about going AWOL for awhile. This is a work in progress. After I finished The Virgin Suicides I was a concerned about what to read next. Taking a look back on that book, it's now one of my favorite books. It was so well written, interesting, just the right length, creative. I really can't put it into words, but if you want a good book, go buy it. I hear the movie is also good. I might go check it out.
So since then, I've drifted from one book to the next. I've started to try to check myself into the presidential election. For those of you who know me, you know that I'm not just tuning in now because of political apathy.... it's more the opposite - I tend to become too involved. In 2000, I was 16 and, perhaps naively, believed certain things were untouchable (checks and balances being one of them). And I'm not saying this from a dark, angry, liberal place in my heart; I think both conservatives and liberals alike can say that Bush v. Gore was an unprecedented (and apparently never-to-be-repeated) role for the Supreme Court.
Needless to say, I took Bush v. Gore a little hard. I made a decision to remove myself from politics (2004 was a painful blip on the radar) and focused more on political theory for the next eight years. Contrary to popular belief, theory and politics are pretty closely interconnected. I need theory for me to figure out what I think the appropriate role of government and policy should be, and then politics can be used to determine the best way to achieve that goal.
After 2000, I thought I didn't want anything to do with politics, that I'd just be satisfied living in the political theory realm, so that's mostly what I studied. Hobbes, Aristotle, Plato, Locke, Mill, Madison, Jefferson, and more all helped me form some idea of what I thought a government should do for its citizens. And, for the most part, I was happy. And then things started happening. In a nutshell, our political reality started to starkly contrast with what I thought our goals as a country should be. In layman's words? The last eight years have made us stray so far from what I think the right path should be that I can't, in good conscience, continue to focus on theory.
So I'm kicking into high gear because I don't do anything half-assed. I think our public education system needs a good look, I think the welfare system and the situation of the poor in this country needs a good look, I think our role in the international economy and how we protect or don't protect our domestic industries needs a good look. So I'm trying to learn world history, sociology, anything and everything to make me think about what issues are important to me and what I want to do about them.
(Please note that while I say I didn't want anything to do with politics, I still voted in elections, so don't worry. I'm not one of those twenty-somethings.)
Sunday, June 22, 2008
Sunday, June 8, 2008
On the morning the last Lisbon daughter took her turn at suicide
-- it was Mary this time, and sleeping pills, like Therese -- the two paramedics arrived at the house knowing exactly where the knife drawer was, and the gas oven, and the beam in the basement from which it was possible to tie a rope.
That's the very first sentence of Eugenides's The Virgin Suicides. I've only finished a chapter, and his writing has pulled me back into the world of literature like a smack to the face. I know I just extolled the virtues of Weisberger's writing, and I don't take that back, but this is so different from chicklit that I can't even begin to describe it. Eugenides has such an amazing ability to describe people, places, situations, that within 20 pages, the neighborhood is real and the characters are well-fleshed out, even though it is taking place in an unnamed town and I have no idea what decade he's writing in, let alone what the narrator's name is... (the back of the book says the 1970s.. whoops, I missed that.)
The story begins with a description of the Lisbon family. There are five girls (13, 14, 15, 16 and 17), all living under a super severe mother who refuses to let them out of the house or have a normal teenage social life. You know the type of house - probably a mustard yellow or pea green colored awning sort of house with the shades drawn and such. No one in the neighborhood ever sees the girls interacting with people outside (except for at school). The narrator is the voice of a boy in the neighborhood (and the male population is fascinated by these shut-in girls, to say the least). He's speaking about this particular year in the past tense, so I'm assuming he's retelling his story of the year that the Lisbon girls committed suicide.
Now I don't know if they are all successful (so far only one of them has been) or why they're doing it (though Cecilia's response after her first attempt has been "Obviously, Doctor, you've never been a thirteen-year-old girl."), but, given the fact that in the present telling of the story, the father of the once close-knit family is now divorced and living alone in an efficiency apartment, I'm going to venture a guess that yes, at least a few of the Lisbon girls, if not all, are successful in their suicide attempts.
The way Eugenides describes things is amazing. I arrived at this book after reading Middlesex (Oprah told me to) this past summer. Middlesex is an incredibly well-written story about a hermaphrodite female who discovers her family history during her path to find her true identity. And it sounds corny and cheesy and new-agey when I sum it up like that, but I promise it isn't. Eugenides struck me as an author who could write very well and someone who has an amazing imagination when it comes to ideas for novels. It's not that anything in Middlesex was very fantastic or unrealistic, rather, the subject matter was just something I never thought anyone would consider writing about.
Anyway, during the Oprah show chit-chat about Eugenides's book, there was a comment made about how long they had waited for a second novel from him and how they were so glad that Middlesex had lived up to his debut novel (although the debut novel was released about 10 years earlier). His debut novel is The Virgin Suicides, so that's how this book ended up on my list. It's relative brevity at 249 pages also makes it tempting for me as a summer read. And of course the photo on the front cover of Kirsten Dunst made it a must add to the collection. (NB: I'm kidding. I'm actually mortified when I am forced to buy the "movie version" of books... you know what I mean, once there's a film adaptation, there's the push to try to sell the novel and so they change the cover art and then you feel like a poser if you end up buying that one instead of the original one because it took you until the movie came out to get around to reading something so good...)
I'll keep you posted on how it goes. I'm popping an Advil (this heat is too much for me) and settling down with the cats to read this one. If the reading gets to be too much, you'll find me at Target, purchasing Dexter: Season One, and watching that in its entirety.
Meanwhile, I continue to dread the end of Sunday.
That's the very first sentence of Eugenides's The Virgin Suicides. I've only finished a chapter, and his writing has pulled me back into the world of literature like a smack to the face. I know I just extolled the virtues of Weisberger's writing, and I don't take that back, but this is so different from chicklit that I can't even begin to describe it. Eugenides has such an amazing ability to describe people, places, situations, that within 20 pages, the neighborhood is real and the characters are well-fleshed out, even though it is taking place in an unnamed town and I have no idea what decade he's writing in, let alone what the narrator's name is... (the back of the book says the 1970s.. whoops, I missed that.)
The story begins with a description of the Lisbon family. There are five girls (13, 14, 15, 16 and 17), all living under a super severe mother who refuses to let them out of the house or have a normal teenage social life. You know the type of house - probably a mustard yellow or pea green colored awning sort of house with the shades drawn and such. No one in the neighborhood ever sees the girls interacting with people outside (except for at school). The narrator is the voice of a boy in the neighborhood (and the male population is fascinated by these shut-in girls, to say the least). He's speaking about this particular year in the past tense, so I'm assuming he's retelling his story of the year that the Lisbon girls committed suicide.
Now I don't know if they are all successful (so far only one of them has been) or why they're doing it (though Cecilia's response after her first attempt has been "Obviously, Doctor, you've never been a thirteen-year-old girl."), but, given the fact that in the present telling of the story, the father of the once close-knit family is now divorced and living alone in an efficiency apartment, I'm going to venture a guess that yes, at least a few of the Lisbon girls, if not all, are successful in their suicide attempts.
The way Eugenides describes things is amazing. I arrived at this book after reading Middlesex (Oprah told me to) this past summer. Middlesex is an incredibly well-written story about a hermaphrodite female who discovers her family history during her path to find her true identity. And it sounds corny and cheesy and new-agey when I sum it up like that, but I promise it isn't. Eugenides struck me as an author who could write very well and someone who has an amazing imagination when it comes to ideas for novels. It's not that anything in Middlesex was very fantastic or unrealistic, rather, the subject matter was just something I never thought anyone would consider writing about.
Anyway, during the Oprah show chit-chat about Eugenides's book, there was a comment made about how long they had waited for a second novel from him and how they were so glad that Middlesex had lived up to his debut novel (although the debut novel was released about 10 years earlier). His debut novel is The Virgin Suicides, so that's how this book ended up on my list. It's relative brevity at 249 pages also makes it tempting for me as a summer read. And of course the photo on the front cover of Kirsten Dunst made it a must add to the collection. (NB: I'm kidding. I'm actually mortified when I am forced to buy the "movie version" of books... you know what I mean, once there's a film adaptation, there's the push to try to sell the novel and so they change the cover art and then you feel like a poser if you end up buying that one instead of the original one because it took you until the movie came out to get around to reading something so good...)
I'll keep you posted on how it goes. I'm popping an Advil (this heat is too much for me) and settling down with the cats to read this one. If the reading gets to be too much, you'll find me at Target, purchasing Dexter: Season One, and watching that in its entirety.
Meanwhile, I continue to dread the end of Sunday.
Done...
So Weisberger's book was a good/easy read. She writes better than your average chicklit author, which sometimes confuses the reader into thinking they're reading something other than a souped-up romcom. Then expectations get a bit too high, and you might be left feeling like it was kind of a vanilla novel. This is what happened with me... and then I took a step back and thought hey now, this is chicklit, and just because Weisberger's writing is better than chicklit doesn't mean she should be penalized for that. So, in a nutshell, it was a fun story, an easy read, entertaining, the whole nine yards. Was it as break-out as Devil? No, but that's probably because a debut novel happens only once, and then people start expecting things from you. Gross. Anyway, if you want a fun beach read, pick it up. If you're not a huge fan of Weisberger's you can probably wait until it comes out in paperback. And if you're not a huge fan of reading in general, this will probably become a movie eventually (or at least I see potential), so you can see it there.
So it's Sunday and there's one last, precious, weekend day. How I miss college. Even though those Sundays were also full of dread (reading/papers/exams/problem sets), they still felt like Sundays. And Mondays don't feel like these Mondays. I can't wait to go back to school. Too bad it costs money. Poop. Anyway, as you can see, another book has entered the docket over on the right hand side. I've literally bought around 20 books in the last 3 weeks. Yup, nearing bankruptcy because of books. (Kidding). I'm just going to lounge around, relax, clear my mind, work on GRE prepping, and try to finish (for once and for all) Bill Bryson's book.
So it's Sunday and there's one last, precious, weekend day. How I miss college. Even though those Sundays were also full of dread (reading/papers/exams/problem sets), they still felt like Sundays. And Mondays don't feel like these Mondays. I can't wait to go back to school. Too bad it costs money. Poop. Anyway, as you can see, another book has entered the docket over on the right hand side. I've literally bought around 20 books in the last 3 weeks. Yup, nearing bankruptcy because of books. (Kidding). I'm just going to lounge around, relax, clear my mind, work on GRE prepping, and try to finish (for once and for all) Bill Bryson's book.
Friday, June 6, 2008
worst. week. ever.
I know there's no excuse for my utter lack of posting. Having said that, this week was the worst work week ever in my 10 months with The Company. It wasn't even because anything catastrophic happened this week. Instead, it's been an issue of momentum. Day after day, the things I work on (that everyone in my area is working on) are so close to falling apart and I can barely hold it together. I am so tired that I can't get through ballet class without feeling so incredibly fatigued that it frustrates me beyond words. I think it's a bad sign when there is an enormous difference between classes I take on weekends and classes I take on weeknights. Anyway, I'm off on a tangent...
I finished a book this week and it was sans blogging, unfortunately. I'm going to try to avoid that from now on. It was Such a Pretty Fat by Jen Lancaster. I had read her previous book Bitter is the New Black and I liked it. It was an interesting style of chicklit. It's about how she left her high-paying job and had to relearn what's important and what isn't. While you can say that's cliche, I think seeing these lessons through real examples still makes a good story. Lancaster's newest book seemed somewhat funny, and my friend whole-heartedly endorsed it, so I picked it up and started reading. It had 4.5 stars out of 5 on amazon, so I felt like it'd be a pretty sure thing and they said she was like David Sedaris. They were so wrong.
As you may have noticed from the title, this could be considered a weight-loss story. Yes, Lancaster has funny insights. Yes, there were moments where I laughed out loud and that was embarrassing, but there were moments that were forced. Her frequently used footnotes were often irrelevant asides and seemed a little desperate for a cheap laugh. Humor's hard and obviously I'm a critic and not a writer myself, but I feel like the writing wasn't stellar, and definitely wasn't on par with Bitter. Not to mention the fact that she readily admits she was under the gun to write this particular memoir. I mean, everyone needs a paycheck.
On top of that, it's hard to conjure empathy for someone who has such a hostile edge. The book starts off with someone calling her a fat bitch, and, unfortunately, that's right on the mark. She approaches everyone and everything, whether they are friends or family, with anger and resentment. She lashes out verbally while shoveling down whole bags of Raisinets, butter-lathered pork chops, and Olive Garden dinners. Does she think that those people she's lambasting don't also want to guzzle wine, cupcakes, and chocolate-covered raisins? I feel that's pretty universal... but at the end of the day, it comes down to making yourself stop. It was the infuriatingly simple cure to her anger that made her unsympathetic. Obviously it takes awhile for her to figure this out, but that amount of time was enough for her personality to be so off-putting that I just couldn't keep myself reading. It took 10 days for a single piece of chicklit. It was hard to swallow. It wasn't 4.5 stars to me. Maybe I'm just bitter.
Anyway, time for a cure. Lauren Weisberger released her newest book Chasing Harry Winston. Obviously, she's best known for her book The Devil Wears Prada, which I still contend is better than the movie adaptation. She followed up with Everyone Worth Knowing which was above average, but a far cry from Devil (probably because it was actual fiction instead of being based on her life). I decided to give her another shot with Chasing Harry Winston, intentionally ignoring the 3 star reviews on amazon.com. I mean, honestly, these people thought Pretty Fat was good, so maybe I'll differ in my opinion on this one too.
I'm starting it tonight, so I'll repost tomorrow night... as for right now, a Bachelor marathon is on. And then I'm going to the pool. Yup, at 9pm. The one benefit of living in Ohio.
I finished a book this week and it was sans blogging, unfortunately. I'm going to try to avoid that from now on. It was Such a Pretty Fat by Jen Lancaster. I had read her previous book Bitter is the New Black and I liked it. It was an interesting style of chicklit. It's about how she left her high-paying job and had to relearn what's important and what isn't. While you can say that's cliche, I think seeing these lessons through real examples still makes a good story. Lancaster's newest book seemed somewhat funny, and my friend whole-heartedly endorsed it, so I picked it up and started reading. It had 4.5 stars out of 5 on amazon, so I felt like it'd be a pretty sure thing and they said she was like David Sedaris. They were so wrong.
As you may have noticed from the title, this could be considered a weight-loss story. Yes, Lancaster has funny insights. Yes, there were moments where I laughed out loud and that was embarrassing, but there were moments that were forced. Her frequently used footnotes were often irrelevant asides and seemed a little desperate for a cheap laugh. Humor's hard and obviously I'm a critic and not a writer myself, but I feel like the writing wasn't stellar, and definitely wasn't on par with Bitter. Not to mention the fact that she readily admits she was under the gun to write this particular memoir. I mean, everyone needs a paycheck.
On top of that, it's hard to conjure empathy for someone who has such a hostile edge. The book starts off with someone calling her a fat bitch, and, unfortunately, that's right on the mark. She approaches everyone and everything, whether they are friends or family, with anger and resentment. She lashes out verbally while shoveling down whole bags of Raisinets, butter-lathered pork chops, and Olive Garden dinners. Does she think that those people she's lambasting don't also want to guzzle wine, cupcakes, and chocolate-covered raisins? I feel that's pretty universal... but at the end of the day, it comes down to making yourself stop. It was the infuriatingly simple cure to her anger that made her unsympathetic. Obviously it takes awhile for her to figure this out, but that amount of time was enough for her personality to be so off-putting that I just couldn't keep myself reading. It took 10 days for a single piece of chicklit. It was hard to swallow. It wasn't 4.5 stars to me. Maybe I'm just bitter.
Anyway, time for a cure. Lauren Weisberger released her newest book Chasing Harry Winston. Obviously, she's best known for her book The Devil Wears Prada, which I still contend is better than the movie adaptation. She followed up with Everyone Worth Knowing which was above average, but a far cry from Devil (probably because it was actual fiction instead of being based on her life). I decided to give her another shot with Chasing Harry Winston, intentionally ignoring the 3 star reviews on amazon.com. I mean, honestly, these people thought Pretty Fat was good, so maybe I'll differ in my opinion on this one too.
I'm starting it tonight, so I'll repost tomorrow night... as for right now, a Bachelor marathon is on. And then I'm going to the pool. Yup, at 9pm. The one benefit of living in Ohio.
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