Sharing Time!

This book was great fun. Weiner’s funny and introspective during his travels all over the world, and shares some theories on why some countries and its residents are happier than others.

One thing I learned: never go to Moldova. I have not read about a more depressing place in my life. It sounds almost as bad as living in a hyper violent country like Afghanistan.

Anyways, this is a good read if you’re looking for something pop-sciencey and non-fictiony.

The downside to reading books based solely on people’s recommendations (and not learning about he plot beforehand) is that sometimes you read stuff you’d normally have no interest in. Case in point: this book.

This is a book about two sisters in the ’80s, AIDS, and weird familial relationships. If you’re keeping score, I am interested in 0 of those 3 subjects. And yet the story is written beautifully, and in a way where you have to keep reading. I liked it in spite of myself.

Recommended.

Me before reading this graphic novel: Ha, this’ll be funny. Daniel Clowes is funny! Look at that crazy looking weapon, that’s funny! This is going to be page after page of hilarity.

Me after reading this graphic novel: I hate everything and everyone. There are no good people in the universe. We are all products of our environment.

(Ok, I don’t really believe the above, but you get the point. I guess that’s what I get for judging a book by its cover.)

Joshua Mohr is as talented as any author writing today, and each book of his seems to be a departure from the last, though not in a bad way.

This was entertaining all the way through, but as I was reading, I kept flashing back to how amazing his previous novel Damascus is. So let this review serve as a reminder that you should go back and read that.

I loved Teddy Wayne’s last book (Kapitoil), and I loved this one as well. Reading his stuff is as enjoyable as sitting down with a book gets for me. It’s a given that his books are funny, but this gives additional insight into the nature of fame and celebrity.

Worth a read.

It’s as good as everyone says it is. Sometimes taking on one of “the best books of the year” feels like reading an interminably long novel for school. Not the case here. You will not read this and feel like your heights are being Wuthered.

I read a review of this that called it “uneven,” and I’d say that’s the best description I could ever come up with. Some sections are brilliant (I’d say chapters, but it has none)… and some make you wonder why you’re putting in the effort to read a 450+ page book when surely there are shorter ones that are probably more enjoyable.

I can’t wholeheartedly recommend it, but I’m glad I read it nonetheless.

This book is made up of non-fiction essays the author wrote for GQ, The New York Times Magazine, and other publications. Most of them are riveting. Some of them are a little boring. All of it is interesting, even when it’s boring in long stretches.

Some of my favorite essays can be read online for free, and as I’m just now discovering, he wrote all of them for GQ. But you should just read the whole damn book, as it’s a pleasure.

Upon This Rock

Getting Down to What Is Really Real

The Final Comeback of Axl Rose

Violence of the Lambs (fair warning, this one might give you nightmares)

Here I go again, reading books everyone reads because there’s apparently something culturally relevant about them. Except for this one didn’t let me down as much as the other books I’ve read that fall into this category. Hallelujah!

If you’re old like me, you remember when Dawson’s Creek came out, there was commenting to the effect of, “Kids don’t talk like that!” You could apply that same complaint to the way the teenagers in this book talk. It’s fucking preposterous.

Overall, the pacing is good, and in general, it’s a quick read because there’s tons of white space on every page. I’m assuming in part because it’s made to be consumed by fifteen-year-olds. Mr. Green is very good at talking to that age group, as evidenced by the fact that his tumblr is hugely popular. I am not fifteen any more, so some of this charm was lost on me.

I’d recommend this if you wanna burn through a book in a day or two and feel at one with the zeitgeist.

From the book:

“Speaking of photography, Susan Sontag writes that under its influence, ‘travel becomes a strategy for accumulating photographs.’ In digital culture, does life become a strategy for establishing an archive? Young people shape their lives to produce an impressive Facebook profile. When we know that everything in our lives is captured, will we begin to live the life that we hope to have archived?”

This book is depressing. Unbelievably depressing. About half of it was devoted to robot/human interaction (an unexpected, sometimes surprising, and mostly skippable part of the book), and the other half was about how disconnected always being connected to each other can make us feel.

And with that, I need to take a walk.