Matt O’ Rama

Woohoo! A new Vikram Chandra book!

I happened on an article in Salon.com yesterday talking about Sacred Games, the new book by Vikram Chandra. You’re already excited, I know. He’s the author of one of my top 10 favorite books of all time, Red Earth and Pouring Rain. I used to go to the library and pick out a random book from the New Releases shelf to read. Red Earth’s cover, of a monkey with his arm resting on a typewriter, caught my eye and I absolutely fell in love with the book. After reading it for free I bought a copy, lost it somehow, and bought another one because I couldn’t bear not to have it available to read. That was in 1995. He released a book of short stories in ’97 which I never got around to reading for some reason, then nothing until now. I just placed my order for Sacred Games with Amazon and I’m sure the temptation to dig into it as soon as it arrives will be strong. I’ve got 2 books from the library however (Kiffe Kiffe Tomorrow and The Wizard of the Crow) so I’ll have to wait. I just hope Chandra’s next one doesn’t take so long, I’m already waiting for it.

Nice try at least

The Observer | The 100 greatest novels of all time: The list
No list like this is ever going to please even a fraction of people but this one is a little strange even considering that qualification. It’s very heavy on the English authors (which isn’t too surprising since it’s an English paper doing the list) but any list of greatest novels whose only Hemingway is a book of short stories is a little off in more than one sense (no Sun Also Rises? And since when is a collection of stories a novel?). And no Vonnegut? That puts me off right there. No Delillo? No Pynchon? Don Quixote as number one is a safe choice but a good one. But I guess my liking for The New biases me against any list like this which has to be heavy with The Old to appease people who think anything from the past century is automatically disqualified from Great status. Like I say, nice try.

How About Banning Unfeeling Idiots From Library Boards?

The Porter County (Indiana) library system board of directors, apparently realizing that they’d rather not spend their afterlife roasting in hell, has lifted their ban on lending books to homeless children living in shelters.
Sheesh. These people should all lose their jobs for even thinking of something like this. A library should be a place for people to come and have a chance to better themselves or at the least get a break from reality, something I’d imagine most people living in homeless shelters would welcome. They don’t need to be treated like criminals and denied access to books, of all things. Shame on this board, I hope they never have to be treated like they’ve treated the residents of the shelter.

Beware Falling Books!

.flickr-photo { border: solid 2px #000000;}.flickr-yourcomment {}.flickr-frame { text-align: left; padding: 3px;}.flickr-caption { font: 75%;/* color: #666666; */ margin-top: 0px;}.flickr-buddyicon { margin-right:5px; vertical-align:middle; border: solid 1px;}.flickr-postedby { font: 75%;}

problem in the library, originally uploaded by Klara Kim.

The horror! The horror!