the season of lists part one - books
Mood:  cool

it's december, the season for "best of" lists, and while i won't be as shallow as to name the most beautiful people of the year or anything like that, i'm not above making lists. hell, i rather like lists. i like organization of information, keeping track of what tv shows to watch, what movies to rent, what books to read, what tv shows have been watched (or recorded), what movies have been viewed, what books have been read. it's all good fun for obsessives like me. so, without further ado, here's a probably incomplete list of my favorite books* (in no particular order):

• house of leaves by mark danielewski - a strangely put together book, involving multiples layers of plot (author is writing for a young man who seems to be losing his mind and is providing often (seemingly) unrelated footnotes on a manuscript he found written by a crazy, possible nonexistent old man about a film that never existed about a house that never existed), footnotes, typesetting bordering on pretentious (until you bother to actually read for context) and a central mystery (a house that is bigger inside than outside) that is quite powerful
• the poisonwood bible by barbara kingsolver - the story of a missionary and his family told through the voices of several narrators (the missionary's wife and daughters, taking turns), a fascinating journey into africa and many social and politcal issues, not to mention a great family story and a memorable sequence involving natural destruction at the hands (so to speak) of an army of ants
• hearts in atlantis by stephen king - actually a group of interrelated stories (two novellas and three short stories), all dealing with vietnam (before, during and after) and the politics of the 60s and 70s, connected through a group of children and a violent incident from the past. brilliantly constructed, violently emotional, nothing like what most people would expect from king
• bag of bones by stephen king - one of king's many books about writing, the emotional core of this story (a widower falling in love with a young mother and her child even as he deals with a ghostly mystery and the sudden death of his wife) raises this above the others
• lolita by vladimir nabakov - a bit of poetry; it's amazing how nabakov (whose first language was russian) can do so well in english, with great imagery, evocative metaphor and a great story about obsession and love (not pedophilia, as you might expect)
• dune by frank herbert - the first of a series, a great treatise on politics buried in a richly detailed science fiction world
• god emperor of dune by frank herbert - the tale of a half worm, half man mad with power and those who would attempt to thwart his rule. the second and third book of the dune series seemed like flimsy little placeholders to me, adding to the overall story only a little, like there was a demand for sequels before herbert had ever envisioned any, but this fourth book has a richness that makes it stand beside the original.
• catcher in the rye by j d salinger - what to say about this one? there isn't much plot to speak of. it's all about the narrator and his aimlessness, his detestation of the world of adults. but that barely describes it
• to kill a mockingbird by harper lee - a brilliantly simple and deceptively complex story, about growing up, about secrets, racism, and so much more
• the adventures of huckleberry finn by mark twain - above all, i always saw this one as being about the power of imagination to improve any situation
• crime and punishment by fyodor doystoevsky - a densely written novel about a young man determined to commit a crime and prove there don't have to be consequences
• 1984 by george orwell - a prescient look at the omnipresent media/government and the death of the individual
• insomnia by stephen king - another dense novel by king, this one focused on an old man who fins his insomnia gives him the ability to see beings that cut away the life force of those who die, leading into a supernatural struggle to stop a disaster, not to mention a back and forth debate about abortion, a little like the early chapters of king's tommyknockers gives us a serious debate about nuclear weapons
• replay by ken grimwood - a surprisingly powerful but fairly simple story about a man who gets to live his life over and over again, finding ways to improve upon what has come before, fix past mistakes and find happiness (if he can)
• ishmael by daniel quinn - one of those books that can change your life if you give it the chance. not really a novel but more a conversation about the state of the world and modern culture and where humanity has gone wrong in "growing up"
• my ishamel by daniel quinn - the sequel that continues the conversation, taking it in different directions and giving using a little more of a more novel-like structure
• it by stephen king - don't trust the miniseries, which, despite its pathetic ending, was still well made. this book is a seriously epic look at childhood and growing up and finding who you are as a grown up, not to mention the supernatural aspects, the allusions to numerous horror film staples and the unfilmable battle in the end, a great exercise in characterization
• ender's game by orson scott card - a classic science fiction novel about a brilliant boy destined for greatness, sent away to battle school to play at zero-g war and learn how to fight aliens, except that descripton makes it sound far too shallow
• speaker for the dead by orson scott card - the sequel to ender's game that brings ender into adulthood, fashions a brilliant alien world, gives us a disturbing and powerful family dynamic, a fantastic way of looking at death (and the life of the recently deceased) and, in my view, surpasses it's predecessor
• i know this much is true by wally lamb - take a simple tale of twin brothers, one schizophrenic and hospitalized, one whose life is falling apart and expand it into a detailed character study several hundred pages long, and you've got this book
• the story of b by daniel quinn - take quinn's angle on modern culture and focus it on religion and a character who is essentially the antichrist
• after dachau by daniel quinn - a deceptive metaphor about life focused on a woman who wakes one day to recall a life lived previously and who may provide a drastically different way of viewing the world
• lord of the flies by william golding - the simple tale of a group of planewrecked boys stranded on an island and letting go of the trappings of modern life only to fall prey to their own savage ways
• brave new world by aldous huxley - like 1984, this book seems more prescient than it seems a treatise on it's own present, about the way of the world to sedate us into conformity
• the sea came in at midnight by steve erickson - an eerily complex novel, moving forward and backward in time, shifting perspectives and narrators and looping around on itself so that, in a way, it's hard to be sure what it's all about
• from the corner of his eye by dean koontz - about the coincidence and interconnectedness of our lives, and also (contrary to what one might expect i would enjoy) about god and his place in life
• false memory by dean koontz - despite one glaring detail that bugged the hell out of me (and which i brought up to the author at a signing), this seemingly overlong novel about three people succumbing to the sudden onset of severe phobias turns out to be a fantastic exercise in characters, with one of the more powerful scenes i've ever read
• american gods by neil gaiman - about the gaudy faux religious trinkets and landmarks of modern america. though written by british gaiman, a strangely insightful look at american culture through the trappings of a weirdly supernatural plot
• the holy by daniel quinn - a look under the surface of america and the world, at strange goings on behind the scenes of the reality we know. a let down in the end (though not anywhere near as much as quinn's newcomer's guide to the afterlife was) but a great read anyway, with some great imagery
• the third chimpanzee by jared diamond - a look at what truly sets humans apart from other mammals and the other two chimpanzees (diamond's contention being that humans are just, well, the title says it all), with looks at the origins in other species of what has become in humans drug use and self desructive behavior, including the making of nuclear weapons
• guns, germs and steel by jared diamond - a richly detailed look at what makes different cultures different, from the availability of specific edible plants to the presence of large mammals, from continent to continent and how geography has shaped the evolution of culture
• hamlet by william shakespeare - a man going crazy after the death of his father at the hands of his uncle who's having an affair with his mother, or a man bent on revenge because his father's ghost demands it
• high fidelity by nick hornby - a book about lists and about men and about relationships, as the main character tracks down the five greatest break ups of his life to discover why his girlfriend recently left him
• about a boy by nick hornby - a man with the simplest life he can make for himself finds it complicated after he pretends to have a son in order to meet more interesting women than he might usually
• fever pitch by nick hornby - hornby's autobiograpy by way of an exploration of his obsession with soccer, told through anecdotal accounts of the games that figure in the major cornerstone events of his life
• into the great wide open by kevin canty - a relatively straightforward tale about two teens falling in love, complicated by their miserable lives outside of each other <

watchlist for yesterday:

• house "damned if you do" - though the tea was obvious, the humor in this episode, not to mention regular jabs at religion, was great
• veronica mars "an echolls' family christmas" - predictable ending with the poker game culprit but the why of it was a great mystyer and the stalker plot was done well with a fantastic ending, not to mention veronica's confrontation with jake kane
• ghost hunters - the evp wasn't too impressive this time, but it's refreshing in a way to have a couple episodes now where the team didn't really find much of anything. the approach of proving the science over the supernatural is a great new angle for a show like this
• the daily show - nothing special but it's the daily show, funny and great even at its worst
• south park "woodland critter christmas" - wrong in so many ways, like the best of south park's episodes. gotta love stan demanding that there's a point to this when he's stuck helping the mountain lion cubs learn how to perform abortions... for those of you who didn't see this, that must sound either disturbing or hilarious out of context

watchlist for today:

• zatoichi
• the door in the floor

* not limited to novels, obviously, as there are some plays or nonfiction works involved, though i've left comics out for now