Recently Arrived Books
A quick round up of stuff that’s arrived at Spike Towers recently, with synopsis cribbed from Amazon and some random thoughts from me.
Sawn-Off TalesDavid Gaffney
Synopsis: “David Gaffney’s compact, surreal tales are filled with poignancy and wit. Each story goes off like a tiny depth charge in the mind, leaving you with the trace memory of some new urban myth - comic, absurd and disturbingly true.”
– Half way through this at the moment. No story is longer than a couple of hundred words. And they are all the better for it. I want to say he’s like an English David Sedaris, because he has the same lightness of tone and warmth, but he’s nothing like Sedaris - much shorter, darker, and with that deadpan English sensibility that makes the grotesquely surreal seem mundane.
Skipping Towards Armageddon: The Politics and Propaganda of the Left Behind Novels and the LaHaye Empire - Michael Standaert
Synopsis: “This is an investigation and critique of the Christian right in America via “The Left Behind” series of novels. Protestant Evangelism in America is a potent cultural, historical and political force. It is an inseparable part of the national character. As a religious denomination, the personal faith of Evangelicalism brings hope to millions of followers, just as other forms of religious belief enrich and give meaning to the adherents of these faiths.
What the book reveals is that the “Left Behind” series is not a harmless series of thrillers written from an evangelical Christian perspective but the primary tool of a man of whom none other than Jerry Falwell has remarked: “He has set the agenda for evangelicalism more than any other person.” This agenda, by its very own admission, seeks to bring about the end of the world. With no end on sight to the series, with other large publishers issuing “me-too” series (most notably Bantam), we trivialise these books at our peril.”
– I tried reading one of the Left Behind books earlier this year. Someone had left it behind on a dive boat. Within the first three pages, all I could think was - I would have been a millionaire if I’d thought people would pay to read this shit.
The Lost Colony - Grady Klein (graphic novel)
Synopsis: “Historical and contemporary American racial, economic, and social issues lie at the heart of this witty, sophisticated, candy-colored adventure, set in a utopian island community. Bertha (Birdy) Snodgrass, preadolescent daughter of the town banker, throws in her lot with a shady Chinese Mexican wizard, his golemlike assistant, and, finally, with Louis the slave. Readers with a grasp of pre-Jamestown history will have the easiest time understanding the riffs on Puritanism and the various American hypocrisies woven into this story. Racial and cultural slurs are buried beneath the surface of character interactions, and no ethnic group is spared. That, of course, is the point: to see oneself as a possible victim of prejudice, or, like Birdy, work toward changing things and make friends with people who are different. Teens (especially those enrolled in advanced-placement American history classes) as well as many adults will find a lot to enjoy and think about in this brash, fantastic tale–and they will look forward to other volumes in the planned series.” (Booklist)
– Tried to read this but found its narrative to be strangely paced and the story flow confusing - I like the idea a lot more than the reading experience. The publisher, www.firstsecondbooks.com, has some excellent graphic novel titles coming out - they are definitely a publisher on a mission to find the best graphic novels from all over the world and you can see from their beautifully produced catalogue they have a real passion and flair for what they do. I’d love to read practically their entire back catalogue
Only 13 - The True Story Of Lon - Julia Manzanares & Derek Kent
Synopsis: “From a child runaway, to a top earner in Thailand’s prolific sex industry, comes the true story of a little girl from an impoverished land where girls aren’t valuable enough to educate, yet are expected to become the primary income earners–responsible for the basic needs and welfare of their families.
By the time Lon was 18, she had been responsible for the sole support of her family for five years. After suffering a childhood filled with beatings, blamed for her fathers death, and denied further education at the age of 12, she ran away and soon sold the only item of value she possessed–her young and supple body. The more she earned by agreeing to the most perverted and degrading acts demanded by her foreign customers, the more money her mother demanded. An abortion at 15, followed by a suicide attempt, hundreds upon hundreds of clients, and the discovery and loss of her first love-all before she was 18-are only a part of her story. Her relentless determination to save her sisters from the same fate gave her the strength to endure, and to tell the unknowing world how the “Daughters of Isaan” must honor their family obligations, regardless of the cost to themselves.”
– Only 13 has already been a bestseller in Thailand - there are so many excellent English language books published here that never see a wider US/UK audience - and now this is its first American printing.
Clear Water Will Ashton
Synopsis: “Set in and around Clearwater, a vast, subterranean shopping centre lying on the edge of the Thames estuary in Kent, Will Ashon’s spectacular debut novel constructs a story of intrigue, action and high entertainment around six principal figures. King James of Vernaland is an ex-secret service hardnut with a God complex, Binary Robert, his young companion with a genius for computer-hacking and data-harvesting; Peter Jones is a disaffected lifestyle journalist desperate to rescue his career with a scoop on the invisible workings of the Clearwater complex, and Mandy, the young shop assistant he befriends in his attempts to penetrate the vast edifice of consumerism. And then there’s Jimmy Patel, a retired professional spin-bowler turned melancholic-alcoholic, about to be fingered himself for professional indiscretions. It’s just not cricket. CLEAR WATER binds these five together along with the unforgettable Verna Landor - a wartime ‘entertainer’ of dubious stripe and King James’ muse - and builds an extraordinary narrative of espionage, desire and dysfunction to a thrilling denouement. An intricately structured, deadpan exposition of contemporary life, CLEAR WATER announces the arrival of a prodigious new talent.”
This has been getting rave reviews and the Amazon reader comments call on comparisons to Delillo, David Mitchell and Pynchon… although perhaps the nearest is Ballard, especially as his new novel Kingdom Come deals with a shopping centre as well! I’m getting a copy of that brought to Bangkok next week so I’ll be curious to read the two and see how they compare.
Misfits in America: Thine Alabaster Cities Gleam: A Story of the Last Half of the Twentieth Century - Lawrence R. Velvel
Synopsis: “Thine Alabaster Cities Gleam is both a trilogy that describes what academic and professional life were like during the last half of the 20th century, and a work of wide ranging criticism of the dishonesty, failure of duty, violations of rules, elitism, bragging and celebrification that became the road to success in the last 50 years of the century. The first volume, Misfits in America, carries its protagonists through college at the University of Michigan in the late 1950s, the Harvard and Michigan Law Schools in the early 1960s, practicing law for the Department of Justice in the mid 1960s, early years in the academic world, and extensive but fruitless efforts in the late 1960s and early 1970s to have the federal courts perform their constitutional duty regarding the Viet Nam War.”
– Nothing to say about this one yet.
Sexual Revolution 2.0: Getting Connected, Upgrading Your Sex Life and Finding True- Regina Lynn
Synopsis: Join author Regina Lynn in The Sexual Revolution 2.0 as she personally explores the new world of online romance, e-personals, cybersex, date blogs, internet-powered sex toys and on-demand porn. Along the way, meet brave pioneers who are venturing to the outer limits of the sex-tech convergence and ordinary people who are simply enriching their love life by embracing new technologies. By the end of the journey, you will understand how technology can help you achieve the one thing it can never replace: human connection.
I like Regina Lynn’s Sex Drive column for Wired a lot, so I’m looking forward to finally getting to read this.
The Quantum Zoo: A Tourist’s Guide to the Neverending Universe - Marcus Chown
Synopsis: The two towering achievements of modern physics are quantum theory and Einstein’s general theory of relativity. Together, they explain virtually everything about the world we live in. But, almost a century after their advent, most people haven’t the slightest clue what either is about. Did you know that there’s so much empty space inside matter that the entire human race could be squeezed into the volume of a sugar cube? Or that you grow old more quickly on the top floor of a building than on the ground floor? And did you realize that 1 percent of the static on a TV tuned between stations is the relic of the Big Bang? These and many other remarkable facts about the world are direct consequences of quantum physics and relativity.
Quantum theory has literally made the modern world possible. Not only has it given us lasers, computers, and nuclear reactors, but it has provided an explanation of why the sun shines and why the ground beneath our feet is solid. Despite this, however, quantum theory and relativity remain a patchwork of fragmented ideas, vaguely understood at best and often utterly mysterious. They have even gained a reputation of being beyond the understanding of the average person. Author Marcus Chown emphatically disagrees. As Einstein himself said, most of the fundamental ideas of science are essentially simple and may, as a rule, be expressed in a language comprehensible to everyone. “
– Despite the assurances this is an easy read, I am pretty sure it’s going to make my brain hurt.
Other Splinters posts of interest:
- Rayford Steele?
- Krapp on Channel 4 At last Channel 4 are contin…
- The Story of the Novel, chapter 2
- A new refutation of hope
- Separation
