Waywords Book Reviews

Quick Takes on My Reading
SteveAtWaywords on Storygraph Steve Chisnell on Goodreads

Ever since I retired from the public school classroom, I have voraciously been consuming titles new and those I regretted missing. And in keeping with my goals, I want to find the value of the widest range of reading. Here are many, rating them based upon their own purpose or ambition.

 

“The critic has to educate the public; the artist has to educate the critic.”

–Oscar Wilde
Quoted in Oscar Wilde, Art and Morality: A Defence of “The Picture of Dorian Gray” by Stuart Mason (ed.) (1908)

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“Paradise” by Toni Morrison
“Paradise” by Toni Morrison

The seeming conceit of the novel–Who killed a group of women living just outside of their small town and why?–is answered as Morrison would: by layering relationships and histories atop one another while relating the stories of individual perspectives.

“Following the Brush” by John Elder
“Following the Brush” by John Elder

Elder’s travelogue from the 1990s is a worthy enough introduction to some of the traditional aspects of Japanese society, though it barely reaches outside tradition nor offers much reflection for the year he spent there with his family.

Early Tolkien Criticism – 5 Books
Early Tolkien Criticism – 5 Books

Early critical reviews and writings on Tolkien range from safe takes on the new fantasy form to vapid praise, and from hyper-focused examinations of the name Bifur to broader post-structuralist analyses. Here’s a few from my shelf and their value today.

“Decline and Fall” by Evelyn Waugh
“Decline and Fall” by Evelyn Waugh

Absurd and comedic satire on British “appearances” and class with plenty of lowkey digs at other topics along the way. Unfortunately, 100 years later, we are reminded that not all “humor” ages equally well.

“Secret Windows” by Stephen King
“Secret Windows” by Stephen King

King’s 1980s essays and talks here serve mostly for completists. Some writing tips, some fiction, some analyses of horror, but King offers each of these more amply in other books.

“Heart of a Dog” by Mikhail Bulgakov
“Heart of a Dog” by Mikhail Bulgakov

While not as fully realized as some of his other works, this novella still packs some creative and absurd punches at the early Soviet Union (and the rest of us) by offering a dog the physical attributes of humans and then poses the political question of who we are.

“Night Bus” by Zuo Ma
“Night Bus” by Zuo Ma

Chinese indie comics talent Ma has not produced the slickest and most commercially-designed story for graphic novels. He’s an uncertain artist (who isn’t?) wading into public space to tell his own story, one which will feel familiar to all of us.

“Looking for the Lost” by Alan Booth
“Looking for the Lost” by Alan Booth

While Booth offers more hour-to-hour details and less reflection than I would like, his travelogue of walking rural Japan through its literary and military history is remarkable, memorable, and genuinely enlightening.

“River of Ink” by Paul M. M. Cooper
“River of Ink” by Paul M. M. Cooper

Cooper’s marvelous and well-researched adventure in translation under tyranny in ancient Sri Lanka is unique, page-turning, and often unexpected.

“Haunted Reels” by David Lawson, Jr. (ed.)
“Haunted Reels” by David Lawson, Jr. (ed.)

What begins as a fascinating experiment is mostly a subpar effort by otherwise talented people writing in a genre outside their expertise coupled with a “hands-off” editorial role of its publishers.

“Whereas” by Layli Long Soldier
“Whereas” by Layli Long Soldier

Soldier’s plea “How can I convince you?” has a futility to it after this passage of time, the ignorance of sacrifice, this othering, this falseness of language, this phenomenon of justification.

“An Odyssey” by Daniel Mendelsohm
“An Odyssey” by Daniel Mendelsohm

Mendelsohn’s memoir finds uncanny and revealing parallels between a father auditing his son’s class on Homer and the epic’s father-son relationships.

“Be Recorder” by Carmen Gimenez
“Be Recorder” by Carmen Gimenez

Gimenez plies her way through a complex cross-section of marginal identities and works to reconcile not only her internal understandings but those which work upon her. The collection’s title is a call to action for all of us.

“Jerusalem” by Alan Moore
“Jerusalem” by Alan Moore

Moore’s monster epic is worth every word and distorted bending of reality, from its angelic jokes to bizarre art shows. How much of history can it digest at once? More than I caught on a first read, for certain.

“Ban en Banlieue” by Bhanu Kapil
“Ban en Banlieue” by Bhanu Kapil

Kapil’s mesmerizing and complex work belies its sobering demands upon its readers, meeting the artist’s own internal sacrifices.

“Preacher” by Garth Ennis
“Preacher” by Garth Ennis

As with so many series, Preacher wanders and repeats its plot-level tropes too often, but its ambition, audacity, and trio of protagonists largely compensates

“The Tower” by William Butler Yeats
“The Tower” by William Butler Yeats

Perhaps self-indulgently caught up in desire, Yeats’s reflections on our lives as magic and myth, as narrative, as aging and remorse, remain sumptuous thought.

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