How to Read a Book

I have a backlog of books to read. I’ve had them ever since Murder by the Book closed. I took with me books I had always wanted to read but never got around to. Now they are tumbling and rampaging around my house. I’ve read a few of them over the last six years, but my New Year’s resolution was to make a bigger dent in the piles.

Just begin, just read.

I decided to choose several books — new, old, forgotten, classics — and rotate them, a chapter of this here, a chapter of that there. I currently have seven on rotation. What are they?

“A Brief History of Time” by Stephen Hawking. This book serves as the illustration in the dictionary of “a book a lot of people own but few finish.” I’m determined to finish it. It is the ultimate mystery book. Curved space, waves that are particles and particles that are waves. Quirky. Or do I mean "quarky"?

“Americanah” by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. I had always wanted to read this book, even before I read her stunning essay in “The New Yorker.” After I read the essay, I moved the book closer to the top of the pile, but over the last year it remained there, just below the top of the pile. New Year’s resolution: Read it!

“Sirens” by Joseph Knox. Recently read about this in some review. I needed to read a new book (c2017) by a new author. The main character is a Mancunian detective. Yes, I finally get to use the word “Mancunian” in a sentence!

“Dark Money” by Jane Mayer.

A mark, a yen, a buck, or a pound,

A buck or a pound,

A buck or a pound

Is all that makes the world go around.

That clinking clanking sound

Can make the world go around.*

*“Cabaret”

This is a horror story (so far) about the dark uses of money by the dark, secretive billionaires who want to make more money. I’m left asking, how much money does one person need?

“What You Don’t Know About Charlie Outlaw” by Leah Stewart. Funny, touching, out-of-the-box book about a television star being too honest in an interview. As his reward, his girlfriend dumps him and his series people probably hate him. Charlie has taken off for a hike in a jungle, where he is kidnapped by unorganized individuals. Actually, they are organized under only one principle: kidnap an American.

“The Death and Life of the Great Lakes” by Dan Egan. This is the latest pick by the PBS Newshour/New York Times Facebook book group. Ecological disaster. Solution. Another ecological disaster. Another solution. That’s where I am right now.

+++++

I’ve been doing this rotational reading for a few weeks now, and it is invigorating … as long as I can keep the books straight. That’s one reason for keeping them fairly diverse. A couple have already rotated out, i.e., I finished reading them. A couple rotated out because I wasn’t engaged by page fifty and saw no reason to continue. Book drop.

My review of the seventh book on my list, the latest to drop out of rotation — because I finished it — follows in my next post.