Take The 50 Book Challenge
I read about this challenge to read 50 books this year on Bookslut (yes, I read Bookslut sometimes, so sue me, I like books), and I thought I'd play along. You all are desperate to know about my reading habits, I'm sure. Well, let me sum them up. Sometimes I buy books, and then they usually sit in a huge amorphous pile by my desk, and then sometimes when there's nothing on TV, I pick one out of the pile. Fortunately, there's often nothing on TV, so I think I can get pretty close to reading 50 books this year. I've already completed one.
1. Fade To Blonde, by Max Phillips . I picked this sucker up at the New York Is Book Country festival a few months ago. The re-emergence of hard-boiled noir literature as a viable genre has been totally neglected by most literary observers, who prefer their storytelling a little more genteel. This offering, from a press called Hard Case Crime, is emblematic of a great restoration. Phillips has recreated the universe of Raymond Chandler with utter believability. The story revolves around a failed screenwriter, ex-GI sharpshooter and retired boxer who gets mixed up in a Southern California underworld of hopheads, porn directors, and, yes, dangerous blondes, in the 1950s. Phillips updates the literature of that age a bit. His characters are more psychologically intricate, his sex scenes more explicit, and he avoids James Ellroy-style histrionics. The novel moves along with punchy, straightforward, sexy prose, and doesn't lack for wit. I felt like the plot unravelled too quickly toward the end, but that's a common pitfall with such books. The atmosphere is so dense that the author feels forced to explain everything in the last 15 pages. But it's damn good for a bus ride, and has a great old-fashioned cover painting.
What book will I read next? Who knows?