Wrapped Up in Books, Spring 2005 Edition- In Which Our Heroine Encounters Surly Adolescents, a Hermaphrodite, and a Woman With Only One Buttock

Sincerest apologies to any of you who have been waiting anxiously for a follow up to January's WUiB. No doubt if you were really concerned we'd be getting thousands upon thousands of e-mails expressing shock and dismay that I had thus far failed to produce a follow-up. I did get a request for book recommendations, and I guess I'm willing to consider that public outcry. Shall we?

Cover of the Month

Collected Prose- Paul Auster
I haven't started reading it yet, but after a month or so of Mr. Auster gazing penetratingly at me every time I rounded the corner heading towards the breakroom, I consented to bring him home. It is very apparent to me that he is aware of the power of this picture. First, it's from 1968, probably well before anything collected within was written (my half-assed flipping showed nothing earlier than 1971, and that was a three page piece on Jacques Dupin which I will not be reading anyway). More incriminatingly, most of Auster's face (one eye, nose, mouth) appears again on the spine. The only other example of the author photo on the spine tactic I can come up with: Jewel.

Towelhead- Alicia Erian
This has been my favorite discovery of the past couple of months, but one caveat before I wholeheartedly recommend it: there's a lot of sex, and it's all from a thirteen year old girl's perspective. Assuming you can handle that, there's also some really subtle characterization and the most strikingly realistic adolescent voice I can remember. I'm not really one for lengthy plot recaps, but the story is basically an account of what happens to Jasira when her mother makes her move to Houston with her Lebanese father shortly before the first Gulf War. Sex ensues (although not quite as grossly as that implies).

Prep- Curtis Sittenfeld
I think I got conned into thinking this would be more substantial by the glowing Tom Perrotta quote on the cover. It wasn't terrible, but if you get the desire to read about an adolescent girl (as I apparently seem to ALL THE TIME) go for Towelhead. Also, Tom? "Improbably sexy" it was not.

Candide- Voltaire
This is the one with the woman with one buttock. Pretty funny, for the 18th century.

Middlesex- Jeffrey Eugenides
The Family Tree- Carole Cadwalladr
Two fairly lengthy multi-generational family epics with a lot of content about genetics. I liked them both, but I don't have much to say about either.

Home Land- Sam Lipsyte
I really liked this when I read it, but in the following two months two things have happened to dull my enthusiasm for Home Land. First, it won The Believer's book award. I know that isn't fair, but have you seen how insufferable The Believer has gotten lately? The last couple of Nick Hornby columns have made me ill, and the Rick Moody piece in the latest issue certainly qualifies as one of the most gratuitous articles I've subjected myself to in recent memory- mostly because the topic (the National Book Award finalists) has already been discussed at great length in the letters column, and Moody, as it turns out, has nothing especially revelatory to add. My second reason is mildly more justifiable, and that was my rediscovery of Lipsyte's story in the 2002 edition of the Dave Eggers edited The Best American Nonrequired Reading. The story wasn't too impressive, but that wasn't my issue with it- although it's a completely different character from Home Land's narrator, he has the exact same strange sexual fetish (leg warmers, of all things). That means that either Lipsyte is really lazy, or he's watched a lot of Kathy Smith videos... and presumably not for the fat-burning workout.

Rebels in the Backlot- Sharon Waxman
This is a dishy take on some of the more interesting directors of the 1990s, specifically Paul Thomas Anderson, Steven Soderbergh, David Fincher, Spike Jonze, David O. Russell and Quentin Tarantino. I'm not so sure about those six as the best representatives of "rebel" cinema, but Waxman does uncover some funny gossip (the George Clooney/David O. Russell stuff is pretty hilarious- Clooney thinks he's really down-to-earth and defends crew members from Russell's tirades, culminating in an actual fistfight) and some actual insights (as you may have guessed, all of these guys have major mother issues). Worth checking out if you're in a '90s nostalgia mood.

Experience- Martin Amis
If you're incredibly fascinated by the personal life of Martin Amis, maybe you will enjoy this. Shouldn't that suffice for any review of any celebrity memoir? I guess in cases where the book was so dreadful as to not even be interesting to fans that could be acknowledged, but otherwise, really, what is there to say? This, I suppose: The highlight for me was the lengthy discussion of Amis's horrific dental problems. Honestly.

Daniel Deronda- George Eliot
March, in its entirety, was devoted to Daniel Deronda. I wouldn't really recommend that you devote a month to it. My interest in the Gwendolen Harleth character got me far enough in that I felt obliged to finish it, but I got stuck several times in the middle. I really do love 19th century novels, but I tend to get really bored with characters who are supposed to be paragons of virtue, because apparently back then virtue was best represented by complete humorlessness. One thought- based on this book's unlikely discussion of Kabbalah, I came up with some unsuccessful literary adaptation stunt casting for Daniel Deronda:

Gwendolen Harleth- Madonna (she likes playing characters who should be twenty years younger, right?)
Mirah Lapidoth- Demi Moore (the Kabbalah thing and the bad lit adpatation thing sold me)
Daniel Deronda- Paul Rudd (I pictured DD with a disproportionately large head, for whatever reason)
Mordecai- Daniel Day-Lewis (tubercular Jewish mystic- I figure DDL would get into that)
Harleigh Grandcourt- Josh Homme (this is Gwendolen's completely reprehensible husband... when I said stunt casting I meant it.)

So read Towelhead, read Candide, read Home Land if I didn't creep you out too much, it actually is worthwhile. All I ask is that if you decide to pick up Collected Prose you don't let Paul stare too deeply into your soul.

--MZ--

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Was Middlesex worth reading? I mean, you say 'hermaphrodite' and I say 'I'm there!' but I've been disappointed by shit that normally interests me as of late. I mean, I liked Virgin Suicides well enough but couldn't shake the teen-lit feeling.

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Yeah, I'd say it is. You won't get the teen lit feeling, so don't worry about that- the actual narrator's childhood and adolescence doesn't start until well past page 300. There's incest too, if you're into (reading about) that.

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