What have I been reading/listening to?  James Ellroy’s L.A. crime novel WHITE JAZZ.  It’s about a totally corrupt lawyer/cop/enforcer for the LAPD named David Klein who plays every possible angle and both ends against the middle in 1958 Los Angeles, trying to investigate a routine break-in at a drug Dealer’s house that turns into something much, much bigger.  He’s a murderer, he’s a racist, he’s a thug, he’s got a little too much interest in his own sister…  It’s populated with historical figures and events (Howard Hughes, Joan Crawford, tearing down the Chavez  Ravine slums to make way for Dodger stadium) and enough stacatto slang to make your head spin.  Rumour has it that when Ellroy turned in his manuscript to the Publisher they said “Dude, this is waaaay too long”, so he took it back and removed every adjective and made every sentence about two to three words long.  It reads like the lovechild of Mickey Spillane and Jack Keruoac.  Best of all, when you listen to it on your iPod, it sounds like Leut. Bradshaw of Firesign Theater fame on all-night bender.

Western and Adams-the whores briefed nice-quasi-deputies for the night. Bluesuits out in force: popping tricks, impounding trick cars. Prostie vans behind Cooper’s Donuts; Vice bulls bagging IDs. Men stationed southbound and northbound-hot to foil sex prowlers hot to rabbit. My perch: Copper’s roof. Ordnance: binoculars, a bullhorn. Dig the panic: Johns soliciting whores-cops grabbing them. Vehicles impounded, van detainment-fourteen fish bagged so far, prelim Q&A: ”You married?” ”You on parole or probation?” ”You like it white or colored? Sign this waiver, we might cut you loose at the station.”

It’s also supposed to be a movie directed by James Carnahan of SMOKING ACES and the much, much better NARC, starring swooney hipster George Clooney.  Honestly–what’s not to like?

 More books here.

You know how your friends give you books and say “You gotta read this, you’ll love it!” and you go “Sure”  and put it on the pile and kind of forget about it until it’s time to give it back?  Well, PRESTON FALLS was like that for me.  My buddy Paul loaned it to me, it got put on “the stack”, and it was only be accident that I finished HEAT and needed something to glance at while The Wife was putting the kids to bed.  And at first, I must say, I found it well-written but very irritating — people who should know better people making bad decisions, couples not communicating, aimless time wasting  But then I kept reading, and the more I read the more involved I became, until I’m getting the oil changed in The Wife’s car today and I’m on the last 50 pages, and I’m like, totally into it, man. 

I won’t ruin the plot, but it’s safe to say it’s about a married couple with two children who have a Summer house in a Preston Falls–a run-down cottage–and the husband, an amateur musician who has problems with his temper who is unsatisfied by his corporate job, takes a two month leave of absence away from his family to work on the house and work through some of his “issues”.  Unfortunately, the decisions he makes are not the best, and circumstances start to tumble out of control.  And myself being part of a married couple with two kids who has a corporate job and has thought about a little place up North, and who is also an semi-retired amateur musician…well, let’s just say there were some interesting parallels (though hopefully not too many!).  Anyway, this is Brad’s Book of the Month.  I even found an interview with the author, David Gates, on line: 

Q: In Jernigan, you gave us a front-row seat at the unraveling of a self-destructive man. Again, in Preston Falls, we watch as Doug Willis, a successful corporate flack, throws his work and family life into chaos. Why does this topic fascinate you?

A:  You mean there are other topics?

Even though I’ve been busy as heck with kids, wife, PTA, kitchen renovation, the plot for world domination, etc., I still try to find some time to read, either on “paper” (some of you 20th century-ers may remember this quaint delivery apparatus for thought beams), and also on iPod.    Here’s what I’ve been reading lately:

HEAT by Bill Buford  – This is a book by the food writer for the New Yorker who met “Molto” Mario Batali and somehow convinced him to let him work an appenticeship at one of his 4-star restaurants in New York.    It’s a totally fascinating portrait of what it’s like to work in a professional restaurant, the personalities involved, the skills involved, the business acumen–everything.  In the second half of the book he travels to Italy to learn the origins of cooking and apprentices at a butcher shop in a tiny town in Tuscan.  It’s one of those books that makes you realize how little you know about anything “real”.  As an added bonus, it also makes you very hungry (if you’re not a vegetarian).  It made me go out and buy some quality kitchen knives, though I think The Wife will draw the line and butchering a pig on our new butcher-block countertops.

 THE ROAD by Cormac McCarthy – This guy probably does not need any praise from me, seeing as how a) he has already won a McArthur “Genius” Fellowship, b) he has a movie version of his last book, NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN, coming out this Fall directed by The Coen Brothers, c) this book won the Pulitzer prize, and d) most importantly (or least importantly?) he was on OPRAH last month, but I just have to say this was one awesome, awesome book.  Now if I told you this book was about an unnamed Father and his son wandering a post-apocalyptic world where everything is covered in gray ash and there is almost no food and it is freezing cold and the only people you may meet are marauding bands of violent, desperate men, many of whom have resorted to cannibalism, was a “must read”, you’d probably say “Now where’s I put that copy of Finnegans’ Wake?”  But this book is utterly compelling and edge-of-your-seat suspenseful, as well as quite profound and meaningful.  Though its grimness was very, very sobering, I was really impressed that it was so grim and that the grimness did not let up.  I hesitate to think what Oprah’s book of the month club made of all this.  My favorite quote from the book:

The Boy:  “Can’t we forget the awful things we saw?”  The Father:  “Sure.  You forget want you want to remember, and you remember what you want to forget.”

GO DOG GO – P.D. Eastman – My son loves this book, my daughter loves this book, I love this book.  For my money, with this book and ARE YOU MY MOTHER? P.D. Eastman  show’s he is just as good if not better than Dr. Seuss.  Stop dogs stop!  The light is red!  Go, dogs go–it’s green ahead!  Suck on that Cormac McCarthy…

I know I am not atrue American because a) I have never watched FRIENDS, b) I have no interest in Nascar, and c) I have never read a Stephen King book. Until now!

For reasons shrouded in mystery, I picked up the book-on-iPod edition of Stephen King’s most recent book, CELL, which I’ve been listening to in my car on the way to work. And you know what? This sh*t is scary! At 3:03 PM on a day in October, everyone using their cellphone receives a signal that turns them into homicidal maniacs, trying to destroy everything in their path–with their hands, their cars, their teeth. Thousands of people are murdered in hours. Buildings are blown up. Planes crash. The few remaining survivors try to figure out what the hell is going is going on and make their way by foot from Boston to Maine, trying to avoid the phone crazies, as well as the other survivors only try to save themselves.

I think the reason I am enjoying this book so much is a) who doesn’t love the Apocalypse?, and b) it reinforces my natural feeling that, were I faced with calamity like this, or any other natural or unnatural disaster, I would be one of the first to die. “This way!” I would shout, and *BAM*, I’d be blown up/eaten/run over/vaporized. These books are especially nerve-wracking for those of us with children, wondering how you could protect your family. Who doesn’t love staying awake at night worrying about that!?

So next up — gallons of water in the basement and a concealed weapons permit! Meanwhile, check this book out! But don’t tell me how it ends! And for God’s sake–don’t call my cell!

PATAGONIA, Ariz. — Jim Harrison, author of rugged, outdoorsy books like “True North” and “Legends of the Fall,” is tough on vehicles. His current ride is a much-abused Chevy Tahoe that every day is pounded over terrain most S.U.V.’s experience only in commercials: splashing through creeks, lurching down hills, bouncing over rock-strewn dirt roads in the back country of southern Arizona, where Mr. Harrison and his wife, Linda, spend the winter months in an adobe casita on the Sonoita Creek. The shock absorbers are so overstressed they’ve gone a little spongy.
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Anyone who likes mysteries knows that among the different sub-genre of mysteries (police procedurals, medical examiner mysteries, hard-boiled P.I.’s, etc.) are special group of crime novels from the point of view of homicidal maniacs, killers, and people who know they are bad but just can’t seem to stop themselves. The most famous would probably be Jim Thompson’s THE KILLER INSIDE ME, and there’s Lawrence Block’s HIT MAN series, and I’m currently listening on my iPod to DARKLY DREAMING DEXTER, which is about a serial killer who only kills other serial killers, and which is way better a read/listen then it has any right to be.

I had watched one episode of the Showtime series DEXTER, based on this book, and found it interesting but kind of implausible (as well as icky) that there were so many serial killers out there. Somehow I ended up giving the book a try, and I must say it is very compelling and interesting, mostly because the book (and honor binds me to say I first read this comment in The Times), while not shying away from the gross murder angle, is really best as a comedy of manners, wherebye a character who admits he has no human qualities (because he is, you know, a psychotic sociopath) observes the world around him (downtown Miami, which sounds awesome, especially the Cuban sandwiches) and comments on it from his own skewed perspective. He tries to understand the social, political, and romantic interactions of the people around him who he would just as well murder in cold blood as share a donut with, and that’s what makes it entertaining.

It’s got some not-so-good writing (“She stared at me–hard”), and some of that glossy-serial-killer-cadaver-porn that I do not care for (but we’re not supposed to care because he’s, you know, the good serial murderer), but the police procedural stuff is also very interesting and realistic. So I’d recommend it.

There’s another book in the series that just came out, and I must say that I’d probably be inclined to read it, unlike, say, the HIT MAN books, where I stopped after the second book as I started wondering “Why am I reading about the adventures of a remorseless murderer? What about these people getting murdered?” Why? Because he’s funny. And perceptive. And you learn a lot about Miami and police work. And because DEXTER is, you know, the positive role model sociopathic murderer…

I love that radio show THIS AMERICAN LIFE, but it’s not on when I’m in the car, and I don’t want to sit at home and listen to the Real Audio version for free on their website, so after they wrote a cease and desist letter to the guy who was bootlegging the shows on-line, I finally bit the bullett and subscribed to AUDIBLE.COM, where for $21/month I get every episode of TAL every week, as well as two free book downloads per month. Now I rarely have time for the book download thing because I realy only listen in the car, and half the time I’m listening to TAL and the other half I’m comparing the subtle sonic differentiation between Graham Parker and The Rumour and Vitalic’s “My Friend Dario” (which has an excellent video on MTV featuring women in spangly bikinis go-go dancing with football helmets on).

So anyway, a few weeks ago I noticed thee “two free book downloads” icon and figured what the hey, I’ll get a book. And not just any book! I wanted one of those long, unadbridged, tediously literary books. So what did I pick? Zadie Smith’s ON BEAUTY. Why? Because it was nominated for a Booker Prize, because it’s inspired by a classic book (Howard’s End, by E.M. Forster), and because it was 18 hours long. That, I said to myself, will be a book!
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“I smashed him hard with the butt of my gun as he gurgled his words through broken teeth. Blood spewed from his mouth. I hit him again. He stopped gurgling.”
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Last week my daughter wrote a book while hanging out with her Mom, who was giving exams the last week of school. I happen to think this book is frickin’ awesome!. Hopefully you’ll enoy it as well. Click here to download the book as a PDF. (If you can’t read PDF files, go get Adobe Acrobat.) Enjoy! And remember…you knew her when!