Toltec(?) Wisdom

I just finished The Four Agreements by Don Miguel Ruiz. Apparently, it was on the New York Times bestseller list for over five years. Did I know that? No. I only found out about it from Mighty Girl.

Anyway, it's a slim, attractively designed book and you can get through it pretty quickly. The four agreements are:

• Be impeccable with your word - Tell the truth, don't say bad things about other people--or yourself--and use your words for positive aims.
• Don't take anything personally - when people say or do bad things about you, that's their trip not yours.
• Don't make assumptions - have the sack to ask questions and ask for what you want.
• Always do your best - try your hardest, given the circumstances, and you won't beat yourself up later.

Pretty good, right? I think so. I really believe you could make significant changes in your life by following those four points. I also believe the book could have been one page long. Because while there were plenty of nice nuggets in the 150 pages, there was also lots of purple, meandering prose that left me wondering if Don Miguel weren't a bit of a charlatan hiding behind the Toltec seal of approval. Maybe it's because English is not his first language. Maybe.

Or maybe I need to be more impeccable with my word. Sorry, Don Miguel.

I Could Use a Litte Boko-maru Right About Now

This week I pulled another book off the shelf for a re-read. Other than ice-nine, I remembered practically nothing from when I first read Cat's Cradle twenty years ago. I will try to do better this time around, because the book is so freaking fantastic. There is no one better at peeling back the layers on war and religion and people than Vonnegut. The book is very funny, but it's always slipping in these haymakers from behind bushes.

Here's what the newly appointed ambassador to San Lorenzo, Horlick Minton, says before he tosses a wreath in the ocean to memorialize the Hundred Martyrs to Democracy:

"I do not say that children at war do not die like men, if they have to die. To their everlasting honor and our everlasting shame they do die like men, thus making possible the manly jubilation of patriotic holidays.

But they are murdered children all the same.

And I propose to you that if we are to pay our sincere respects to the hundred lost children of San Lorenzo, that we might best spend the day despising what killed them; which is to say, the stupidity and viciousness of all mankind.

Perhaps, when we remember wars, we should take off our clothes and paint ourselves blue and go on all fours all day long and grunt like pigs. That would surely be more appropriate than noble oratory and shows of flags and well-oiled guns."

A message for there for everyone, particularly those campaigning for a certain office.

RetREADs

Things have been kind of crazy lately. T-ball, talent shows, piano recitals, surly clients, client sites getting hacked, what seems like an endless string of proposals to write, the list goes on. It's made getting to the library a little difficult. Heck, it's made writing a post on this blog these last two months an item on my TO-DO list so far at the bottom to not even be discovered.

So I decided to head on over to our bookshelf and re-read some of my favorite books. I started with The Bird Artist and re-discovered what a fantastic and unique character Margaret Handle is. She steals every scene she's in. You owe it to yourself to meet her.

I then moved on to The River Why which is on my Top-5 books of all time. Yes, you have to slog through a fair amount of philosophy and Gus's search for spiritual meaning, but there are three chapters in there that will knock your socks off. The first, when Gus first encounters Eddy (and loses his oranges) sets the hook. The second, when Eddy visits his cabin, lands you ("Come with me to my house" might just be my favorite line in all of literature). And then the final chapter when Gus meets Julie, well, carry on the fishing analogy however you see fit: it either clubs you over the head or releases you back to the stream.

Sometimes it's advantageous to have a shitty memory. Re-reading great books is one such example.

Must Be a Good Book

Yesterday at the gym, I was downstairs in the dungeon/Island of Misfit Machines doing my usual cycle of spinning and weights. Normally, I'm the only one there, but yesterday there was another guy lifting some really big weights. Late 30s, balding, not huge, stinky. In between reps, he kept picking up a book to read. Never seen that before. Sort of reminded me of Jim Courier reading Armistead Maupin's "Maybe the Moon" during the changeovers in a tournament.

Later, after my swim, I come out of the shower to see the same guy, dripping wet, sitting naked on a skeavy bench and reading again. He finally put the book down to go dry himself with about a dozen paper towels.

I don't think I'll add it to my list.

Rhymes with Witch

I finished Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows a couple of weeks ago and found it enjoyable, thrilling, and satisfying. That last adjective is particularly important given the book is--as known by everyone in the world--the final wrap-up of Harry's battle with Evil What's-His-Face.

The pace of the first half of the book is MUCH slower than the second. I can kind of picture J.K. tooling away and realizing she better step on the gas or she'd be looking at a tome the Post Office would have to deliver with a fork lift. And man, does she stomp on it. My brain was spinning those last hundred pages.

In that last hundred pages is a word. A single word. A word I'll bet dollars to doughnuts Ms. Rowling anguished over whether to include. I'll even bet there were several editorial meetings at Arthur A Levine/Scholastic Books about the word. Heated meetings, with people muttering expletives under their breath.

I think the wrong decision was made. The word is not shockingly bad, but it is completely out of character with the rest of the series. Seven books, thousands of pages, and the whole thing came to a SCREECHING halt when my eyes hit the word.

I wonder what the audio version does with it. When I read Harry 7 to my kids, I will have to casually gloss over that word...because who wants to get into that discussion with innocents until they absolutely have to?

Page 736, in case you're curious.

Drowned in the Storm

About a year ago I sort of suddenly realized that I had never read any fantasy fiction. Well, aside from the Tolkien books many years back. So, fatigued with the current literature scene, I went about rectifying the situation. I did some research and found that the Philip Pullman series and the George R. R. Martin series were universally well received.

And I have loved them both. The Pullman books are supposedly geared toward young adults, but that seems to be utter nonsense to me. The themes are big, they're scary, exciting, and filled with danger and violence. Even some sex. Add the tearing down of religious lies and you get your cherry on the top.

I just finished book 3, A Storm of Swords, of Martin's series, and it was just as great as books 1 and 2. But golly, after 1,128 pages, I find I'm needing a break. Reading about modern relationships and urban ennui is starting to look appealing again. Especially since the reviews for book 4 aren't that hot. I guess I'll put my sword back in its scabbard for a spell.

Catching Up

Man, this week has flown.  Somehow it's Friday afternoon and I just realized I haven't posted in over a week.  Work has been crazy.  No money coming in, but a slew of people wanting proposals.

I've gotten a few new albums and finished 2 books lately, so I thought I'd pop in with a few quick comments in lieu of more formal reviews.

Clap Your Hands Say Yeah
I really hate it when reviewers compare the band in question to some other band in the past.  Really hate it.  So I'm going to do it...because with this album I really have no choice.  Clap Your Hands sound so much like Talking Heads it's uncanny.  Not late-period Heads when David Byrne's ego was Saturnesque, but early Heads when they were a band.  This album is alive with quirkiness, odd beats and song structures and is completely captivating.

The National - Alligator
I considered downloading this album on eMusic for months and finally pulled the trigger.  You know how some albums are "growers," and they take a handful of listens to start making their impression on your brain?  Well this one is an ivy, or a WEED, or some other really fast growing plant.  It's dark, it's melodic, it's a head-scratcher and I totally love it.

Rilo Kiley - More Adventurous
I think I need a few more listens on this one.  Because right now, and I'm a little afraid to say this, I think it's kind of boring.

Michael Azerrad - Our Band Could Be Your Life
A friend sent this to me because he knows how much I like the Replacements.  Basically, there's a chapter on 13 different seminal bands from the 1980s.  These are the bands that quite literally invented the indie scene we all love today.  And they did it themselves as there was nothing there to help them along.  Azerrad is fine writer and a great story teller.  If you think life as a musician is glamorous, then you need to read this book.  It's more like starving to death and getting loogies spat in your mouth.  Quite the horrifying read, actually.

J.M. Coetzee - Disgrace
This guy can write.  I guess that's what they hand out Nobel Prizes for.  He tackles such complex themes and relationships with such simple, direct language.  And it's a deceptive book in that it appears so slight you start thinking that nothing is happening as far as plot.  But then you realize that a LOT is happening; he just deals with the monumental and the mundane with an eerily equal tone.  Kind of like life.

Where Did I Put That Chain-Mail?

We literary snobs like to turn our noses up at the whole fantasy/sci-fi genre.  Those books are for the doughy, the pasty, the be-spectacled, the greasy.  But every so often, when I reach my saturation point on urban angst and ennui, I go screaming toward anything with a riveting STORY.

Over the Christmas break I finished George R.R. Martin's "A Game of Thrones."  There are 1,280 customer reviews at Amazon, so it obviously has a following.  And for good reason.  It's filled with knights and ladies and battles and beheadings and deception and lust and mutton and mead and...The Others.

It was a completely enjoyable read and I'm wondering how long I can hold off before picking up book 2 in the series, A Clash of Kings.  The last scene with Daenerys and her suckling "babes" was quite the barn-burner (pun intended).

J.D., Stop Bugging Me!

The media would have you believe that J.D. Salinger is a total recluse, a hermit that skitters away from other humans as if negatively charged.  Well, then how do they explain the fact that in the last twenty years I've encountered him TWICE?!  My god, I'm beginning to think the man is stalking me.

The first meeting came in 1985 when I was working at a restaurant in NH.  My manager told me that she had just seated someone special in my station and to please take good care of him.  After some arm-twisting she told me who it was and that she was good friends with the thirtysomething woman in the booth with him.

At the time, he was my absolute favorite writer.  Not for "Catcher In The Rye" (I was always more of a "Franny & Zooey" guy), but for the two best short stories I've ever read, "The Laughing Man" and "Uncle Wiggly in Connecticut."  The thought of serving this man significantly bumped my heart rate.

He was old and hard-of-hearing.  He kept asking for a tuna sandwich, which we didn't have on the menu.  I finally said okay and went across the alley to the convenience store for a can of tuna which my manager and I made into a special tuna & tarragon homage.  He didn't seem to be especially--or at all--grateful, he just went about his chewing, swallowing, and leaving.  His companion seemed very nice and full of life which made me a little sad.  It seemed like signing up to be Salinger's nursemaid was going to be no gig of giggles.

Fast-forward twenty years.  I see the two of them, again in NH, this time in a crunchy supermarket.  In 1985 I never would have said that he would live to see 2005, but there he was, shuffling along, more-holding-onto than pushing a cart.  And there she was, too.  Now in her 50s, but still radiant despite a life that must get progressively harder each day.  And just forget about his hearing.

Twenty years ago, my manager told me Salinger had a chestful of manuscripts all lined up for posthumous publishing.  I don't know what's in that chest, but when I looked in their cart a couple of weeks ago, I saw three cans of tuna.

The Summer Guest

Writing about a book feels so trivial this morning with Iraq raging on, Karl Rove deliberately ruining lives again and skipping away (I think all that bile is building up in his waddle), Rick Santorum stating that the Catholic pedophile problems were caused by Boston's liberalism, and the future of the Supreme Court so bleak.  Especially since the book that takes place in the wilds of Maine at an idyllic summer camp.

But on I go anyway.  I recently finished Justin Cronin's The Summer Guest. The book was meticulously plotted, and the characters were well drawn and likable.  It would have drawn 3.5 stars if TypePad had that option, but I rounded down for one reason.

Namely, the book suffers from a distinct lack of an edge.  You like ALL the characters.  Even the ones who are crusty and curmudgeonly or affluently aloof eventually reveal a heart of gold.  The dialogue rings (mostly) true as things you and your friends on their best days might say.

One, just one, evil-doer would have done wonders for this book and injected some true conflict other than the daily monotonous battles we all face with life itself.  It felt like Cronin was writing a book his mother would be proud of instead of letting it rip, potential family embarrassment be damned.