Ethan Frome by Edith Wharton
There's a running joke at my job about this book. Most teachers there hate it and almost all kids hate it. And yet, people keep teaching it. I labeled an email "Another thought I had about Ethan Frome" to a colleague and then cut and pasted the entire text of the novella to them in the body of the … [Read more]
White Noise by Don Delillo
This is another reread. I first read this book in 2003 or so when I was in college, and while I enjoyed a lot about it, I can't say I understood much beyond the weird story. There's a Beckett-like element at play within this novel, as so many of the fat-rendered glut of modern life is broken down … [Read more]
Gulliver's Travels by Jonathan Swift
Patti Smith voice: Horses, horses, horses, horses, horses..... This book is amazing and more people should read it. I recently decided to tackle a few of my literature gaps, and 18th century British literature is probably my major one. I could say 17th century too, but I have read enough … [Read more]
How to Read Poetry like a Professor by Thomas C Foster
I've been reading Thomas Foster's "How to Read..." series in preparation for teaching AP this fall. This volume is probably the technical of the books, and not the least enjoyable by any stretch, but the least playful. It's also the book that I probably most need since like Thomas Foster mentions … [Read more]
In Pharoah's Army by Tobias Wolff
Bullet Train by Kōtarō Isaka
Shadow of the Torturer by Gene Wolfe
The Missing of the Somme by Geoff Dyer
The Crystal Cave by Mary Stewart
A Good Man is Hard to Find by Flannery O'Connor
The Collected Stories of Breece D'J Pancake by Breece Pancake
Child of God by Cormac Mccarthy
Candide by Voltaire
A Shropshire Lad by AE Housman
On Animals by Susan Orlean
The Facts by Philip Roth
In Pharoah's Army -4/5 The second memoir by Tobias Wolff (known for A Boy's Life too) but covering his time in Vietnam. This memoir reads a lot like a Vietnam novel -- faint with memories, covering topics, and episodic. It's hard not to compare it to Tim O'Brien's The Things they Carried (a … [Read more]
Driving the Deep by Suzanne Palmer
I enjoyed the sequel to The Finder even more than the first book. Initially, I thought Fergus had another unwilling partner in Zacker, a NY cop who attacks Fergus when he returns to Scotland to make amends for deserting his family as a teenager. In typical Fergus fashion, he’s at the wrong place at … [Read more]
