Omnivoracious

Omni Yearly News: 2003

The Iraq War began in March, and the Human Genome Project announced it had accomplished its mission of sequencing the complete human genetic code in April, while Arnold Schwarzenegger followed the release of Terminator 3 in July with his election as governor of California in October. It was a year of blockbusters in books, with the fifth Harry Potter installment rivaled by a surprise hit thriller that suggested a secret history of the Catholic Church. Audrey Niffenegger and Khaled Hosseini made debuts with novels that would become perennial bestsellers in paperback, while our editors' choice for the best book of the year was an electrifying story of addiction and recovery whose status as a memoir was still a few years from being questioned.

What we were reading: Continuing in Tom’s Old Media Monday tradition, here's a run-down of how the critics received some of our picks for the year's best books: 

• Janet Maslin on A Million Little Pieces  (astutely suspicious, a year and a half before Frey pissed off Oprah and became the poster boy for memoirists cum fabulists): "This story is supposed to be all true. It is supposed to be a scorchingly honest account of how its author sunk to unimaginable depths, railed against the Twelve Step program that was supposed to help him and ultimately found his own form of salvation. His account does have grit and myopic immediacy that could make it a campus classic, what with such attention-getting incidents as the time this self-loathing author pulls off his own toenails. But in charting the course of his experience, he follows a memoirist's Twelve Step pattern that is as familiar as what Rehab offers."
• Mark Bowden on Jarhead: "Jarhead is some kind of classic, a bracing memoir of the 1991 Persian Gulf war that will go down with the best books ever written about military life.… Swofford writes with humor, anger and great skill. His prose is alive with ideas and feeling, and at times soars like poetry. He captures the hilarity, tedium, horniness and loneliness of the long prewar desert deployment, and then powerfully records the experience of his war."
• A.O. Scott on The Fortress of Solitude: "The Fortress of Solitude is crowded beyond my powers of summary with lessons, insights, facts, dates, song titles and minor characters. But I much prefer its mess and sprawl to the tightly wound intellectual parlor tricks of earlier Lethem novels."
• Erik Larson on The Devil in the White City: "[Larson] wants to tell the whole story, both the glory of Burnham's creation and the sordid details of the first known urban psychopath in American history. It is not a comfortable fit. He uses language well, but has little sense of pacing or focus…. It must be said, however, that though this grab-bag approach slows the narrative, it does allow the inclusion of some good stories about characters like Buffalo Bill Cody."
• Robert Harris on Positively Fifth Street: "[McManus] wins $866,000 in a single hand and takes the lead, and now we're into this with him, willing to pore over his recounting of hand after hand and becoming intimate with the strategies of marathon no-limit poker. He's not afraid to admit his overwhelming fear when a hand is decided on the turn of a final card, ''fifth street.'' But for all his self-deprecation, McManus is smart. He knows that the professionals have him marked as a weak player, so he doesn't play like one…. and walks out with just under $250,000--and, even better for a writer, a great story."

Great Debuts of 2003: The Kite Runner, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, Reading Lolita in Tehran, Vernon God Little, Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus!

Top Five Amazon Editors' Picks: A Million Little Pieces, The Time Traveler's Wife, Jarhead, Moneyball, Shutter Island

Top Five 2003 Amazon Bestsellers: Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, The Da Vinci Code, The South Beach Diet, Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them, The Five People You Meet in Heaven

In Memoriam: Among the authors who passed away in 2003: Roberto Bolaño, George Plimpton, Robert McCloskey, Carol Shields, William Steig, Edward Said, John Gregory Dunne, Leonard Michaels, Hugh Kenner,  and Amanda Davis

• See our Books of the Decade: 2003 page
• See our overall Books of the Decade: 2000-2009 page

--Jon

Omni Daily News

His Sabanic majesty: After Alabama's victory over Texas in last night's BCS National Championship Game, find out how you can be as successful in work and life with head coach Nick Saban's How Good Do You Want to Be?

Hello, everybody: January 8, 2010 is Elvis Presley's 75th birthday and, unsurprisingly, you can read about pieces of his life in several new books, including The King and Dr. Nick, Baby, Let's Play House: Elvis Presley and the Women Who Loved Him, and Elvis: My Best Man. It's also David Bowie's birthday, but he's just 63, still living, and still completely awesome. Still, here's a new book about him.

Red Pottage, on my reading list since 1900: The New Yorker reports on Books of the Century, Daniel Immerwahr's project to catalog yearly bestseller lists from 1900-1999.

Moving and Shaking:  An NPR appearance shoots Diana Wells's Lives of the Trees to the top of our Movers and Shakers list. (See what I did there?)

--Jon

Omni Personal Shopper: Let's Do Something

This Omni Personal Shopper project is not getting any easier. Jude says:

One of my kids doesn't have lots of interests. He's 15 years old, plays bari sax in band (but doesn't really care about it), gets straights "As" without trying (and feels no passionate interest in any of his classes, although he likes a few of the teachers), and seems to only be truly happy when we're driving, so I try to take him driving a lot (he's still in the learner's permit stage). He complains that his friends only want to play video games instead of *doing* things like camping, hiking, or biking anywhere, but even though he complains about them sitting around playing games, he likes to play video games too, although he quickly loses interest in any particular game. He really wanted a laptop, but I can't afford one yet. He has a good sense of humor. He's a good person. He frequently counsels his older sister and attempts to make his irrational, older, angrier brother think more rationally. He likes using StumbleUpon when he uses my computer. I'm *really* worried about him because my other kids have strong interests. I'd like him to care about something passionately.

I'm guessing there's more than one of us here that share/shared similar traits with your son--for example, I'm still theoretically interested in video games, but my patience for them maxes out at about 10 minutes. Fortunately, your son is only 15 and has ample time to grow out of this, whereas I am apparently a lost cause. Unfortunately, 15 is probably the worst age to shop for. But let's try.

Tom's first thought was The Selected Works of T.S. Spivet, a story in words and drawings of a painfully precocious boy that has the sort of restless (and funny) intelligence that seems like your son might grab hold of. Another very funny story of a bored fellow who finds more adventure than he bargained for, which he loved at that exact age and attitude, is The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (and all the sequels).

Anne suggests John Green's Paper Towns as a book that will also appeal to his sense of humor, calling it a work of "this breathless energy and wit and just truth--the kind of truth that makes you dog-ear page after page so you can find that line again when you need it." She also thought that To Kill a Mockingbird might resonate in a "good person," (it will) and that his inner mentor/moderator would relate to Dave Eggers's A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius.

My inclination is toward books about people (kids especially) that do things like "camping, hiking, or biking," because those are things that I like to do (and forgive me, I am about to ramble on a bit). At 12 or so, I loved The Tracker, Tom Brown, Jr.'s autobiographical account of learning how to identify and follow animals based on prints and sign, as well as developing wilderness survival skills--knowledge that ultimately led to work with law enforcement and his own tracking school. Strangely enough, the jacket hasn't changed at all in the 30 years since I tore through it.

At about the same time, I read Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (maybe the ultimate book about a kid really doing things) and The Call of the Wild (even though it's ostensibly about a dog, trust me: a kid can identify) If he's read those (or if you think he may be interested in some true-life drama), there's always the armchair adventurist genre, with books like Jon Krakauer's take on the disastrous 1996 Mt. Everest expedition, Into Thin Air, and mountaineer extraordinaire Ed Viesturs's survey of K2 attempts (both successful and spectacularly not), K2: Life and Death on the World's Most Dangerous Mountain. These books are aimed at an adults, but there's really nothing to them that would challenge a smart teenager. However, they do recount serious, real-world consequences and probably (if I remember correctly) contain a little bit of coarse language. But I would have eaten these up at age 15. (Note: I'd avoid Krakauer's Into the Wild for now.)

I'll add one more suggestion before moving on again to other people's recommendations (especially if I've really gone down the wrong track here). You mention that he's happy when driving, and I thought that might translate into an interest in maps and route-finding. Wilderness Navigation is a readable and informative manual on finding your way in the woods and hills, and its concepts can be practiced at home. Of course, he'll need a compass. Anne also recommends the ultimate on-the-road book, Jack Kerouac's On the Road. Adult themes here, though some might argue that they're overgrown child themes.

Ok. Time for something different.

Kind of. Dave, well, he had the same idea as me. He says, "If living life in the great outdoors is what your son craves, I recommend Jean Craighead George's classic, My Side of the Mountain.  It's a great story for any budding naturalist who also might need to be reminded that the modern world isn't really all that bad.  (However, I don't support the befriending of raccoons. They are nasty critters.)" Agreed.

Alex, our resident comic book/graphic novel expert thinks that kids like comic books. I don't know, he might be onto something. He brings three recommendations (and the attached comments):

Scott Pilgrim Vol. 1: The first installment of this charming, funny, and frenetic series aimed at teens.  Videogames play heavily into the style and tone of the main character’s perception of everything around him, from girls to bullies to homework. 

Calvin & Hobbes: Homicidal Psycho Jungle Cat: This classic collection of daily and Sunday strips will be perfect for the reader whose attention span is on the go. Plots never last longer than a page or two, and they vary enough to prevent stagnancy or repetition. Bill Waterson’s artwork is action-packed, chameleon-like, and matched only by his wild sense of humor.  There isn’t a bad Calvin & Hobbes book in print, but this one is a personal favorite. 

Batman: The Long Halloween: If your son is looking for more of a reading commitment, the 12 chapters contained herein make it easy to stay focused and entertained. Batman faces his entire rogue's gallery as he hunts down a mysterious villain behind a series of holiday-themed murders. Lots of colorful, kinetic artwork from Tim Sale, and an explosive plot by Jeph Loeb. 

Finally, Lauren points out that it might be worth calling out the Top 10 Picks for Reluctant Readers from author (and former school teacher) Rick Riordan, who has managed to get millions of kids to crack open a book.

Jude, I hope that gets you started, or maybe fuels more ideas of your own.Good luck, and happy holidays.

--Jon

Omni Daily News

Figures it was the punter: Former Cincinnati Bengals punter/wide receiver Pat McInally recently auctioned off 101 books from his impressive collection, including Beatrix Potter's personal copy of The Tale of Peter Rabbit. (AbeBooks.com)

Human see, human do: Dinotopia author James Gurney turns his view from the extinct to the critically endangered, unveiling a series of arresting great ape sketches drawn up-close-and-personal at the North Carolina Zoo. (via boingboing.net)

One family's shameful secret: A crisis of conscience spurs a Mansfield Massachusetts man to return a library book that was due May 2, 1910.

Moving and Shaking: There's a wasket in the basket, a woset in the closet, and six Dr. Seuss titles in the top ten slots of our Movers & Shakers list.

Omni Personal Shopper: The Boy Who Taped Cats

The Omni Personal Shopper project rolls down the Mississippi with this conundrum from Linda:

The queries posted so far are too easy. If you can come up with something for my little brother - and millions just like him, you will be hailed as geniuses or possibly even genii. He lives in Mississippi. He is a truck driver. He plays in a band. He drives a van. It used to be kind of a cool old retro van but now he is over 40 and it's just a dull mini van. He has two great kids but does not live with them. He likes beer, not wine. He doesn't mind going to swap meets with our dad. It’s all good but we just don’t have much in common. Once he said maybe we should talk more because Mom would like that. When we were young, my brother was the plague of my life. He once covered my favorite cat from nose to end of tail with masking tape and then used my camera to take a picture of his work before untaping the cat. Impressively, he didn’t say a word and I didn’t find out until I had the film developed months later. He played the soundtrack for the Sound of Music over and over on my parents’ big console stereo. To this day, I cannot stand that movie. He hogged the TV and wanted to watch the Electric Company instead of Andy Griffith. If there is a book of instruction on how to be an irritating little brother, he must have read it three times. Other than that, I don't think he reads. I have never heard him mention a book he likes or seen him with a book in his hand. I used to hold him down and tickle him or give him noogies until he cried. I didn’t let him touch my records or come in my room. That’s all I can think of. Other than that, I’m sure I was very kind to him. This year, I rifled through the big bin of old LP’s at Goodwill. My little brother likes LPs. He likes the way they are a little bit scratchy. He likes that they sound old and come in big awkward covers that sometimes have amazing artwork and sometimes dorky photos. I don't know what kind of music he likes so I judged them by their covers and/or their smell. But they seem a paltry gift. Can you help?

First things first: Linda, we are sorry about your cat. But you had to know that giving him "noogies until he cried" might have come back to haunt you, or your cat. Regardless, here we go.

Many of our suggestions focus on his love of LPs. Mari suggests Goldmine Record Album Price Guide, 6th Edition, hoping that, as he’s driving around the country picking up scratchy old LPs, he can judge them by more than their smell—and maybe hit some vinyl motherlode.

Daphne, fresh off a trip to the Fillmore, reminds us that knows rock-show poster art can be better than the show itself. Gig Posters Volume 1: Rock Show Art of the 21st Century features perforated pages so your brother can frame the ones he loves best. She also recommends Rolling Stone 1,000 Covers: A History of the Most Influential Magazine in Pop Culture. Perfect for the music lover, it includes 1000 controversial, influential, provocative covers from Rolling Stone Magazine.

Lauren also has two picks, both about cover design. For the Love of Vinyl: The Album Art of Hipgnosis
recounts the inspiration of some of the most iconic cover art from the '70s and '80s, including covers from
Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath, and Paul McCartney. The Man with Kaleidoscope Eyes: The Art of Alan Aldridge. Aldridge's career spanned 40 years, during which he influenced the Beatles' psychedelic transformation and designed album covers for the Rolling Stones, Elton John, the Who, and Cream.

Tom adds his own customary dash of eclecticism (as well as something that might be the perfect combination of old records and swap meets): The complete cover art collection of imaginary soul singer Mingering Mike. As a teenager in the '60s and '70s, Mike Stevens created over 50 album covers for his fictitious alter-ego, complete with liner notes and cardboard "records" inserted inside the sleeves. While browsing crates of records at a flea market, author Dori Hadar discovered this incredible catalog, eventually tracking down Stevens at his home, and ultimately producing this truly one-of-a-kind tribute.

Maybe we can discern his musical tastes from cues in his appearance. Is his hair long? Does he wear inordinate amounts of leather, or occasionally flash metal horns? If so, he might appreciate All Known Metal Bands, at first glance a simple catalog of metal band names. But between the lines, it's the story of dragons and demon-lovers, of werewolves and Walpurgisnacht, of unlikely umlauts and the power of power chords.

We'll now move away from the musical theme. When Brad saw Mississippi, vans, beer, and taped-up cats (which, let the record show, he doesn’t approve of) he immediately thought of the eclectic Southern spirit of photographer William Eggleston (born in Tennessee but raised in the Mississippi Delta and educated at Ole Miss) whose “democratic camera” has captured the very anti-Andy Griffith beauty in the run-down landscapes and streetscapes around us—whether it’s Graceland or a  gas station. He suggests William Eggleston’s Guide and/or William Eggleston: Democratic Camera—Photographs and Video, 1961-2008.

Is he in love with his van (or the memory of another van)? Or does his his sense of humor lean toward the weird and warped? One of the devious geniuses behind the failed (and much mourned) The State, Michael Ian Black has probably taped his share of cats—and you wouldn’t want him in your room. But in the words of Amy Sedaris, he’s given us My Custom Van, a book that—like any good van—is ”luxurious, entertaining, spooky, disturbing, and hilarious.”

Or maybe, still, after all these years, he's still a cat-taping, irritating little brother. If so, we might suggest More Stuff on My Cat, a photographic of various objects and substances placed on cats, or the official manual for incorrigible boys, The Dangerous Book for Boys. It's never too soon (or too late) to drop the wisdom.

Good luck, Linda. If you think of anything else that might be useful, send it along. We want to help.

--Jon

Omni Daily News

On the trail of "our most Freudian novelist": The New York Times takes us on a tour Patricia Highsmith's Greenwich Village as mapped by Joan Schenkar, author of The Talented Miss Highsmith. Interesting: "Schenkar is convinced that if Highsmith had not become a writer, she would have been a murderer."

Any reason to mention the Velvet Underground: Over at the Daily Beast, Taylor Antrim chats with Lou Reed at a VU "reunion" commemorating The Velvet Underground: New York Art. The article contains several photos of what appear to be several precocious, ultra cool 12-year-olds, plus Nico.

What is more natural than book people and dancing? If you've ever attended Book Expo America--or more specifically, a Book Expo America party--you've witnessed it: workaday reservation melting with each sip of chardonnay from a cashless bar; the tentative doffing of spectacles and sport coats; Duke of Earl pulsing in a dusky club in a city far from home. Book people, dancing. The ritual reprised itself last night in Brooklyn for the release of Michael Lloyd Young's Blues, Booze, & BBQ, a road trip down blues-soaked Highway 61 from Memphis to Greenville, Mississippi. Galleycat's Jason Boog reports.

Moving & shaking:  Gregory Mone's The Truth About Santa pulls back the curtain on Santa's workshop to reveal a laboratory packed with NSA-worthy surveillance technology, wormhole science, and clones. It's currently #1 on our Movers & Shakers list. (SPOILER ALERT: he exists.)

--Jon

Omni Daily News

I vant to suck your blog: AbeBooks.com's Reading Copy Books Blog gushes over A Brief History of Vampires in Literature, from Lord Byron's debauched writer's camp at Lake Geneva in 1816, through the Cajun camp of Charlaine Harris's Sookie Stackhouse novels. (More on Byron at the L.A. Times, including his don't-miss nickname for William Wordsworth.)

I love you for your brains: The Guardian chews on the latest wave in romantic fiction: zombie love.

Scare tactics: The Huffington Post looks at 7 Spooky Movies Based on Books, asking readers to vote on the scariest novels and film adaptations. 

Moving & shaking: Red meat from The Audacity to Win--including the reasons Hillary was passed over as Obama's VP candidate--propels David Plouffe's campaign memoir to the top slot of the Movers & Shakers list.

Happy Halloween!

--Jon

Omni Daily Crush: "The Haunting of Hill House"

This is the trouble in telling ghost stories: You've got to keep the tension building without showing the ghost, and once you bring on the revenant, you had better nail it, or the whole show is shot. So in the spirit of the season (so to speak), here's the most spooktacular ghost story I've read, one whose ghost is everywhere and nowhere: Shirley Jackson's The Haunting of Hill House.

Hill House opens:

No live organism can continue for long to exist under conditions of absolute reality; even larks and katydids are supposed, by some, to dream. Hill House, not sane, stood by itself against the hills, holding darkness within; it had stood so for eighty years and might stand for eighty more. Within, walls continued upright, bricks met neatly floors were firm, and doors were sensibly shut; silence lay steadily against the wood and stone of Hill House, and whatever walked there, walked alone.

Creepy things happen at Hill House--midnight wall-banging, bedside visits from hand-holding specters, self-slamming doors--and so ghost-hunter Dr. Montague has brought together a small group of people with a history of supernatural experiences, in the hopes of inducing otherworldly manifestations from the house. Of the four, Eleanor is particularly sensitive (both to poltergeists and perceived slights), and soon becomes the focus of Hill House's evil intent.

Or does she? The best ghost stories aren't solely about things that go bump in the night; they're also about the things that go bump in your head. There are a lot of ghosts doing the Macarena in Eleanor's skull, and in Hill House she seems to have found the perfect mate (she often recites the phrase "journeys end in lovers meeting"). That opening sentence can just as easily be used to describe Eleanor--outwardly inflexible, inwardly inchoate, and everywhere utterly alone--and as the plot escalates, it's never made explicit who's zooming whom. In a pivotal scene, the guests discover a message scrawled on the wall: HELP ELEANOR COME HOME ELEANOR.

How shall we punctuate this? It makes all the difference. (Stephen King covers this is in his paean to horror, Danse Macabre, but I'll shoot from memory here, or make it up as I go.)

HELP ELEANOR COME HOME, ELEANOR
(Get out of the house. Go home. Only Eleanor can help Eleanor.)

HELP ELEANOR COME HOME. ELEANOR.
(Hi. This is Eleanor speaking, and I could use some help.)

HELP, ELEANOR. COME HOME ELEANOR.
(Hill House: Darling Eleanor, you're already home.)

And I'm sure there are more ways to punctuate that, and even more ways to interpret each punctuation. So is Eleanor the victim of an external, evil presence, or is she a childish narcissist desperately demanding attention? It really doesn't matter. Either way, the story is superbly crafted and unnerving as hell, a classic of the genre and a perfect read for Halloween week, a book best read alone.

--Jon

Omni Daily News

Philip Roth is still dirty, brilliant, and funny: And so prolific lately that he must spend his waking life at his keyboard, doubled over flying fingers. Over at The Daily Beast, Tina Brown talks to the great American novelist about The Humbling, the fear of not finding the next idea, writing about sex (typically frank, gentle readers), and the future of the novel.

I'll take thinly veiled metaphors for a thousand: Test your knowledge of rampaging, hedonistic poets and their rampaging, hedonistic, monsters with The Guardian's "How well do you know gothic fiction" quiz.

Books that made a difference to John Cusack: Alright, why not? (Oprah.com)

Moving and Shaking: According to NPR, Jane Gardam is "the best contemporary British writer you probably haven't heard of." And now her 12th novel, Old Filth, has risen 11,605% to the top of the Movers & Shakers list.

--Jon

Omni Daily News

Wild things, you make my heart singze: Spike Jonze's adaptation of Maurice Sendak's Where the Wild Things Are (with a screenplay co-written by Dave Eggers) hits theaters, promises creepiest gigantic puppetry since Labyrinth.

Shut up, watch the video, and just leave me alone: Jennifer Burns, author of Goddess of the Market, goes on the Daily Show to talk about Ayn Rand's recent resurgence in political thought.

Michael Chabon wears amazing orange pants: Former Amazonian Erica Jorgensen talks to the Manhood for Amateurs author about full-disclosure parenting and minding one's own business.(seattlepi.com)

Balloon Boy signs massive, three-book deal: Actually, I don't think he has--yet. I just wanted to say that you heard it here first.

Moving & shaking: An effectively waged publicity campaign has catapulted Guerrilla P.R. 2.0: Wage an Effective Publicity Campaign without Going Broke into the top slot on our Movers & Shakers list.

--Jon