January 2010 Archives

It's been a long time since I've read a book that I absolutely loved. 2009 not a good year for my fiction reading. I averaged exactly 2 books a month according to BookTrack, which I suppose isn't bad (especially because it includes Moby Dick which took me a LONG time), plus I didn't really get that wrapped up in anything (with a few exceptions, like Moby Dick).

The History of Love is helping me start 2010 off right. I have always had mixed feelings about Nicole Krauss' husband's books (though that's really because of our long-standing rivalry), but there is no ambiguity about The History of Love. It's incredibly sad. Actually, I think the right term is bitter sweet. I hate to call anything bitter sweet, but that's what this book is. The happy moments make you want to cry more than the sad ones.

It's interesting that early books by both Ms. Krauss and her husband involve stories about the Holocaust in some way. Many books take place a few generations in the past, and I suppose for Jewish writers when you set a book or stories in this recent-past time frame (or have a current character in his 80s) the Holocaust by necessity becomes a key (it not THE only) event.

I have now read several early novels by current female authors that start with a chapter in the male point of view before switching to a female point of view. (Some of these books switch back and forth, some just switch permanently to female p.o.v.) (I may post about this more later, at which point I'll actually list the books rather than just expecting everyone to take my word for it.) (By everyone, I mean me.) I wonder if this is an intentional "trick" by female authors writing their first novel. Do male publishers gravitate towards books in the male point of view while female publishers have less bias? Couple that with the fact that writers are often told the first chapter is the critical one for selling a book to a publisher, and it makes sense to drop a male p.o.v. chapter to start off a novel even if the rest is narrated by a female voice. Or maybe it's coincidence.

At my wife's suggestion I read this American Book Award winner. It's not so much a novel as a series of interconnected novellas. The characters overlap, but it's not until the last third of the book that you really feel like you are reading one coherent story. While I liked each section, it was difficult having to start up again each time the novel shifted.

Everyone who knows me knows that I can't stand the incorrect usage of the phrase "begs the question." I'd like to take a moment and recognize a small victory in the futile pursuit for its proper application.

According to an article in Slate.com, Chief Justice Roberts recently used the term--and, being the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States--he used it correctly. That is, he used it to denote that one of the lawyers was applying circular logic.

I suppose that well-educated judges should be one of the few groups familiar with the correct usage of "begs the question," being that they spend their days dealing with logic, reasoning, and arguments.