Literary Lollapalooza, September Edition

This month, we leave the frivolity of summer behind in favor of cold hard facts, as I dive head first into as a pile of nonfiction, only coming up for air to take in the latest bestseller from Dan Brown.

This is Literary Lollapalooza, September Edition.

Books Acquired:

Fiction: The Lost Symbol by Dan Brown, Hairstyles of the Damned by Joe Meno, Gilead by Marilynne Robinson, Under the Dome by Stephen King

Non-Fiction: A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers, Super Freakonomics by Steven D. Levitt & Stephen J. Dubner

Books Borrowed: Juliet, Naked by Nick Hornby

Books Read:

The Duel: Pakistan on the Flight Path of American Power by Tariq Ali

If you pay attention to American foreign policy, or at least stay somewhat afloat of the daily news then it comes to no surprise that Pakistan has been a key element in our Middle Eastern exploits. It is the sixth most populous country in the world and is the only Islamic state to currently have nuclear weapons. It shares a border with Afghanistan, stretching thousands of miles, which is the likely hiding place of Osama bin Laden and continues to be the site of some of the worst insurgency. It has been ruled by a military dictatorship for 33 of its 50 year existence, almost all of which have been backed by the U.S. government. You see, Pakistan is important to us Americans. We’ve provided over $10 billion dollars in aid since 2001, and we’ve sold them more than $5 billion in U.S. weaponry in 2006 alone. So what does the future of Pakistan look like, and what does it mean for the rest of the world?
Tariq Ali is one of the most well-respected and well-connected Pakistani journalists and in this book he examines the entire fifty year history of Pakistan in order to answer this question. With clear and insightful writing, Ali dissects the brutal and shifting militaristic leadership of the country he loves. He explains in great detail how each insurrection and coup came about and how some were stopped before they could ever come to fruition. He also coldly examines the role that the U.S. government has played in backing certain military regimes, in order to protect American interests in the region. I learned more than I ever thought I could about not only Pakistan but about foreign policy and Middle Eastern diplomacy as well.
But don’t be fooled for a second, this is a very dense book recommended to students of history and foreign policy only. This isn’t a book to take on lightly. At times it reads like a textbook of dates, names, and terms. At others it takes on a lively tone of rebellious patriotism, boldly questioning the status quo and calling for everyone to take a closer look at how Pakistan relates to the rest of the world. This is a great book about a difficult and timely topic.

A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers

This autobiography caught my eye years ago and it has been on my reading list ever since. I have even sold this book to other people based solely on my enthusiasm about someday reading it. Its cover is striking, with a sash of blood red drape hanging across the upper left corner, revealing a cloudy sky at either dawn or dusk. It seems to suggest the revelation of some great hidden truth.
It doesn’t reveal any deep hidden mysteries, but it does reveal a writer of astonishing ability. If you think the title is a bit self-important and pretentious you would be right. Unfortunately Eggers has already beaten you to the punch. In what turns out to be a frequent self-deprecating, self-conscious commentary on his own writing, Eggers reveals an obsessive need to judge and validate his every thought or action. What follows is a sort of meta-autobiography as he mixes real events and conversations with imagined self-excoriating conversations with characters that start out being one person but eventually morph into some version of himself. Confused yet? Trust me it’s not actually all that confusing.
Eggers’ great skill here is to do two things at once: a) tell the story of his life following the death of his parents and then having to raise his twelve year old brother, and b) constantly comment on or judge how truthfully or artfully he is accomplishing a). What this built in self-conscious commentary reveals is the inherent “icky”ness of writing a book about oneself. How does one, with all humility and honesty, treat one’s life story as noble or tragic enough to deserve being memorialized at all, much less when you are the one writing the memorial? It leads to questions of integrity and self-aggrandizing phoniness. Eggers is painfully aware of all of this, and so in disarming bits of literary playfulness he both embraces the fact that he is indeed the center of the story, but that he also gets how stupid and self-centered that makes him seem.
Despite all of the literary hoops, Eggers is first and foremost a story teller, and the tale that he lays down here is in fact a heartbreaking one. But don’t worry; you won’t want to open a vein or anything like that. Luckily Eggers also has a great sense of humor and manages to keep things light while treading very dark territory. The first few paragraphs are pretty much a straight-forward memoir recounting his mother’s deterioration from cancer, he and his siblings’ care for her after the sudden death of their father, and the horrors of having to watch as a loved one dies slowly and painfully from an unseen killer. Having lost my mother to cancer in my early twenties, I found it very difficult to get through these pages. I spent much of my time on the bus, or in the break room at work, fighting back tears, swallowing hard to get rid of the lump that rose in my throat.
The book of course has its faults, such as an almost meandering second half, but no amount of pointless twenty-something blathering can take away the book’s multiple charms. An oddity of a book that revels in its own inadequacies, this may not be evidence of a staggering genius, but it is definitely the work of a master craftsman.

The Lost Symbol by Dan Brown

I couldn’t resist the temptation to take a roller-coaster sidetrack in the midst of my non-fiction month. I had never read any of Mr. Brown’s previous novels, though like millions of others I did see the Ron Howard and Tom Hanks film of “The DaVinci Code”. This novel being set in Washington, D.C., was something that I could not resist. I am just nerdy enough to visit the various locations in the book, a sort of literary treasure hunt or scavenger hunt for book nerds.
You know what you’re getting into when you read a novel like this one. While based on history, the facts end where the book begins. You have to be willing to suspend your disbelief, turn off your bullshit detector, and just go with it, even if you already see that it’s just going to drop you off in the same place you got on.
It’s a fun read with all of the events taking place within a twenty-four period. Sort of like “24” for the nerdy history buff, conspiracy theory set. Is it logical, or believable, or even remotely plausible? Of course not. But you know that already.
This isn’t about facts, it’s about fun. And there is plenty of fun here, even with an over-the-top full-body-tattooed black magic 33rd degree Mason as the villain (I know!). This is a trifle. Take it on vacation. I’ll let you know when I finally do the historic sites scavenger hunt.


The Partly Cloudy Patriot by Sarah Vowell

Sarah Vowell is a history buff. Strike that. Sarah Vowell is absolutely batshit gaga about U.S. History. Seriously. She visits places like Salem and Gettysburg on her vacations because she loves history so much. She’s also very, very funny.
That Sarah Vowell is a history nerd should come to no surprise to anyone who has seen her in any of her many appearances on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart or Late Nite with Conan O’Brien. That’s how I was first introduced to Sarah Vowell. Watching her talk about presidential assassinations with her trademark sardonic humor, I was instantly a fan.
This is a collection of her essays, ranging from topics in U.S. history to modern pop culture, and it is really, really funny. Did I say that already? Its okay, it bears repeating. If you like David Sedaris or Ira Glass, this is right up your alley. Enlightening and educational, she never ceases to make me think and laugh about the world we inhabit.

TT4N. Next month I get the privilege of reading brand new books by two of my favorite authors, Nick Hornby and Stephen King. Until then, happy reading!