Juliet, Naked

This was the first book I've read by Nick Hornby. I have seen only one movie based on one of his books, High Fidelity, and really liked it, so after additional recommendation I thought I'd give one of his books a try. Juliet, Naked centers around Annie, Duncan and Tucker Crowe and their intertwining relationships. Tucker wrote an album, Juliet, in the 80s and promptly quit his tour to lead a reclusive life. The album earned him a cult following of which Duncan is the ring leader and he dragged Annie along with him. All of them have regrets about life over the last 15 to 20 years and the book deals with the struggles of never getting that time back.

Duncan is a character I can love to hate. A pretentious know-it-all devotee to Crowe, he spends his life trying to dissect every element of Tucker's life. He goes as far as traveling to America to visit all the places significant to the production of Juliet, marveling at a urinal which he believes played a significant role in the abrupt end of Crowe's career. When he isn't examining his bootleg albums, he's analyzing theories on the Internet about Crowe's personal life. This isn't wrong in and of itself, necessarily, it's more that his opinions and interpretations are, to him, fact, as he is the expert and nobody would know better than him.

All in all, it's a humorous, and sometimes touching story about people trying to figure out how their own lives have passed them by without having done anything of true significance, what they should or could have done differently to avoid it, and how to make up for time lost. I thoroughly enjoyed the book, it reads quickly, it revolves around music, and the characters are all flawed, but possess redeeming qualities. I'll give it a 4 out of 5 and put more of Hornby's books on my list of "To read."

You Shall Know Our Velocity! (Updated for Sacrament)

Maggie's parents gave this hardcover edition to me for Christmas, which was pretty exciting. I didn't ask for this book specifically, just books by Dave Eggers, but I'm glad I got this one. I was told there was some addition made to the paperback, I'll have to look into that because I'm told it changes the story quite a bit.

I just finished this, and it was a hard one to put down, unlike Never Let Me Go. I read this in sort of a glum, monotone voice from the narrator, Will. I'm not sure if that was accurate of me, but Will always seems lost in thought and the real world rarely excited him, like he was just an observer, or maybe nothing understood him or his situation.

Eggers made it easy for me to relate to Will, always having conversations with other people or objects in his head. I like the idea of the spontaneous world traveling, though under the circumstances it was rather sad.

Boomsday: Stupid title, fun book

I've been doing a lot more reading than I ever have at any point in my life. I'm not sure why, maybe it's because I'm getting older and whatever I used to do (video games) doesn't have the same allure. Well I still play video games, but fewer of them less often. Anyway, I just finished this wacky book about a PR rep who is passionate about the problem Baby Boomers bring to social security. She blogs about some heinous solution to issues it causes for younger generations and her senator buddy decides to give it a run in Congress. They call it a "meta" issue and that's really what the book is, because it obviously would never happen, and that kind of sticks out the whole way through which took a little bit away from the overall impact.

I give it a 3.5 out of 5 for its high entertainment value. It's a quick read with good dialog and over-the-top personalities with silly names. The situations, such as the whole bill being put into discussion, were sometimes a little too ridiculous, but they did make for a fun read as long as you're not too serious about realism. Satire, I believe is what this would be. The way this book is written, it's easy to see how it could be put into a movie, much like his book that I haven't read "Thank You For Smoking."

Paying for social security sucks for sure because I won't see any of it, and this book isn't going to get discussion on the issue moving, but it's really out of my hands. There's a lot of criticism and controversy on it, and for good reason. I watched a movie not too long ago, I.O.U.S.A. that touches on the issues of funding social security, and they're not pretty. Among other things, this country is in a load of trouble. I have a theory that we'll be owned by China within the next 20 years, if we're not all dead by then that is. I'm sure North Korea is going to use some nuclear arms against their southern neighbors and there will be some nasty fallout. I'll sit here and not look forward to that.

Never Let Me Go Left Me Wanting

After reading such raving reviews, and seeing phrases like "Edge-of-your-seat mystery," I suppose I was going into this expecting Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro to be a gripping read. That's not what I got at all. It's about some kids brought up in a boarding school, and slowly and methodically more and more details are revealed by the author. Very methodically.

I wouldn't say I struggled to get through this, because I read it relatively quickly relative to myself. I thought it was a little too drawn out. The beginning was quite slow and there wasn't any quick connection to the characters, but overall Ishiguro did a good job of introducing a new element at just the right time to keep you reading. By "just the right time" I really mean if it was any later, I would have been pretty frustrated.

I kept reading though and by the end of the book it feels as if you grew up with the characters and it was a more rewarding experience than I would have guessed I would have had after the first 50 pages or so. I suppose would give this about a 3 of 5. Honestly though, it wasn't much mystery as to what was going on, and it really didn't seem that profound. It was a decent read, and left me touched by what these characters endured, but not to any notable power.