Currently Reading: Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison
So I’ve really struggled with this last post for Nine New
November Novel ‘Ntries. It’s not that I don’t have books that I’ve finished and
need to write about. In fact, I still have two to write about in order to be
caught up. The problem is that the next book I completed after Death of a Salesman was Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel
Garcia Marquez. It was an incredible book and I just don’t feel like I’ve had
enough time to digest all my thoughts about it and thus be able to do it
justice in a post. So I’ve decided to hold off on that post until I can
properly put all of my thoughts in order.
Plus, my best friend from college is coming to visit me
today and, therefore, I have a limited amount of time to complete this post and
with it my goal for the month.
So I’m slightly copping out and doing another book
recommendations post. But with a twist.
As of today, I’ve read 27 of the books on my list of
classics. I’m sure that I’ve been pretty clear about which ones I did and
didn’t enjoy, but I’m not sure it’s been clear which ones I have enjoyed the
most and believe you should read. So today, I’m going to give you book
recommendations from my Reading List. As always,
descriptions come from the backs of the covers when available.
WARNING: My blog posts about these novels most likely
contain spoilers. I would love to know your opinions of the books once you’ve
finished, but if you intend to read them, it’s probably better to save my posts
for after.
“He’s a boisterous, brawling, fun-loving rebel who swaggers
into the ward of a mental hospital and takes over …
He’s a lusty, profane, life-loving fighter who rallies the
other patients around him by challenging the dictatorship of Big Nurse. He
promotes gambling in the ward, smuggles in wine and women. At every turn, he
openly defies her rule.
The contest starts as sport (with McMurphy taking bets on
the outcome) but soon it develops into a grim struggle for the minds and hearts
of the men, into an all-out war between two relentless opponents: Big Nurse,
backed by the full power of authority … McMurphy, who has only his own
indomitable will.”
“Seconds before Earth is demolished to make way for a
galactic freeway, Arthur Dent is plucked off the planet by his friend Ford
Prefect, a researcher for the revised edition of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy who, for the last fifteen
years, has been posing as an out-of-work actor.
Together,
this dynamic pair begin a journey through space aided by a galaxyful of fellow
travelers: Zaphod Beeblebrox, the two-headed, three-armed ex-hippie and totally
out-to-lunch president of the galaxy; Trillian (formerly Tricia McMillan),
Zaphod’s girlfriend, whom Arthur tried to pick up at a cocktail party once upon
a time zone; Marvin, a paranoid, brilliant, and chronically depressed robot;
and Veet Voojagig, a former graduate student obsessed with the disappearance of
all the ballpoint pens he’s bought over the years.
Where
are these pens? Why are we born? Why do we die? For all the answers, stick your
thumb to the stars!”
“At once naturalistic epic, captivity narrative, road novel,
and transcendental gospel, Steinbeck’s The
Grapes of Wrath is perhaps the most American of American classics. Although
it follows the movement of thousands of men and women and the transformation of
an entire nation during the Dust Bowl migration of the 1930s, The Grapes of Wrath is also the story of
one Oklahoma farm family, the Joads, who are driven off their homestead and
forced to travel west to the promised land of California. From their trials and
their repeated collisions against the hard realities of this new America,
Steinbeck creates a drama that is intensely human yet majestic in its scale and
morale vision, tragic but ultimately stirring in its insistence on human
dignity.”
And now I've technically completed this goal for November!
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