A pleasure each weekend is reading the reviews in the tabloid sized Book Review section of The New York Times. There are so many books in print it is not a failing to acknowledge that you will never read them all. As each week comes and goes dozens of new books are announced and those which make the pages of the Book Review are the lucky ones the Times elects to preview. Hundreds more come off the presses that don’t make the cut.
On some weekends (Usually Sunday and Monday) I might read fifteen to twenty reviews and not make note of a book I will buy and read, or look for in the local library. On other weekends I jot down the title and the author of a book I really want to read and later in the week go shopping on Amazon.
No matter the final outcome each weekend I always find some snippet of information that pleases, informs, educates or provides a chuckle. These morsels might come directly from the book under review or be the comment of a reviewer.
No matter the final outcome each weekend I always find some snippet of information that pleases, informs, educates or provides a chuckle. These morsels might come directly from the book under review or be the comment of a reviewer.
These are some of those special moments from this weekend’s readings.
The unscrupulous editor in chief, Simei, informs his staff that their target audience is nitwits. Crossword clues must be no more challenging than “The husband of Eve.” (Numero Zero, Umberto Eco. Reviewer: Tom Rachman)
There are episodes in his theatrical chronicle that recall an epigram of Oscar Wilde’s : “My play was a complete success. The audience was a failure.” (The Blue Touch Paper, A Memoir, David Hare. Reviewer: Tina Brown)
The stars here are the story and the ideas and Vonnegut himself, who is always funny in the way banging your knee can sometimes be funny.: You hurt like hell and so the only thing to do about it is to laugh.(Breakfast of Champions, Kurt Vonnegut. An audio book read by John Malkovich. Reviewer: Michael Ian Black)
When former U. S. Senator Alan Simpson was a scout he and another scout were sharing a tent. They became angry with one of the other scouts. Since rain was forecast, and their tent was on higher ground, Simpson and his friend dug a trench around their tent that aimed the flow of water into the other boy’s shelter. That night, it rained and the other boy got very cold and wet. (Lights Out, Ted Koppel. Reviewer: Walter Russell Mead)
There are episodes in his theatrical chronicle that recall an epigram of Oscar Wilde’s : “My play was a complete success. The audience was a failure.” (The Blue Touch Paper, A Memoir, David Hare. Reviewer: Tina Brown)
The stars here are the story and the ideas and Vonnegut himself, who is always funny in the way banging your knee can sometimes be funny.: You hurt like hell and so the only thing to do about it is to laugh.(Breakfast of Champions, Kurt Vonnegut. An audio book read by John Malkovich. Reviewer: Michael Ian Black)
When former U. S. Senator Alan Simpson was a scout he and another scout were sharing a tent. They became angry with one of the other scouts. Since rain was forecast, and their tent was on higher ground, Simpson and his friend dug a trench around their tent that aimed the flow of water into the other boy’s shelter. That night, it rained and the other boy got very cold and wet. (Lights Out, Ted Koppel. Reviewer: Walter Russell Mead)
Last week I finished reading an audio version of my new book in four days…As I was about to leave, I jokingly asked the audio book audio director if he could make the book a runaway audio brest seller.
“You should have written a smut novel,” he told me. “Those are the ones that sell.”
“Who in the world listens to smut novels?” I asked.
“Long-haul truck drivers!” he replied.
He was pulling my leg, but only slightly. Audio recordings of erotic fiction are a blooming business. (Author’s Note, Aural Sex. Elaine Sciolino)
She slept with Friedrich Engles (He founded Marxist theroy along with Karl Marx), but never read a word of his writings. (She couldn’t, she was illiterate.) (Mrs. Engles, Gavin McCrea. Reviewer: Jan Stuart)
