Books Read in 2009

[Pro A.]

Well, who are we kidding? This was probably inevitable. I will not re-attempt my lofty goal of reading 100 books in a year, seeing as how I missed by more than half, half of which were school-assigned reading. Maybe that doesn't count, but... I could choose not to read them, I suppose.

At any rate, I'll keep my usual log of books I'm reading along with a short review. Currently, I'm reading Pronto by Elmore Leonard, one of the few crime novels of his I haven't read.

[pfft]

is this the part where we are supposed to mention what we are reading too? or is this a one man show?

[Pro A.]

I'd hope everyone will reveal what they read and what they thought and why. I'll be doing my part, but I'd hope that everyone else will share their thoughts on what they've been reading. Who knows? Maybe someone will read a novel or collection of stories based on someone's recommendation. That's what I'd hope, at any rate.

[pfft]

oh well right now i am reading; The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand....

and i plan on reading alot more this year than last year. we shall see.

[Vishus]

I'm not sure if these were in the last thread.

"The Hellbound Heart" by Clive Barker - The movie is almost exactly the same. Like all books the fact that it gets detailed still makes it worth reading.

"The Kite Runner" by Khaled Hosseini - I liked everything except....
Religiously Amir didn't become like his father, but that's ok. He's an adult and its his choice.

Anything by HP Lovecraft - You can find all of them on the internet for free. So pick one by random. I thought they would feel old when you read them, but they still feel pretty darn bizarre and fresh to me. Nowadays a horror movie has to have a real killer. These stories should work well for a fantasy horror movie with the right team.

Future: "Weaveworld", "Abarat" Series and "Scarlett Gospels" by Clive Barker, and any existing side stories to His Dark Materials by Phillip Pullman. Hopefully I can read them and report them eventually this year.

[Pro A.]

1. Pronto, Elmore Leonard, **1/2

Dialogue-wise, Leonard has a standing that is second to none. No one even comes close to his ear for rhythm and speech. Just reading 250 pages of a mediocre Leonard novel is fun. This story, about a bookie who goes on the run after the Feds put the word out that he's skimming the mob, has potential but Leonard never does much with the characters he has or the plot, for that matter. His characters carry it, even during the very odd trek in Rapallo, Italy, but the story starts grinding to a halt as Leonard struggles to come up with a conclusion that is satisfying. Probably one of the weakest Leonard novels I've read to date, but that says more about the strength his other novels have.

[iSDK]

I've gone through a number so far. Between holiday time/shut down time I've done a lot of reading thus far.

1. Dark Elf Trilogy, R. A. Salvatore
- Homeland
- Exile
- Sojourn
2. Icewind Dale Triology, R. A. Salvatore
- The Crystal Shard
- Streams of Silver
- The Halflings Gem
3. The Legacy, R. A. Salvatore
4. Starless Night, R. A. Salvatore
5. Passage to Dawn, R. A. Salvatore
6. Sea of Swords, R. A. Salvatore
7. The Orc King, R. A. Salvatore
8. The Pirate King, R. A. Salvatore

If I really need to give a description of these novels.... well google em. I'm not gonna give a write out for em. If you like fantasy (Forgotten Realms) you'll enjoy these.
While I'm sure some of you hate Drizzt, I don't care.

9. Never Have Your Dog Stuffed, Alan Alda
Great book, yea its a re-read, but seriously if you like comedy or awesome people... read this book. Still need to read "Things I Heard While Talking to Myself" another of his books.

10. Tales of Beatle the Bard, J.K. Rowling
Short & sweet, seriously what else you need? The Dumbledore comments at the end of each story are worth if you read the stories on Amazon before.

11. Deathly Hollows, J.K. Rowling
Audiobooks count right? Yea I "read" this while playin WoW... mwahahaha.

Thats all I got thus far

[Pro A.]

Sure, audiobooks count. Listening to them generally takes the same amount of time as it would to read it for some people, I guess.

[³¹¹]

I plan on finishing my Murakami (hard boiled wonderland) over reading week and then starting on some Dexter.

[Pro A.]

Shorter reviews for these books. Two were for class, one on my own. Sad state of affairs that I can't pick up the pace. Oh well. I intend to remedy that.

2. Jane Eyre, Charlotte Bronte, ***
Melodramatic, but engaging Romantic-era novel with a female protagonist that has more energy than most. Some amazing coincidences and strange plot twists don't undermine solid prose and characterizations.

3. Tess of the D'Urbervilles, Thomas Hardy, **1/2

Might need a second go-round for this book. Trying to read a 500-page book in a week is difficult, to say the least. Brutal, harsh, and often unpleasant character study about a good woman whose past is always out to compromise her life and love. More melodrama, but this is steeped in brutality.

4. The Enemy, Lee Child, ***1/2

Breakneck, frentic novel that actually works as a prequel of sorts. Jack Reacher, the hero of Child's series, narrates in first-person as he tells the story about the one case--a series of murders starting with a two-star general--that changed his life forever. The ending is a little spotty and so are some of the plot points, but the ride is so exhilirating.

[Pro A.]

5. Wide Sargasso Sea, Jean Rhys, **

I have a serious moral problem with authors doing prequels or sequels to works that are not their own, especially when we're talking about a book that is in the literature canon. Problem or not, that is what Rhys has done with Sargasso, which serves as a prequel of sorts to Jane Eyre and tries to explain how things end up as they are in the novel. The book might have worked if the answers weren't as ambiguous as the narrative frame, which goes from the main character, Bertha, to Rochester, and then back again to Bertha for the epilogue. The eventual conclusion has one real payoff and ultimately wastes some interesting imagery.

6. Call for the Dead, John Le Carre, **1/2

Le Carre's first novel is more detective story than spy thriller, but it does have elements of that in the novel. A prominent player in British SIS is murdered and Le Carre's long-running hero George Smiley is determined to get to the bottom of it all, but he has the usual problems standing in his way. For a first novel, it isn't a bad effort, but it seems childish compared to the work he'd end up doing just a few years down the road.

7. The Ghost War, Alex Berenson, **

Berenson's second spy novel, a sequel, to The Faithful Spy, is a very disappointing encore as his hero, former CIA sleeper spy John Wells, is dragged back into the game to investigate two separate but connected events: Arms dealing with the Taliban and Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan and a blown CIA job in North Korea. Combine that with a mole inside the CIA providing the Chinese with intelligence and you have the makings of a decent novel, but Berenson's clunky prose and stale characterizations (especially with the mole and the villains) deflate the potential and leave us wondering where he went wrong. Berenson's claim as the top American spy novelist under the age of 50 has me skeptical now after tripping so badly. Looks like Daniel Silva, for better or worse, is still the king.

[Pro A.]

8. Journey Into Fear, Eric Ambler, ***

Surprising, tough, and exciting spy novel written and set in the late thirties/early forties with a Hitchcockian angle as a British engineer in Turkey working with submarine and warship technology as targeted for assassination by the Nazis. He flees onto a ship, thinking he'll be safe. The Nazis, however, are also on the boat and they hope to close the gap. A tightly-paced story that focuses very much on dialogue, which is surprising, and Ambler shows a strong ear. As for the story, it follows a familiar pattern, but Ambler, the first grandmaster of the spy novel, makes the experience an enjoyable one.

[XboxEvolved]

what is this book you speak of? Did it get announced at CES this year or something?

[Pro A.]

No, these are just books in general. Everyone's encouraged to talk about what they read. For me, it's a boon as a writer. The more I read, the more I learn.

[LiquidEagle]

I just read The Importance of Being Earnest by Oscar Wilde for my English Drama class, if that counts :-p

[Pro A.]

It counts. I read the same play for my 19th/20th Century Brit Lit class a few weeks ago. Meh...

[Travis]

The China Hands: America's Foreign Service Officers and What Befell Them - E.J. Kahn, Jr.

It's awesome if you're into that kind of stuff. The guys Kahn talks about in this book (John S. Service, John P. Davies, etc) are pretty much my inspiration and I consider them American heroes. I had a professor that actually knew Jack Service personally when he worked at U.C. Berkeley.

[masteratt]

oh man i gotta read some books.

[Nelodium]

I am currently reading Audrey Niffenegger's "The Time Traveller's Wife". Really interesting read, and enjoying every minute of it so far.

[Pro A.]

9. Foe, J.M. Coetzee, **

Another book that takes liberties with a classical work. In this case, it's Daniel Defoe's Robinson Crusoe. The book runs the hypothesis of having a young woman named Susan Barton and Friday becoming vagabonds while trying to sell the novel to a fictional Daniel Defoe. The book has potential, I suppose, and its images of two outsiders in European society is quite stark and brutal, but the novella-length book never creates much intimacy with the characters except for Susan, who wasn't even in, near as I can recall, the original Robinson Crusoe.

10. Swag, Elmore Leonard, ***1/2

Tough, vintage Leonard from the 70's. Former car dealer Frank Ryan bails out a car thief named Stick. He proposes they go to business together and stick up all kinds of joints and make a fortune. They do well to start, but greed, murder, and a woman end up throwing everything askew when Ryan and Stick aim to make a hundred thousand sticking up a department store in the middle of downtown Detroit with a crew of shady characters. Not among the best of Leonard, but a tight plot (except for the shaky end) and some sharp, visceral dialogue matched with some cool characters makes this one hell of a ride. Not to be missed.

[Greg]

My first book of the year.

1. Intensity, Dean Koontz

I've had this book for a while and just now got around to reading it and it's a great book. I read the whole thing in one day which is a rarity unless I love a book. The book is about a college student who visits her friends family and during the visit the family is killed by one of the best antagonists I've ever read about. The woman then races to try and stop the "Homicidal adventurer". Its an intense thrill ride all the way through and if you are a fan of Dean Koontz you would love this book.

[Pro A.]

11. LaBrava, Elmore Leonard, ***1/2

Among a fair amount of Leonard aficionados, this is his best novel. I dunno if it is. My pick would probably be Freaky Deaky, but damn, is this good material. A former secret service agent-turned photographer, a former mobster on the fringes, a former movie star from the late-fifties and the early sixties, a Cuban refugee, and a psychotic, delusional ex-part-time cop all mesh together when the cop and the Cuban conjure up a plan to swindle $600,000 from the ex-movie star, who has a thing for our hero, Joe LaBrava, the photog who has had a crush on the movie star since he was 12. The plot goes in some unexpected directions and is a lot of fun just to read the dialogue. The finale falters a bit, but still great fun. One of Leonard's best. Side note: The Cuban, Cundo Rey, will be one of the major players in Leonard's new novel coming out in May, Road Dogs. He'll be paired up with Jack Foley (Out of Sight), who was played by George Clooney. Outstanding stuff.

[Pro A.]

12. Maximum Bob, Elmore Leonard, **1/2

Lightweight, breezy, but still worth the price of admission because no one can make dumb low-lifes as intriguing as Leonard. His 1991 book, set in Florida, puts us in the company of Judge Bob Gibbs, known as Maximum Bob, for his hefty sentences against criminals. Now it looks like a couple of hicks with a penchant for violence and con work are out to get him. Lucky for Gibbs, the hicks are being targeted by Kathy Baker, who is being watched by the judge's lecherous eye. The book goes in a few wild directions, including a rather grim sequence involving a dog and an alligator, but this is not even close to first-rate Leonard. Passable? Sure. Amazing? No.

13. Road Dogs, Elmore Leonard, ***

This must be a first for the master. Three characters from three past novels are brought together for a dandy of a caper. Jack Foley (Out of Sight) meets up with Cundo Rey (LaBrava) in prison. Cundo likes Jack and helps him beat a thirty-year prison sentence and sends him to Venice Beach to watch over his common-law wife Dawn Navarro (Riding the Rap). Jack, the most prolific bank robber in America, has FBI agent Lou Adams after him and he finds himself screwing Dawn almost instantly. Dawn, naturally, has a scheme involving a Hollywood actress with loads of money and she has her own agenda, which she wants in place by the time Cundo is let out of prison. The plot is nothing new, but seeing three of Leonard's best characters circle around one another is a treat and his dialogue and prose sparkle once again. Not first-rate, but definitely among the better works he's done this decade.

[Pro A.]

14. Gone Tomorrow, Lee Child, ***1/2

Thirteen is a lucky number for Child and his penultimate hero, Jack Reacher. Told from the first person, Reacher sees a white woman in NYC who exhibits all the signs of a suicide bomber. When he intervenes and she ends up killing herself, Reacher, the ex-MP cop, finds himself entering a world filled with mysterious feds, aspiring politicians, mysterious women (Reacher's favorite kind) and a conspiracy deeply-rooted in the Cold War and the War on Terror. Trust me, it all works. Child's prose is as sharp and non-invasive as ever. The opening five chapters alone are worth the price of admission. Best part is you have a hefty 395 pages to go. This is Child's best novel to date. Name me a thriller writer who is doing better work today. C'mon, I dare you.

[Milly]

Im a very Girlie Reader.. Im not overly into Fantasy unless its Harry Potter, But I recently read P.S I love you, Which was a very good read, probably one for the girls only. And I re-read Scar Tissue by Anthony Kiedis. I dont get much of a chance to read at the moment due to uni Stuff..

[Pro A.]

Been a while, but so it goes with finals.

15. Lush Life, Richard Price, ***

Price, best known for his novel Clockers and his work on The Wire, shows off his skills as a dialogue writer and as a novelist determined to get to the nitty-gritty of what makes New York tick. His novel follows several strands of people with a murder at the epicenter. We have Det. Clark, a veteran who can barely identify with his children, Eric Cash, a witness struggling between his real life and the life he wants, and we have the father of the deceased going through a similar struggle, and then we have Tristan, a young boy whose life is anything but pictureesque. The murder itself is no mystery and how it eventually ties together is a bit weak. The dialogue also gets a little confusing, especially when Price throws in three or four speakers, but for an incisive portrait of modern life in the city its about as on the money as you could hope for.

[Pro A.]

Wow... I've really slacked on my updates, shame on me. Much briefer commentary with these books.

16. Star Wars: Fate of the Jedi: Outcast, Aaron Allston, **

This new nine-book series deals with the fallout of the last series as Luke Skywalker is exiled for the past events that occurred within the Jedi Order. There are a number of other storylines going on too like political intrigue and Jedi going on psychotic breaks. Interesting stuff, but way too much going on and Allston can't bring any momentum or urgency to that all-important first book of a series.

17. Star Wars: Fate of the Jedi: Omen, Christie Golden, *

Golden's debut effort is one of the worst--if not the worst--books written since Del Rey took the series over. She has the characters down okay, but her prose and storytelling skills are dismal compared to Denning and Allston, the other authors working on this nine-book set. Hopefully this is just an aberration.

18. Friends of Eddie Coyle, George V. Higgins, ****

Higgins' debut novel is a stunning piece of work both from a dialogue and storytelling perspective. His story about a mob-connected gofer looking to get out with his head on straight is an exciting no-frills effort that is regarded by many crime novelists as one of the premier efforts in the last half-century.

19. Drama City, George Pelecanos, **1/2

A minor effort from one of the best crime novelists around works as a dual-layered story about a paroled ex-con and his probation officer getting sucked into a nasty vortex by the ex-con's friends and enemies. The dogfighting stuff--written a few years before the Vick situation--has some interesting prescience but the story as a whole feels more superficial than layered, which is essential for a story like this because it is character-driven.

20. Stick, Elmore Leonard, ***

More vintage Leonard, as it were. This book, which picks up as a sequel of sorts to Swag, follows Stick in Florida as he tries to go straight, but that doesn't work out (when does it ever?) and he soon finds himself neck-deep with thugs, real-estate brokers, and hitmen you could only find in South Florida. Light on plot, but heavy on that brilliant dialogue, and that's good enough, especially with the cast Leonard has put together here.

[Pro A.]

21. Cat Chaser, Elmore Leonard, ***

Interesting, slightly off-beat Leonard from the early eighties about a former Marine involved in the invasion of the D.R. getting into it with the wife of one of Trujillo's assassins and evading the husband, a former CIA agent, a private eye with unknown motivations, and a Dominican yo. All want to get rich and all have it in for the husband. The plot goes in just about every direction imaginable, but it all works in the end and the love story between George and Mary is a very good one. More politically driven than other Leonards, but a fun one set in sunny Florida and the Dominican.

22. Fate of the Jedi: Abyss, Troy Denning, **1/2

Denning, the second-best Star Wars author behind Tim Zahn, does what he can to bring the story back online involving a shadowy Sith group, Jedi going on psychotic breaks, and the usual political intrigue that brings in Mandalorian warriors of Boba Fett fame. More psychologically resonant than others (a Denning specialty) and some dramatic heft to Luke's storyline break this book out of the doldrums and give some genuine direction for the first time. Damned if I know or care what's going on half the time, but at least we have some positive momentum for the first time in ages.

[Pro A.]

23. Shutter Island, Dennis Lehane, ***1/2

Lehane's follow-up to Mystic River is a psychological thriller set in the 50's, which is about as far a cry as what he's done before, but it still has some of the trappings of the whodunit and so forth, involving a violent patient disappearing from a maximum security prison on an island. The story starts on that path in earnest, but it becomes more about Teddy Daniels, a federal marshal, and the personal demons he is fighting along with the suspicion that something is seriously wrong on this island. Book takes a wild left turn with fifty pages to go that demands a second reading. Some readers may be outraged at the neo-noir twist on a classic noir idea, but it goes to show Lehane's mystery as a writer both from a prose and plot point of view. Not as thought-provoking or haunting as Mystic, but a damn fine page-turner all the same.

[the poe collector]

Two books this year, which is a personal best.

Island by Aldous Huxley and Catch-22 by Joseph Heller. They were both interesting, but I loved Catch-22 and it's now one of my favorite books.

[Pro A.]

I need to read Catch-22 again because I think a lot of the insane shit went over my head at 17 and 18.

[the poe collector]

I thought it was hilarious. The plot can be pretty hard to follow with all of the characters and events being told out of order, but I really enjoyed it.

[Travis]

I have it but I couldn't get into it last time I tried to read it. I have that problem. If I don't absolutely love a book by about the 50th page, I can't read it. I'll try again in about a year.

I'm re-reading Catcher in the Rye and I've re-read all of Salinger's short stories in the last month.

[Pro A.]

Yeah, well, it's not all bad. The writer needs to earn the reader's respect. And on that note...

24. The Lost Symbol, Dan Brown, **1/2

Took the bastard six years and though he claimed he worked extra-hard to make this book just right, it probably could have used some tighter editing. This time, Freemasons and D.C. architecture figure into the plot as Robert Langdon is brought into the center of a conspiracy that involves an old friend as he tries to stop a lunatic from blowing the doors off a secret that goes back hundreds of years. Brown does an adequate job of keeping the plot moving and there are some interesting scenes in the second half that show a different light to D.C. and the surrounding area. Most of the characters are pretty broadly drawn and the prose has more than its share of hiccups, but for light-weight reading it could have been worse.

[olla86]

Now I am reading The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco and I like it greatly. It is a detective with the elements of history.

[Pro A.]

So I've gathered. I remember Kubrick wanted to make it into a movie at one point in the early 90's. Fate went the other way.

25. Blood's a Rover, James Ellroy, ****

Ellroy's long-awaited finish (eight years) to his Underworld USA trilogy is well worth it. Like American Tabloid and The Cold Six Thousand--which you must read to understand this one--Ellroy mixes facts and fiction, history and the fantastic, as he takes a buzzsaw to American history. His finale, which takes place post RFK's murder to Hoover's death, deals with an assortment of real-life characters like Hoover, Nixon, Howard Hunt, Carlos Marcello, and Howard Hughes (habitually called Dracula). The three main protagonists include an ex-cop dealing with both the mob, Hughes, and an FBI operation into black militant groups; an FBI agent as the direct connect to Hoover who is dealing subversion while finding himself romantically involved with far-left radicals; a voyeur P.I. who gets himself head over heels and is soon assassinating hitmen and shipping heroin from the Dominican as the mob prepares to move in for their last-ditch effort to make enough money to declare war on Cuba. A mesmerizing, larger-than-life take on history punctuated by Ellroy's staccato prose and hard-hitting dialogue. He's known for strong men driven by their weaknesses (mostly women, there and gone) but the two main women in the book, Joan and Karen, are every bit as strong and even more compelling than the men. Not perfect, but too good to resist and a bravura ending to a sensational trilogy that took American history out back and blasted it with a shotgun. Definitely NOT for all tastes.

[OmniCloud]

I dig chick books tbh...I used to just read them when I was younger to try and understand women more, so..well so I could get more girls;) but, a lot of them are pretty good...and good mysteries...

Last book I read was the notebook...

I'm bout to read the Twilight series now..

[Pro A.]

Spare yourself the indignity of that dirge. If you want to read about real vampires, read Bram Stoker's novel or Stephen King's Salem's Lot. At least they behave as real vampires should and not this teen-angst bullshit with their dicks locked in vice grips.

[OmniCloud]

Er..I dunno I like the movie...Vampires seem to be thrown in there just to look cool and be mysterious, at it's core, at least for the first film and book it seems, it's just a love story.

I don't really wanna read Stephen King's stuff, it's mostly disturbing...and that's getting played out

[Generosity of God]

my reading time this year has mostly been taken up by the tales of the otori series (Lian Hearn). i've just finished reading darkly dreaming dexter (Jeff Lindsay) and am now moving onto the lost symbol (Dan Brown). once i finish that i'll go back and finish the other two stories in the dexter omnibus. then after those i'll probably read a discworld (Terry Pratchett) book or two.

Tales of the Otori (Lian Hearn)
1. Heavens Net is Wide
2. Across the Nightingale Floor
3. Grass for His Pillow
4. Brilliance of the Moon
5. Harsh Cry of the Heron

6. Darkly Dreaming Dexter (Jeff Lindsay)

[Pro A.]

26. Glitz, Elmore Leonard, ***

The book that propelled Leonard to the best-seller list is an interesting sort of noir story that moves from humor to darkness about as easily as it shifts location. A cop is marked for death by a momma's boy psycho and he tails him from Puerto Rico to Atlantic City and a hooker's murder turns the game to a deadly chess match that involves the usual stream of strange, seedy characters that you would come to expect from your typical Leonard novel. A little too leisurely, perhaps, but still fun to read.

[Pro A.]

27. Clockers, Richard Price, ****

Price's best-known novel (and the inspiration for The Wire in many ways) is also his best. Price follows a homicide detective and a crack dealer's lives in an absorbing, energizing piece of literature as they try to make sense of their lives amidst the decay in Dempsy, a fictional New Jersey town. Price, a master of dialogue, also shows his exceptional prose and story-telling skills as he creates a real, breathing town out of thin cloth, filled with rich and vivid characterizations. At the center of it all, a young man dealing coke is murdering outside of a restaurant and a man who is innocent fesses up to the crime. The answers to why and the truth connect much of this long, but rich, piece of work. A must-read for any fan of crime novels.