just finished didion’s ‘year of magical thinking’ and highly recommend it. it was pretty much on every best of 2005 critics list and deservedly so. now reading bourdain’s ‘a cook’s tour’ bc I loved ‘kitchen confidential’ and picked this one up in the bargain section. hoping it will be a quick read while I’m in london.

I read The pursuit of Happines, which you have to special order because it isn’t printed in the US. Amazing love story. I also just read The life and Death of Charlie St. Cloud…really unique story about brothers and death.

Thank you to Rivster for recommending THE TORTILLA CURTAIN last time we wrote on this subject. I cannot stop thinking of the many issues posed throughout the book. I most definitely recommend it. However, I am disappointed to hear that a movie is being made starring Kevin Costner & Meg Ryan. I just can’t picture it.

Enjoyed browsing through others’ comments about books. They are similar to the ones people have suggested at my place, and I’m thinking I should check out the Jody P books next– I have a really long plane ride coming up in March and I’m trying to stock up!

Thanks for the hints.

I read (remember I teach high school English) “Girl with the Pearl Earring”. Personally I really liked it. I’ve heard mixed thoughts. It kept my attention and I was anxious to see how it ended. It’s also interesting because it’s a fictional story, based on unclear true facts. If you read the book, don’t bother watching the movie. It’s horridly off. It starts too late in the story, and ends ten years before the book. DOH! Why do they do that GRRR

My pleasure. It can be a little tricky recommending a book…not knowing if others will like it…and so forth. My mom just finished it too.

Oy, I am so disappointed by JAB’s news regarding the casting of “Tortilla Curtain.” I don’t see it at all!!

Last Shabbos I read an advance copy of “Seven Days to the Sea’ by Rebecca Kohn. More details about the book on my blog. Also, I am in the midst of rereading “Deborah, Golda, and Me” — enjoying it far more now than I did as a young college student

I will definitely have to pick up Tortilla Curtain, thanks Rivster, and JAB! Who is the Author? Also, thanks Ari, cause I recently read The Myth of You and Me from your recommendation, and it was great. Unfortunately I don’t have any updates of my own, as I’ve been slack at reading lately. Will get back on track by the next blog post about it!

hi there. i’ve been a [secret] fan of your blog for a while now. On the subject of books: I just finished My Sister’s Keeper and am in the midst of Rashi’s Daughters by Maggie Anton. I also read Stalking Elijah by Rodger Kamenetz. All fabulous books. It’s hard to get Amazon delivery here, so I’m sort of stuck reading what gets passed around. Luckily, its all been good. Any suggestions?

A Girl Becomes a Comma Like That by Lisa Glatt (Simon & Schuster) is a beautifully written novel but be warned, it will make you cry. The Position by Meg Wolitzer was the last book I actually read in its entirety — totally engaging story.

Spinster hermit–I have A Girl Becomes a Comma Like That on my amazon wishlist…I need to buy it.

I’m 3/4 through Guns, Germs, and Steel, which is dense but fascinating.

I just finished Ronlyn Domingues’ “The Mercy of Thin Air“. It was AMAZING. Totally impressed and blew me away. Also really good is Leah Stewart’s “The Myth of You and Me“.

I’m on a chicklit kick lately, and just finished See Jane Date by Melissa Senate. I thought it was fantastic.

I really don’t read much of modern lit, although I do enjoy plenty of it. I just never find the time really, so I was reluctant to post. I usually have about a half dozen books going at any one time. Some get finished, some wait for a bit.

Justice Stephen Breyer’s excellent ‘Active Liberty’ is the short course on what the Supreme Court should look like if it truly was ever concerned with things like ‘justice & liberty for all’. It’ll no doubt be a valuable guide for his increasingly angry but ever isolated dissents for the next 2 decades coming.

The instructive ‘The Status syndrome’ by Sir Michael Marmot is a brief for his life’s work on how stress can and does affect our lives, and how it’s medical effects are systemic, populational, and class based.

‘The Bone Woman’ by Clea Koff was one of the first, and possibly most attractive ‘forensic memoirs’ to come out about the field, long before CIS hit the air. She’s worked mainly in war zones, her choice, and it’s interesting to see her take on all the carnage at the end of the last bloody century. I knew many
of the folks involved, and wanted to see her take on things.

‘Dark age ahead’ by Jane Jacobs, a mainly dyspeptic view of life from one of the great critics of our age. Up there with Robert Hughes ‘The culture of complaint’ for diagnosing the critical but largely hidden dangerous currents of our age. I’ll also add Jimmy Carter’s good summation of our current moral plight in ‘Our endangered Values’. Most will ignore or dismiss both as just ‘old farts’ who can’t help themselves. But we’ll do this at our peril, naturally. Cheers, ‘VJ’