Apr. 2002
This Pulitzer Prize winning novel centers around a middle-aged realtor in New Jersey and a pivotal 4th of July weekend. This book is written for S type personalities, meaning Ford spends excrutiatingly too long covering the minute details of everyday life, never talking too much about overarching concepts. Frustrating, for me (N).

Apr. 2002
Dave Eggers was the founder of Might Magazine, published out of San Francisco from '93 to '95. It wasn't until several years ago when I read Shiny Adidas Track Suits and the Death of Camp, a collection of humorous, pointed essays from Might, that I became aware of Dave Eggers et al.

Post-Might, Eggers started a quartery print & web publication called McSweeney's - something I once tried to read but curiously never went back to. Next was A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, a manic-depressive autobiography of his adult life, some of it spent looking back on his childhood, but two-thirds of it allocated to how he navigated his early twenties while caring for his orphaned younger brother.

Eggers' writing eloquently reflects his thoughts at every turn, sometimes so closely that it borders on stream of consciousness. But it's how, not what, Eggers talks about that retained my interest for the book's 400+ pages. He has a charming command of language and a unique, self-absorbed style that made this book a Pulitzer prize finalist in 2001.

Also worth reading is the "Mistakes We Knew We Were Making" section included, upside down, in the back of the book.

Mar. 2002
Amazingly beautiful prose... a rich style similar to Kerouac in density, but vastly different in tone and verbage. I'll be the last one to say this, but Joseph Heller really crafted a masterpiece - grand in scope and metaphorically relevant for all time.

Mar. 2002
From David Sedaris, author of Naked, comes another collection of essays. While Naked read like a fully realized book, MTPOD is very much just Sedaris' cobbled together musings as of late. Naked was cohesive and filled with raw, honest humour - this book is a mishmash of softbellied observations. Not the best.

Feb. 2002
Steve Martin authors this "novella" about Mirabelle, a lovelorn sales clerk working in the glove department of a Beverly Hills departmet store. In the story's brief 150 or so pages Martin sketches his protagonist with great insight, but little intrigue. My friend Jenny found this roundabout love story more interesting than I did.