Huh. I’m rather behind on this blog post! I blame it on Internet problems 🙂
I did a very bad job of tracking the books I read in October and I’m afraid I can only remember two of the books that I read, besides my nutrition books. I know I read more books than these two, but can’t for the life of me think what they were! Ah well.
The nutrition books, for my correspondence course, were The Dietitian’s Guide to Vegetarian Diets: Issues and Applications, Second Edition by Virginia Messina, Reed Mangels, and Mark Messina, as well as Becoming Vegetarian: the complete guide to adopting a healthy vegetarian diet by Vesanto Melina, M. Sc., R.D., and Brenda Davis, R.D. I quite enjoyed these two, even though at times they could be a little dry. Very informative though!
The two novels that I read were absolutely excellent. The Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger was one I hadn’t been planning on reading, but I was told that it was amazing so I decided I’d give it a shot. It turns out that this book really is incredible. It made me cry three times! I can’t remember the last time a book elicited such a strong reaction from me. It is a very moving story and Niffenegger is a genius.
An Object of Beauty by Steve Martin was the other book I read, on recommendation from the father dear. I was blown away by Martin’s talent. I don’t usually like him in his films, usually because they’re comedies and I just don’t like him in that role. But he wrote this book with such a lovely style. I don’t think I liked the characters, and I’m not sure I liked the story (I can’t really decide, to be honest), but even so, I can tell a good writer when I read them. And Martin is very talented. It makes me want to watch the film Shopgirl again, which he wrote and starred in… at the time I first saw it, several years ago, I didn’t much like it, but I think I’d like to watch it just to appreciate the talent, even if I’m not a fan of the story.
Have you ever read a book or watched a film where you could appreciate the quality of the skill and style, but just weren’t into the story so much?
Have you ever read “the Road” by Cormad McCarthy? I’d never even heard of it until last week. There is a great programme on Radio 4 here called “A Good Read”, where two guests each week get the other guest and a host to read a book they recommend, the host does the same, and they discuss all three books. I catch it sometimes on the radio driving home. This week some guy nominated “The Road”, and he asked the other guest what she’d made of it. She said “I thought it one of the greatest books ever written.”. It is an absolutely bleak, play-apocalyptic story, but the writing is is limpid, each word resonant and exact. They were saying it was biblical language, it was as forceful as Shakespeare – these are not comparisons you ever hear! I googled it and the reviews all said it was a great masterpiece, a classic, etc. I got it out the library on Friday and they are right. I’m not far in because it’s too harrowing to read much at once but it is also mesmerising, the images are just Homeric in their vividness, the language is so spare and stark and melodic. I can’t imagine how I missed it when it was published in 06. I thought of you while listening to the programme because one of them pointed out that in the story, as the possibilities of living reduce, so does the vocabulary and the punctuation, though it remains as powerful, so there must be a real rhetorical interest there. Anyway don’t read it if you are feeling depressed and fearful ever and you need to keep a sense of conscious detachment while reading it because the language is so compelling, but some time, one year, it is a book that demNds to be read.
Or post-apocalyptic, even.