TWIB-II 50: 9/15-9/21
Oct. 9th, 2008 05:13 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
akujunkanI read six books from September 15-21. It was also the week during which I moved back to Japan; thus the lateness of this post. At any rate, here are my thoughts on the week's four English books:
1) So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish - Douglas Adams
Say what you will about the changes in tone between So Long and the earlier volumes in the trilogy. This one is by far my favorite. It is just so consistently funny; moreover, the humor is as zany as in previous volumes but with an insightfulness that pokes fun at aspects of Earthling life on earth (instead of their intergalactic cognates), and I'm nothing if not a sucker for well-executed parody. Even if the preceding volumes weren't to one's taste as a reader, it's worth going through them to get to this book. And if they were, well, kudos to Adams for not rehashing the same old narrative elements.
2) Young Zaphod Plays it Safe - Douglas Adams
Yes, it's a short story and not a book, but for the sake of completeness I'm including it here. At any rate, Young Zaphod is a 20-odd-page parable about the hazards of Big Business Bureaucracy, with some intergalactic creepiness thrown in, which is to say, not at all long enough for me to have an opinion on it one way or the other.
3) College Girl - Patricia Weitz
Patricia Weitz's coming-of-age novel about a college senior who learns to confront dating, sexuality, and her own insecurities, gets a lot of things right. Weitz accurately captures the atmospheres of state university dormitories, lecture halls, frat parties, and the people who populate their backgrounds. Main character Natalie's struggles with her treatment at the hands of her emotionally abusive family and boyfriend are believably--and painfully--portrayed and developed.
Indeed, College Girl is very nearly an excellent book, but it falls short due to Weitz's disasterous decision to reduce all of her characters, and indeed college itself, to sex. Yes, it is a huge aspect of the college experience, but were one to believe Weitz's narrative, no college student ever talked or thought about anything BUT sex: not their professors, not their homework, not the concert they went to the other day, the new CD they bought, or the movie they just saw. And these are college seniors we're talking about here. It's unfortunate because it seriously undermines Weitz's otherwise spot-on depiction of university life.
That said, College Girl is a fast read with more meat to it than most; one that deals with a difficult and serious subject with less melodrama and a good deal more sensitivity than one might expect.
4) Any Given Doomsday - Lori Handeland
By every indication, Laura K. Hamilton is the author of a series of poorly-written, sex-drenched supernatural pulp fiction, and Handeland is ripping Hamilton off. It follows that if I am going to read crap fiction, I would rather read little-known crap fiction than throw my money at a bloated wanker of a crap author.
And I make no bones about it, Any Given Doomsday is some wonderful, sex-drenched crap. Or to be more precise, sexuality-drenched crap, because the sex scenes themselves are pretty vanilla and not terribly explicit. In other words, this book was the perfect airport read: simplistically written so I could handle the story with one eye closed and racy enough to keep things interesting, but not so racy that I'd be embarrassed were someone to lean over my shoulder and glance at the page. Do NOT go into this book expecting anything other than brain floss, but as far as brain floss goes, it's perfect.
That will be all.
1) So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish - Douglas Adams
Say what you will about the changes in tone between So Long and the earlier volumes in the trilogy. This one is by far my favorite. It is just so consistently funny; moreover, the humor is as zany as in previous volumes but with an insightfulness that pokes fun at aspects of Earthling life on earth (instead of their intergalactic cognates), and I'm nothing if not a sucker for well-executed parody. Even if the preceding volumes weren't to one's taste as a reader, it's worth going through them to get to this book. And if they were, well, kudos to Adams for not rehashing the same old narrative elements.
2) Young Zaphod Plays it Safe - Douglas Adams
Yes, it's a short story and not a book, but for the sake of completeness I'm including it here. At any rate, Young Zaphod is a 20-odd-page parable about the hazards of Big Business Bureaucracy, with some intergalactic creepiness thrown in, which is to say, not at all long enough for me to have an opinion on it one way or the other.
3) College Girl - Patricia Weitz
Patricia Weitz's coming-of-age novel about a college senior who learns to confront dating, sexuality, and her own insecurities, gets a lot of things right. Weitz accurately captures the atmospheres of state university dormitories, lecture halls, frat parties, and the people who populate their backgrounds. Main character Natalie's struggles with her treatment at the hands of her emotionally abusive family and boyfriend are believably--and painfully--portrayed and developed.
Indeed, College Girl is very nearly an excellent book, but it falls short due to Weitz's disasterous decision to reduce all of her characters, and indeed college itself, to sex. Yes, it is a huge aspect of the college experience, but were one to believe Weitz's narrative, no college student ever talked or thought about anything BUT sex: not their professors, not their homework, not the concert they went to the other day, the new CD they bought, or the movie they just saw. And these are college seniors we're talking about here. It's unfortunate because it seriously undermines Weitz's otherwise spot-on depiction of university life.
That said, College Girl is a fast read with more meat to it than most; one that deals with a difficult and serious subject with less melodrama and a good deal more sensitivity than one might expect.
4) Any Given Doomsday - Lori Handeland
By every indication, Laura K. Hamilton is the author of a series of poorly-written, sex-drenched supernatural pulp fiction, and Handeland is ripping Hamilton off. It follows that if I am going to read crap fiction, I would rather read little-known crap fiction than throw my money at a bloated wanker of a crap author.
And I make no bones about it, Any Given Doomsday is some wonderful, sex-drenched crap. Or to be more precise, sexuality-drenched crap, because the sex scenes themselves are pretty vanilla and not terribly explicit. In other words, this book was the perfect airport read: simplistically written so I could handle the story with one eye closed and racy enough to keep things interesting, but not so racy that I'd be embarrassed were someone to lean over my shoulder and glance at the page. Do NOT go into this book expecting anything other than brain floss, but as far as brain floss goes, it's perfect.
That will be all.
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no subject
on 2008-10-09 09:25 am (UTC)I know what you're saying here, but the first image that popped into my head was dental floss for the brain - ouch!
ps - no access to AIM? *makes :-( at you*
no subject
on 2008-10-10 04:08 am (UTC)Douglas Adams
on 2008-10-09 07:09 pm (UTC)Again I curse British authors!
Re: Douglas Adams
on 2008-10-10 04:04 am (UTC)Wonko is awesome, but my favorite passage will forever be the raffle ticket sale in the diner.
Ewww...
on 2008-10-09 09:51 pm (UTC)Re: Ewww...
on 2008-10-10 04:08 am (UTC)Hee! I like it.
The sex in Doomsday is overwhelmingly hetero, gauzily described, with only socially acceptable kink (May-December pairings, harem women, slight "lesbian" overtones with no hint of gay sexuality...you get the idea).
I'm planning on tackling LKH later this semester when I'll likely be sick of intelligent writing in general. (But only if I can get her books from the library. Don't want to pay $$$ for that stuff.)