BOOK ‘EM, DANNO
Yo.
So thanks to my Kindle, I’ve been burning through my original “200 Books” list quite rapidly, to the point where not too long ago I turned it into a “250 Books” list.
I’ve updated it again!
It now contains 300 books. Because.
Take a look here.
I’ve also decided to color my top five books on that page just so that random passers-by know that The Caine Mutiny is the best goddamn book ever my literary preferences.
Bye.
Book Review: The Jungle (Sinclair)
Have I read this before: Yup, up in Vancouver.
Review: Want to feel depressed, disgusted, discouraged, and disturbed? This is your book.
Seriously, this ranks up there as one of the most depressing books I’ve ever read. It follows Jurgis, a Yugoslavian immigrant, as he and his family try to “make it” in Chicago during the early 1900s. The book opens with Jurgis getting married to Ona, and that’s about where the happies stop.
Jurgis gets a job in the meat-packing industry and basically faces tragedy after tragedy after tragedy throughout the whole book. Not only do we get the horrible details of what the meat-packing industry was like for workers back then, but Sinclair also details how impossibly difficult it was for immigrant workers to even keep the most basic of jobs because of how unsafe the whole industry was. And many got screwed out of reasonable rent/housing because of greedy landlords and the language barrier.
This is a hard book to read, man. Not because of the way it’s written or anything like that—it’s just depressing as all hell. Which was one of Sinclair’s main points in writing it. He wanted to show how terrible it was for immigrant workers during that time.
So read it. But make sure you’ve got your Zoloft ready.
Favorite part: God, how can you have a favorite part of this book? I suppose the very detailed descriptions of the working conditions.
The hands of these men would be criss- crossed with cuts, until you could no longer pretend to count them or to trace them. They would have no nails, – they had worn them off pulling hides; their knuckles were swollen so that their fingers spread out like a fan…and as for the other men, who worked in tank rooms full of steam, and in some of which there were open vats near the level of the floor, their peculiar trouble was that they fell into the vats; and when they were fished out, there was never enough of them left to be worth exhibiting, – sometimes they would be overlooked for days, till all but the bones of them had gone out to the world as Durham’s Pure Leaf Lard!
Rating: 6/10 (just because it’s sooooo depressing)
Book Review: The Great Gatsby (Fitzgerald)
Have I read this before: Yar! First time was in 10th grade English. We had a choice between this and some other book that wasn’t on my list. Hence, I chose Gatsby. I think I was the only one who did.
Review: Don’t make me review this. I don’t think I can. I love this book, yo. If you’ve read my 100 Things, you’ll know that character-wise, this is my favorite book. It’s such a compact story, but there’s so much in it. I think Gatsby is fascinating and for some reason I really like the fact that Nick, the narrator, doesn’t really have a voice of his own (at least compared to a lot of other narrators of books). He exists for things to happen around, it seems, and that puts an interesting twist on the whole story. He’s almost limited omniscient in that sense because he really gets the story from everybody’s angle but doesn’t get to be in anyone’s head but his own.
LSAjflakdjfasfjaskflj I just really like this story.
Also, if you ever want to listen to an audiobook version of this, I highly recommend the one read by Alexander Scourby. It’s unabridged and fantastic.
Favorite part: Oh, jeez.
“They’re a rotten crowd,” I shouted across the lawn. “You’re worth the whole damn bunch put together.”
I’ve always been glad I said that. It was the only compliment I ever gave him, because I disapproved of him from beginning to end. First he nodded politely, and then his face broke into that radiant and understanding smile, as if we’d been in ecstatic cahoots on that fact all the time. First he nodded politely, and then his face broke into that radiant and understanding smile, as if we’d been in ecstatic cahoots on that fact all the time. His gorgeous pink rag of a suit made a bright spot of color against the white steps, and I thought of the night when I first came to his ancestral home, three months before. The lawn and drive had been crowded with the faces of those who guessed at his corruption—and he had stood on those steps, concealing his incorruptible dream, as he waved them good-by.
UGH GORGEOUS.
Rating: 10/10
Book Review: The Three Musketeers (Dumas)
Have I read this before: Nopers. I started it back in the summer of 2008 but only got like 30 pages in for some reason. Not sure why I stopped.
Review: I really like Dumas. The idea of four sword-fighting dudes fighting for the king sounds like an appealing story on its own, but Dumas seems to up the intrigue quite a bit by the way the story proceeds. Also, poisonings. That seems to be a thing for Dumas.
Anyway. I’ve always enjoyed stories that have characters with very distinct, almost trope-like personalities/personality traits. This is one of them. It’s like the three Karamazov brothers, but with more swords and less Russian name confusion.
(Okay, it’s not, really, but can you imagine how fantastic that would be?)
Also, Porthos will forever look like Oliver Platt in my mind. THANKS, DISNEY.
Favorite part: The death of Constance is really freaking sad. I hate to call that my favorite part, but it is. The vast majority of The Three Musketeers is either action or humor (or both), but that part was definitely very sad.
I also really liked the friendship that built between Athos and d’Artagnan.
Rating: 8/10
I don’t know why I never put this up here before
Hello to everyone yet again. Since I’m incredibly bored and since I finished a lot of books over the summer (at work, haha), I’ve decided to provide you all with the book list I’ve been working through. Books in red are one’s I’ve read (makes sense, doesn’t it?). Asterisks denote books I would recommend HIGHLY.
(Edit: this list is now located under the “200 Books” tab up above. Click that instead!)
Eigenblogger 