Five Books I May Not Get to This Summer

On this hot-as-$%&*ing-he*l summer night, I thought I'd add an entry about five books from my shelf which I somehow doubt that I will get to this summer.

I am writing this entry as I am set to travel to Myrtle Beach for the 4th and I usually end up reading there more than going to the plaj! 

For starters, I always seem to read books from the public library before I read my own. Case in point, I just finished the novel "Little Children." For those of you who know me best, I did indeed see the movie first!

But, here are five books from my own shelf, which I might have to donate to the Rockingham County Jail...................unless I read them soon!

1) "Mrs. Dalloway" by Virginia Woolf. I brought a used copy of this paperback at a shop in Hilsborough, NC, which is just outside Chapel Hill. I decided to get it as a means to impress my friend Anne back in Roanoke. I haven't read the book yet. I even took it on an airplane flight to Mexico last December.....so much for impressing your friends!

2) "At Long Last to Kiss Amanda" by Frank Norris. I found an original version of this 1961 novel at an estate sale in Roanoke. When I found it, I had a huge crush on this young lady named Amanda who was a student at Hollins University, where I went to grad school (the school actually let us guys in!). I never got to kiss Amanda, and I've never read the book, but I love the novel's opening sentence:

"My friend Lamar Howell, one of my very oldest friends, shot and killed himself on my place at Echota."

I gather this book is actually supposed to be funny?!

3) "Middlesex" by Jeffrey Eugenides. I was estatic that my mother got me this novel, a Pulitzer Prize Winner, for Christmas. I love Eugenides' earlier novel "The Virgin Suicides," which was made into a movie by Sofia Coppolla. But, much to my shock and horror this epic about three generations of the Greek-American Stephanides family in suburban Detroit has an anti-Turkish tone. Hmmmm......let's go on to book number four.

4) "Mary: A Novel" by Janis Cooke Newman. For a brief while, I was one of many Roanoke Valley residents who reviewed books for "The Roanoke Times." We never got to choose our own books, though I read quite a few that I adored. This was one of two books which was sent to me that I never got around to reading. This 2006 novel about Mary Todd Lincoln is a staggering 680 pages! I will be eligible for retirement in the year 2035. Perhaps, I will have time to read it then...............and, this is coming from a slacker who suffers from insomnia!

5) "Stonewall Jackson: The Man, The Soldier, The Legend" by James L. Robertson, Jr.

The last book I mention dealt with history, but it is a novel. This 762-page book about a famous Civil War general by Virginia Tech professor and historian Robertson is a biography, and those who've actually read it claim it is very good. I met Robertson while I was a town reporter for Blacksburg in 1996. This book was the talk of the town. I picked it up at the Antietam Battlefield outside Frederick, Md., a few years after writing a story about the book. The book has a quote from Dennis E. Frye of "The Civil War Times Illustrated" which states that this work will 'stand alone for the next forty years and prhaps into eternity.............'

Alas, at this point in time, I can't verify that! But, I can say that Dr. Robertson lives in a very nice house.

Lastly, I want to thank Moviezzz of Srpingfield, Mass., and Christopher Knight of Reidsville, NC, for mentioning me on their blogs.

It hasn't helped me get any hits, but neither did the youtube videos. Though, you really should check out that Cuneyt Arkin clip...they don't make movies like that any more, not even in Turkey!

Links:

http://www.talkingmoviezzz.blogspot.com