While in Corolla, N.C. over fall break, Sara (Jonathan's girlfriend) and I walked across the street from the beach house to check out a cute little bookstore. There we spent time discussing politics, travel, and just good literature. I also took some time to purchase a few books as well. Below are the three books I bought with a little description of each.
#1 YOU DON'T LOVE ME YET written by Jonathan Letham
"Smart and Funny.... A biting satirical take on the intersection of art and commerce, integrity and facade.... a send-up of all things cool." -Los Angeles Times
"Fit to be devoured over a weekend." -Rolling Stone
"A gentle and hip romantic comedy [that] breezes through LA's iconoclastic anonymity with a refreshing sincerity."
-The Independent
Bestselling author Jonathan Lethem delivers a hilarious novel about love, art, and what it's like to be young in Los Angeles. Lucinda Hoekke's daytime gig as a telephone operator at the complaint line- an art gallery's high-minded installation piece- is about as exciting as listening to dead air. Her real passion is playing bass in her forever struggling. forever unnamed band. But recently a frequent caller, the Complainer, as Lucinda dubs him, has captivated her with philosophical musings. When Lucinda's band begins to incorporate the Complainer's catchy, existential phrases into their song lyrics, they are suddenly on the cusp of their big break. There is only one problem: the Complainer wants in.
#2 APPLES written by Richard Milward
"If... Bret Easton Ellis had grown up in a North of England housing project, Less then Zero might have looked a bit like Apples. It's one of the best books I've ever read about being young, working-class, and British." -Irvine Welsh, author of Trainspotting
"Apples is an astonishing debut. ... Catcher in the Rye meets The Arctic Monkeys." -The Times Magazine (UK)
"[An] unbelievably good, affecting, unpretentious debut novel... Apples feels truthful: whether the drugs, the sex, the boozing or the brutal insecurities of adolescence, it all smacks beautifully of the real thing." -Time Out (London)
As a distraction from sleazy male admirers, spiteful classmates, and her mother's progressing cancer, adolescent Eve's eyes are opened to a multicolor life of fumbling one-night stands, drug-filled clubs, endless varieties of cheap candy-flavored booze, and banal consumerist choices. A key member of Middlesbrough's party-going "in" crowd, Eve barely notices Adam. Adam, however, notices Eve. While contending with sexual frustration, and irrational and fiery-tempered father, and increasingly compulsive behavior, is Adam too busy furtively reading porn magazines in his bedroom to make his move on Eve?
A paean to the scattershot difficulties of growing up and an electrifying take on amoral youth and teen misadventure, Apples is an affecting, ingeniously crafted coming-of-age novel that has critics calling Richard Milward "the voice of the MySpace generation."
*Note: This young author is only 21 years old!!
#3 NOTES FROM A SMALL ISLAND written by Bill Bryson
"Astute and funny... an amusing guide to U.K.'s foibles, as well as a tribute to its enchantment." -New York Time Book Review
"Hilarious and observant." -USA Today
"In this tour of Britain, you can find no better companion than Bill Bryson." -Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel
"Bryson is unparalleled in his ability to cut a culture off at the knees in a way that is so humorous and so affectionate that those being ridiculed are laughing too hard to take offense." -Wall Street Journal
Veering from the ludicrous to the endearing and back again, Notes from a Small Island is a delightfully irreverent jaunt around the unparalleled floating nation that has produced zebra crossings, Shakespeare, Twiggie Winkie's Farm, and places with names like Farleigh Wallop and Titsey.
*Note: I started reading this book three years ago when we vacationed in the Virgin Islands. It was a book that was on the shelf at the house we were staying in. I had too much of a guilty conscience to take it home with me and so I left it there when we returned home. I am extremely excited to finish it! Bryson writes with such subtle humor and irony that you can easily lose track of time while you are reading this book.
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