • Year Purchased: 1990s
  • Source: Unknown
  • About: Some of the best classic movies aren’t, well, classic. At least not in the sense of having wide, lasting cultural impact. Maybe they were box office winners in their day, quiet sleepers or cheapie programmers, critically acclaimed or unappreciated gems; most have been long forgotten by the masses, embraced and beloved by fanatics alone. Hollywood studios churned out hundreds of films a year, so it is no wonder that, of those hardy survivors, few are truly iconic. If you want to learn more but are too cowed to wade through the classic film jungle alone and bewildered, Forgotten Films to Remember makes it easy. Covering the years 1928-1959 (with a quick overview of the 1960s and 1970s), John Springer devotes a paragraph each to dozens of remarkable movies that you really need to watch. In the process, a clear, workmanlike but interesting narrative of studio-era Hollywood emerges. The accompanying photographs are mostly from the author’s archive.
  • Motivation: I love old movies, especially obscure ones.
  • Times Read: 4 or 5
  • Random Excerpt/Page 18: “Howard Hawks made a strong movie out of Martin Flavin’s play, The Criminal Code, aided impressively by the performance of Walter Huston. He played a district attorney who becomes the warden of a prison, populated by men he has sent up. Constance Cummings and Phillips Holmes had the love interest such as it was and Boris Karloff skulked about as a squealer.”
  • Happiness Scale: 9

A Year in Books/Day 207: Romancing the Ordinary

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  • Title: Romancing the Ordinary A Year of Simple Splendor
  • Author: Sarah Ban Breathnach
  • Year Published: 2002 (The Simple Abundance Press/Scribner)
  • Year Purchased: 2002
  • Source: It was a Christmas gift from my mom.
  • About: There is something a bit stale about most inspirational books that are directed at women, or maybe I don’t have the proper constitution for that type of thing. Either way, I was surprised to discover that Romancing the Ordinary, although a trifle flowery in spots, is actually inspiring. I know, I know. Hear me out. These are the reasons I love this book: 1) It’s easy to use. Twelve months=a dozen chapters. In other words, I can take an entire month to read a chapter. It’s such a slight commitment that it does not take serious time away from my other reading. 2) It’s guilt-free. Romancing the Ordinary isn’t a self-help program, but a reminder to slow down for three seconds and attend to your own needs. It’s a how-to guide in relaxation, if you will. 3) It doesn’t try to make you a better person. If it did, I would have pitched it years ago. 4) It is full of quotes, and we all know I love quotes. 5) Most of the books quoted from are fabulous. Anything that turns me on to books I’ve never read, especially intriguing ones, is a winner. 6) It has recipes. The Rice Pudding is delectable. 7) Even though I haven’t tried 85% of her ideas, I don’t feel inadequate. Who needs that from a book, anyway? I take what I want, dismiss the rest, and go on my merry way. 8) The underlying message. Perhaps it is an elaborate way of saying something very basic-“Hey there! Always remember that alone time is great. Don’t let yourself get lost in the demands of the every day.”-but it is a reminder we all need on occasion.
  • Motivation: My mom bought a copy for someone else. After they raved about it, she decided that I would find it enjoyable, too.
  • Times Read: 3 or 4
  • Random Excerpt/Page 208: “I am now an orderly woman. By this I mean, I am a woman who reveres order. But I am not the neatest person. I have always been a messy girl, and not so long ago, in an effort to embrace my imperfection, I came to the awareness that I will probably always be a messy girl.” (Ed. note: Ahem. My husband would say that this reminds him, quite powerfully, of me.)
  • Happiness Scale: 8 1/2

A Year in Books/Day 206: Crazy Sexy Cool

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  • Title: Crazy Sexy Cool
  • Authors: The Editors of Us Magazine
  • Year Published: 1996
  • Year Purchased: 2010
  • Source: My mom
  • About: The editors of Us Magazine seemingly created this photography volume for the sole purpose of making the definitive cultural statement of their age. That is rarely a good idea, and it falls flat here. The text by David Wild is the problem. It’s dated in a way that the 1990s era photographs aren’t. Although limited to an introduction, his writing is so self-consciously important and self-indulgent that it’s embarrassing. No amount of evoking Let Us Now Praise Famous Men or You Have Seen Their Faces (with photography and text by, respectively, Walker Evans and James Agee/Margaret Bourke-White and Erskine Caldwell) will magically elevate this book to their level. There’s nothing of intellectual substance here; it’s all empty, pithy-sounding word combinations. Skip the text and go straight to the photographs. You’ll thank me. The images are genuinely captivating, and do their job of capturing the transitory nature of celebrity as it was experienced in the late 20th century. That’s enough. Too bad the editors of Us Magazine didn’t realize that.
  • Motivation: My mom knows how much I like coffee table books, movies, pop culture, and photography. She found this book at a community sale for a dollar or two.
  • Times Read: 1
  • Random Excerpt/Page 12: The preceding anticommercial message comes to you directly from John Keats’ “Ode to a Grecian Urn”, written way back in 1819, a romantic, carefree era long before the fall of Communism and the rise of Courtney Love. At the risk of having my poetic license revoked, I would like to think if the old Keatster were still around putting quill to Powerbook he might forget about urns entirely and instead be penning “Ode to Mark Seliger’s Portrait of Drew Barrymore.”
  • Happiness Scale: Text-2/Photographs: 8

A Year in Books/Day 205: Four Little Blossoms at Oak Hill School

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  • Title: Four Little Blossoms at Oak Hill School
  • Author: “Mabel C. Hawley”
  • Year Published: 1920 (The Saalfield Publishing Company)
  • Year Purchased: Circa 1920
  • Source: My Grandma
  • About: When this book was published nearly a century ago, it wouldn’t have been considered naive or innocent, but a reflection of mainstream normalcy: what childhood was, or aspired to be. As such, the plot isn’t important. All you need to know is in the characters’ names: Bobby, Meg, Dot and….Twaddles. The Blossoms are siblings, and range in age from 7 to 4 (Dot and Twaddles, you see, are twins). Nothing much happens, just the usual sweet or sly childhood shenanigans one associates with a bygone era. The Four Little Blossoms’  benign adventures lasted for seven books. Published between 1920-1930, they were part of the Stratemeyer Syndicate assembly line. Other, more famous series from Stratemeyer include the Bobbsey Twins, Hardy Boys Mystery Stories, Nancy Drew Mystery Stories, and Dana Girls Mystery Stories.
  • Motivation: This unimportant little book has, by extreme happenstance, been in the family for over ninety years, having been owned or read by four generations. Who knew that it would hang around so long? I wonder if this is the orphan of a once complete set, or if this is the only Four Little Blossoms book my forebears bought?
  • Times Read: Dozens? As one of the first “real” chapter books I owned, at 3 or 4, I used it to move my skills beyond the Little Golden Books stage.
  • Random Excerpt/Pages 10 and 11: “The Blossoms lived in the pretty town of Oak Hill, and they knew nearly every one. Indeed the children had never been away from Oak Hill till the visit they had made to their Aunt Polly, about which you may have read in the book called “Four Little Blossoms at Brookside Farm.” They had spent the summer with Aunt Polly, and had made many new friends and learned a great deal about animals. Meg, especially, loved all dumb creatures. And now that you are acquainted with the four little Blossoms, we must get back to that chimney.”
  • Happiness Scale: 10, because it helped me become quite a fine reader

A Year in Books/Day 204: Audrey Hepburn An Elegant Spirit

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  • Title: Audrey Hepburn An Elegant Spirit
  • Author: Sean Hepburn Ferrer
  • Year Published: 2003 (Atria Books)
  • Year Purchased: 2003
  • Source: Barnes & Noble
  • About: Audrey Hepburn always seemed so decent. Not goody-goody, but all of those superlatives most of us wish we were (and only sometimes are): compassionate, patient, kind, loyal, curious, gracious, humorous, dignified and empathetic. Decency of character is not something I require of actors, writers, musicians or anyone else whose work I admire; in fact, many of the people I love-those whose talent pierces my core- are at least a bit morally scruffy. Continue reading →

A Year in Books/Day 203: Raving Fans

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  • Title: Raving Fans A Revolutionary Approach to Customer Service
  • Authors: Ken Blanchard and Sheldon Bowles
  • Year Published: 1993 (William Morrow and Company, Inc.)
  • Year Purchased: 2010
  • Source: An ex-place of employment
  • About: I hate this book. I’m tempted to say that I passionately hate this book, but it’s too ridiculous and poorly written to engender that amount of feeling. If you’re wondering why I’ve kept a book this bad instead of tossing it on a rubbish heap whilst kicking up my heels in glee, I use it as a reminder to work my writing fingers to the bone so I do not have to toil in the corporate world again. Ever, ever again. Ever. Because if I do, I’ll probably have this crap thrown at me a third time. I’m not knocking the premise behind Raving Fans; it is sound-very basic, but sound. The execution, though, is worthless. The single worst passage I’ve read in my entire reading life is in this book. (See below) Honestly, if you can run through 132 pages in 15 minutes while knocking back Scotch in a dark, noisy bar without missing anything, what you are reading is too watered-down. Continue reading →

A Year in Books/Day 202: Tales of Mystery and Imagination

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  • Title: Tales of Mystery and Imagination
  • Author: Edgar Allan Poe
  • Illustrator: Harry Clarke (from the 1919 edition published by George C. Harrap and Company Ltd.)
  • Year Published: 1987 (The Franklin Library)
  • Year Purchased: 2005
  • Source: Barnes & Noble clearance rack
  • About: It’s Poe, people. We all know Poe, don’t we? His stories are such an immutable fact of our culture that we’re practically born with them embedded into our consciousness. Continue reading →

A Year in Books/Day 201: George Eliot A Life

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  • Title: George Eliot A Life
  • Author: Rosemary Ashton
  • Year Published: 1996 (Penguin Books)
  • Year Purchased: 2007
  • Source: A discount bookstore in New York.
  • About: I have a lot of nice things to say about this biography, but the words refuse to line up in the right order. If I wrote down what I was thinking, it wouldn’t make any sense to you. Actually, I tried. About five times, and it didn’t make any sense to me, either. In an effort to get my point across in a straightforward way, and not drive myself crazy whilst doing so, I’m going to toss some descriptive and applicable words at you: Thoughtful. Intelligent. Careful. Illuminating. Human. Measured. Absorbing. Interesting. Appropriate. Subtle. George Eliot is one of my favourite English-language novelists of the 19th century. Her books bear reading and stand up to repeated visits. So does Ashton’s biography.
  • Motivation: I like George Eliot’s work. I love biographies to the point of near obsession.
  • Times Read: 2
  • Random Excerpt/Page 72: “Her isolated position high up in her foreign attic, poised between a past life of much frustration and under-achievement and an unknown future, encouraged her penchant for thorough analysis and turned it inward. Sara had worried about her state of mind and her ability to cope alone. Mary Ann replied that she did quite enough worrying on her own account. Solicitude which expressed itself in criticism was not helpful.”
  • Happiness Scale: 9
    English: George Eliot

    English: George Eliot (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

     

A Year in Books/Days 199 and 200: MGM Posters/MGM When the Lion Roars

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DAY 199: MGM Posters The Golden Years

  • Title: MGM Posters The Golden Years
  • Text: Frank Miller
  • Year Published: 1994 (Turner Publishing, Inc.)
  • Year Purchased: 1990s
  • Source: I have no idea!
  • About: There’s nothing like an old movie poster. When art and commerce combine with history and nostalgia, the result is a visually stunning social commentary. In looking at the representative posters of five decades, changing attitudes and mores are as obvious as changing aesthetics. MGM was known for the luxuriousness of its productions, and the top talent of its employees. Although designed as throwaways, the posters that advertised its movies were no exception, and neither were their artists. My favourite era for this exciting medium is definitely the 1920s.The posters are stunning. At the risk of sounding like a crotchety hundred year old, it has been all downhill since then.
  • Motivation: Old movies are my friends. We’re tight. I’m pretty close with art, too. Continue reading →