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	READING NOW		READING NEXT		READING SOMETIME
					A Separate Peace Bleak House Endurance: Shackleton's Incredible Voyage Foucault's Pendulum Lord of the Flies Notes of a Nervous Man Song of Solomon The Hamlet: A Novel of the Snopes Family The Mezzanine The Winds of War The Witches of Eastwick Up in the Old Hotel and Other Stories
	Main Street Sinclair Lewis i went into my local independent bookstore. behind the counter was an impish girl i see often but don't know her name. before i can move down one of their three short aisles she asks if she can help me. i say i'm looking for main street by sinclair lewis. she pinches her lips in thought and turns to the computer while making the "hmmm, let me see" sound. as she starts typing she prepares me for the inevitable by saying, "i still have my copy of that from junior high at my mom's house, as many do i imagine, so it's not a very commonly sought-after title." how many online booksellers do you know that come with emo girls jockin' your arrested reading skills? the right answer of course is not nearly enough.		The Monk Matthew Lewis this was described by one of my college english professors as one of the best, if not the best, examples of gothic literature ever penned. i searched hard for it back in the early 90's and consumed it minutes after finally finding it. i remember the highlights but not the details. i hope i've waited long enough for it to re-ripen on the vine (e.g. my bookshelf).
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			Georges Alexandre Dumas 07.2010 there's a lot written about how unknown this book is, so much so that it gave me pause to take give it time. but i immensely enjoyed my first dance with dumas and have since been respectfully saving his other works, forcing myself not to gorge on him in one sitting as i feel inclined to. after getting through the first few chapters i found the under-published nature of this book to be purely scandalous. now, i'm not going to say this book was every bit as entertaining as the count of monte christo because it's not, but to be fair the count is a truly special human effort. that said, georges is crazy-good entertaining and i'm more than mildly shocked hollywood hasn't sank it's teeth into it because it seems to have a very manageable and ready to go narrative and would be leagues more entertaining that much of the drivel they typically roll out. but it's probably for the best because i'm sure they'd botch it like mad so i'd recommend you read it before they begin their miscasting and associating depp or dicaprio in a role that deserves so much more uniquity than that. no one needs to come in and fix or redefine something as sweeping, pleasing and accessible (292 pages) as georges. so good. link to this review
			The Shadow of the Wind Carlos Ruiz Zafon 06.2010 i was initially going to say if you're looking for a good summer read this might be it, but upon further reflection i think it may play better while sitting in front of a crackling winter fire, under covers and reading by dim light. the writing is unique and winsome and contains good episodes of love, lust, loss, insight, mystery, and of course tragedy. link to this review
			The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin Benjamin Franklin 05.2010 i read a portion of benjamin franklin's autobiography about ten years ago when i was researching time management as he is considered the father of the art of self-improvement. back then i only read part two (of four) as that was the section that dealt with his notions on self-improvement and i was at the time trying to be thrifty about my time. something stirred me recently making me think not reading all of franklin's text may have been a mistake. curiously, what sent me back to the work was a promise i made to myself during the last semester to not watch any television as i was teaching and i didn't want it to distract from or reduce the quality of my classes. aside from the super bowl and two recommended episodes (by my students) of south park i held to my commitment. towards the end of class i started whimsically thinking of what i would watch first once the self-imposed ban was lifted. i tried a few shows like west wing, deadwood, weeds but found myself totally unable to sit through even ten minutes of anything. listless, i went to my bookshelf and the franklin spine caught my eye. i began with part one and consumed it with a ravenous fervor usually reserved for hbo series finales and sporting playoffs. after finishing the book i did some research and discovered two interesting things about this book. first, it is one of the most popular and controversial autobiographies ever written. it is said to be the case because it is not entirely accurate and sloppily written. this is simply another way of saying not all people feel franklin was the first true american many deem him to be. the second curiosity about the book is the manner in which it was constructed. as mentioned, the work is divided into four parts. the first part, which was around 80 pages long, was written by franklin while on a weeklong solitary, holiday from his work. the purpose behind the effort was to record his life to pass onto his son at some later date. the second part talks about his methods of time management and self improvement. it is short but has to be one of the most compelling pieces of thought penned in early america. the third part was drafted in response to people who had seen the first part through various and curious means and urged franklin to continue documenting his life for future minds to learn from. it is said that the work less compelling here because the first few sections were personal and innocent in nature and starting in the third section, his writing became pedantic and boastful. if this was the case, and i didn't greatly sense it, the writing is still charged and of interest. and lastly the final part of his work which was his last effort to complete the story was just a few pages in length as he died before his thoughts could be completed. regardless of people's thoughts and criticisms of this work, benjamin franklin's autobiography is an inspired piece of literature penned by an inspired individual which should leave you feeling ten kinds of inspired to do more with your days. link to this review
			A Man in Full Tom Wolfe 05.2010 a person once said to me that if someone described the act of playing a piano to them, and they had never seen anyone do it, they would have said such a thing was not humanly possible. i agreed with them and it also voices how i feel about the writing of tom wolfe, and others like him. i just don't understand how he is able to write from the intimate perspective of so many people, so many races, so many generations, backgrounds, agendas, perspectives. and to do so so entirely believably. it's wholly unreasonable to my mind because i've always been taught and told to write about what you know, from your experience and there's just no way this man has this experience or this insight. it's ten kinds of crazy which makes his efforts twenty kinds of enjoyable. this sprawling narrative is surely no exception. one curiosity about this book is some of the oft-repeated phrases used throughout. there are two in particular that stand out for me even now. one was "big-breasted lawns" which there seem to be many of in the more affluent parts of atlanta. and the other phrase was "shank to flank" which i must confess to being not entirely sure what it means, but it does have a way of rolling off the tongue in a mischievous and decadent way. link to this review
			The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo Stieg Larsson 01.2010 this book is surely tearing up the recreational reading circuit and once you get into the story you'll quickly see why. while not stylistically as clean and polished as a dan brown work, there is a certain ikea-like mood set in the tale and one that keeps you briskly working deeper and deeper in until you suddenly find yourself at the end. if the author has a predominate quirk, it is this: he has some hangup or fetish for technology and includes details in a manner i can't believe his or any editor would let through. for instance, at one point in the story a character loses a computer and needs a replacement. the subsequent passage read: Unsurprisingly she set her sights on the best available alternative: the new Apple PowerBook G4/1.0 Ghz in an aluminum case with a PowerPC 7451 processor with an AltiVec Velocity Engine, 960 MB RAM and a 60 GB hard drive. It had BlueTooth and built-in CD and DVD burners. Best of all it had the first 17-inch screen in the laptop world wth NVIDIA graphics and a resolution of 1440x900 pixels, which shook the PC advocates and outranked everything else on the market. with the state of modern technology, this stuff will sound impressive or relevant for about four months. hell, the machine was probably dated by the time the book went to the printers. to what advantage is this level of inconsequential detail allowed to be included? if you wanted to impress that the girl liked high end stuff wouldn't you be better served saying something like, she replaced her lost machine with the apple's latest release which would have made any technology minded person under the age of 25 drool with covetous envy. altivec. powerpc. nvidia. bluetooth. 1440x900. 7451. 960mb ram. i don't get it. at all. including such detail is only going to make the work prematurely date itself. fact is when i sat down to write this review and thought back to this prose, i found the above passage in the 600 page text in less than two minutes because i remembered exactly where it fell on the page (next to the last paragraph in the bottom, left corner) given how befuddled i was by its inclusion. oh well. aside from larsson's juvenile attraction for technology specs, the girl with the dragon tattoo is a nice winding ride with a more than enough attention-getting dips in the road along the way. link to this review

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