Girl Meets Boy, by Ali Smith

It is rare that I find a book in the free book pile at work that really strikes my attention. It was one of those rare situations the other day when I came across Ali Smith's contribution to the Cannongate myth series, Girl Meets Boy. The title might be deceiving. It is a contemporary retelling of Ovid's Metamorphosis. I am always surprised upon reading these modern myth re-tellings because they are all quite potent and relevant. As the title might suggest, the book is about gender, in part the point of intersection where two genders become fluid, and multiple. But the book is also about corporate culture, art and resistance. Not only the subject matter was fascinating, but the writing style was infectious. Reading the book was like entering the minds of the characters and following them around for a while. I didn't want the very short novel to end. But inevitably, I finished it quickly, then proceeded to flip back through to find the most wonderful morsels of language. I have loved all three of the books in this series that I have read thus far. Mostly, I just like how Ali Smith tells a story.

Girl Comics

Occasionally, I have a weakness for young adult literature. It's easy to read, often adorable, and unriddled with the darkness that often plagues adult literature. Last week I came across the Minx series of graphic novels, targeted at teenage girls. The first one that I read had a bit of substance, as it dealt with the cultural importance of art, specifically street art, and presented some biting commentary on suburbia. The Plain Janes was the story of a girl who had been present at a cafe bombing, and as a result, her parents moved her to the suburbs where she attended the very boring local high school. Rather than fighting to enter the popular crowd, she fought to befriend the misfits by developing a guerrilla art project that made the whole town descend into irrational fear. The comic I am currently at the heart of is far less redeeming. Clubbing is the story of a rich, goth snob from London who is sent to her grandparents' house for the summer to prevent her from getting into too much trouble. But there is something infectious and adorable about these graphic novels for teens. They are like tv shows. And because I don't have a tv, they seem to fill the place that tv might if I had one.

Magical Thinking

The Lunatic

Wide Eyed by Trinie Dalton

I got this book when I worked for Utne magazine and only read the first story before I determined that it was necessary to send to my best friend. I knew she would love it, and was not as compelled to read the book as I was last week when I visited her and noticed the book on her shelf. I read it on the airplane home and was completely smitten. It was simple and weird and magical and I wished I could write a book just like it. When I finished it a few hours after I began, I didn't want it to be over. I was not through with her magic.

The Savage Detectives by Roberto Bolano

This is the best book I've read in a long time. Who can resist young, egotistical avant garde Mexican poets convinced that they are the next generation of underground literature?

A few books in a few weeks

I am stricken with some blogatory obligation to write something new. Either I haven't been reading much at all lately, or I have just failed to be enthralled by my recent reading material. I started reading The Archivist by Martha Cooley some weeks ago and was slightly put off by way in which the author decided it was a good idea to fuse past and present. I get the point of doing so--we are all haunted by our pasts. But it felt tedious to read. Then I picked up Alice Munro's The Runaway and Beth Lisick's This Too Can Be Yours. I enjoy Alice Munro's old fashioned style and astute sense of both place and humanity. But when I picked up Lisick's book, I couldn't quite take the humor. I really enjoyed her memoirs, but this book of short stories was just too over the top for me at the time I picked it up. I can certainly appreciate her use of humor, but it is so out of sync with my own imagination that it is difficult to accept at certain times. But I finished her collection of brief stories and decided I needed to go to the bookstore. Actually, before my trip to the bookstore, I started reading Queen of the Oddballs, a typical memoir written by a woman who grew up in the 70s and found her childhood experience unique enough to write it up and market it to women who like to read about what other women did while growing up female. It was amusing, but I still thought it was necessary to buy some new books that I chose myself rather than picked up for free at work. I came home with Weight by Jeanette Winterson, which is slightly less glorious than I had hoped, and The Lipshitz Six, by T Cooper, because I went to a book reading for this novel a few weeks ago and thought it might be worth reading.