Books On Fire

Following my own advice, this month’s reading pool is a combination of genre fiction, best-sellers, and classics. It maybe a little light on classics but August needed to be balanced. I can’t really recommend a couple of these books because I have not verified their quality but rather I was intrigued by their title or a short description I might have read in a catalogue. I believe I’m actually more often disappointed by what are generally considered “good” books than I am by these unknown and often eye-opening texts. Give them a try (but balance them with solid classics).

Will I be forced to add any of these titles to my Worst reading list? Last month’s Death of Virgil was a strong candidate but other readers certainly will not agree. Maybe it should have made my Most Painful list instead?

Here is the reading pool I have selected for September. This is a month filled with personal commitments, birthdays, doctor appointments, so we’ll have to see how many books I actually read (especially with The Tunnel from August being only half read to start with).

1. Odditorium — Hob Broun
2. The Los Angeles Diaries: A Memoir — James Brown
3. The Concrete Blonde — Michael Connelly
4. Tidings of the Trees — Wolfgang Hilbig
5. The Dead Girls — Jorge Ibargüengoitia
6. Train Dreams — Denis Johnson
7. The World of Henry Orient — Nora Johnson
8. Lady In the Lake — Laura Lippman
9. Hark — Sam Lipsyte
10. Cop Hater — Ed McBain
11. The Confidence Man — Herman Melville
12. Gasoline — Quim Monzó
13. The Lonesome Bodybuilder — Yukiko Motoya
14. Cockroaches — Scholastique Mukasonga
15. Cockroaches — Jo Nesbo
16. Wonderland — Joyce Carol Oates
17. The Occasional Virgin: A Novel — Hanan al-Shaykh
18. The Amboy Dukes — Irving Shulman
19. The Naked Eye — Yoko Tawada
20. The Nickel Boys — Colson Whitehead