Insanely beautiful

The book club is reading Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer this month. This is an insanely written book about the insanity of grief and loss that is eccentric beyond anything I’ve ever seen in print. It’s mainly in the brilliant, busy mind of nine-year-old Oskar, who’s dealing with the loss of his father on 9/11.

You have to give yourself up to it, let it be what it is, without caring about the normal conventions of writing. Nothing makes sense to the characters, so it doesn’t make sense to you either. If you keep going you begin to see what’s happening, where it’s going, and by the end of it you’ve been crying and nodding your head in such deep understanding that you realize it was beautiful. Insanely beautiful.

Please leave a comment with your first 50 words on the topic “insanely beautiful.”

Favorite Fictional Character

My favorite fictional character probably should be given by decade. If I start with the current decade, it would be one of the female sleuths–maybe Kate Shugak or Dr. Temperance Brennan. This would be the Temperance in the books, not the TV show character: they are vastly different. I also get quite a laugh from Kinsey Millhone in all her sleuthing efforts.

Going back a decade, I should select one of the mythological archetypes from Women Who Run with the Wolves rather than a character from a novel. I think I read that book for 10 years straight, again and again.

The decade before that . . .

Please leave a comment with your first 50 words on the topic “favorite fictional character.”

Party

In one of my book clubs, we read The Memory Keeper’s Daughter. The book’s set to be a movie, premiering on Lifetime on April 12. To the book group, this is a good excuse for a party. Food, wine, a bunch of yakky women, and a story we all responded to deeply when we read it. I think we’ve found the meaning of life and disguised it as a party.

The book is excellent. A story about secrets and grief and how both can destroy a family. Read it.

Please leave a comment with your first 50 words on the topic “party.”

Pooh Bear

That plate of fudge reminds me of Pooh Bear discovering waaaay too many pots of honey down the rabbit hole. After he slurped it all, he couldn’t get out the door. The kitchen is a rabbit hole, the fudge is waiting to trap me inside and turn me into a roly poly mama bear who can’t fit through the exit.

There’s only one solution. I take a deep breath, storm the kitchen, bravely grab the plate and . . .

Please leave a comment with your first 50 words on the topic “pooh bear.”

Old Friend from Far Away

Old Friend from Far Away: The Practice of Writing Memoir by Natalie Goldberg was mentioned in the Sunday newspaper. It’s a new book of hers with writing prompts for 10 minute writing practices exercises that eventually will yield a memoir.

Since Natalie Goldberg is the muse behind my love of writing practice, I’m mentioning it here. The book has dozens of prompts for timed writing practice. Some examples are, “Write about a time you itched. It could be physical or metaphorical.” or “Tell me about your mother’s hands.”

I can’t wait to get my hands on it.

A Year of Mornings

Two friends, 3191 miles apart in the Portlands–both Maine and Oregon–create a photography blog together that is now becoming a book. And because the year of mornings is over, they are now creating a year of evenings.

So many people have taken the work they’ve done on their blog and turned it into a book. The kind of books you’d never have seen or imagined before blogging.  I find this . . .

Please leave a comment with your first 50 words on the topic “a year of mornings.”

The Memory of Running

Just read The Memory of Running by Ron McLarty. I enjoyed every word. The protagonist is inarticulate and out of touch with his own feelings, his own body, his own joy. Every word is true to that point of view, a perfection of language that reminds me of the feat of language I so admire about The Color Purple.

The running  is metaphorical–running away from yourself or maybe back to yourself.  The plot involves a fat drunk who rides a bike across the country without actually planning to do it. He’s . . .

Mad as Hell

I’m reading “Confessions of an Economic Hit Man” by John Perkins. This book makes me mad as hell. Here’s proof of how American corporations have raped the planet and reduced many of it’s people to poverty as part of their normal business day. And been rewarded for it.

I know this book came out in 2004 and there was a whole lot of conversation about it at that time, but why isn’t anyone talking about it now? (John Edwards might be talking about it.)

Have we lost our understanding of how evil looks and . . .

Please leave a comment with your first 50 words on the topic “mad as hell.”

The Last American Man

I just started reading “The Last American Man” by Elizabeth Gilbert. The members of my book club who’ve already finished it were saying things to me like “he’s such a man” that he irritated me. I was all set to hate this guy. But I find I agree with him about a lot of things. We are too disconnected from the real world. We do need to get out in the woods and experience the natural world to a . . .

Please leave a comment with your first 50 words on the topic “the last American man.”

The Lovely Bones

I’m reading The Lovely Bones, a novel by Alice Sebold. I think Alice Sebold is going to become a favorite of mine. This book is written from the point of view of a 14 year old rape and murder victim, who observes her family’s reactions to her death from “her heaven.”

Sebold has a bestseller on the charts right now, her latest novel The Almost Moon. I haven’t read this one yet, but certainly intend to do that very soon.

Please leave a comment with your first 50 words on the topic “the lovely bones.”