"You should read this author. You'll like him"

About a year and a half ago, my friend R. brought over a book as an apartment-warming gift: Tim Winton's The Turning. He had told me about this book a few years back and how much he loved it. Naturally, he figured I'd adore it too. I had heard a lot about Winton but had never read him, and appreciated R.'s gesture in buying me one of his favourite books. I had a couple of other books on the go at the time, so I didn't end up picking it up for about a month.

Now I had half-a-feeling that the Winton book would be tough for me. For one, according to the back-cover blurb, the stories were "set in small-town Western Australia." That was an immediate red flag: while I do try my best to read things outside of my comfort zone, I'll admit that I've always struggled with stories based solely in rural settings. It's a bias, for sure, but a bias nonetheless that is difficult for me to overcome. (I guess that's the inherent nature of a bias...) Moreover, it's a book of short stories, albeit "overlapping," which is also not my default reading pleasure. I much prefer the full-length novel - something I can truly sink my teeth into. Still, this was a gift, and my friend R. is a learned and curious reader, so I was willing to unshackle my natural inclinations to ignore this type of work and give it a shot. More important, interesting and well-wrought characters and stories should be interesting and well-wrought regardless of the setting, yes?

Well, I only made it to page 19 (the book mark is still there), so not even two complete stories. I figured my mood at the time wasn't right for this book, so I put it down, determined to give it another go later in the year. However a whole slew of other books got in the way, so the Winton was left to gather dust on my "to read" shelf. R. asked me a couple of months after giving me the book whether I had read it and enjoyed it, and felt the need to come clean and said that I tried it but just "couldn't get a handle on it." I then admitted my struggles with books set outside urban areas (I think I might have used the phrase "in the bush"), but that I would eventually read it.

Anyway I was out at R.'s last night - we brought over a wonderful late harvest Riesling along with some cheese, pears and apples - and we got to talking about the Philip Roth book, Sabbath's Theater, I had just finished about 30 minutes before arriving at his place. I was waxing (probably not very eloquently though) on how wonderful the book was - Tier A Roth, which in my eyes is Tier A literature. To my surprise, R. admitted that he didn't much like Roth! "So now we're even!" I said, recounting my struggles with the Winton. When we thought about it some more, it made some sense that we didn't like each other's favourite authors: despite our friendship and apparent similarities, we don't have shared sensibilities when it comes to literature.

But we did end up striking a deal: that I would give a more earnest attempt at the Winton if he would give Roth a fighting chance. I'm picking one of the easy Roth books for him: The Ghost Writer. It's the one I tend to recommend for those who have never read Roth since it's fairly short, tightly written, and doesn't meander off into crazy flights of prose and narrative as other Roth novels are wont to do. (Of course that's one of the things I love about his work, but recognize it's not something others tend to enjoy.) It's a pure pleasure from beginning to end, at least for me. (My friend H. told me he reads this book every second year, and he's not the biggest Roth fan.)

So it's onwards to Tim Winton's The Turning! Once I start and finish Martha Baillie's The Incident Report first, of course. It's due next week at the library.

Books, books, books!

As some of you know, I'm into purging. It's (sort-of) part of my job, but I've tried to bring that same sense of culling to my own life. When I moved a year ago, I undertook a major downscaling of my possessions. Despite my best efforts, however, I still wasn't happy with the number of boxes I was carting to my new apartment - to the extent that I vow I will downsize even more the next time I change abodes. (In an ideal world, I'd be able to cart all my possessions in about six or seven boxes. That's of course fairly unrealistic, but a worthy goal nonetheless.)

One of the biggest areas of purging was my book collection. I'm a reader - I have an unabashed and passionate relationship with the written word. But I realized a couple of years ago that that doesn't necessarily translate into being a collector. Because of my work, book collectors are a species I'm all-too familiar with. And while I admire many of them, the simple truth is that I ain't one of them. I don't have the financial resources, the inclination or quite simply the space to be a serious collector. A few years ago, I was looking at my bookshelf and thought to myself, "Why the hell do I still have that copy of John Irving's A Prayer for Owen Meany when I have no intention of ever reading it again?" I seem to remember enjoying it, for sure, but not enough to re-read it. Yet my bookshelves were rife with similar books. They were relics of my reading history, trophies. But they didn't serve much purpose except to take up space.

Since then, I've been ruthless about getting rid of books. I still read, of course, probably more than I ever have. But I use the library for most of my books. And when I do buy books (usually secondhand), I tend to pass them on to friends when I finish. This is not to say I don't keep any books. There are some authors that are special to me (Roth, Murakami, Kundera, Lawrence) and that I suspect I will re-read at some point. And I've kept pretty much all the books that have been given to me over the years as gifts. Most important, I still maintain a shelf of books I've bought that I'm eventually going to read, the so-called reading queue.

For many years now, I've indulged in an orgy of book buying delight at the various University of Toronto fall book sales, most prominently the one at University College and Trinity. I've gotten much smarter, however, which each passing year (and some years I haven't gone at all) - namely, not buying books that I feel I should read (Moll Flanders tends to be the example I like to use) but books that I'm almost certain I will (eventually) read. It's resulted in a lot less books being bought by yours truly (with the added benefit of having less strain on my shoulder from lugging my purchases home).

I'm going to be away for both the UC and Trinity sales this year, so I made a special effort to make the book sale at Victoria College. In fact, I went twice: on Saturday, and yesterday (Monday) when books were going for half price. I did well this year, and bought a lot more books than I had intended. So in no apparent order - well I guess the order I stacked them next to me to note them - these books are being added to my reading queue shelf:

The Sportswriter by Richard Ford. He's an author I've never read but who's been on my radar for years, largely because writers I like respect his work.

The Middle Stories by Sheila Heti. It's a series of small and seemingly quirky stories; she herself, from what I understand - I don't know her personally, but we're probably not too far removed sixth-degree of separation wise - she's personally quirky. I don't think I need to read this from cover to cover, so I'll probably put it on my bedside table and pick up from time to time.

Zinger & Me by Jack MacLeod. A colleague of mine loves this book, and it's about the academic world and journalism, so figured I'd give it a shot; and it only cost me $1.

The Golden Notebook by Doris Lessing. The favourite author of another colleague of mine. She lent me books of another series Lessing wrote (the name escapes me) but I just couldn't get into it. So I figured I'd try the Nobel Laureate's most renowned work.

Ceremony by Robert Parker. Bought for next year's camping trip; the book is small, portable and most likely fun to read.

Paris Notebooks by Mavis Gallant. I've been doing a lot of proseltizing of Gallant lately, telling people that they should be reading her wonderful short stories. This is her great work of non-fiction. It would be ideal for taking on a trip to Paris - maybe I should plan one of those...

Picked-Up Pieces by John Updike. As much as I love Updike's Rabbit series of books and his short stories, his essay writing (particularly about sports) and book reviews are fantastic. This collection gathers his mid-1960s to early 1970s non-fiction.

Anil's Ghost by Michael Ondaatje. Can one really go wrong spending a mere $2 on Ondaatje?

Night Field by Don McKay. Perhaps Canada's greatest living poet, this was a steal at $1.50. I met McKay a couple of years ago, just as he was planning his big move from BC to St. John's, Nfld. Talk about moving cross country!

Dangling Man, The Victim, Seize the Day by Saul Bellow. This is a Vantage Press hardcover that collects Bellow's earliest novels. I've read the novella Seize the Day, but not the other two works. One of the real attractions, however, is the groovy retro book jacket. It's going to look great on my book shelf!

A Love Supreme by Kent Nussey. An impulse buy since I've never heard of the book or the author. But he lives in Toronto, and the story is set in and around Little Italy. Also, the story seems to revolve around jazz, one of my loves, so it's worth taking a flyer on. (It was only $1, so hardly much of an investment.)

Hugging the Shore by John Updike. More essays and reviews, this time covering the mid-1970s to early 1980s.

I should add one more book to the list, bought outside the confines of the Vic College Book Sale: The Skating Rink - Robert Bolano. This is going to be the first book I read on my vacation (leaving next Friday!) to Buenos Aires. I know, Bolano is a Chilean and lived in Mexico City, but it's still sort-of South American. Yes? No? I don't care.

For the love of reading

"Oh, how different my life would have been had I not grown up in the same house with my grandmother, how much narrower and blander! She was the reason I was a reader, and being a reader was what had made me most myself; it had given me the gifts of curiosity and sympathy, an awareness of the world as an odd and vibrant and contradictory place, and it had made me unafraid of its oddness and vibrancy and contradictions."
- American Wife, Curtis Sittenfeld (p. 321)

I'm beginning to re-emerge from my silence. Stay tuned!