Books

It has come to my attention, actually my wife has acutely pointed it out, that my blog has become a collection of self-indulgent delves into the dark part of my being. "It is a candid reflection of my condition," is my general response.

"Yes," she said, "but no one is going to read it if it just brings them down."

Oh. Right. Readers.

Readers are important for me. They are, as a matter of fact, the entire reason i succumbed to blogging in the first place. It has become a way for me to release all the anxiety and depression that i have been struggling with, but originally it was to be an outlet that i was sharing (am sharing) with an invisible, mostly, readership. I love that. It gives me a great sense of accomplishment and purpose when i carve out another posting on my blog. But i don't want to be read as a dark depressing ego maniac who can't get beyond the dark frustration of unemployment or the despair of looking forward for a career.

The truth is i find a great deal of pleasure in a great number of things. Some of those things (blog appropriate) are reading, food, and mt. biking. I also like movies, dates with my wife, time with my children, and cash in my wallet. So, as an exercise in the pleasures of life i would like to take time, weekly, to focus on what i love in life so as not to get lost in what i hate. Today's topic: books (at this point I will try to make it brief).

I picked up two books from the library this week: Drop City by T.C. Boyle and The Prince of Tides by Pat Conroy. I gotta be honest, and i don't care what award it won/was nominated for, I dropped Drop City less than three chapters in. It read like a self indulgent hippie cliche and i was struck first and foremost at the way in which the "hippies" were portrayed. People with the privilege and luxury to abandon society, then leach off of it (collective pool of food stamps), then proclaim they have no need for it. Briefly, Drop City (surmised from the dust flap) is a novel about a hippie commune called Drop City that pulls up roots in California and relocates to Alaska. Allegedly it becomes a story about the clash and eventual alliance between two fringe aspects of American society that exist in radically different dichotomies. I don't have patience for the hippies of today, i certainly don't have time for a glorified retrospective. I will say, on Boyle's behalf, he is undoubtedly, however, a very talented writer. Not the greatest, not even close, but talented none-the-less and i will be moving onto one of his other novels soon. I have heard that his short stories are good too, so i will read those as well, me being a lover of short stories. The Prince of Tides has been an altogether different experience.

Prince of Tides thus far (I am half-way through) is an epic. It is one of the most challenging and moving novels i have ever read and each page draws me to the next. His gift of language and the honest style with which he portrays the Wingo family in S. Carolina is refreshing and beautiful. I am shocked and disappointed that i haven't read his novels before now. He reminds me of a more refined David James Duncan (thinking of Brothers K) and a more honest and approachable John Updike (thinking of In the Beauty of the Lillie's). It may not be wise to share thoughts on novels before they are finished but i have a feeling that Prince of Tides will not disappoint and I look forward to writing more about it upon completion.