The Time Machine - H. G. Wells (4.5 of 5 Rabid Morlocks)

Yep. Another day at the copy machine. But have no fear, audio books are hear...

Have you ever had the experience of picking up a book and not remembering if you'd read it before? Such was the case with The Time Machine. I was positive that I'd seen the movie, but unsure if I'd finished the book. It wasn't until the second to last chapter that I got my answer. In the book, after playing hide and go seek with the Morlocks the scientist travels to the even more distant future to see the end of the world. It was the giant crabs on the beach of a dying world that sparked my memory. Does anyone else remember if this scene is in the movie?

Anyway, I was surprised this second time around at the large sections of political rhetoric scattered through the book. While wandering around in the museum, Wells delivers a long discourse about how the working classes and aristocracy separated. It sounded like something akin to Marx. I probably wouldn't have noticed Wells' political agenda if we hadn't spent a few weeks discussing The Island of Dr. Moreau in my Darwin class this past semester. I'm interested in reading in some of his other books. Do any of you have any recommendations?

I just checked his bibliography on Wikipedia. Looks like he wrote 50 books and at least that many short stories. Wow. I had no idea he was so prolific. The audio book that I checked out had a handful of his short stories: "The Man Who Could Work Miracles," "The Diamond Maker," and the "The Flowering of the Strange Orchid." They're all a little bit quirky, but seek some little insight about the human condition.

The Broker - John Grisham (1 of 5 Contrived Plot Lines)

You might find this surprising, but this is my first encounter with a John Grisham book. And frankly, I was not impressed at all. If all his books are this bad, I'm unsure why his publisher continues to speak to him. The copy I got from the library was the abridged audio version. Last time I checked, abridgements are attempts to take out all of the boring parts. Now, if the abridged version was more mind numbing than watching paint dry, what does that say about the original? Has anyone read the original? Did the editor just happen to take out the good stuff this time by mistake?... And excuse me, was that supposed to be an ending? The conclusion to The Broker, well, conclusion is too generous, the last page of The Broker was even worse than the second Pirates of the Caribbean. Is there a sequel to The Broker or was that really the end?

[Jake takes deep breaths while he counts down from ten.]

The Broker begins with a fictional president of the United States leaving office. On his last night as president, he pardons an attorney who has been sitting in a maximum security prison for six years. The attorney was charged with trying to sell secrets to foreign governments about a secret spy satellite network floating in space. The CIA plans to free him, and then wait to see who kills him, in order to discover the creator of the satellites.

Now, this plot might have a lot of potential. It might play out much like the Borne Identity books/movies. But Grisham's execution is absolutely terrible. Once the CIA dumps the attorney in Italy I was expecting all kinds of car chases, gadgets and double crossing secret agents. Um...nope, just page after page of boring bureaucrats moving him from safe house to safe house and teaching him Italian. The plot is dull. The characters are dry. The conclusion is nonexistent. This book apparently was number one on the New York Times Best Seller list back in 2005. Why? Did I uh...miss something?

White Noise - Don Delillo (2 of 5 Soup Cans)

Has anyone else read this book? Of all the crazy books I've read, this one probably takes the toxic cake. This commentary on postmodernism was assigned reading for my environmental literature course last semester. The novel follows the quirky lives of a man, his wife and their four children. A good portion of the narrative takes place in front of the television. When they're not drooling in front of the tube, they are teaching Hitler studies courses at the local university, attending bible studies classes, taking pills to combat the fear of death, flying around the world, riding tricycles down freeways, running from airborne toxic events and shopping at grocery stores. Their existence is busy, but shallow and fragile.

For the first fifty pages I remember being quite taken with the writing style. It is blunt and eccentric, quite refreshing from dense writing of The Plague. The discussions of the characters are similar to those you might hear on Seinfeld, the "show about nothing." However, just like Seinfeld, you can only take so much of it. About halfway through the book I was ready to move on. The novel bounces around so quickly that it is sometimes difficult to follow. The characters are so intentionally shallow that I found a difficult time actually caring what happened to them.

I guess the real kicker is that Delillo wrote this criticism of consumerism way back in 1985, prior to our entering the Paris Hilton era. Imagine the firepower he would have writing this book today...

Granted, this novel did win the National Book Award in 1985. But like most books that win awards such as these, they have to be somewhat off the beaten track. Personally, I wasn't impressed, but you might be. Happy reading.

The Abstract Wild - Jack Turner (3.5 of 5 Walks with Thoreau)

Yep. I did it again. The scheduled post, posted without me. I should really just block out some time and write up all of these reviews. Most of these books I read earlier this year. The details are already packed away in the dusty corners of my memory. The longer I wait the less I have to say about them. For example:

Abstract Wild is a series of essays about returning to the "wildness" of nature. Jack Turner's work is heavily influenced by Thoreau's Walden Pond. Turner took a similar journey into the wilderness of the United States to reconnect with his origins. There are few passages here and there that are quite stunning, but most of it starts to sound the same by the end of the book. If going green and getting back to nature are your cup of herbal tea, I say go for it. The book is only about 150 and is a relatively quick read.

Sharp Teeth - 4/5 Grisly Animal Attacks

I discovered this book on a recent stop in Barnes and Noble, and I knew I had to read it. It is written in free verse, like Dante's Divine Comedy, and to give you a vague and unsatisfactory description of the story it could be described as something like Romeo and Juliet meet the Wolfman with elements of I, Robot, Fatal Attraction, Boyz in the Hood, and Lady and the Tramp. So, I know what you are thinking "Oooo, wow another werewolf book, how original!" and my response to that is "Yup, just about the most original thing I have read this year!"

Disclaimer: may contain some explicit content, more suggestive than descriptive however.