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Articles tagged with: books

Something Wicked This Way Comes
March 5, 2007 – 2:25 AM | No Comment

The writing is both very precise and wildly overwrought, particularly the dialogue, which…my God, even a Lassie episode is closer to how kids really  talk, and the father’s lengthy pontificating in the library was just …

Snobbery: The American Version
March 5, 2007 – 2:24 AM | No Comment

Very sharp and funny, particularly the extremely dry and long overdue takedown of Susan Sontag. (9/8/03)

She’s Not There
March 5, 2007 – 2:23 AM | No Comment

A lovely…what’s the term I want here?   “Memoir of the transgender experience,” I guess.   In any case, funny and touching in just the right balance, and beautifully written.   (9/8/03)

The Selling of the President
March 5, 2007 – 2:23 AM | No Comment

The prose is a little bit clumsy, but if you like media studies, it’s a fab read in an election year.   Grab a copy if you can.   My newest favorite political joke: “I’d …

Maupassant, Selected Short Stories
March 5, 2007 – 2:23 AM | No Comment

The editor made a big thing out of not including “The Necklace,” which I think is a mistake; it’s probably his strongest story.   These are good, but it took me a while to get …

Screening Party
March 5, 2007 – 2:22 AM | No Comment

Hilaaaaaarious.   A group of people sitting around making catty comments about various movies is sometimes hard to translate to the page, but Hensley does a great job with it.   His friend Tony and …

Running with Scissors
March 5, 2007 – 2:22 AM | No Comment

Read it in one day.   It’s sort of a Sedaris/Mary Karr hybrid, but that’s not a bad thing, and it’s not derivative, I didn’t think, although it might seem like I thought that.   …

Rumble Fish
March 5, 2007 – 2:21 AM | No Comment

Probably the best written of the S.E. Hintons, but with the least likable characters.   Rusty-James is a straight-up jackass.

Robert Kennedy: His Life
March 5, 2007 – 2:21 AM | No Comment

It’s a bit dry sometimes, but totally worth grinding through the slower spots, because it gives you a really good sense of the world at that time and the background on certain Big Moments In …

The Restless Sleep: Inside New York City’s Cold Case Squad
March 5, 2007 – 2:21 AM | No Comment

A very quick read.   The writing is somewhat uneven in terms of the diction, because Stacy Horn goes back and forth between kind of parroting tough detective-speak and writing more formally and deeply about …