Reading

Zuckerman Bound, Philip Roth
Again, I have to say I don't know what possessed me.  I renewed the book four times reading it from Winter to early Spring.  I am sure Mr. Roth won't approve.  The book has no pictures and there aren't really a plot in any of the four stories.  But I got to tell you, I enjoy the writing.  I read it mostly on my commute between home and work.

Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell
Great story teller.  Sometimes, so much so that I forgot what the stories have to do with what he's trying to convey:  in this case, success is really a collective effort.  Sometimes I feel like what he's telling is essentially your mother is a woman but then again, he does it with flair, numbers and stories and present the argument in a scientific coherent way.  A good read.  At least unlike Zuckerman Bound, I can finish it in less than two days and not to have to renew it four times.  Most of the time, reading to me is like fast food, if I can finish it in 2 days great, if not, not so great.


In Milton Lumky Territory, Philip K. Dick
A book I picked up from the library after work on a Friday.  It's a 1 week special with no renewal so it sort of forces me to finish the book in one dash.  Dick is famous for his sci fi stories, like the much acclaimed Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep first published in 1968 and later adapted to the big screen as Blade Runner in 1982.  I don't know what to make of Territory.  It definitely is not sci-fi, there is no androids or the like and it's not literary like Roth's incessant mumbles.  The protagonist is a salesman in his early twenties who in the beginning of the story marries this twice divorced single mom who also happens to be his 5th grade teacher and ten years of his senior and sets out to save the store she founded by crisscrossing the country to buy and sell some electric typewriters from Japan.  The story, in my mind, lacks any narrative arch of sort.  The only surprising thing happens towards the very end of the story.  It's like I am not so sure if what's written on the last chapter is what actually happens to the characters or just the imagination of its young protagonist, his preferred story with his wife and step-daughter.  In that sense I think the story has some sci-fi element to it though I can't be sure nor can I find out.  I think it's written in such an oblique way it's just hard to decipher.  In the author's forward, Dick says "This is actually a very funny book, and a good one, too, in that the funny things that happen to real people who come alive.  The ending is a happy one.  What more can an author say?  What more can he give?"  Well, then I guess it's just me.