Probably my favorite Chabon. I didn't listen to the audiobook, though.
Actually, I was thinking it would be sort of like a pet. You know, we could...we could name her Trixie, or Miss Kitty Fantastico, or something.
Tara ,'Empty Places'
Literary Buffistas 3: Don't Parse the Blurb, Dear.
There's more to life than watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer! No. Really, there is! Honestly! Here's a place for Buffistas to come and discuss what it is they're reading, their favorite authors and poets. "Geez. Crack a book sometime."
-t - Mar 07, 2014 5:06:03 pm PST #22125 of 28348
I am a woman of various inclinations and only some of the time are they to burn everything down in frustration
Dana - Mar 08, 2014 5:05:15 am PST #22126 of 28348
I'm terrifically busy with my ennui.
I couldn't get into it either.
Kat - Mar 08, 2014 7:53:03 am PST #22127 of 28348
"I keep to a strict diet of ill-advised enthusiasm and heartfelt regret." Leigh Bardugo
I liked Yiddish Policeman's Union, but certainly not as much as I liked Kavalier and Clay.
I am test-driving nonfiction for purchase for school. Someone recommended Brain On Fire and I am just OVER the "I got sick" memoirs. Not a genre I love even a little. I don't like memoirs in general, actually. Unless there is some greater significance (like Henrietta Lacks which is beyond just her story).
What I think we will buy so far:
Henrietta Lacks
Devil in the White City (not my choice even a little)
Driving Mr. Alpert
Candyfreak
A Few Seconds of Panic
Amy - Mar 08, 2014 8:01:51 am PST #22128 of 28348
Because books.
Why not Devil in the White City, Kat? I haven't read it yet, but I've been wanting to. (That said, I have books about Jack the Ripper in the past, so.)
I'm reading The Dream Thieves, because it was in at the library, and I am in love with this series. But I'm also partway into The Road and Rose Under Fire.
meara - Mar 08, 2014 8:40:13 am PST #22129 of 28348
Just read one I quite enjoyed: "The Speckled Monster"--about smallpox and London and Boston starting to innoculate, way back when. It was written to read quite easily, but there were a surprising number of endnotes (I figured she was making up 90% of it since there was a fair bit of dialogue and "he thought" and stuff, but apparently a lot of it was actually taken from letters those people wrote and/or diaries).
Kat - Mar 08, 2014 9:08:06 am PST #22130 of 28348
"I keep to a strict diet of ill-advised enthusiasm and heartfelt regret." Leigh Bardugo
Amy, for students, Devil in the White City is entirely boggy in the parts about the building. They love the serial killer stuff but the rest is boring for them (and me).
I read a lot like an average high school kid in what entertains me personally. Like I know where they get hung up and where they get bored.
For example, we have In Cold Blood which is excellent, but there are chunks that are just too slow. Ditto To Kill a Mockingbird (which is, of course, fiction, but there is that whole middle part where I lose kids).
In some ways, the best nonfiction for my students are ones where the writer/researcher is also overtly but tangentially part of the story. So Stiff? Mary Roach is looking at this info because she's interested but also because she is contemplating her own mortality. Plus, gross. So they love it.
I have to get The Speckled Monster because that looks good.
For long form (as opposed to book length), I'm desperate to teach the Atlantic piece on fraternities, but it too is boggy and the opening talks about some frat boy trying to fire a bottle rocket out of his ass. So maybe not? But fascinating and funny. And the author's tone? So overt and snide.
Amy - Mar 08, 2014 9:11:30 am PST #22131 of 28348
Because books.
But then they would know not to fire a bottle rocket out of their asses ...?
Yeah, I didn't think about the boggy parts. I tend to skim them when it's just me, but for class it would a little different.
sj - Mar 08, 2014 9:12:53 am PST #22132 of 28348
"There are few hours in life more agreeable than the hour dedicated to the ceremony known as afternoon tea."
The audiobook for Candy Freak is good fun.
Connie Neil - Mar 08, 2014 10:53:20 am PST #22133 of 28348
brillig
Stiff made me decide to go the full-bore "here, take the whole thing" route for when I die. the University of Utah has a body donor program.
Sue - Mar 08, 2014 12:55:49 pm PST #22134 of 28348
hip deep in pie
Loved Candy Freak. Love the story in Devil in the White city, but found the prose terribly purple in parts.
My favourite non-fiction of the last few years has been Pulphead, by John Jeremiah Sullivan. It's a anthology of his essays though, not a comprehensive story.
Also love Year of Magical Thinking, but probably not so relatable to high school kids.