Portnoy's Complaint by Philip Roth

This book, even now, forty years after it was first published, is still hilarious. I thought Mordecai Richler was funny; Philip Roth is funnier. There is no story in this novel, only a ceaseless stream of complaints by the protagonist. Hence the title. So the book reads like a one-man stand-up comedy routine. Mr Roth is merciless. Ouch. No wonder Jeff says some people were quite offended by the book.

A Year in the Life of William Shakespeare: 1599 by James Shapiro

This is an interesting concept: focusing on one year of Shakespeare's life. After all, books written on Shakespeare can fill up several rooms, so one has to find a new angle. 1599 isn't just any year. It was during this time Shakespeare supposedly wrote Henry the Fifth, Julius Caesar, As You Like It, and Hamlet.

I say "supposedly" because the fact is, we don't know exactly when Shakespeare wrote his plays. Mr Shapiro needs to write with confidence that Hamlet was written in 1599, otherwise his book would appear to have been built on sand. In reality, it's a whole lot of guesswork when it comes to dating Shakespeare's plays.

If that's all there is in terms of shaky facts, I would have loved the book still. It is full of rich historical details, and scholarly insights. I've read Julius Caesar, and studied As You Like It, and Hamlet in high school (in Toronto), so it's quite interesting to learn what was behind their creation. Unfortunately, there are a few other problems which prevented me from fully enjoying the book.

One is that, reading the analysis on Shakespeare's text, I was reminded of all that I hated about literature classes in school. While reading is a pure pleasure, the exercise of finding double, triple meanings in a particular choice of words, meanings that the author himself mostly likely never dreamt of, is ridiculous. In the case of Shakespeare, it is even more absurd to dwell and dig since his plays were published years later by people who worked with him; who knows how accurate the final result was.

Another problem is I came upon a small mistake made by Mr Shapiro regarding English history. On page 90 (Harper Perennial Edition 2006), second paragraph, the part about Cambridge being unfairly passed over is all wrong. Now, one can argue that Mr Shapiro specializes in literature, not history. Fine. I'm not saying that the whole book is worthless because of one mistake. It's just that if I noticed this mistake because I happen to have an interest in English history, how many other inaccuracies are there in areas that I'm ignorant of?

Ah well. I know it's foolish of me to use maths standards on an arts book. I'm not, actually. The fact is, the arts world has no standards at all, which brings me back to John Carey's book What Good Are the Arts?...

The Elementary Particles by Michel Houellebecq

I believe I came across the name Michel Houellebecq in a book review somewhere, but it wasn't even M. Houellebecq's book the reviewer was talking about, so it's somewhat of a mystery how I ended up with this novel.

The book was apparently highly popular in France. I read the English translation, of course. Unless a great deal was lost in the translation process, which I don't think is the case, I yet again find the French incomprehensible. Put it simply, this is the most unpleasant book I've ever read in my life. Repetitive pornographic descriptions of sex and violence take up most of the book. Three female characters in the story end up committing suicide and we are supposed to think this is what happens to all women: loss of youth and beauty leads to disease and death by one's own hand. What is the point of the Bruno character? Or Michel? Or the whole book? I see printed on the jacket glowing praises, and I say to myself, It's the Emperor's New Clothes again. There are no ideas here, only total nonsense.

Well, I felt somewhat vindicated when I read later that M. Houellebecq had spent time in a mental institution. Hey, the dude is crazy! I knew it! There were also two negative reviews of the book in the New York Times. Now, it is not impossible that someone boring like me can never understand how twisted or messed up some people are, especially if they are a product of the '60s. But this book, far from providing analysis, is a piece of junk.

Atonement by Ian McEwan

I didn't see the movie so I thought I'd read the book. As always, Mr McEwan writes with a gorgeous style that seems to come entirely effortlessly to him. He also manages to rattle me like no other writer. This time, perhaps in his attempt to write from a female --- and a novelist's --- perspective, he spends much of the book on minute detail descriptions instead of discussions on ideas. The book is beautifully crafted, yet it's also a suffocating read. I wonder what the movie is like...

Cary Grant: A Class Apart, by Graham McCann

Biographies are not usually my thing. While history is always a fun topic, I find personal details surrounding a famous figure uninteresting and unreliable. Basically, I'm far more interested in what someone did with respect to history than that person's background, temperament, marriages, children, etc. This book on Cary Grant came highly recommended, and Mr Grant was in several of my favourite movies (The Philadelphia Story, North by Northwest, and Charade), so I thought I'd give the biography a try.

I'm afraid I don't change enough: I still don't really like biographies for the same old reasons. A book on the film industry from the 30's to the 60's would have been far more interesting to me. Instead, I got too much about Mr Grant outside of his film career. Worse yet, this not very thick book is one third filmography, notes and index. Oh, it's an enjoyable book. I had no difficulty finishing it. It's just that now I know --- biographies are still not for me.

Skellig, by David Almond

This is a kids' book. It's about kids and for kids. The little story contained in the slim volume of under 200 pages (counting the large font and the generous spacing) could have been summed up in one page. However, it is really a poem. A moving poem full of imagination and tenderness. So even though I haven't been a kid for a very long time, I was mesmerized by the story, and will recommend it to anyone of any age.

The Reader, by Bernhard Schlink

I picked up this book because the movie based on it has garnered several film award nominations. But I did it in the wrong order, of course; I should have gone to see the movie first. Once I've read the book, the film adaptation is bound to disappoint.

Since Bernhard Schlink's novel was written in German, I was faced with yet another translated book. The prose was rather dreamy. Was it the author's intention, or was it because the translator was a woman? What else is missing in the translated version? I couldn't get these nagging thoughts out of my mind.

[Spoiler warning!]

In the meantime, the story conjures up a sense of surreality. In fact, which part of the story is even remotely realistic? A deeply felt relationship between a 15-year-old boy and a 36-year-old woman? Someone who would rather be exposed as a heartless murderer of defenceless women than an illiterate? I suppose I am to take things as metaphors and allegories, not as absurdity and contrivance. When I did manage to do that, the novel became absolutely beautiful.

The Ancient Ship, by Zhang Wei

I saw this book at our local Costco. Someone had placed it on top of laundry detergents. The description on the back cover intrigued me. Although I'm fluent in Chinese, over the years, having read no Chinese books, I have left myself at a point where I can no longer absorb literary Chinese writing. My eyes would glaze over "fancy" words and expressions, while my brain registered no meaning. Perhaps, I thought, I could give an English translation a try.

So far, the experiment has been a failure. The main reason is actually an old problem of mine. Due to my lack of imagination, I tend to have a difficult time relating to people with whom I have nothing in common. When I was young, I loved novels about high school students or university life, that was the environment familiar to me. As for stories about the countryside, they might as well have taken place on Jupiter. I thought I had grown out of this limitation, now that I was older and more worldly. Unfortunately, no, I'm as uninterested in peasant life as ever. And The Ancient Ship is all about the countryside.

The second problem is to be expected: too much is lost in the translation. The names, when not in their native Chinese form, are awkward and impossible to remember. The sentences are stiff. The story line seems to jump around in a semi-random fashion. I soldiered on for about a hundred pages, but found myself exhausted. Maybe I'll go back to it later when I'm desperate for reading material...

Persepolis: The Story Of A Childhood, by Marjane Strapi

I brought this book with me to Mexico along with the other three, but when I was stretched out on a white sandy beach, I asked myself, Do I want to open a book about life in Iran during the Islamic Revolution? Why did I even bring such a book to this paradise? So Marjane Strapi's memoir in the form of a graphics novel flew from Toronto to Cancun and back untouched.

Once I was home and thrown back into snow storms and temperatures at below -15 degrees Celsius, I had no problems finishing the book. It's very funny, very sad, and very interesting. Iran is not a country that I know much about, so I'm happy to learn new things. Their Islamic Revolution reminds me of China's Cultural Revolution, yet they are also quite different. Such a strange and fascinating land.

Shakespeare: The World as Stage, by Bill Bryson

This is yet another book I brought with me to Mexico. As it stands, I'll read anything written by Bill Bryson; and if he happens to write about something of interest to me, all the better. Such is the case with this slim book.

Really, what's there left to say about William Shakespeare that hasn't been said already? Nevertheless, it's still fun to have everything put together by Mr Bryson who can breathe humour into a restaurant menu. The book is slim because we know scarcely anything about the greatest writer in English literature. The verifiable facts on Shakespeare will probably amount to fewer than ten pages, so Mr Bryson's volume also includes stories on Shakespearean scholars, experiences of Shakespeare's contemporaries, and the theatre life in Elizabethan days. It's a highly enjoyable and informative read.

There are those among us who wish they had been born to a different era, one filled with romance, adventure and creativity, unlike the dreary materialistic one in which we find ourselves. Perhaps a reality check is in order from time to time. When a talented playwright such as Christopher Marlowe could be charged of being "a blasphemer and atheist" and faced, "at the very least, having his ears cut off---that was if things went well", I'm afraid it wasn't all romance and adventure in the old days. Not to mention that the Elizabethan era is generally considered to be the golden age in English history...

A Prisoner of Birth, by Jeffrey Archer

This was another book I read in Mexico. A perfect book for the beach. About a quarter of the way through, I said to Jeff that Jeffrey Archer's novel is a copycat of Alexandre Dumas, père's The Count of Monte Cristo. Sure enough, soon afterward, references to Dumas's count appeared in Mr Archer's story. Let's say the imitation is even less plausible than the original, but just as much fun. I'd hate to believe that class still matters so much in today's Britain though...

Slam, by Nick Hornby

Nick Hornby is one of my favourite writers, even though his characters are typically so outrageous in my eyes that I have a hard time believing such people actually exist in real life. Slam is along those lines.

Note: spoilers coming up!

The story is simple. A regular 16-year-old boy finds out that his ex-girlfriend is pregnant with his child. We get to see how he deals with this news before, during and after the pregnancy.

Now, you can see why I find such characters outrageous. Things like teen pregnancy plainly don't happen in my world. Granted, Mr Hornby quoted the stat that says Britain has the highest teen pregnancy rate among rich countries. Still, high school kids who want to become parents are as strange to me as junkies who stick needles into their own veins. So, while sitting on a white sandy beach in the Riviera Maya in Mexico, I read Mr Hornby's usual humorous writing with many a chuckle and an occasional head shake, firm in my belief that the story is too outlandish to be plausible.

Well, guess what. Truth is indeed stranger than Fiction. I saw on the news ticker yesterday (Feb 15, 2009) a story in Britain where a 13-year-old boy is claiming to be the father of a baby born to a 15-year-old girl. His joy may be short-lived, as eight other teens are considered possible fathers to the baby. I think I owe Mr Hornby an apology.

Outliers, by Malcolm Gladwell

Malcolm Gladwell's third book is all the rage at the moment, especially among young mothers. It proclaims to unveil the secrets behind extraordinarily successful people, the likes of Bill Gates and the Beatles. Well, who wouldn't want to know that?!

Alas, such secrets do not exist. As he usually does, Mr Gladwell offers marvellous insights, and challenges conventional wisdom, but ultimately, I'm afraid he's stating the obvious. Nonetheless, Mr Gladwell is a very clever writer, and his book is easy to read and highly entertaining.

A World Without End, by Ken Follett

Sometime in the mid-90's, I read Ken Follett's thoroughly engrossing novel Pillars of the Earth. Then out of the blue in 2007, Oprah picked it for her Book Club. As luck would have it, Mr Follett had a sequel coming out just at that time. I wasn't going to buy the hardcover edition of the sequel at the height of its popularity. Even if it's as good as the original, it's not worth keeping around. So I waited until a few months ago when the paperback version of A World Without End come to our local bookstore.

In the meantime, words came out that this sequel is more like "a book without end." In my case, I had no difficulty finishing it, but I must say, it was a lame story, an almost exact copy of the original except this time around, the freshness is gone. There is a close to one-to-one correspondence of characters, except that instead of trying to build a cathedral, our hero is building a bridge. However, a bridge is not nearly as exciting as a cathedral, so other things are thrown in there as fillers.

Mr Follett had said he wrote Pillars because he had a keen interest in medieval England and its magnificent cathedrals. I can completely understand, as I find the topic fascinating myself, hence my enjoyment of his novel. However, the sequel seems more an attempt at capitalizing on the success of the original than a worthwhile story on its own.

This Boy's Life, by Tobias Wolff

I am torn over Tobias Wolff. He writes so beautifully, and the stories are enthralling, but duplicity seems to be the main feature shared by his characters. Of course, everyone lies, in ways big and small. I just find it difficult to sympathize with those who are habitual liars. Then again, what some call lies, others call imagination. This is probably why Mr Wolff is a first-rate writer while I've never exhibited any creativity in a literary sense.

This Boy's Life is a memoir of Mr Wolff's boyhood in the 1950's. His family is dysfunctional to say the least. As I turned the pages, I was filled at once with admiration for his survival skills, and with abhorrence for his natural-born dishonest ways. How on earth could the boy in the book someday become one of the best writers of his generation? How much of the book, even if called a memoir, is true? We're talking about someone with an off-the-charts amount of imagination here. It wouldn't be the first time a writer embellishes a supposedly true story.

Ultimately, the book is still fantastic, well worth reading irrespective of how much it stretches the truth.

Playing for Pizza, by John Grisham

Years ago when John Grisham took the top seller list by storm, I read and enjoyed a few of his books like everyone else. However, it wasn't long before I got bored with his formula. Jeff had to convince me that Playing for Pizza is not the usual product of the Grisham factory.

There are no lawyers, southern cities or conspiracies in this book. It's about a washed-out NFL quarterback's experience of playing a season of semi-pro American football in Parma, Italy. Mr Grisham captures the lovable naivete of the American, and presents it in a humorous light. The detailed descriptions of football games grew tedious, but the overall story is light-hearted and not entirely unbelievable.

What Good Are the Arts? by John Carey

In Part One of his book, John Carey attempts to answer the following questions: What is a work of art? Is 'high' art superior? Can science help (in defining art)? Do the arts make us better? and Can Art be a religion?

Most of us have been brought up to think that the arts hold a special place in our society. We put artists, musicians and writers on a pedestal. We protest if the government cuts funding to the arts. We gladly make donations to the museums and the symphony. I do all of these things, yet over the years, I've often wondered, What is the point?

Mr Carey argues convincingly that a work of art is anything that is considered art by anybody. This is actually rather depressing. Talks of the timelessness of a painting, or the universal attraction of a piece of music, are nonsense. Just look at how unappreciated so many of the artists and musicians were in their lifetime.

The other answers provided by Mr Carey are equally dispiriting. Some of the greatest artists and writers are the least charitable among us. Adolf Hitler was one of the fiercest champions of fine art and classical music. Totalitarian regimes the world over have been the strongest supporters of the arts, far more so than democracies. The conclusion is, not only do the arts not make us better beings, they turn us into elitists who over time can lose all humanity.

Part Two of the book is rather odd. In it, Mr Carey argues that literature is the highest form of art. To me, it make no sense to rank art forms. They appeal to our different senses. Of course, if I were forced to, I'd choose books over paintings and music, but we need all of them.

Black Dogs, by Ian McEwan

I brought four books with me to Europe, but managed to finish only two: Melissa Bank's The Wonder Spot and Ian McEwan's Black Dogs -- we had a busy trip that left little time for reading.

Black Dogs is not one of the more acclaimed works from this literary master of our time. Nor does it contain one of his extremely disturbing tales. Nevertheless, this being a McEwan novel, it left me unsettled in the end. One would be hard-pressed to find a central plot. Instead, we are presented with a series of loosely connected stories and a whole lot of philosophical musings on Communism, Fascism, the roles that parents and children play, ... It may sound boring, but it is not at all. In fact, it is terribly thought-provoking, perhaps too much so. McEwan's well-wrought prose is also a joy to behold. It has been a long time since a novel has left such an impression on me.

The Wonder Spot, by Melissa Bank

A few years back, I had read Bank's top seller debut, The Girs' Guide to Hunting and Fishing. It has a thin plot but is very funny; Bank has a wonderful sense of humour. The Wonder Spot is in essence a remake of, not even a sequel to, Bank's first novel. Consequently, while it still has numerous hilarious lines, I found it frustrating to read something that exhibits no growth from an obviously talented writer. We are back to the topic of relationships, of a young woman who is, well, out of it when it comes to just about every relationship in her life: with her parents, with her friends, with her boss, with her co-workers, and most of all, with the men in her life. Just as The Girs' Guide, The Wonder Spot is obviously autobiographical. It is almost impossible to believe someone with Bank's talent could have been such a loser (there is no nicer way of putting it) in life. I did finish the book, but Bank's style and subject matter have lost their freshness and attraction.

Devil May Care, by Sebastian Faulks

Devil May Care, The New James Bond Novel by Sebastian Faulks

I took advantage of the couple of days of free time to read a light book before the trip to Europe. Like most people, I am a fan of the 007 movies. When it comes to the novels, I've only read, many years ago, Goldfinger by Ian Fleming.

One can see that Sebastian Faulks wants to maintain Fleming's style of simple writing and exciting story-telling. The absurdity of the main villain seems more pronounced in a book than in a movie: somehow, one can easily treat a Bond movie as science fiction or a cartoon, but it's harder to gloss over the belief-defying plot when it is written down on paper. I remember enjoying the book while reading it, but now, five weeks later, I have only the vaguest recollection of the story, which means I can safely read the book again in a few months and enjoy it all over.