What i read in July...

Goodbye July! You were bittersweet, and for a while in that first week you seduced me into thinking that I didn't like reading. You'll notice i only read very short books for a while. Short books are best anyway, aren't they you hussies.

The Mahe Circle by Georges Simenon

I do love Simenon, but the last few i'd read by him were just ok. This one was shit-hot though, and reminded me how much Simenon is capable of doing in so few pages. His characters are always somewhere on the cusp of despair and desire, and he writes about heat and claustrophobia better than anyone. Weirdly though, this little novel would just make a great holiday beach read. 

Black Leather Barbarians by Pat Stadley

Troutmark Books here in Cardiff is a mecca of second-hand books, and my good buddy bought me this little biker gang gem recently, so yeah.

 

Happy Endings Are All Alike by Sandra Scoppettone

I finally got around to reading this! And it was great. A YA novel from 1978 about a teenage lesbian relationship in small town America and how their friends and family react when it goes public. Harrowing in places but still totally relevant with a strong feminist and LGBT standpoint.

 

The Furnished Room by Laura Del-Rivo

If you love early-60's Soho then this is a great example of what that time and place felt like, that pre-Beatles existentialist bedsit grim Britain. And while it wasn't 100% successful (i was a bit disappointed that she chose to write yet another male anti-hero in this oeuvre) it did make me fascinated enough in Laura Del-Rivo to order another of her books, Daffodil On The Pavement (which looks great and DOES have a female protagonist..)

  

Jernigan by David Gates

This reissue (originally published in the early 90's) is out any day now, and people will be gushing about it. It pretty much deserves the hype because it is one of those great American novels which pokes at the American Dream and pops it. Jernigan is kinda a dick, and yeah this is another alcoholic dude novel, but his journey over the edge is quite enjoyably bleak and very 90's.

  

Mr. Weston's Good Wine by T.F. Powys

Enjoyed this! Think bawdy Christian fable meets Ray Bradbury, with a touch of Wicker Man pagany sexual shenanigans. The mysterious Mr. Weston rolls into town with his wine wagon and for one night in November time stands still. Whimsical, funny and quite saucy...a weird tale of old English village life with a totally unique, slightly disturbing, feel to it.

What i read in June..

June was an excellent reading month! Sian and i both had birthdays and bought each other a bunch of books, and we also had some time off work, so not even The Man could interfere with our book-guzzling. Oh, and the sun came out and that was nice too, and everything's peachy. Here's what i read.

It Always Rains On Sunday by Arthur La Bern (1945)

This was a decent early kitchen-sink type of affair. I'm a fool for a novel that all takes place in one day, so if you're into that and like a bit cockney-speak, you might want to snap up this lovely new reissue on the London Books Classics range.

The Ice Queen by Alice Hoffman (2005)

Hoffman doing what Hoffman does best, small-town americana, a bit of myth and magic, and a whole heap of grim realness. Lightning-strike victims, sex in the bath.

The Wallcreeper by Nell Zink (2014)

She's kinda a big deal right now, and her writing will definitely divide people, but i found this totally compulsive, fucking nuts, intensely smart and hurty. It reminded me a little of Miranda July in that way that she dissects something to the point of seeming both ridiculous and profound in a new way.

The End Of Vandalism by Tom Drury (1994)

I really loved this. More small-town shenanigans. This is one of those novels that takes its time, rambles all over the place, doesn't seem to be doing much and then somewhere in there you start to realise just how much you are enjoying yourself. Full of warmth, dry humour, sadness and sweetness, if you like a bit of Richard Russo or Gilmore Girls you should check it out.

The Fever by Megan Abbott (2014)

Let's just stop for a second and appreciate how utterly fantastic Megan Abbott is. An author i feel genuinely lucky to be living at the same time as, and who can seemingly do no wrong. Her latest is very much in the same territory (teenage girls) as Dare Me, except it's about a strange inexplicable epidemic, girls having seizures, highschool, sex, a weird flourescent lake...pulp meets YA.

In The Enemy Camp: Selected Poems 1964-74 by William Wantling (2015)

I've been waiting for some Wantling to be reissued for YEARS people. Admired by Bukowski, an ex-con, heroin addict who fought in the Korean war, Wantling was of the new wave of post-beat 70's poets - raw, taboo-busting, but also sensitive and courageous. Thurston Moore's disappointing intro tries to depict him as some of rock'n'roll poet, whatever that means, lame. 

Sylvia by Leonard Michaels (1992)

Set in early-60's Manhattan, this seems to be a mostly autobiographical novel about a young writer that falls in love with the Tom Cruise-level mental Sylvia. Yeah, i know all you need right, another book about a seductively damaged fantasy-girl and the POOR DUDE who gets burned. But, it good. Real good. 

1965: The Most Revolutionary Year In Music by Andrew Grant Jackson (2015)

Ahh...i love the Sixties. Can't really go wrong with a book about the Sixties.

SPURNED CLASSIC! Songs by Paul Parrish

Paul Parrish

Songs

(1971)

Paul Parrish is one of those singers who maybe did too few albums, didn't have enough mystique and maybe just got unlucky and has been scattered in the wind ever since. Until recently, cos they've finally put some of his early stuff out on cd, and it is GREAT.  His first album The Forest Of My Mind (1968) is a gorgeous slab of soft-psych folk-rock reminiscent of Sunshine Superman-era Donovan, full of flutes, harpsichords, flower-power anthems, and period charm (you might find it a little saccharine, personally i love saccharine keep it coming) - so go buy, it's really good. 

Songs came out in 1971 and is, again, a total product of its time. A mostly piano-led singer-songwriter album, everything kept simple (title included) and sparse and heartfelt, with the odd McCartneyesque bit of piano pop but mostly a bunch of introspective and lovely little ditties you can hum along to. Again, i have to stipulate that this is an album with song titles like A Poem I Wrote For Your Hair and I Once Had A Dog, all sung completely earnestly, so you might wanna use your safe word before subjecting yourself to this if you have trouble with that kinda thing. It might be a personal failing, but I can take a harsh pounding of this kind of post-60's hippie melancholy like a champ.

Nice huh. Apart from that bit where that guy chips in ('Ed Venezuela?'). I'm sure at some point at school i wrote a poem about someone's hair. It sounds like something i would do. So I just went for a walk and listened to Songs on my ultra millenium-denial discman, and (apart from all the skipping due to aforementioned shitty discman) it sounded pretty as heck in the sunshine walking around Pontcanna. I guess there's not much more to say about it than that. It's a shame so much great music gets lost over time, or falls in and out of fashion, it all seems kinda arbitrary. Here's one that deserves to be salvaged, and hopefully with its recent reissue, might well find its place in some of our hearts.  

What i read in May..

Hmm, I didn't read much in May. And now that i look back at what i read i'm like huh, weird.

Tucker by Louis L'amour

If you like westerns, you've probably read some L'amour. This is a particularly good L'amour.

Lust Queen by Don Elliott

Don Elliott is actually Robert Silverberg, the science fiction author. He wrote a bunch of trashy pulp erotica back when he was a struggling writer. Hollywood, cocktails by the pool, and wildcat sex. 

Agostino by Alberto Moravia

Uber-Fruedian 1940's Italian coming-of-age. Serious. Not bad.

Dept. of Speculation by Jenny Offill

Lots of novels dissecting marriages these days. This was really great, sad, precise and meditative and full of lines you'd want to tattoo on you. I love being married.

Death Claims by Joseph Hansen

The second Brandstetter novel, just as good as the first. Well crafted and stylish, these novels are great on setting and really capture the era (70's California),  this was also full of mourning and grief.

What I've been listening to..

Carrie & Lowell by Sufjan Stevens (2015)

I've got total faith in Sufjan. Illinoise is one of the great albums of the last few decades and despite not loving his last couple of albums the guy's a wizard, we should just let him do his hocus. Carrie & Lowell is stripped down, meticulous and full of revelation. Pretty extraordinary. I keep going back to it.  

Blood Rushing by Josephine Foster (2012)

This is from the album Blood Rushing, which i just bought. Josephine Foster is just so fascinating. She reminds me of Eva Green a little, because she scares me. She has that same oddly alluring, shamanic intensity. The album is supposedly inspired by ancient Pueblo tribes, and here she seems to be inhabiting some kind of spirit alter-ego, Blushing. Gosh, so great.

Shallow Water by Electric Citizen (2014)

Witchy, mellotron-heavy Sabbath-y ROCK. This gem is from the album Sateen, which if you're into Fifty Foot Hose, Jefferson Airplane, Julian's Treatment, or contemporary stuff like Blood Ceremony and Uncle Acid & The Deadbeats, you should pick up, stat.

Nikkie Lane

Loving Nikki Lane this month! Both her albums (Walk of Shame and All or Nothin') have been on a continuous rotation on my cd walkman, with all their sassy, trailer-trashy, phil-spector-y charm. Yee-haw. 

Already There by Verve (1993)

Remember when Verve were great!? On occasion I go back to the Storm In Heaven-era stuff in all its methadone-shoegaze glory and reminisce. It's just so wide-eyed and oceanic. At school I had 'Already There' scrawled on the inside of my Humanities notebook, and I was. (You've been walking round like you're some kind of angel/hello, high, are you? yes. well, that explains it.)

What i read in April..

Hey bambinos, did April treat you like a lady? It's been good here. We drank us up some hot lemon and ginger water, watched a bunch of Castle, listened hard to Sufjan's latest, Sian did some tarot and yoga, I got some new stripey 1966-style trousers, we did a readathon, and I ended up having a really good reading month. It started off not so great and got better, and by the end i'd pretty much got my groove back reading-wise. Reading ruts suck so bad, sometimes it feels like you're deliberately choosing letdowns just to hurt yourself, like eating Yum Yum Instant Noodles when you're craving soul food. We just watched the movie Soul Food..

(here's what Sian read...)

 

Grosse Pointe Girl by Sarah Grace McCandless

This was cute and i especially liked the scooby-doo-esque illustrations.

We All Looked Up by Tommy Wallach

I obviously bought this one because it's got a great cover and some Joanna Newsom lyrics at the beginning, and who can blame me? Me. I can. It was kinda shit. 

Mira Corpora by Jeff Jackson

I don't remember much about this. Though it did leave a sour unsatisfying taste in my mouth. See Yum Yum Noodles above.

Turtle Moon by Alice Hoffman

Seriously, you can't beat 90's Hoffman - hypnotic, vivid writing full of downbeat real life, magic and revelation.

The Ponder Heart by Eudora Welty

Delightful short comic novel of the American South, told with sass and a whole heap of enthusiasm. 

The Vet's Daughter by Barbara Comyns

A great and peculiar novel which showcases Comyns' unique mix of grim Dickensian reality (female oppression) and very British magical stuff (levitation). Reminded me of Edward Gorey and those 60's toytown pop songs about grocers and flowershop ladies. 

Fadeout by Joseph Hansen

What a find! Wonderful ultra-70's West Coast noir. The Brandstetter mysteries were apparently one of the first to highlight strong openly gay characters in what was (and still is) a heavily hetty genre. This first one was so great. 

The Red Box by Rex Stout

This was what i read for the 24-hour readathon (which sian and i interpreted to include naps and full-on sleeps). My first Nero Wolfe (i got this out of the library) and despite being maybe a little too long i really found it charming and funny. Who doesn't love a bit of cyanide poisoning? 

Jerusalem The Golden by Margaret Drabble

A very decent novel from 1967, about a girl who goes to London to escape an unloved Northern childhood. A real character-study, packed with moral complexities, depth and ambiguity, and some Bohemian types with great clothes and hair. 

What I read in March

This month was supposed to be Multicultural March, which i kind of failed at a bit, but hey ho...*whistles*


Burning The Days by James Salter

If you've read any Salter you already know he can write like a wizard. I found these recollections a bit of a struggle, though i liked the bits where he hung out with Robert Redford.


Schoolgirl by Osamu Dazai

Strangely charming novella by this doomed Japanese author. A day in the life of a teenage girl, which despite being from 1939 felt actually timeless, the woes of adolescence always feel contemporary don't they?


One Moonlit Night by Caradog Prichard

Really enjoyed this weird little hymn to the horrors and joys of life in a small Welsh village, as seen through the eyes of a child. Kind of sweet, aside from all the poverty, death, insanity, adultery and gothicky old-world religious fervour.


Minotaur by Benjamin Tammuz

Yawnfest.


The Fire Next Time by James Baldwin

I was determined to read some Baldwin, as a friend of mine is actually in love with him. Got about half way through Another Country and gave up, then I picked this up and yep, it's raw and angry and you can see how influential it would've been to the civil rights movement. The opening letter to his nephew is the best bit though.


Silent Running (BFI Film Classics) by Mark Kermode

Kermode's adorably nerdy ode to one of his (and my) favourite films is inessential but a nice way to pass an afternoon.


Faces In The Crowd by Valeria Luiselli

Luiselli is smart, obsessive, odd and there is something about her work that clings to you like a sucky-fish. This is fiction that messes about with the idea of the novel, it starts off as one thing and ends up something else. Lovely.


Nothing Personal by Jason Starr

Starr's update on noir is totally New York and kind of nasty. No Exit Press are reissuing these with some shit-hot new covers and whilst this was totally page-turnery and trashy and very dark, i'd say you wanna go read Tough Luck instead, which is damn near perfect.

And here's what Sian read.