Books Bought November

Things were fairly sedate until Cindy and I went to the Green Valley Book Fair last weekend. Even then, I believe I practiced remarkable restraint. You be the judge. Here are the books I bought in November with the reasons why.

NOVEMBER BOOKS BOUGHT


Encyclopedia of Fantasy And Horror Fiction (NF 2006) - Don D'Ammassa

Normally $22, this one was on sale at Amazon a few weeks ago. Since it's fairly current (2006), I thought this would be a good reference book for my desk at work.

Trade Paperback; Price = $9.68


The Fine Line: Re-envisioning the Gap between Christ and Culture (NF 2008) - Kary Oberbrunner

This book examines two types of Christians: those who isolate themselves from culture and those who embrace all aspects of culture with little or no discernment whatsoever. A fascinating concept; I couldn't say no, especially not at this price.

Trade Paperback; Price = $3.99



Reel Spirituality: Theology and Film in Dialogue (NF 2006, 2nd edition) - Robert Johnston

Awhile back I read a book called Eyes Wide Open about Christianity and the arts. I've been looking for books specifically on Christianity and film and this one seemed to be on everyone's must-read list. And the price was right.

Trade Paperback; Price = $10.43


Holy Superheroes! Revised and Expanded Edition: Exploring the Sacred in Comics, Graphic Novels, and Film (NF 2008) - Greg Garrett

I'm doing some preliminary research on an upcoming project and hope this book will be helpful.

Trade Paperback; Price = $8.86


The Engine's Child (2008) - Holly Phillips

I absolutely love Holly Phillips's beautifully stylized short fiction and although this novel has gotten generally poor reviews, I'm a big enough fan to give it a try, especially at this price.

Trade Paperback; Price = $4.00


Catching the Big Fish: Meditation, Consciousness, and Creativity (NF 2006) - David Lynch

I remember this book coming out about the same time that Lynch's most recent film INLAND EMPIRE was released. I wanted to buy the book then, but didn't want to spend $20 on it. Plus it's pretty slim; I read nearly the whole thing in Borders one day. I figured it wouldn't give a whole lot of insight into Lynch's films, but thought it might reveal a little about what makes this weird dude tick.

Hardcover; Price = $5.00


Writing and Selling the YA Novel (NF 2008) - K. L. Going

There are some good Writers Digest books out there, especially Nancy Kress's Beginnings, Middles & Ends. I don't know if this is necessarily one of them, but since it does deal with YA novels and I have written (but not yet published) one, I thought, what the heck?

Trade Paperback; Price = $4.00


The 3 A.M. Epiphany (NF 2005) - Brian Kiteley

Another Writers Digest book that I'd heard about a few years ago. And here it is, falling right into my lap. How opportunistic!

Trade Paperback; Price = $4.50


Things That Fall from the Sky: Stories (2002) - Kevin Brockmeier

Brockmeier has successfully combined weird and literary over the course of his career. I've loved several of his stories and loved his novel The Truth about Celia even more, so I'm really looking forward to this collection.

Trade Paperback; Price = $3.50


The Real Festivus (NF 2005) - Daniel O'Keefe

Our staff this year is having something of a Festivus-themed celebration, so I thought this book might give me a few ideas on some hijinks to conjure up in the coming weeks. Gather 'round for the Feats of Strength!

Trade Paperback; Price = $3.00


Zahrah the Windseeker (YA 2005) - Nnedi Okorafor-Mbachu

Okorafor's The Shadow Speaker was one of the most delightful YA books I've read over the past few years. I've been looking for Zahrah for awhile and was delighted to find it just as I was making one last sweep of the YA novels at the Green Valley Book Fair.

Trade Paperback; Price = $2.75

Total Expenditures for November = $59.71

That's it for November. Now get out there and read something.

Wintergreen Virginia

Just a few photos from our weekend trip to the Wintergreen Resort. Text to follow soon.

Playing Favorites, Installment #8

(It's been awhile since I've contributed anything to "Playing Favorites," my discussion of what are not necessarily the greatest songs, but, as the name says, my personal favorites.)



Installment #8 - "Life in a Glasshouse" (Radiohead) - Radiohead (2001)

“Life in a Glasshouse” opens with some weird, atmospheric shimmering sounds that could be interpreted as church bells tolling. I offer up that interpretation only because what follows is a slow dirge in A minor featuring trumpet, trombone and clarinet, instruments often found in New Orleans-style jazz, but in this case they carry a funereal flavor.

Once again, I'm in trouble with my only friend
She is papering the window panes
She is putting on a smile
Living in a glass house

You could say this is mourning, pure and simple. Pure and simple, maybe, but its effects are deep and far-reaching. It’s more than just the loss of innocence that’s being mourned, it’s the loss of something you can’t return to or improve upon; but it is something that can get worse. Celebrities pay a high price for their status. I’m sure they often read the papers and tabloids (and watch the cable and web equivalents) thinking, “Isn’t there something more important to cover than us? We’re at war; people are starving!” And I’m sure there comes a point when the famous actually want to share something of substance with the world, in fact they’re probably dying to share. But they can’t. "We are hungry for a lynching," after all.

At the end of the second chorus, “ Well of course I'd like to sit around and chat,” is followed by a string of the word “only” repeated over and over with white-hot intensity while the clarinet wails, a soul overwhelmed with indescribable loss, a great mass of pain looking for just a drop of comfort. It’s almost a dwelling, or rather a lamenting on the fact that the singer can’t share this with you, but only if he could, it might just benefit us all. But it’s never going to happen. The last line “There’s someone listening in” is delivered in an exhausted resignation, devoid of hope. The horns end on a C - F# interval, one that longs for a release that never arrives.

“Life in a Glasshouse” is far from a great Radiohead song, but it is one I will always remember because of my friend David. We were driving to a leadership retreat a couple of years ago, talking about music. David had Amnesiac with him and slipped it into my car CD player. “Listen to this, listen to this,” he would say about every thirty seconds, turning up the volume and pointing out some musical or lyrical particular. I think we only made it through two or three songs, since the other people riding in the back seat were getting tired of the Radiohead seminar. But David told me to hang onto the disc for awhile. I listened to it, thinking it was great, but the last song baffled me for awhile.

When David passed away a few months later, I always associated that album with him. His brother Brian insisted that I keep the CD, that David would have wanted me to have it. Although we never got the chance to discuss “Life in a Glasshouse,” I always think of David when I hear it. David's life, attitude and outlook were as far from "Life in a Glasshouse" as you can get. He was hopeful, with a bright and joyous outlook, full of wonder. I often dwell on Radiohead's music and this song in particular, wondering what thoughts David would have had on a particular lyric or musical choice. I can almost hear him in the car now, turning up the volume to drown out the naysayers in the back seat.

Twilight Zone, Episode 5: “Walking Distance”

"Walking Distance" (aired October 30, 1959)

New York advertising executive Martin Sloan pulls his sports car into a lonely gas station on the outskirts of a small town called Homewood. It happens to be Sloan’s hometown, a place he hasn’t visited in years. Needing a break from the fast-paced advertising world, he decides to take a walk into town while his car is being serviced. When he arrives, the phrase “Things haven’t changed much” takes on a whole new meaning.

“Walking Distance” is one of the handful of Twilight Zone stories that has stood the test of time for several reasons: Serling’s touching (but not sappy) script, Bernard Herrmann’s outstanding musical score, experiments in camera work and lighting, and a superb performance by Young.

Serling’s writing sometimes seemed a bit heavy-handed, sometimes a bit pedantic, but with “Walking Distance” he simply stood back and told a great story. You can’t go home again and even if you could, it wouldn’t work. It’s almost as if Serling is telling us there’s an order to the universe and you can’t tamper with it. It’s often sad, often regretful, but there it is; you can dwell on it or you can move forward.



This is the first episode where I actually noticed many of the weird tilted camera angles that would help define the series. In “Walking Distance” this technique (as well as the symbolic lighting) works perfectly, showing us a world that’s somehow out of kilter, one that needs restoration. Yet the technique is not overused.

There’s a scene of Gig Young in a drugstore having a soda that’s just about as good as TV got in the 1950s. He’s reflecting on his life, his youth, where he’s been and where he is now. He’s driven himself too hard in the advertising world and you can see it in his walk, his stature. But when the camera comes in for a close-up, you can see the lines on Young’s face, lines the character Martin Sloan shouldn’t have at age 36, but they’re there. (Young was actually near 46 at the time.) You can also see it in Young’s tired eyes. The drugstore soda fountain stood could almost be a barstool, a place where the weary pour out what’s left of their souls to anyone willing to listen.

Sadly, Young’s offscreen life was an extremely dark one. Although he won a Best Supporting Actor Oscar for the 1969 film They Shoot Horses, Don’t They?, alcoholism destroyed his later acting career. (Young took both his wife's and his own life in 1978.) I can never watch “Walking Distance” without wondering what Young’s life might have been if he could have really experienced what Martin Sloan experienced.

Turning 50 in 2010

No, I'm not, let's get that straight right now! But here are just a few things and people who will be turning 50 in 2010. (Doesn't hurt to look ahead, right?)

Books






Music



Film




People

Bono
Kenneth Branagh
Adam Clayton
David Duchovny
Neil Gaiman
Daryl Hannah
Mike Lookinland
Aimee Mann
Julianne Moore
Cal Ripken

God Grew Tired of Us (2006)

A few months back I was talking to a guy from my church about films, documentaries in particular. He recommended that I see a documentary called God Grew Tired of Us. I thought that, if nothing else, it was an interesting title.

The film (directed by Christopher Quinn and narrated by Nicole Kidman) tells the larger story of southern Sudanese Christians who were driven out of their country by northern Sudan's Muslim Arabs during the second Sudanese Civil War (1983-2005). Thousands of refugees walked over 1,000 miles to northern Kenya for sanctuary, where their hollow, emaciated bodies sought food and shelter. (I warn you: the footage in this section is graphic.) Relief does come to many; several of these "Lost Boys" are given an opportunity to go to America where they might work to rescue those of their families who remain behind.

Yet the smaller story of three of these boys (men by this time) is the main focus of the film. Daniel Abol Pach and Panther Bior get placed in Pittsburgh, John Bul Dau in Syracuse, NY. While in America, they will have to earn enough money to first pay for their airfare to America before they can help support their families.



From this point, God Grew Tired of Us becomes a multifaceted film that touches on themes of joy, cultural confusion, adjustment, loneliness, striving, unrest and hope. These men have no idea how to react to American culture. Some of them have never even experienced electricity. Without realizing it, the men point out some of the less attractive aspects of American culture. After one year in America, Panther comments, "In the United States, people are not friendly. You can find someone that's walking in the street by himself, you know, don't even talk, you know. You cannot go to the house of somebody you don't know, though you are all Americans. They call the police and say, 'why did this guy come to my house? I don't know him." In one of the film's most telling scenes, John looks in wonder at all the Christmas lights, Christmas trees, all the signs of commercialism and says (paraphrase), "There are so many ways to celebrate Christmas here... All our people have is Jesus Christ."

The camera follows these men for three years during which time they work two or three jobs so they can send money home. It doesn't take long for them to understand that people working minimum wage jobs can't get very far. In one scene, John sits down, tired from all his work, and reflects on what life was like during the genocide in Sudan. He's clearly thankful for his new life in America, but longs to see his family again. He realizes that because of the genocide (which at this point is still going on), this may never happen. When he was a boy of thirteen in Sudan, one of his jobs was burying the bodies of the slaughtered. "I began to think," John reflects, "that God had given up on us."

God Grew Tired of Us shows us all the things we take for granted as Americans. It shows us what it's really like to be a stranger in a strange land. And it shows us the lengths that some people will go to in order to provide for the ones they love. I don't want to tell you too much more; I'd rather you see the film for yourself. Be prepared for an incredible experience.

Await Your Reply (2009) - Dan Chaon

In the first chapter of Await Your Reply, we see Ryan Schuyler, a college dropout, racing down the highway with his severed hand in an ice chest. In the next, it's Lucy Lattimore, recent a high school graduate running away with her history teacher. Then we have Miles Chesire, searching for his twin brother who vanished 10 years ago. From there, it's a wild ride.

Wild, but not chaotic. I could tell you more about these characters, but I won't. (And I'd advise you not to read too many reviews that might reveal more than you want to know.) Dan Chaon masterfully unwinds these parallel stories that seem to have no connecting elements other than identity.

Await Your Reply is all about identity and the possibility of starting over, a concept attractive to many people in these unstable times. But the novel is also about family, relationships, trust and fear. Alternating chapters told across various timelines add an almost insurmountable tension, keeping the pages turning at a brisk pace. Yet read too quickly and you'll miss some wonderfully resonant writing that requires patience.

As soon as I finished the novel, I wanted to start it again just to see if I could find the clues that I'd missed the first time. You may have the same reaction. Don't be surprised. And don't plan to get much sleep once you've started this one.