BOTM for October (way late)

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If I'm going to be honest October was a tie - there were two books I really enjoyed for entirely different reasons. But the one that's going to get the top placement and the tiny .jpg image in the corner is Stephen Oates' With Malice Toward None: A Biography of Abraham Lincoln. Recently my friend Jason and I were compiling (yet another) list of the top 10 most underrated Americans, and I put Abraham Lincoln on there. My point was that, no matter how much glory worship and idolization Lincoln has, after reading one of his many biographies I couldn't help but feel there should be more.

One of the criticisms levied at Oates' biography is that it isn't as impartial as some other works, notably Donald Herbert's Lincoln, but it's exactly that partiality and sense of passion in the writing that makes this such a great read. Painting a complete picture of the President's life without getting mired in too much minutia, Oates covers everything from Lincoln's early years up through his sessions in Congress, the Presidency, and the years of the Civil War. Many of his speeches and letters are excerpted, and taken as a whole presents an astonishing picture of a man who placed humanity in front of politics and faced one of the worst periods in our nation's history while maintaining the ideals that all men were created equal.

Elsewhere in October:

  • The Ghost Brigade by John Scalzi - If I was splitting the BOTM between fiction and nonfiction, this would have taken the prize for fiction. Scalzi continues to maintain the high standard he set with his debut Hugo-nominated novel Old Man's War, and this quasi-sequel, dealing with the mysterious Ghost Brigade, super-soldiers made up of the DNA of the deceased. This is high-adventure, military space SF i nthe Heinlein tradition, and it's filled with great one-liners, nifty gadgets and big guns, humor, unexpected grace and some high-minded ideas on the questions of self and the definition of humanity. none of which gets in the way of an epic story. The last (perhaps) novel set in the universe, The Last Colony, came out earlier this year and I look forward for continuing on Scalzi's myriad worlds.

  • After Dark by Haruki Murakami - A very quick, dreamy novella of the conversations and episodes that occur over the course of one night in Tokyo. After Dark moves in a more cheerful and less formalized pace than Murakami's usual work, and it's a nice diversion from his more structured novels. The plot, if there really is one, concerns two sisters: Eri - a beautiful young model who lies in a mysterious coma and may or may be watched by a foreboding evil presence, and her younger sister Mari, a more plain (if intelligent) girl who spends the evening walking through Tokyo and meeting the strange denizens who inhabit the nighttime corridors of the city. Enjoyable if not on the level of classics like The Wind Up Bird Chronicle or Hard Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World.

  • The Woman in the Dunes by Kobo Abe - This came as a recommendation from CoffeeZombie, who besides running the excellent Zombie Underground seems to have zeroed in on my particular wavelength. If any book can carry of mantle of being "Kafkaesque" than this would do it. Junpei, an amateur bug collector, heads out on a secret vacation from his dull job to the coast in order to find some new interesting specimens in the hopes of getting his name in the entomology books. Without warning, he finds himself a captive of a village that is constantly under threat by the shifting sand dunes. Instead of abandoning the village, the inhabitants live in sand pits, and spend their days shoveling the sand in an effort to keep everything from being swallowed up. Junpei finds himself living a nightmare existence as he is trapped in one of the dunes with a woman. The novel, rather than focusing solely on the plot mechanics, relies instead on the sense of dread and loss of identity of Junpei as he is forced through he various escape attempts and interactions with the woman to re-define his notion who he is. The Woman in the Dunes is a baffling yet rewarding work that makes the reader look closer at the nature of authority and our roles within it.
And since November has come and gone I'll have to get to that month sooner rather than later.

We Now Return to Our Regularly Scheduled Program

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Let's just say if I was a newly created D&D character, whoever rolled me must have stuck the 6 in Constitution, because lately I'm getting sick if the guy in the next county sneezes.

Thanksgiving, normally one of my favorite holidays, was a dismal, black day due to the fact that I was so sick I couldn't get the stomach up for some of the delicious homemade pastries and pies made by my wife's family. I couldn't play with either my son, my 4-year old nephew OR my brand-spankin' new 1-month old nephew because I hadn't gotten to the doctor yet. The rest of the weekend proceeded in a similar fashion: sweating, freezing, coughing, sleeping, repeat. The highlight of my 4-day weekend (extended to 5 since I couldn't go 2 minutes without coughing on Monday) was finishing the second season of Avatar, alone, in bed, on my iPod while the Missus brought me up some toast.

A lot of friends have given me grief about my love for Avatar, saying that it's a poor-man's anime, but I unashamedly love it, and one of my recent favorite family moments was sitting down and watching it with my nephew, who was ecstatic that his Uncle Chris loved Avatar as much as he did. We yelled "Yip Yip" everything time Appa would fly into the air.

So now Tuesday is here, and I'm finally well enough to cart my bloated carcass back to the office. Today would have been Jimi Hendrix's 65th birthday, and it is also my son's 6 month birthday. Which means that it's also my friend Ken's son Nathan's 6 month birthday.

Which is also as good a place as any to end this post.

Written During a Particularly Boring Meeting

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In a perfect Metal world The Red Album by Baroness would have been #1 instead of #5 in Decibel Magazines Top 40 Metal Albums of 2007. Of course, in a perfect Metal world "Master of Puppets" would be our National Anthem and TRL would have special drop in's by Opeth and High on Fire.

Elsewhere on the list are many of the usual culprits, some of which I agree with (Watain, Jesu), some of which I don't (Dillinger Escape Plan, Darkest Hour), and some of which I have no clue about (Melt Banana? WTF?). But that's what makes list making so fun - there's always a great argument/discussion/fist fight to be had.

Since the subjects I have up in the cranium would take too much effort for my sleep-deprived brain to get down with any sense of clarity (Jack is currently 2 days into a massive teething/no sleep/screaming frenzy), I thought I'd make up a quick list or two about whatever comes into my head. A little (though not as good) in the vein of Reforming Slacker's sweet post from a few days ago (and lately she's been on a run of extremely interesting, intelligent posts). So to kick things off, here's the first list:

6 Things That Give Me Comfort at My Desk

1. My Mini Library - I always keep a short stack of go-to books on my shelf for those "just in case" moments, like when I forget to bring my current book from home, if I need some inspiration, or if I just want to goof off a bit. Right now the shelf has my tiny leather-bound copy of The Complete Works of Shakespeare, Walt Whitman's Leaves of Grass, the City Lights Pocket Poets Anthology, the I Ching, and my trusty college copy of Strunk and White's Elements of Style.

2. Miles Davis' Milestones on Cassette - Even though the cassette player on my little $29.99 neon blue mini boom box is broken, I can't bear to part with my worn and stretched copy of Milestones. It leans comfortably against the wall, looking at me and telling me that it's all cool, and those cats can't bring you down.

3. The Missus in Montreal - Even though I have a couple wedding pictures resting on my desk, the picture I look at the most is a tiny portrait of the Missus tacked to the wall immediately to the left of my monitor, right in between the Tiny Masters of Today pin and Kids in the Hall postcard. We were in Montreal with some friends, and in a fit of humor I whipped out my camera and said "Give me sexy!" She responded with a hair flip that I somehow captured perfectly, She hates it, but it's one of my favorite pictures of her.

4. The Voss Cork - I think by now everyone knows about Voss Water (no relation - I don't see a dime), but far less well-known is Voss Wine (no relation - I don't see a dime). We shared a bottle with some friends while in California and I saved the cork, which is always close at hand when the need for some serious fidgeting arises.

5. My Napoleon Dynamite Bobble-Head - He used to be paired with my Kip Bobble-Head, but Kip was decapitated during the Commercial Truck Pilots of 2007, and was sadly lost. When I need consensus on something, I'll tap the top of Napoleon's head. When I'm looking for a dissenting view, I'll slap his cheek. Then I'll weep silently.

6. Smaelg - Smaelg hides under my desk in a box next to the recycling bin. I reserve Smaelg for special occasions, typically occasions involving irritating people. Those people get to see Smaelg's eyes, and maybe a flash of his slick, razor-sharp jaws before the end.