alice ended. beware the filth that follows

I ended up being pretty captivated by "The End of Alice." What can I say? I enjoy spending a little time in the mind of a psychopath. Let me just go ahead and get the plot-spoiling over right now. He's not in jail for molesting little girls -- he's in jail for killing his young lover. The book is written in such a way that it would be easy to translate to a movie. Jumping from present-day to flashback and back again, the narrator takes us through several intertwined stories. In jail, he's the passive and relatively well-behaved prisoner who spends a lot of time corresponding with "fans," one of whom becomes "our girl." Our girl is the 19-year-old who doesn't fight her urges to seduce a 12-year-old boy. The narrator tells her story to us rather than transcribing her letters. He believes he can convey her thoughts and feelings better than she can. He also flashes us back to the story of Alice, whom he is reminded of by "our girl." They're similar because they're sexually twisted -- how can the pedophile resist? And he takes us back to his childhood, where we learn that he was sexually abused by his own mother. The scene in which she molests him is one of many jaw-dropping moments in this novel.

Having been in prison 23 years, our narrator doesn't understand a lot of the references made by the girl. Like Sylvester Stallone in "Demolition Man," he's lost in the gap of time passing without him. But he understands the language of lust and pain, and he revels in the dream world she allows him to enter. He brings the reader back to his world by beginning chapters or new scenes with visions of prison -- the guards calling roll, the library or drug cart slipping him something new, his roommate having his way with him. I one of the book's most surprising and shocking scenes, our prisoner gets fed up with being "the woman" and reverses the situation, violently raping the man on the Fourth of July and singing "The Star-Spangled Banner" during the act.

We learn eventually that the girl is writing to the prisoner because she knew Alice. "I live differently because of you," she tells him. She lived in Alice's neighborhood. He met Alice when she stumbled upon him, the renter of her family's property. She was only 12, and somehow already a mess -- previously molested, he suspects. She teases him, and he falls in love with her. They become lovers, and -- long story short -- she ends up in a rage at him when she believes he has made her bleed. In truth, she has only gotten her first period, but her fit conjures within him old feelings and haunts from his experience with his mother. He had happened to see her menstrual blood after she molested him, and believed he had hurt her -- a fact that was only compounded when she died a short time later. So in an anger pent up from a life of confusion and hate, he stabs the girl to death.

Another book made my jaw drop a few times yesterday. I was flipping through a copy of "Wetlands," which has been reviewed as a plot-less tale that turns women's sexuality and hygiene into a freak show. Is it a statement or just an excuse to be nasty? I'm not one to judge there, but at least "The End of Alice" tells a compelling story. It's sad and detestable, but it's part of understanding the world. And it's well written. A few more Homes books under my belt and I might be on my way to having a favorite author (see "This Book Will Save Your Life"). I enjoyed the suspense that was built toward the end, as the narrator kept being interrupted while telling the story of meeting Alice and how she tied him to a tree. I like how the end was built up poetically, as well, with rhythmic and alliterative prose that I didn't want to stop reading. I like that this book was so different from the one I read from her recently. I like that the author is a female writing from a male's perspective. I like that the image on the cover of the book -- a butterfly trapped in a jar -- was symbolic throughout the book and made physical near the end. I like that this book was so able to transport me out of the real world that when I returned, I could only float, mesmerized, in a fog after reading.

Yesterday I started reading Nick Cave's "And the Ass Saw the Angel," and so far so good. The prologue takes us to a man in quicksand and to the sky as a crow flies over a valley. Then a set of twins is born to a dirty and drunken mother. One twin dies and the other comprehends with supernatural ability. Sounds boring but it's not.

the end of innocence

Faced with a lack of boredom and a little vanity, I'm beginning to incorporate my Twitter feed with my two blogs, the one you're in right now and Pickle Hater. My Twitter feed can be found here. Don't expect anything too out-of-this-world -- I'd hate to disappoint. This is just a way for me to keep things fresh in my mind and find more uses for Twitter. A lot of what I post there has to do with books and food anyway.

I just started reading "The End of Alice," which I received as a birthday present last month. It's the second A.M. Homes book I've read, as the one right there with the doughnuts is hers, too. We'll get to that shortly. So far "The End of Alice" is a little disturbing. I really hope the little girl sitting next to me on the subway wasn't peeking over my shoulder as I read about a woman interested in seducing a child. The book is written from the viewpoint of a man in prison. So far the situation is vague, but it appears he's a sex offender and pedophile. He has mentioned Alice a few times, but at this point I'm not sure who she is. He is reminded of her by another woman who has begun writing him letters. Apparently she can relate to him because she is a pedophile herself, and she's described to him her crimes and feelings in detail. I might re-read the first 15 pages just to make sure I'm clear on what's happening. It's a little fuzzy as I've read from the book so far only in morning grogginess. I was awake enough to make connections to "Perfume," though. Prepare for a monster post today.

Me Talk Pretty One Day
Picking up where I left off the other day, I'm going to share (I hope briefly) my thoughts on a few books I've neglected during the past month or so. First off: "Me Talk Pretty One Day" by David Sedaris. You'll remember I tried "Holidays on Ice" over the winter but was a little disappointed. "Me Talk Pretty One Day" saved Sedaris for me. It's frequently recommended as the Sedaris book to start with, and contains 28 funny essays about his first years in New York and experiences with his boyfriend, Hugh, in France. Also interspersed are poop humor and childhood memories, such as elementary school teachers trying to fix his lisp, and what it was like to live with also-famous sister Amy. I'd like to do a head-to-head Sedaris vs. Klosterman battle. The former is more revealing of himself, while the latter is more of a pop-culture maker-funner-of-er. Preferences are irrelevant though, because either way I'm glad I've brought some essayists into my life. (Did I mention I met Klosterman? That's right. He said I had a cool haircut.) Next on the essay list? Sloane Crosley with "I Was Told There'd Be Cake."

The Reader
"The Reader" was first recommended to me by an older male customer. He said it was a beautiful book, and I was sold upon inspection of the cover. I wasn't aware of the impending movie at this point, so I was elated to find this book at The Strand (for $1, of course). The first half of this book I found to be pretty enjoyable. Although it also involves pedophilia, it wasn't overly descriptive and at least provided some emotion. The book's narrator is a boy who meets a woman and begins a sexual and literary relationship with her. He hides the relationship from his friends, and he eventually believes this is why she leaves. She skips town, and he encounters her again in college, when she is on trial for crimes related to the extermination of Jews in Germany. This part of the book is told from the point of view of him watching the trial and includes little human interaction, so I found it strange and boring. Even the "excitement" of her story didn't make up for my loss of interest. And again, even the "secret twist" didn't save the book.

Hanna's shameful secret is that she cannot read, and when the narrator deduces this, he debates whether to reveal this to the judge in order to save her from a harsher punishment. Whether she spent the rest of her life in jail or was branded illiterate didn't mean much to me. The author couldn't convince me to care. The most I came away with from this book was the oddly romantic notion of an illiterate woman seducing young lovers and having them read to her, which was extended in the end when the narrator spends years making audiobooks for Hanna and sending them to her in prison. Even the narrator is complacent in the end: "Whatever I had done or not done, whatever she had done or not to me--it was the path my life had taken." I wish I was touched more by this book, but ultimately I was disappointed by its dullness.

This Book Will Save Your Life
One woman I work with at Barnes & Noble claims this book actually did save her life. I may not have been convinced to read it, though, had I not seen and bought its U.K. edition in our bargain area at work. The American version on our Fiction Favorites table depicts a large wildcat, a palm tree and the Hollywood hills. It's unfortunately ugly and unappealing. The British version presents the reader with six mouth-watering doughnuts, one from which a bite has been taken (super delicious).

I enjoy recommending this book at work, but, sadly, it turns people off to hear it's a book about a man in a midlife crisis. But this book is so much more than that. A divorced day-trader lives in a fancy house in California. His best friend is his maid. One day he finds that he's experiencing strange pains, and he can't figure out what he's been doing with his life -- literally. Thus begins his strange relationship with emergency services. He ends up saving a horse from the sinkhole by his home and rescuing a kidnapped woman from the trunk of a car, and he becomes a local hero. Less sensationally, he also helps save a crying woman he meets at the grocery store by showing her that life has so much more to offer than the painful draining of housewifery. The doughnuts come into play when he accidentally befriends the owner of a doughnut shop and a semi-reclusive screenwriter. His new group of friends color the backdrop of his reunion with his son. It's a happy book, and I can say honestly that I found myself grinning with satisfaction over the last page. It's one of the more inspiring books I've read. You should read it, too.

Perfume
I really, really enjoyed reading "Perfume." It was unlike anything I've read before in style. It did, however, remind me of "Rosemary's Baby" for a minute because it took a while to get to the hyped parts. The cover reads: "The Story of a Murderer," but I was more than two-thirds done by the time you could really call Grenouille a murderer. Born unwanted by a filthy woman on the street, baby Grenouille was rescued and cared for by church nurses. One returned him to the rectory claiming he must be a child of Satan because he had no smell. Grenouille grows up quietly, keeping to himself and building within himself a sort of library of scents. He commits his first murder early in the book, but even to him it seems a random occurrence. He was out in Paris one day and was drawn for what seemed like miles to find the source of the most beautiful odor he had ever encountered. The source ended up being an adolescent girl -- a virgin at her most pure moment of existence.

Grenouille decides to become a great perfumer, and works his way to that end. He trains under a man who teaches him techniques by which he can extract scents from earthly objects. When he's learned all he can, his master conveniently dies so that he can't profit from Grenouille's talents anymore. Grenouille decides to travel to a place where he can learn even more, but takes a seven-year hiatus in a cave. He finds the place where he can't smell the offensive odor of humans, but eventually has a breakdown when he realizes he can't smell himself. So he sets out again, and when he becomes a journeyman perfumer, he creates a variety of human-like scents to wear. In this way he learns he can manipulate humans via their nasal passages (leads straight to the brain, I suppose). He finally sets a new goal for himself when he smells a virgin again. This time it's the most beautiful one around, and he spends two years letting her ripen while he kills 24 other virgins. He wraps their bodies in oiled canvases to soak up their aroma, and he steals their hair and clothing. He wants to use these scents to create the most powerful perfume in the world.

When he finally kills the last, most potent virgin, he is caught. But not before he has a chance to concoct the potion, which he later uses to save himself from execution. Things are relatively normal for a story about a murderer with extra-sensory smell perception. It's when he unleashes the virgin-laced perfume that the book takes an "exciting" turn. Grenouille's dream is to create a scent that would drive people mad with bliss: "they would love him as they stood under the spell of his scent, not just accept him as one of them, but love him to the point of insanity, of self-abandonment, they would quiver with delight, scream, weep for bliss, they would sink to their knees just as if under God's cold incense, merely to be able to smell him, Grenouille! He would be the omnipotent god of scent, just as he had been in his fantasies ..."

It makes sense that an unloved vermin would dream of commanding the emotions of the masses in order to be idolized, or just noticed. But the climaxical orgy that ensues when Grenouille presents himself before the executioner smelling of virgin rapture proves unfulfilling. He is freed by the court after the entire town is stripped of modesty long enough to bring together in public fornication the most unlikely couples. Grenouille is collected by the greatest virgin's father, who offers to adopt him as a son. But Grenouille has seen that his life's work has been completed, and there is nothing he could pursue to make him happy. So he escapes and returns himself to the place of his birth, where he surrounds himself in the night by the most vile citizens -- beggars and criminals who gather by firelight in the rankest-smelling part of the city. He takes his last vial of perfume and douses himself, knowing full well what the result will be. The urchins are overcome with lust, which becomes a sickening greed, which quickly turns ravenous and cannibalistic. They consume him out of love.

Talk about a book that would be fantastic to fully research. The meaning of love, the meaning of evil, the symbolism of virgins, the complexities of sex and desire, the purpose of life and pursuit of happiness. Not to mention the talent of the translator. This book was translated from German, as was "The Reader." I wonder what a difference the translator makes -- because I feel I was conscious of it during "The Reader," as though I could see how the book might be more beautiful in its intended language. With "Perfume," I would believe it had been written in English initially. One of my favorite passages included this description of the virgin's blossoming: "What a year before had been sprinkled and dappled about was now blended into a faint, smooth stream of scent that shimmered with a thousand colors and yet bound each color to it and did not break."

It is also this idea of a young person blossoming that allowed me to connect "The End of Alice" with "Perfume." The woman who is sharing her perversion with the narrator watched a certain boy over a period of time in order to strike at just the right moment, just as Grenouille allowed his virgin to peak. From "The End of Alice": "She longs to sample him, but has waited, given him first a year and then a second summer of slow roasting, and now has returned, hoping to find him close to perfection, done. She drools." I'm not sure I believe adolescents possess such a magic moment in time during which they are the perfect blend of adult and child. Most children believe they are much more mature than they are, while many adults admit to still feeling like children. If such a magical moment does exist, I feel sure it is for a much more romantic and noble purpose than sex. By Grenouille's standard, the virgin at her pinnacle would be utterly ruined and useless were she no longer a virgin. But these days that's more of a technical term -- certainly nothing that would so tarnish a person who otherwise would be at her most love-worthy. Perhaps that is the hope -- that a person at that moment is exactly half innocent and half ready to be released of innocence, and therefore more receptive to love than either half on its own. But it's like Janeane Garofalo's character says in "The Truth About Cats and Dogs," "Love your pets, just don't love your pets."

from my own room

I'm going to examine as well as memory and concentration will let me the books I've consumed in the last couple of months. Tonight we start with Virginia Woolf's "A Room of One's Own."

So much for thinking it would be easy to get through this skinny classic. I bought it, as usual, at The Strand for $1, and got a little bonus inside: a postcard bearing the author's image. It made a great bookmark, and still holds the place where (dare I admit?) I cut the reading short with only two pages to go. Did it wear me out? Did it prove I'm not enough of a feminist? Pish-tosh. I loved this book. It made me wish I had nothing in the world to do any day but write. I marked a little black arrow on nearly every page, so I won't quote all my favorite parts. I read "To the Lighthouse" in high school, but I forgot how great a writer Woolf is. Obvious, of course, but much of what I marked was simply out of reverence for the phrasing. Her talent makes me want to write. To practice. Her words make me want to write. To have the time:

"... going at ten to an office and coming home comfortably at half-past four to write a little poetry."

If only women had more money, they might be able to live that dream, Woolf says.

She's also not without a sense of humor:

"You cannot, it seems, let children run about the streets. People who have seen them running wild in Russia say that the sight is not a pleasant one."

Or imaginative cynicism:

"I thought at last that it was time to roll up the crumpled skin of the day, with its arguments and its impressions and its anger and its laughter, and cast it into the hedge. A thousand stars were flashing across the blue wastes of the sky. One seemed alone with an inscrutable society. All human beings were laid asleep--prone, horizontal, dumb."

She chases her question, "Why are women poor?" But it eludes her in research: "... the question far from being shepherded to its pen flies like a frightened flock hither and thither, helter-skelter, pursued by a whole pack of hounds." And she doesn't quite solve the problem, either. I noted in the margin that Woolf frequently builds suspense for a point, then interrupts herself before reaching a significant revelation in her search for the "essential oil of truth."

She does, though, decide that "it is fatal for any one who writes to think of their sex. It is fatal to be a man or woman pure and simple; one must be woman-manly or man-womanly."

Woolf's thoughts cover what men think of women, how men write about women, whether women write about men, and how society will view women in 100 years (2029). I'd like to revisit this work periodically for inspiration as a writer. And I'd venture to say Ms. Woolf would be on the list of people, "dead or alive," that I'd invite to a dinner party.

"What one means by integrity, in the case of the novelist, is the conviction that he gives one that this is the truth. Yes, one feels, I should never have thought that this could be so; I have never known people behaving like that. But you have convinced me that so it is, so it happens."

But ...

"Praise and blame alike mean nothing. ... So long as you write what you wish to write, that is all that matters; and whether it matters for ages or only for hours, nobody can say."

Amen.

brief book update

I've had three books open this month, and none of them fits the usual M.O. First, there was Virginia Woolf's "A Room of One's Own," which took a while to get through because it requires more thought than can be conjured on the subway. But I read at night, during Thanksgiving vacation, and during lunch breaks at work. I made a lot of notes, which I'll share with you soon, but I'm afraid I don't have enough free moments today to do so.

The second book I can't yet reveal because it's actually a gift for someone, but I wanted to give it a gander before i put it in the mail. This book I've been seriously skimming. I definitely think the recipient will appreciate it more than I can without a thorough study. I'm enjoying the book, and it moves pretty fast, but it's a bit like reading Shakespeare because of the language. Plus it's not set up like a "normal" novel ... it's got an inventive style/format. I'm not done with it yet, but I hope to be in the next day or two so I can send it off.

The third book I'm almost done with is David Sedaris's "Holidays on Ice." A customer recommended it very highly to me the other day, so I pounced on it at The Strand, where I also picked up two other Sedaris books and a bunch of other lovelies like "Lolita" and "The Alienist." I have made it quite quickly through the small volume of six essays, but so far the first one has been the only really enjoyable one. Sedaris recounts his days as a Macy's elf, and I can relate, having worked retail. I only have one left, and so far the rest have been (and I hate to say it) kind of boring. It's my first Sedaris, and I'm confident the non-Christmas variety are much more engaging. But for $1, I guess I can't complain. Plus when I finish it this afternoon, I can say I only "wasted" three sittings on it.

a million books to read

People really tried to ruin this book for me. "But it's not true!" they cried when I told them I'd been tearing up. "I couldn't stand the way it was written!" they cringed. I admit it takes some getting used to. Random capitalization, no quotation marks, no paragraph indentations, missing commas, run-ons galore. Voice, people, voice. I know this book is a fabrication. I remember the hoopla. I grazed the Smoking Gun article and decided it didn't matter. I read the book as if it were simply a good story, which it is. I don't care if every detail is true, or even if major plot points actually happened. This book was amazing to read. Once I got past reading every capitalized word with extra emphasis, I tore through it quite quickly, and it's officially on the list of books I love.

"I look up. There are tears running down Lilly's cheek and she is smiling at me. It is a deep smile, not the type of momentary happiness, but the rare kind that comes when something inside without words is woken from slumber and brought forth to live."

More often than not, Frey is saying something profound. You're there, you feel what he feels, you become him. You're dirty and vomiting, you're gorging yourself on cafeteria food, you're dreaming of drugs, you're angry with the system, you don't look yourself in the eye, you're constantly testing yourself. Then you fall in love and you remember that there are reasons to live. You might have done some awful things in your past, but they have made you. They don't have to control you. You can learn to trust yourself.

The near tears came again on the subway. Just as I was on a train pulling into Union Square, I read: "Hey, Kid. You forgot something." I see Lincoln's name in the next paragraph and I have to close the book and my eyes and let it sink in. They've come to help James rescue Lilly. It's fucking beautiful.

Frey wins the award for most cursing in a piece of literature, but it's understandable. When you're trying to hang on and all you've got is cigarettes and coffee, potty mouth is to be expected. There was also a lot of crude description of blood and guts, but I feel like I can handle anything after making it through "The Gargoyle." (Incidentally, I recently hand-sold that to a blind Rastafarian. Go figure.)

I got this book at The Strand for $1, just like "The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time." I've been back twice recently, and here is what I've bought:

Virginia Woolf - "A Room of One's Own"
Siri Hustvedt - "What I Loved"
George Orwell - "Nineteen Eighty-Four"
Rick Bragg - "All Over But the Shoutin'" (I am from Alabama, I should read this.)
Manil Suri - "The Death of Vishnu"
Homer - "The Odyssey" (I already own it but this copy is much more portable.)
Douglas Adams - "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy"
Lewis Carroll - "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" (Again, already own a non-portable version.)
L. Frank Baum - "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz"
David Sedaris - "Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim"
Paul Auster - "The New York Trilogy"

I will basically buy any classic I haven't read and any newer stuff that I've seen on our tables at B&N. I did skip over a couple that we have on display that just didn't sound very appealing: "Spartina" and "Being Written." Maybe one day I'll run across "My Friend Leonard," Frey's sequel to "A Million Little Pieces." I've pretty much decided any book I want will end up at The Strand or a Goodwill eventually, so it's hard for me to justify buying anything new. I might indulge, though, during employee appreciation week at work. I've got a running list of things I have noticed at the store:

"The Diving Bell and the Butterfly"
"Play it as it Lays"
"Unbearable Lightness of Being"
"Um"
"I Hate New Music"
"No One Belongs Here More Than You"
"In the Land of No Right Angles"
"Daphne"
"The Gum Thief"

I'd also like to get "When Wanderers Cease to Roam," which is a really cute gifty biography, and the little New York Christmas book. Apparently I love to make lists, so I should probably also get the book of lists as Christmas Gift to Myself.

I've decided I should alternate reading classics and contemporary works, so I'm going to tackle the Virginia Woolf next, followed probably by "Redeeming Love," given to me by my sister, and then "Catch 22," and then "Then We Came to the End." It's the plan for now anyway, and upcoming books will probably also include "Madame Bovary," "The Heart is a Lonely Hunter," Paul Auster and David Sedaris.

P.S. I promise to take more notes and stop glazing over the details.

the curious incident of the blog in the night-time

I've managed to get ahead of myself again! But it happens to be fortunate in that as of only last night do I fully realize the significance of the title of this book. I happened to be watching Sherlock Holmes solve a case on the telly, and out rolled the words from his lips: "The curious incident of the dog in the night-time." And it all made sense. The narrator of this book is an autistic 15-year-old named Christopher who loves Sherlock Holmes and finds himself mystified by the case of a dead poodle.

I won't be able to be too specific in discussing this book because I've read another entire book between the time I finished it and now, and I can't wait to spill that one, too, even though I still haven't been keeping up with quotes recently. It's just too much of a hassle on the subway ...
ANYWAY, (as Chuck used to say), this book did almost make me cry. I didn't know it was a sad book until I was riding the subway one day and reached the part where Christopher finds out his mother isn't dead -- she's in London with her lover.

Anyone attempting to read this book over my shoulder on the train probably thought it was horribly written, but that's because Mark Haddon captures his character's voice so well. You feel like it's written by a 10-year-old genius. Nothing Christopher says is a lie, and none of it is without a significant amount of logical reasoning. Sometimes that reasoning extends to Christopher's favorite pastime, "maths." The book is chock-full of equations and diagrams, and Christopher uses them to explain the world around him. It comforts him to have these constants in his life, because he has a difficult time dealing with emotion, and when things get to complicated, he can close his eyes and recite the prime numbers. It also makes him feel better to think about how people's brains are like computers:
"Also people think they're not computers because they have feelings and computers don't have feelings. But feelings are just having a picture on the screen in your head of what is going to happen tomorrow or next year, or what might have happened instead of what did happen, and if it is a happy picture they smile and if it is a sad picture they cry."

It's nothing short of heart-wrenching to watch this character find out that his mother is alive, and then to watch him become frightened of his own father, the dog killer, and then to watch him become the Brave Little Toaster and hop on a train.

let's see how fast this thing can go

I decided to stay up tonight and finish "Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs." I couldn't get enough Chuck. I want more. It's like having a conversation, but less annoying. Now I'm going to have to start reading Nick Hornby and Sarah Vowell. I might be a nonfiction believer. I've read nonfiction before, but mostly in a religious or referential context. This wasn't like reading at all. This was like staying up all night and becoming best friends with someone over a beer and a bowl of cereal (not at the same time). It's when shooting the shit turns spiritual, and I caught a glimpse of the brainpower I used to have in high school, that which powered four-hour telephone conversations about nothing. Zack Morris, "Left Behind," Lucky Charms, Adam Sandler. Discuss.

By far, though, my favorite chapter is "All I Know is What I Read in the Papers." Chuck perfectly explains what it is to be a reporter. I've been a reporter. I know that no reporter inserts his opinion into stories. The tone is literally set by the first interviewee to call you back. And the one that could alter everything might just call while you're off blowing your nose for 2.5 minutes. You train yourself to word things like a balance robot. Even if you saw it with your own eyes, certain things are always "alleged." A source can lie to you, and you can print it, but it doesn't make you a liar. They really said that. Chuck almost made me miss being a reporter -- almost. It had its perks, but I lack the drive of nobility required to join that team again. If I'm going to make a pittance, I've got to be doing something I love. The only exception is that I would do something I merely like just because there is no chance in hell I'm leaving New York any time soon.