Reading Wednesday
Sep. 14th, 2022 06:58 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sabotabby Just finished: Crystal Mind by K.A. Excell. As stated previously, I am not the audience for this, but it does a good job of being what it is, and is particularly cool in its portrayal of neurodiversity. I think a kid is going to read this and see themselves in it and deeply bond with it, and that is an excellent thing.
Currently reading: Most Famous Short Film Of All Time by Tucker Lieberman. Now, I am the target audience for this. It's also an ARC, which my friend got and then gave to me because she quoted so many passages at me that it made more sense for me to just read it. It's 800+ pages on my e-reader but each of those pages are very short, making for a very fun visual of how the book will look in print.
It's the story of a queer, trans, Jewish Millennial named Lev, who makes security cameras, his best friend Stanley, and his colleague Aparna. Lev is obsessed with the death of an author, Chad Goering, who has appeared to him as a ghost. He receives a vaguely worded threatening email at work, tells his boss for the social capital, and gets told to talk about something else. He philosophizes, at great length, about the Talmud, the assassination of JFK (and the Zapruder footage for which the book is named), and what it means to be a fictional character who's aware he's a fictional character.
Readers, this book is a trip and a half. It's weird and po-mo and poetic and chock-full of literary references, but don't worry, they're all cited. It's a weird, smart, ambitious book, but never to the point of inaccessibility or lack of relatability. I would be binging this thing if I didn't have to go to work.
Currently reading: Most Famous Short Film Of All Time by Tucker Lieberman. Now, I am the target audience for this. It's also an ARC, which my friend got and then gave to me because she quoted so many passages at me that it made more sense for me to just read it. It's 800+ pages on my e-reader but each of those pages are very short, making for a very fun visual of how the book will look in print.
It's the story of a queer, trans, Jewish Millennial named Lev, who makes security cameras, his best friend Stanley, and his colleague Aparna. Lev is obsessed with the death of an author, Chad Goering, who has appeared to him as a ghost. He receives a vaguely worded threatening email at work, tells his boss for the social capital, and gets told to talk about something else. He philosophizes, at great length, about the Talmud, the assassination of JFK (and the Zapruder footage for which the book is named), and what it means to be a fictional character who's aware he's a fictional character.
Readers, this book is a trip and a half. It's weird and po-mo and poetic and chock-full of literary references, but don't worry, they're all cited. It's a weird, smart, ambitious book, but never to the point of inaccessibility or lack of relatability. I would be binging this thing if I didn't have to go to work.
no subject
Date: 2022-09-14 02:32 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2022-09-14 08:22 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2022-09-14 03:36 pm (UTC)Hah! Good for people like me who aren't well-read in the classics. :P
no subject
Date: 2022-09-14 08:22 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2022-09-14 04:57 pm (UTC)btw, the teaching things you post make me laugh and cry and remember my own HS teaching imprisonment. In my case it was a Jewish Day School/Prep School. But I suspect the same things are true no matter where you find yourself. Helicopter parents indeed. Made me miss adjuncting at Berkeley, and I HATED being slave labour.
no subject
Date: 2022-09-14 08:24 pm (UTC)I am expensive, it is true. But hey, libraries! Maybe not for this one.