I was looking forward to four books this summer: "Fearless Fourteen", "Stop in the Name of Pants", "Books: A Memoir", and "Breaking Dawn". "Books: A Memoir" is Larry McMurtry's latest. He tells about his adventures as a book scout and used bookstore owner. I found it interesting, but only because, like Stephen King, he could write out his grocery list and I would buy it. Well, that and I love anything to do with books :-)
"Hit and Run" is Lawrence Block's latest (and I think, sadly, last) Keller the Hit Man book. This one was very different from the previous Keller books. The others were a loosely joined collection of stories of what happens when Keller goes on his jobs and the crazy things that happen to him. This one starts out with Keller going on a job, his last job, as a matter of fact. Keller is ready to retire and devote his remaining years to collecting stamps. Only on this job he gets set up to take the fall for an assassination of a governor, and he's forced to go on the run with only a stolen car and the small amount of cash in his pocket. He makes it to New Orleans, where he rescues a woman who is being attacked in a park. She offers to put him up for the night, and it goes from there. I really liked this one, and was very glad it didn't end the way I was afraid it was going to. I will, however, be very sorry to see Keller go. I enjoyed his stories.
"I Me Mine" was George Harrison's autobiography, actually written in 1980. I figured I knew Pattie and Eric's sides of the stories, now I should know what George has to say. Unfortunately, this really wasn't a straightforward memoir sort of book; it was more just general musings and ramblings and explanations of how he wrote his songs. Frankly, I thought it was a huge waste of time for anyone except the most die-hard George fan (which I'm not). It reminded me of John Lennon's two books, only more coherent.
"The Bell Jar" by Sylvia Plath is another one of those classics you always feel guilty for not having read. Unlike "Deliverance", however, I really liked this one. The language was beautiful, like Nabokov almost, and the story moved crisply along (the only books of long description with no story I can stand are Faulkner, go figure). It's about a young woman named Esther who tries to kill herself and ends up in an asylum. One of the reviews in the back that I read called it "Catcher in the Rye" from a female perspective (or something along those lines). I love "Catcher in the Rye", first of all. When I was 15 or so, a friend of mine read it and wrote to me (in those long ago days before e-mail) that I needed to read this book because I was Holden. I got the book, read it, agreed with her, and then wasn't sure if I should be insulted or flattered. I decided to be flattered. The difference I see here is that Holden wasn't crazy. He didn't do anything to be put in a hospital. He bucked the system, that's all, and refused to toe the phony line. Esther, however, really did need help, since she tried to off herself. They seemed like two completely different kinds of books to me. Plath just makes it so realistic and easy to understand why she wanted to commit suicide. Considering how Plath herself died not long after the publication of this book, it's easy to see why it was so convincing and real.
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