I’ve always gotten greater satisfaction out of a good book than anything else. That includes an expertly prepared meal, good workout at the gym, an entire carton of cigarettes, the elusive no-drama date (ha-no such thing!) and extended tattoo sessions… combined. I never really understood how someone could not like to read; the stories play out like movies in my head, a moving picture I have full creative control over. To save money/paper/slow down the speed with which I accumulate small libraries of my own, I’m trying to only read borrowed books. That Was Then, This Is Now would be one of those, found on a friend’s shelf last weekend and borrowed until I see her next. Both covers have been torn off and there’s quite a few pages with chunks taken out of them. Nothing by S.E. Hinton will ever be considered a classic piece of literature, but I think her writing offers some weird kind of time-traveling wisdom I couldn’t appreciate when I first read her stuff–another loaned book with a nearly identical storyline, The Outsiders. There’s a whole world of good advice hiding in simple sentence structures, the ones intended for children and slow readers.
“You can’t walk through your whole life saying ‘If.’ You can’t keep trying to figure out why things happen, man. That’s what old people do. That’s when you can’t get away with things any more. You gotta just take things as they come, and quit trying to reason them out. You never used to wonder about things. Man, I been gettin’ worried about you. You start wonderin’ why, and you get old. Lately I felt like you were leavin’ me, man. You used to have all the answers.”
Really, my favorite thing about having not buying books is the hours I wind up spending at the library. Something about my time there feels more like an out of body experience or lucid dream than a trip to a depressing gray building filled with painfully typical high school students (complete with hot pink thongs and excessive public displays of affection) and the elderly. I’ve learned I can’t walk in with a purpose or a specific book in mind because I will walk out empty handed. The most productive trips are had by wandering the aisles, running my hands over hardbacks and picking out things that catch my interest–all books are judged by their covers, followed by a quick skim of the first page. This non-method has helped find some of my now-favorite books. The problem is that awake at 3am, with nothing to do, I started ordering dozens of books I had only loosely taken a look at via Amazon. Sometimes it’s just easier to order by subject or author en masse than it is to do any quality searching. After looking at the three foot tall stacks next to my bed, I realized more than half of what I had checked out related to school & workplace violence. No wonder the oldest of the librarians has a tendency to look at me cross-eyed. Well, either that or she really is cross-eyed; I’ve never been able to maintain eye contact with her long enough to be sure. Several times I had college flashbacks from looking at the stack of books next to my bed; I’ve since curbed the amount of time I spend picking out books online in the wee hours of the night… sort of.
Whatever. Here’s some of this summer’s favorites, if you’re in the mood.
American Gods, Neil Gaiman. Quality modern fantasy without feeling like you’re starting down the path to wearing a cape and rolling dice in public coffee spaces. Or going to wind up with a collection borderline-fantasy porn paperbacks more than 3″ thick…
The Tao of Wu, The Rza. This has been read and re-read numerous times. I have a feeling it’s going to take up permanent residence at the bottom of my laptop bag.
That Was Then, This Is Now, S.E. Hinton. Like the quote way above wasn’t enough to convince you!
The Gum Thief, Douglas Coupland. Yes, I did sum this book up (sloppily) in my video blog. You should probably read it since I left out all the good stuff.
Going Postal: Rage, Murder, and Rebellion, Mark Ames. This book will make you feel well-informed (I was quoting it non-stop for a few weeks after finishing it) while simultaneously make you look sort of pseudo-intellectual-assholeish for reading it in public. You’ve been warning.
Veronica, Mary Gaitskill. Ideal for girls on their period that want to think about how they wish they were skinny, rich and living in penthouses in France. Don’t worry ladies, the depressing ending makes up for the bouts of self-scrutiny reading this book may bring on. All in all, perfect for late nights after watching too many romantic comedies.
While my own small collection (just the essentials) is currently spread across several states, I’m realizing how important it is to pay attention to the reading habits of the people I surround myself with. Nothing makes me more uncomfortable than realizing I’m sitting in someone’s living room and have yet to see the traces of a single book. Maybe I’m just finding new things to be critical of others about, but I don’t like the idea of making friends with people that “don’t read,” whatever that means. There need to be more people I can loan books to, more guys out there that have something on their shelves other than a boring sci-fi fantasy novel collection with borderline jerkoff fantasy art on the cover. Or worse… the complete works of Chuck Palahniuk. (Poking fun at people who swear by this guy’s books will never stop being entertaining to me. Sorry.)
“We need to make books cool again. If you go home with somebody and they don’t have books, don’t fuck them.”
— John Waters
Trust me gentlemen, I’m looking at every last title in the stack of books at your bedside. And if there’s none to be found? Well, I’ll be letting myself out shortly thereafter.
