I just took a look at the New York Times 100 notable books of 2011. I haven’t read a single one of them. I’m actually a bit surprised, while not as voracious a reader as I used to be, taking a look at my Kindle, I do see that I have read more in the past year than usual.
I’m not entirely sure what makes a book notable enough to be listed on the New York Times most notable list. Does it mean that other books aren’t good? Does it mean the ones on this list made more money for their publishers and authors. By whose standards is a book on this list decided to be “notable”?
A long time ago I got in the habit of not reading the latest books out, because pre-Kindle, you had to buy them in a bookstore, and the new books were only available in hard-back versions. I could never afford that, so I usually waited for them to be available in paperback versions.
Then paperback books got to be priced out of my reach, and I pretty much just stopped reading. I found other things to do with my time. If I’m in the mood to read, I can kill off 3 or 4 books in a week, and at $15 a pop for a paperback, that becomes difficult to maintain, at least if you also want to pay the mortgage and eat.
The Kindle has finally begun to renew my interest in reading, but apparently, my tastes aren’t what makes the editors at the New York Times go all silly in the knees.
Looking over my Kindle list, I’m surprised to seem some 40 books on there, most of which I’ve read. Probably the most prominent are the Suzanne Collins trilogy of The Hunger Games.
I’ve read similar books in the past, I’ve been reading the genre since I was in Jr. High School. Her books are good, but they aren’t the first about a world like the one she describes. Still, interesting reading.
I just finished a most interesting book by Jeffrey Rounds, A Cage of Bones apparently written some years back. It details the life of a young man who stumbles into a career as a model, and then manages to screw it up, in a somewhat startling way.
Also, on my Kindle, a great book named The Dirty Parts of the Bible that made me laugh, and How I paid for College which also made me laugh.
I also have a wonderful book on Tennessee Williams, Walking On Glass: A Memoir of the later days of Tennessee Williams. I don’t think it’s so much about Tennessee Williams as it is about the author who wrote it, but it’s still a great read. I know the author, and unfortunately he also happens to be bat shit crazy. I guess all good artists are, in some way.
I also have a couple by Christopher Rice, can’t wait for his next one. He’s very good, but apparently not nearly as prolific as his mother. I was also delighted to find Marion Zimmer Bradley’s The Catch Trap, one of my all time favorite books. I have a paperback copy as well, but it is getting some age on it.
Another book I read on a recent trip to Florida had my partner looking at me quizzically as I giggled my way through it. I’ll have to see if Dale Peck has any more, I really enjoyed the one I read.
Still on my Kindle to read are Escape from Camp 14: One Man’s Remarkable Odyssey from North Korea to Freedom in the West. I think I actually read about this one in the Times, but it is a 2012 book, so doesn’t appear on their 2011 most notable list.
Maybe when I see the 2012 list, I’ll have read a book or two from it. I doubt it will make me feel more in tune with the world…I read whatever strikes my fancy, and whether or not it is on someones list has little to do with how I feel about it.