So many left undone

As I age, I am more and more prone to giving up on a book if it doesn't work by page 50 (200 in fantasy novels.) While I may be missing some gems, I think I my net book enjoyment per year is higher. Here are some that were voted out of the book queue this year.

Saturday by Ian McEwan. I quite like McEwan, so I was sad to find this one unengaging. It just felt so limp compared to some of his other works. In order to atone for this, I've just ordered his Cold War spy book, the Innocent.

Tripwire by Lee Child. A non-thrilling thriller. So sad. I'm not ready to give up on Child and will still read Running Blind.

Scribbling the Cat - Alexandra Fuller. The writing is evocative. I felt as if I was standing in Africa myself, but I didn't feel that compelled to continue. I admit, I read so many reviews of this one that I got the gist of the story and didn't care to read much more. I think I'll read Don't Lets Go to the Dogs Tonight instead.

Ice - Vladimir Sorokin. This one sounded interesting. Someone is kidnapping blue eyes blond Russians and whacking them in the chest with axes made of ice. Those that survive are congratulated and told they are now awake. It may speak more to Russian audiences (the awoken include a prostitute, mobster and a drug addled youth - the new Russians?) I found the prose so spare as to be empty. Not even the promise of a tie-in to Tunguska kept me going here.

I am willing to listen to reasons why I should have continued.

Palpable hits

Bookworld has some pithy notes on books unfinished in 2006. She says of Booker winner the Sea "Nothing happened and it didn't happen in very pretentious language." Black Swan Green gets this: "Cloud Atlas was fabulous, this was a crashing disappointment. An underwhelming story about a mopey boy. " There are ten others, be sure to read them all.

I have become more disciplined about putting aside books that don't work for me. Highlights this year include House of Leaves and Confederacy of Dunces. Based on the Amazon ratings ( 4 and 4.5 stars respectively) I am in the minority, but who cares, I didn't like these books. House of Leaves is a post-modern puzzle, which will either thrill through or make you run screaming. The author plays with the font size and color, word placement, word order and runs a separate over-written storyline in the footnotes. So boring.

Dunces is a book of humor. The main character is a buffoon who rejects the modern world in nearly every form. He is meant to amuse and make us question our ways, but I just found it annoying.

And so the story goes

Steve and I have often debated the worst collapse in quality among writers. In some cases, like the Magic Circle, careers are killed by the quality implosion. In others, they improbably live on. For me, one of the great disappointments was Hannibal, the follow up to the Silence of the Lambs. Not only did we get the sad tale of Hannibal's childhood but we get a bizarre change of character for Clarice.

Now we have Hannibal Rising. My suspicions are all the more dark when I see that the screenplay was written at the same time! The book will come out in Dec 06 to be followed by a Feb 07 film. So is this really a "novelization?" In case you care, the book will follow the life of Hannibal before he was arrested the first time.

The general low quality of the recent books should be contrasted to the excellent Red Dragon.

Reading quandary

OK, I won't glorify this to the level of quandary, but what to do when your books seem vaguely dissatisfying and yet you don't what to give up? I started Cold as the Grave, by the excellent Peter Robinson, but it feels a bit flat at the moment. I also read the first few pages of Moonlight Hotel, a satire of American policy in the mid-east. Just to ensure that I spread myself thin, I am also reading the Zanzibar Chest, which is great, and Friendly Fire which concerns Anti-Americanism and what to do about it. Anyway, if I put down the Robinson, I doubt I will ever pick it up again. I could probably re-start Moonlight down the road some time. Something is holding me back on that despite the fact that the Egyptologist beckons. Oh well, muddle through and all that.

It probably doesn't help that I am racing through Sopranos Season 5 either. I find it amusing how different Paul Shulze's character is on Sopranos (Father Phil) than on 24 (Ryan Chappelle).