A Slow Ride Through the Complexities of Infidelity

Title: Adultery
Author: Paulo Coelho
Length: 272 pages
Year Written: 2014
Why I chose this book: I love Paulo Coelho and picked this book up at the airport on a trip.

I love Paulo Coelho. Who didn't love The Alchemist? He is a wizard with words and even more so with feelings. His personality permeates even through fiction. He is clearly a peaceful, happy man who understands what it's like to not be peaceful or happy. Not only do we battle a perceived emptiness of wealth and success (like Santiago in search of his treasure), we second guess ourselves in many ways when we consider how the realities of our happiness and fulfillment match up with expectations. There is often a circular yet treacherous journey associated with our search for these elusive goals in life. Money. Love. Satisfaction.

Adultery was not The Alchemist. It was modern, it was specific, and the protagonist was a woman. I hate to say that the representation of the female narrator was a bit unnatural coming from Coelho, but some of it may have to do with cultural and language translations. The main character in Adultery takes us through her daily life as a successful businesswoman with loving husband and two kids. Nothing is amiss until she has a run-in with an old boyfriend from high school. You can probably tell by the name of the book how the rest of the story goes.

This book is somewhat of a slow read, but has some great moments that make it worth it. As with anything you read by Coelho, you will definitely feel something along the way.

Rating: 8/10

Non-Fictional Fiction About An Old Guy's Crazy Sex Life

Title: Women
Author: Charles Bukowski
Length: 304 pages
Year Written: 1978
Why I chose this book: This was a contender for my book club a few years back, and I'd always been curious about it.

Charles Bukowski's Women follows a specific recipe: introduce a woman, describe her affair with the main character Henry Chinaski, then get rid of her before the next woman comes along. There are really many, many women in Women.

Chinaski is 50 years old, having recently left his job at the post office to become an author. He reaches a decent level of fame with his fiction and poetry, most notably in the number of women who shamelessly throw themselves at him, through rotary phone calls and snail mail, mostly. It is an autobiographical tale with a the label "fiction" loosely veiling it. The entire premise of Women is that Chinaski is fucking a slew of women as research for his writing. This is not without moments of self-reflection, mild epiphanies, and varied human emotion, but for the most part, it is about fucking. His sexual escapades with women, who are generally half his age, are usually ridiculous and often unsavory. But they are realistic, they are entertaining.

After watching a show about Bukowski on Netflix, and seeing him scream at his wife that she's a whore for going out to dance every night, I wanted to read his fiction and compare it to my shallowly-built perception of him. It all checks out. He is tall, fat, drunk, and charmingly chauvinistic, if there is such a thing. As a writer, he is honest if nothing else. His style of fiction writing is in some ways inspirational and other ways directionless. Personally, I prefer his poetry—I bought his collection of poems Love Is A Dog From Hell at the same time as this book and found it more enjoyable overall.

Rating: 7.7/10

A Scientifically Sound, Emotionally Disconnected Guide To Surviving On Mars Alone

Title: The Martian
Author: Andy Weir
Length: 369 pages
Year Written: 2011
Why I chose this book: The Martian was adapted into a film and released last Thursday. My friend Marianna highly recommended the book and I decided to read it before going to see the movie.

The Martian is the novel you would expect from a longtime programmer/space nerd/first-time author. Andy Weir writes about astronaut Mark Watney, who is stranded on Mars after an accident that his crewmates assumed killed him. He survives mostly on the strength of his ingenuity and background as a skilled botanist. This book is interesting, very well-researched and actually quite brilliant in regards to the space travel scenarios it illustrates. That said, it has all the elements of a great movie, but in a literary respect, is lacking certain depths.

The plot itself was interesting: it involves a lot of creative science, and innovative solutions to problems astronauts have yet to face. My problem was that I could never form a genuine connection with Watney. After learning his background and interests (which I could naturally have assumed, anyway), I realized Andy Weir is Mark Watney. This is all I could really think while reading: “shut up, you’re not funny, you’re stuck on Mars” or “Oh, Andy. You WISH you were Mark Watney (or Matt Damon).” In fact, at the end of the book there is an interview with Weir, and this was one of the questions:

"Do you have anything in common with your wisecracking hero Mark Watney?
I'm the same level of smart-ass that he is. It was a really easy book to write; I just had him say what I would say. However, he's smarter than I am and considerably more brave. I guess he's who I wish I were."

This tidbit is evident throughout the entire novel.

Watney is a quintessential wise-ass, often unrealistically flippant in response to life-threatening situations. I don't buy the fact that he was so lighthearted and sarcastic during an experience that was marked by painstaking work, putrid smells, and pure isolation. As a reader, I want more focus on his mental state, especially considering a large portion of the book is formatted as journal entries from Watney. The idea of being stranded alone on a planet for more than a year has so many more possible avenues than this story decided to embark upon (think the movies I Am Legend or Gravity). The story line of The Martian could go much deeper but instead ends up being a surficial semi-sci-fi novel that just happens to be jam packed with legitimate science that Weir actually worked out himself.

This is not to take away from the pure brilliance that seeps through the pages of The Martian. It’s just very clear he wrote it as a way to flex his science smarts and perhaps as a creative resume for a job at NASA.

Rating: 7.5/10

A Vacation You Would Probably Never Take IRL

Title: The Sly Company of People Who Care
Author: Rahul Bhattacharya
Length: 278 pages
Year Written: 2011
Why I chose this book: I found this book in the Kinokuniya bookstore in Los Angeles, and was intrigued by the cover and title.

This book officially has broken the record for longest time it's taken me to read anything (relatively short in length) from beginning to end. I started reading in October and didn't finish until a few days ago. That's five months, a time period in which a lot has transpired in my personal life. By the time the plot switched gears a little more than halfway through, it was easy to identify parallels between the book and my life, and all in all it was a strangely rewarding experience. (Side note: This is also only the second book I've finished in 2015—suffice it to say it's been a lazy year for reading.)

The main character of The Sly Company of People Who Care is a 26-year-old journalist from Bombay who leaves everything in India behind for a rudimentary life in Guyana. One a one-year visa, he navigates the poverty-stricken but awe-inspiring terrain of a new country populated by a smattering of different cultures and customs. He eventually meets a woman that captures his attention and they embark on an adventurous and volatile relationship that eventually lands them in a lot of trouble.

Language and the way Bhattacharya employs it was the most important part of this reading experience for me. The book is chock-full of regional dialect and though that sometimes slowed down my reading, it also paid off well in many moments. Another important part of this reading experience was the vacation that it takes you on. Unless you're Guyanese, you probably weren't thinking of traveling to Guyana. Bhattacharya's main character takes an unlikely vacation that people often question him about, incredulously. The book's ability to transport you to an entirely different place that you probably have zero prior reference for, so acutely, speaks to the layered, complex nature of the writing. Overall, it was an interesting read that took way too long to finish.

Rating: 7/10

A Great Novel for the Elderly and the Basic

Title: The Five People You Meet in Heaven
Author: Mitch Albom
Length: 196 pages
Year Written: 2003
Why I chose this book: I picked this up when I was working at Barnes and Noble (roughly 6 years ago). It's earmarked in a bunch of different places, but I didn't recall much (or any) of the story. It seemed like a nice, wholesome choice to start off my reading in 2015.

From the title alone, you can assume a few things about The Five People You Meet in Heaven. You can assume it has religious undertones, likely a tad cheesy. You can assume it is a feel-good story with a happy ending. You can also assume that Mitch Albom, who also wrote Tuesdays with Morrie, will, from time to time, tug at your heart strings and tear ducts. Ultimately, it was a cute story, but nothing groundbreaking or deeply profound. It might be a nice book to read if I was anticipating an imminent death. Or if I was a religious type who made a New Year's resolution to read more books. This would be the perfect choice.

TFPYMIH (horrible acronym) is the story of Eddie, an old maintenance guy at a beach pier amusement park. He dies, and then meets five people from his life, in their respective heavens, who then explain to him the meaning of his life's events. It is cute, and it is short. Some parts, mainly a section involving Eddie as a soldier in battle in the Philippines, are quite gruesome, but Albom's writing is more on the side of fable than truly convincing fiction. I didn't cry, and I cry at a lot of things, so there's that. At best, I probably smiled, and might have let out a small gasp at one or two moments.

Rating: 7.7/10

Book 30: Tropic of Cancer by Henry Miller

Title: Tropic of Cancer
Author: Henry Miller
Length: 318 pages
Year Written: 1934
Why I chose this book: A tattered, almost obliterated copy of this book was lent to me by my friend Kevin. I took it, but bought a copy on iBooks for ease of reading.

This was not a bad book, but it was a bad choice. As you can see, it has been a MONTH since I last finished a book, and it's December. This means that I have less than a month to read 20 more books. Fortunately for me, this is one of those challenges that you can still feel good about regardless of the outcome (kind of like running a marathon for charity or something like that). Plus, some people won't read 30 books in 30 years. Hmm. Anyway, I say this book was a bad choice because it certainly would be more enjoyable sans a hovering timeline. It is a book that provides profoundly meaningful tidbits, about life and the human condition, but not necessarily a quick and easily digested storyline.

Tropic of Cancer is one of those books I've always known of (perhaps initially through an episode of Seinfeld) but had no clue about its content. The only thing I knew, just prior to starting, was that it was initially banned, which is not a concept my modern mind can necessarily grasp. It turns out that Tropic of Cancer is a surly, kind of depressing, half-fiction account of author Henry Miller's nomadic life in Paris as a struggling writer. The novel is chock-full of dirt, both sexually and hygienically. Life for Henry Miller between 1930 and 1934 was apparently laden with lice, starvation, and whores. I later learned that he based many of his characters on people he knew in real life, including beastly poetic writer Anais Nin (who I read earlier this year, and now realize was probably writing about cheating on her husband with Miller). They apparently had quite the passionate affair that many speculate to have crystallized in his character "Tania":

"I am fucking you, Tania, so that you'll stay fucked. And if you are afraid of being fucked publicly I will fuck you privately. I will tear off a few hairs from your cunt and paste them on Boris' chin. I will bite into your clitoris and spit out two franc pieces..."

More than the actual novel itself, I am fascinated with the circumstances that led to the novel's creation. I am blown away by the inspiration that two awesomely nasty writers shone onto one another in the nude and then onto paper. I'm also fascinated with the feeling of being a fly on the wall of some unintentional bigot's dilapidated Parisian quarters in the 1930s. The novel can be quite graphic, but honestly contains nothing more offensive than life itself. It has been heralded as the literary work that paved the way for our current freedom of expression in fiction. For that, especially, I am grateful.

Rating: 8.3/10

Book 29: The Giver by Lois Lowry

Title: The Giver
Author: Lois Lowry
Length: 225 pages
Year Written: 1993
Why I chose this book: Like the last book, this one was recommended to me by my friend Kevin (which means it will be a great, meaningful book that I absolutely love).

Long after Brave New World, but years before The Hunger Games trilogy, Lois Lowry wrote this brilliant, powerful, yet simple story about many of the same dystopian visions that seem to recur throughout popular literature. The Giver is a kid's book, but relevant to all ages. For those unfamiliar with Aldous Huxley's masterpiece Brave New World, it is about a society where babies are bred for particular careers, and everyone is too doped up on a drug called "soma" to ever consider the bigger picture, or even the existence of one. People are generally more familiar with The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins, in which kids aged 12 through 18 are entered into an annual drawing where boy and one girl are selected from each of the 12 districts to fight in an arena (though more like a complete ecosystem) until one survivor remains. The Giver is not as complex as Brave, nor as violent as Hunger, but much more moving than either.

The main character, Jonas, is a young boy who lives in a community where everything is rigid and controlled. Births are regulated to 50 per year, and each "newchild" is closely monitored so that on their twelfth birthday (which occurs as a mass ceremony every December) they can receive a job assignment from the community's elders, for which they immediately start their training. Though many kids already know what they will be assigned, because of their expressed interests and hobbies, Jonas has no idea what he will get. So, of course, he gets assigned a mystical, prestigious, but super mysterious and scary job: Receiver of Memory. Essentially, his job is to hold all the memories of the world so that everyone else doesn't have to. This turns out to be, like, the biggest gift/curse combo you could ever imagine.

Jonas goes through about a year of very painful self-discovery and newfound awareness, which all culminates in a simple, slightly unfinished ending. Lowry's reserved, elegant style of writing definitely add to the pleasure of reading this story. Moreover, it gives us highly relevant but perhaps uncomfortable food for thought.

Rating: 9.7/10

Book 28: The Celestine Prophecy by James Redfield

Title: The Celestine Prophecy
Author: James Redfield
Length: 246 pages
Year Written: 1993
Why I chose this book: This was lent to me under high recommendation from my young Henry Miller-Murakami, better known as my friend Kevin.

In all caps, the back cover of this book boasts: "A BOOK THAT COMES ALONG ONCE IN A LIFETIME TO CHANGE LIVES FOREVER." This might seem a bit corny or pretentious (corntentious), but after finishing this very spiritual novel, I can't say it is inaccurate. This book is similar in content and attitude to others I have read (Siddhartha, The Alchemist), but delivered in a way that is more modern, much more specific, and perhaps more relevant.

The narrator of The Celestine Prophecy never goes into much detail about himself, his life, or even his appearance. Now that I think about it, I'm not sure he ever gives his name, either (though if I missed that completely, I'll feel pretty foolish). The first chapter throws the reader into a dinner with a longtime, rarely-seen woman/friend, where the narrator is informed about a secret, widely-debated Manuscript circulating in Peru. This Manuscript deals with our understanding of ourselves, our purpose on Earth, and what we must do to achieve enlightenment and move towards our destinies. It all sounds cheesy, but I swear, it's not.

The rest of the book follows the narrator as he discovers the different Insights of the Manuscript one by one as he voyages the jungles of Peru, now made dangerous by government officials and police seeking to prohibit dissemination of the document. The Insights are the heart of The Celestine Prophecy, because they actually make sense, and answer a lot of the questions that we have, and ones that we forgot we should have. The Insights discuss things from the proper way to interact with children, to the importance of speaking with every person you make eye contact with. And, of course, the book's content heralds highly the meaning of coincidences. This is the first thing we've got to start paying attention to, if we ever hope to (Andre 3000 voice) vibrate higherrrrrr, and evolve into really kick-ass super-sentient beings.

This book was very interesting, though a bit lacking in the creative style of the language. Every character seems to speak the same way, and deliver information on-time and in full as the plot progresses. I have a sneaking suspicion that before writing this story, James Redfield wrote (or stumbled upon some version of) the Manuscript in question. Nevertheless, it's worth reading, though it may take a while. Redfield packs each sentence with need-to-knows. It's no lazy read.

Rating: 8.8/10

Book 26: The Sirens of Titan by Kurt Vonnegut

Title: The Sirens of Titan
Author: Kurt Vonnegut
Length: 319 pages
Year Written: 1959
Why I chose this book: I really liked Cat's Cradle and dig Kurt Vonnegut as a human (RIP).

I hate to admit that this is a science fiction novel, but it really is. Most of the plot revolves around space and time travel, and a Martian invasion on Earth. But it really doesn't read as Star Trek as that all sounds. [Quick side note: this is the first book I've read on my phone using iBooks. Thought I'd hate it, but I didn't. I've always been a traditional paper-page-turning reader gal, but reading on my phone was surprisingly convenient and even enjoyable. Yay technology!]

Anyway, The Sirens of Titan is really a very deep book presented in a witty, almost goofy way. It is about a vapid playboy named Malachi Constant who becomes a brainless soldier on Mars named Unk, and eventually returns to Earth as a prophesied wandering space traveler. The plot is wildly imaginative and would seem like a coleslaw of non-sequiturs if not for the fact that everything eventually ties together seamlessly and beautifully.

Vonnegut really has a knack for making you examine not just yourself but mankind altogether. The central themes of this book are, in my opinion, free will and purpose. What if our bigger picture is just a speck in a bigger picture? What is the biggest picture? Reading this book made me smile. It reminded me just how much we really don't know shit about life. Vonnegut, like every good writer, writes about the same things in many different ways throughout his works. He has a brilliant, almost sacrilegious sense of humor, and what seems to be quite the lovely take on life and death. It makes me feel so at peace about his being dead (RIP again).

"Luck, good or bad, is not the hand of God. Luck is the way the wind swirls and the dust settles eons after God has passed by."

Rating: 9.8/10

Book 25: Fight Club by Chuck Palahniuk

Title: Fight Club

Author: Chuck Palahniuk

Length: 218 pages

Year Written: 1996

Why I chose this book: I love Palahniuk but always overlook this book, because in all its acclaim, the story still never appealed to me.

When I first started reading Fight Club, I knew the story, more or less. I thought I'd never seen the movie, either, but had caught enough cable re-run snippets of it that I couldn't be surprised by anything in the plot. Turns out that the more I read, the more I realized I could see Edward Norton and Helena Bonham Carter acting out each scene. I guess I saw more of the movie than I remembered. It kind of ruined the reading experience for me just a bit. 

The basic story is that an insomniac starts a fight club and mischief gang, with the help of his evil friend Tyler Durden who is actually his schizo alter-ego. The book may have been better if I'd read it blindly, not knowing that Brad Pitt is really Edward Norton. 

I've read several books by Chuck Palahniuk, but this was his first. I appreciate the fact that he is incessantly, reliably disgusting, and never shies away from the most grotesque descriptions possible. It wasn't my favorite Palahniuk book, but I already knew it wouldn't be. It seems that he has only mastered his craft of yucky fiction brilliance in the 18 years since his debut novel. It's not a bad book, and I'm sure in some rights it's a classic, but I didn't care for it all that much. 

Rating: 7/10

Book 24: What We Talk About When We Talk About Love by Raymond Carver

Title: What We Talk About When We Talk About Love

Author: Raymond Carver

Length: 159 pages

Year Written: 1981

Why I chose this book: This is my roommate's book, and the title interested me. I love reading what people write about love. 

This is the first book of the year that has actually been a collection of short stories. Generally, I don't enjoy short story collections, because I have abandonment issues. I can't stand the idea of investing in characters and a plot for just a few pages before being yanked into another completely different scenario. And if this is what I hate, then I truly hate What We Talk About When We Talk About Love. But strangely, I don't. I liked the book's incompleteness, failure to deliver answers to some of your most important questions, and cryptic realism. My roommate called it a "total snoozefest." She didn't like it because she was left wondering most of the time. But this is the type of book that won't appeal to all readers. Some people read for information, others read for the joy of reading. Carver's stories deliver a short-lived experience packed with startlingly real emotion. I think the point of his stories are simply to feel, to read and absorb ordinary (yet extraordinary in their own right) moments that usually go undocumented.

One example of a story in What We Talk About drops you immediately in a kitchen with two quarreling lovers and their young baby. The woman kicks the man out, and he won't leave without the baby. He grabs for it, and they yank the infant back and forth between the two of them. The story is only three pages long, but fills you with enough discomfort to make it feel like you just saw it happen in real life. There are many cringeworthy moments in this book, and though none of them are particularly dazzling, they are all quite real. The title was a little misleading, because although this book does have much to do with love, it's not in a very romantic or typically pleasant way. Carver is an obviously talented writer, however, and it came as no surprise to find out he started his career as a poet.

Rating: 8/10

Book 23: The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho

Title: The Alchemist

Author: Paulo Coelho

Length: 172 pages

Year Written: 1988 

Why I chose this book: My friend Kevin told me that this book was similar to Siddhartha (novel by Hermann Hesse), and on top of that, I know it's a classic that most people read in school (but again, I somehow didn't). 

I read that Paulo Coelho wrote The Alchemist in just two weeks, because the story was already written in his heart. If you've read The Alchemist, that just makes the most perfect sense. This book transported me to such a pure place, and touched my heart like only a simple, majestic allegory can (read: Siddhartha). It's about a young Andalusian shepherd named Santiago who decides to follow his dreams (literally) to the Egyptian pyramids. All the while. the world is conspiring to help him achieve his destiny. I admit, it sounds a little corny when you describe it to others, but reading it, it completely enchants you. There are so many life lessons to be learned in this book. No wonder it's been referred to as "more self-help than fiction."

If you've never read this book, now is the perfect time. It's a very fast, enjoyable read that is bound to stick with you in one way or another. There are many, many notable quotes in this book, but this one pretty much sums up the feel of the novel:

"The Soul of the World is nourished by people's happiness. And also by unhappiness, envy, and jealousy. To realize one's destiny is a person's only obligation. All things are one. And, when you want something, all the universe conspires in helping you to achieve it."

Rating: 9.9/10

Book 22: Written On The Body by Jeanette Winterson

Title: Written On The Body
Author: Jeanette Winterson
Length: 190 pages
Year Written: 1992
Why I chose this book: I was assigned this book in a Women's Studies class I took in college. Even though there are notes in the book (in my handwriting), I couldn't remember actually reading any of it.

This was an unexpectedly difficult read, especially coming off the heels of a few more traditional novels with straightforward story lines. Written On The Body, the story of a person and their affair with a married woman, often seems more like poetry than prose. And I use the word "person" because the narrator in this story is genderless. Rather, they do have a gender, but it is never mentioned. This was the only thing I knew about the book when I started to read, and so I caught myself searching for clues as to whether this was a man or a woman. And there really is no way to tell, but that's kind of the point. Jeanette Winterson is telling a story of love and passion beyond gender. Written On The Body is a story about the way love can consume you, get you into ridiculous situations, and run your life so far off course that you don't know what's what.

This book was so fucking quotable, too. It's a Tumblr dream. Winterson has such an ethereal way with words, that even when you aren't quite sure what she means, you feel it anyway. Here are a few of the quotes I marked:

"The day before Wednesday last, this time a year ago, you were here and now you're not. Why not? Death reduces us to the baffled logic of a small child. If yesterday why not today? And where are you?" 

"Why is it that the most unoriginal thing we can say to one another is still the thing we long to hear? 'I love you' is always a quotation. You did not say it first and neither did I, yet when you say and when I say it we speak like savages who have found three words and worship them."

"When she bleeds the smells I know change color. There is iron in her soul on those days. She smells like a gun." 

Rating: 8.5/10

Book 21: A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini

Title: A Thousand Splendid Suns
Author: Khaled Hosseini
Length: 367 pages
Year Written: 2007
Why I chose this book: It was recommended to me by my friend Aria!

When I was little, I was big on the Dear America series—these were basically fictional diaries of young girls who lived through slavery, or the Trail of Tears, or the Titanic, or other historical times. They were great books, and educational in a kind of roundabout way. Not since third grade have I read a really good piece of historical fiction, until A Thousand Splendid Suns. It is his second book, published four years after The Kite Runner, indisputably his most famous novel. I haven't read The Kite Runner, but if the storytelling technique and writing style is anything like Splendid (which I would bet a lot of money on), it's probably coming up very soon on my to-read list.

Splendid is a story spanning thirty years, set in Afghanistan against the backdrop of the real-life war and violence that has gripped the country for decades. It is divided between the perspectives of Mariam and Laila, two women with very different upbringings who find themselves in a similar situations of helplessness and captivity. For me, the novel brought to light a perspective I can't imagine I would have come across otherwise. It's astonishing to think that everything we have been told about war with Afghanistan has been filtered and edited so that we are blind, or perhaps numb, to the atrocities the Afghan people have endured—at the hands of the military, the rebels, and the Americans alike. I cried during one part of the book, audibly groaned at others. One scene involving a Caesarian section made my limbs weak and my eyes blur. That's what a good book can do to you.

Khaled Hosseini is a very talented writer with a gift for simple yet illustrative storytelling. Though his characters can at times feel predictable, you always feel that these people are real. And it's probably because, in a way, they are.

Rating: 9.8/10

Book 19: The Catcher In The Rye by J.D. Salinger

Title: The Catcher In The Rye
Author: J.D. Salinger
Length: 216 pages
Year Written: 1945
Why I chose this book: I know that this is an important piece of literature, one I somehow managed to sidestep in my many English classes throughout life.

Before opening my copy of The Catcher In The Rye, I had absolutely no idea what it would be about. I didn't want to spoil my sense of wonder by checking Wikipedia or SparkNotes, and so, once I started reading, I was a bit surprised. The story seemed so normal. It was just about a kid who seemed to hate everything. He didn't have friends, didn't have sex, and kept getting kicked out of schools. I kept reading and reading, waiting for the big moment of clarity about why this book is such a heralded work. There was never a big moment. It was more the general after-impression left by this narrative that was remarkable. The main character, Holden Caulfield, is seriously maladjusted. He thinks everything and everyone is fucking stupid and phony—except for himself, of course. In the same vein, it is also unsettling that the book is narrated by Holden. I have serious trust issues with first-person narratives. Anyway, as you read, you learn some things about him, and continue to see him unravel, until you realize the book is over and you've just experienced one of the all-time greatest novels ever written. The feeling you feel at this point certainly begs for a much closer re-read. Especially for those who were lucky enough to actually study this book in high school, reading it again as an adult would almost certainly prove to be a rewarding experience. Salinger is awesome. I read this book and I just wish we could be text buddies.

This book took an unusually long time for me to read, considering its relatively short length, but I blame it on a 10-day vacation I took recently (I was reading another book originally, and left it in Houston on a connecting flight).

The most striking part of the book is when you find out the meaning of the book's title. I remember always wondering what in the fuck a catcher in a rye was. Now I know. Oh, how I know. It also reminds me a lot of the much newer novel The Perks of Being A Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky, which must have found some slight inspiration in Holden Caulfield. Both are decently funny, semi-depressing stories of an awkward boy. Overall, The Catcher In The Rye is a tale of growth, pain, and alienation—but most people already know that. I'm the one who just found out.

Rating: 9.3/10

Book 18: A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith

Title: A Tree Grows in Brooklyn

Author: Betty Smith

Length: 493 pages

Year Written: 1943

Why I chose this book: Only knew of it in the sense that it’s an important, classic novel. And I love to tackle those.

A Tree Grows in Brooklyn took an excessively long time for me to finish reading. The book is just shy of 500 pages, and more importantly, it covers nearly two decades of the life of a poor family in Brooklyn. I read about how Katie met Johnny, they got married, had Francie and Neeley a year apart—then I followed Francie through childhood, adolescence, and eventually adulthood. I am, at this point, thoroughly invested in Francie and her family. I’ve spent three weeks with them.

In the book’s introduction, Anna Quindlen writes that A Tree in Brooklyn is “not the sort of book that can be reduced to its plot line.” It is about the human experience. It is about family, failures, fortunes, friendships. It is about a little girl who is aware that her younger brother is favored, a little girl that reads no less than one book a day, a girl that pretends with her family that they are in the North Pole awaiting  rescue when there is no food in the house. It is about her alcoholic dad, her proud mom, her wise grandmother, her irreverent aunts. It is sometimes heartbreaking and most of the time intriguing, reading about this small slice of life during a time I can’t fathom living through. Times in this book were hard, but nothing that the human spirit won’t fight against with utter resilience.

All in all, the book was a bit long, but ripe with realness. It’s almost reminiscent of To Kill A Mockingbird, with Francie and Neeley giving a little bit of a Jem and Finch vibe at times. I see why it’s a classic, and is probably worth a closer re-read at some point in my life.

Rating: 8.6/10

Book 17: She's Come Undone by Wally Lamb

Title: She's Come Undone
Author: Wally Lamb
Length: 469 pages
Year written: 1992
Why I chose this book: I've wanted to read this book for a while, not having known much about the plot but knowing so many people have read and enjoyed it (including Oprah).

Dolores Price is an ordinary girl who is subjected to an extraordinary lifetime of unfortunate events, filling her with pain, confusion, and resentment. Tragedies occur in Dolores' life like they are set on a timer, and are outlined by her bitter sense of sarcasm and wit. She reaches a weight of 257 lbs. after being raped by a neighbor and spiraling into a depression of overeating. Her mother is confounded with guilt, her dad faces brutal emotional retaliation and alienation for having previously left Dolores and her mother, and her grandmother is uptight—not someone Dolores can exactly relate to. In her oversized body, Dolores feels more and more isolated from the world, a feeling that follows her to college and eventually to Cape Cod, where she decides to disappear from it all.

Dolores eventually begins healing, part of which includes a physical transformation. After shedding over one hundred pounds, she is able to start dating and eventually marry who she always considered to be her "dream guy." However, she soon realizes she has fallen back into her previous patterns of powerlessness. He is a perverted high school English teacher, a failed poet with a bad attitude—but handsome. Dolores struggles with repeated troubles which manifest themselves in her life in different ways. When she does have genuine breakthroughs, they are simply triumphant. Following the trajectory of her downfall and eventual climb back to the surface, we become attached to Dolores and regret having ever judged or ignored a person based on their physical appearance. It's true. I definitely thought about my casual use of the word "fat." It's not nice. It doesn't matter. People are people. And they are the people they are for good reason.

This was the first book for author Wally Lamb, and having read all 469 pages in under three days, I'd call it compulsively readable. It's one of those books you can't put down. Many books take a while for me to read because they are difficult, in either language or style. She's Come Undone is as easy as a soft-serve vanilla cone, so that nothing stops your absorption of the plot, of Dolores' life and thoughts.

Rating: 9.5/10

Book 16: Mary by Vladimir Nabokov

Title: Mary
Author: Vladimir Nabokov
Length: 114 pages
Year Written: 1926
Why I chose this book: I was once intrigued with (Nabakov's most famous novel) Lolita, and purchased this book in 2012 to explore more of his writing (as you can see, I have a habit of buying books and not reading them immediately).

I love books that have plots socially predating modern forms of technology. You know, the stories involving letters that take weeks to reach their recipients, and love affairs that spawned from a chance locking of eyes at the local fair. That kind of stuff. No phone numbers, no email addresses. Definitely no Instagrams.

The main character of this book is Ganin (which I believe is his nickname - the book was originally written in Russian so perhaps some things are lost in translation for me), who is a young guy (20s, maybe) staying in a boarding house with a bunch of random roommates. He learns that one of his housemates is awaiting the arrival of his wife, Mary. In some way or another, Ganin determines that this is the same lovely young Mary with whom he'd fallen in love and had a brief affair with a few years prior.

The book is very short, and not much happens. It seems like Nabokov spends a bulk of the novel just setting the scene, and there isn't actually much action. My favorite part of the book comes quite near the end, and it really spoke to me about the validity and importance of memories versus reality. Ganin was holding on to memories of a woman he had only known for a few days, and in his mind their relationship took on a new life. In reality, however, he was likely nowhere as important to her. After all, she'd gotten married to another man. Such is life.

Nabokov is smart and artistic, and although Mary is nowhere near as layered or heavy as Lolita (which comes later, as this was his debut novel), it was still a fairly enjoyable read with subtle yet vivid imagery.

Rating: 7.8/10

Book 15: We Need New Names by NoViolet Bulawayo

Title: We Need New Names
Author: NoViolet Bulawayo
Length: 292 pages
Year Written: 2013
Why I chose this book: This book was actually on display at the library, and after reading a few pages I decided I'd buy it from Amazon.

We Need New Names is the story of a young girl named Darling who is from Zimbabwe, but moves to Detroit to live with her aunt, leaving behind a colorful cast of friends named Bastard, Chipo, Sbho, Stina, and Godknows. The first half of the book follows Darling's life in Zimbabwe, where she spends much of her time ransacking guava trees with her hungry, feisty friends. Though pre-teens, these kids are sharp-witted (though often imprecise) and face an environment of poverty, violence and racial conflict with a flippancy that could come only from children. Darling brags about what she will have in America, only to move to Detroit with her aunt Fostalina and realize that not all Americans live in luxury.

The second half of the book is dedicated to Darling's acclimation to the United States as it parallels with her formative teenage and young adult years. There is a noticeable rift between her and the friends she left behind, and she grapples with her new surroundings and just where she considers "home" to be.

We Need New Names is riveting, and at many times heartbreaking. One of the saddest and most memorable scenes of the book is one that is responsible for its title—it involves a bunch of clueless children attempting to address the issue of 11-year-old Chipo's pregnancy, since her condition hindered their game-playing. It was an extremely unnerving chapter to read. Overall, the book is craftily written, weaving together different cultures and opinions and stereotypes to create a story that feels very honest. Darling's story is the story of many just like her, and reflect even broader themes of cultural identity and negotiation. This is a really great first novel from Bulawayo and I am excited to see more from her.

Rating: 9.6/10

Book 14: Indignation by Philip Roth

Title: Indignation
Author: Philip Roth
Length: 233 pages
Year written: 2005
Why I chose this book: I bought this book on sale when Borders went out of business. It's been laying around for a few years.

Philip Roth is old. Apparently, he's quite the productive author as well. Indignation is third novel Roth released within three consecutive years. He wrote two more in the following two years, and nearly thirty in his entire career. Though this is the first novel of his that I've read, I can bet that many of the book's themes are personal to Roth and appear across his many works.

Indignation takes place in the early 1950s during the Korean War. The main character, college freshman Marcus Messner, is Jewish and overall quite the irritable and indignant (hey!) guy. His father's paranoia about Marcus getting into trouble or getting killed drive him away mentally and eventually physically, when he transfers to an out-of-state college to avoid his dad's overbearing behavior. At his new school, he finds multiple dorm arrangements to be intolerable, and ends up living alone in the worst room on campus. On top of all of this, he goes on a date with the campus nutbag, Olivia (who is a "goddess," but sports a scar on her wrist from an unsuccessful suicide attempt). His strange, stilted relationship with her seems to govern most of his actions thereafter, and for lack of better words (and to avoid revealing too much about the plot), it all spirals downward. I was reminded of the tragic movie The Butterfly Effect (featuring cinematic genius Ashton Kutcher) — as his dad warned him, every small misstep has the potential for tragic consequences.

Roth is funny, disgusting, and powerful as a writer. I'd definitely be interested to read some of his more famed works.

Rating: 8.5/10