Month: June 2008

Brundibar — Maurice Sendak

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Adapted by playwright/screenwriter Tony Kushner and illustrated by Maurice Sendak, Brundibar retells Hans Krása’s children’s opera about a brother and sister who go on an adventure to get their ailing mother some fresh milk. The penniless pair decides to sing in order to earn milk money, but the cruel organ grinder Brundibar chases them away. However, they triumph with the help of a sparrow, a cat, a dog, and a cadre of helpful children.

The original opera was first performed by the children-inmates of a Nazi concentration camp in occupied Czechoslovakia. The symbolic overtones of the story are pretty straightforward, and Sendak emphasizes the point, marking his Brundibar with a Hitlerish mustache and a ridiculous Napoleon Bonaparte hat. Political symbolism aside, Brundibar is simply a great book, full of little songs, beautiful art, and a unique narrative style in which individual characters get their own speech bubbles and even street signs tell a story. This isn’t my one-year old daughter’s favorite book–yet–but it’s certainly one of my top picks from her little library. Good stuff.

On Rereading

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So I just read Blood Meridian again. And–

Like many bibliophiles, I have a stack of books marked “to read,” both a physical and a mental one, a stack that only grows, one that my book-buying addiction feeds and that the reader in me can in no way deplete. The saddest thing in the stack–or about the stack, really (about is the proper preposition, not in) are all the books that I’m sure are just totally great (Atonement, The Sot-Weed Factor) and the ones that I’ve started at least half a dozen times yet never finished–yet (Gravity’s Rainbow, The Wind-up Bird Chronicles) that might not ever get read because of all the new books that get thrown on the stack.

The saddest thing though, is that we–and the “we” here is not editorial, folks, it refers to bibliophiles–we simply don’t reread enough. Because I teach high school, there are dozens of books that I get to reread every year. Every time I read Macbeth or Of Mice and Men or Their Eyes Were Watching God, I’m amazed by how rich and complex and just downright masterful these books are. Each new reading produces new insights, layers, new motifs unraveled, new details, once seemingly mere happenstances, reveal themselves as key to the whole ship and shebang. Rereading is good. And yet we don’t reread enough, precisely because of the stack, the insane egomaniacal compulsion to read all of the great books before, uh, death.

And so well and so thus I reread Blood Meridian. I read it a few months ago, put it down in a daze, read a few more books, all etiolated by comparison, and then, despite the stack I picked up Blood Meridian again, a strange ineffable compulsion forcing it into my hands; I didn’t want to reread the whole thing, just a few passages, and then, and then, well and then so well and thus I was just rereading the whole thing, a whole new book there under the book I thought I had read, had known, knew. I had experienced this before: when I first read Holden Caulfield, we were the same age; five years later I was five years older and he was a jerk. A decade passed and he was an alien (maybe I was a phony). Now, well, now I’m afraid to read the book

We can’t ever really know a book because we change. The book doesn’t change but the reading of the book changes. Because I get so much out of a rereading, because I know that reading in itself is not enough, the stack–which, I should probably emphasize, is a very real, physical presence, a little mound by my bed–because of this, there is a second distress, a pain of not only not being able to read all of the books, but also not being able to not reread many of them that deserve it.

So and well, after I reread Blood Meridian, I do something that I do after I finish every book–I go pick up a couple of books that I’m desperate to reread, as well as a few from the stack. The feeling is strange and breathless and giddy, and ultimately overwhelming. I uncover over old bookmarks, shocked that I made it so far on the last attempt, or stumble over the first five pages. I lie to myself, reading sections of Finnegans Wake, as if.

Right now I’m halfway through DeLillo’s masterpiece Underworld. It’s huge and unwieldy and really fucking good, and I will finish it–this time–but even as I read it I know that I’m missing half of it, that I can only really “get it” in the rereading. And yet and well this is a book that’s been in the stack for years. I have no solution, and I guess there’s no point to this post, only that I wish I had more time to read and then to read again.

Icarus Falls, No Big Deal

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“Landscape with the Fall of Icarus” by William Carlos Williams

According to Brueghel
when Icarus fell
it was spring

a farmer was ploughing
his field
the whole pageantry

of the year was
awake tingling
near

the edge of the sea
concerned
with itself

sweating in the sun
that melted
the wings’ wax

unsignificantly
off the coast
there was

a splash quite unnoticed
this was
Icarus drowning

“Musée de Beaux Arts” by W.H. Auden

About suffering they were never wrong,
The Old Masters: how well, they understood
Its human position; how it takes place
While someone else is eating or opening a window or just walking dully along;
How, when the aged are reverently, passionately waiting
For the miraculous birth, there always must be
Children who did not specially want it to happen, skating
On a pond at the edge of the wood:
They never forgot
That even the dreadful martyrdom must run its course
Anyhow in a corner, some untidy spot
Where the dogs go on with their doggy life and the torturer’s horse
Scratches its innocent behind on a tree.

In Brueghel’s Icarus, for instance: how everything turns away
Quite leisurely from the disaster; the ploughman may
Have heard the splash, the forsaken cry,
But for him it was not an important failure; the sun shone
As it had to on the white legs disappearing into the green
Water; and the expensive delicate ship that must have seen
Something amazing, a boy falling out of the sky,
had somewhere to get to and sailed calmly on.

Feed the Animals

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The new Girl Talk album, Feed the Animals just came out via Illegal Art. It’s about time. We were almost ready to remove Night Ripper from the Subaru’s six-disc changer where it’s been firmly lodged for almost two years, so this is fantastic news. We just finished listening to Feed the Animals (are we said animals?) and there’s much to love here; we particularly like the emphasis on classic pop hits. Excellent craftsmanship. Our friend Jordan, sequestered in pristine Singapore, hipped us to the release, which he describes as “slower paced [with] more power-hits,” adding that “he uses whoomp-there it is…. finally.” Finally.

AFI’s Stupid Lists: No Love for Horror

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The wankers at the American Film Institute just released their lists of top ten films by “genre” (full lists after the jump). Everyone loves to quibble with lists, and there’s plenty weird with theirs. First off, “Animation” is a medium, not a genre. That’s like calling comic books a genre, or TV a genre. But whatever. Also, Shrek on anyone’s top ten is always a bad sign–still, they give Blue Velvet its due and give Groundhog Day some props). What I thought was really odd was that AFI finds room to recognize a “Sports” genre (and on that end, are Raging Bull and Caddyshack really sports movies?), and even a “Courtroom Drama” genre, but doesn’t make a list of the great horror films. Why?

Here’s our list of the great American horror films. We’re sure we’re forgetting a bunch. This blog has been a slapdash affair lately.

1. Night of the Living Dead (the original)

2. Psycho (clearly, not Van Sant’s remake)

3. Alien

4. The Shining

5. Dawn of the Dead (the original)

6. Rosemary’s Baby

7. Re-animator

8. The Thing (John Carpenter)

9. Evil Dead 2

10. Texas Chainsaw Massacre (the original)

Continue reading “AFI’s Stupid Lists: No Love for Horror” →

Poster Making

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If you had a million years to do it in, you couldn’t rub out even half the ‘Fuck you’ signs in the world. It’s impossible. –Holden Caulfield in The Catcher in the Rye

Royal Art Lodge piece from Lots of Things Like This, a slim volume of pictures with words (or words with pictures?) included with McSweeney’s #27 (two other books comprise the issue: a volume of short stories including pieces by Jim Shepard and Stephen King, and a really cool notebook of weird doodles and crazy thoughts by Art Spiegelman). Other artists represented in Lots of Things Like This include Magritte, Goya, Warhol, Raymond Pettibon, Jeffrey Brown, Leonard Cohen, David Mamet, David Berman, Basquiat, and more.

Be Kind Rewind

Edwin Turner3 Comments

Sweet and silly, Be Kind Rewind, Michel Gondry’s fourth film (fifth if you count his 2005 documentary, Block Party) recounts the adventures of Mike (Mos Def) and his pal Jerry (Jack Black) as they recreate films from memory. When Mr. Fletcher, owner of the Be Kind Rewind video store, goes away for a week to a Fats Waller convention, he leaves Mike in charge of the store. Unfortunately, after a bizarre accident, Jerry becomes magnetized and consequently demagnetizes the store’s entire collection of VHS tapes (no DVDs here, folks). When number-one customer Miss Falewicz (Mia Farrow) asks for Ghostbusters, the pair are forced to create their own version from memory (along with help from local laundress Alma (Melonie Diaz)). Miss Falewicz’s nephew and his friends see the bizarre results and must have more, hence the birth of “sweding“–the process of remaking film favorites. The neighborhood citizens go crazy for the sweded films, clamoring for their own favorites to be made. By the end of the film, the entire neighborhood has moved beyond copying other people’s movies. Instead, they make their own film, the (kinda invented) biography of Fats Waller.

Be Kind Rewind is full of goofy fun laughs, and despite its lighthearted tone it never half-asses–or overplays–handling its dominant themes of creativity and community. Jack Black never overdoes it as Jerry, the zany paranoiac, and Mos Def is fantastic as the slightly anxious, slightly slow Mike (his version of Chris Tucker during the sweding of Rush Hour 2 is worth the price of admission alone). Danny Glover plays Mr. Fletcher poignantly, and the character comes to serve as a kind of elegiac totem for the death of highly-specialized local video shops with knowledgeable, cinephile-employees. Be Kind Rewind is a funny, giving film, and never self-indulgent; it moves the viewer without a trace of schmalz. Plus, it never drags. Highly recommended.

Be Kind Rewind is out on DVD today.

Dad’s Little Helper: Malt Liquor for Grownups

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So my wife gave me Rogue’s Dad’s Little Helper Malt Liquor for Father’s Day. The back of the bottle tells the history of Father’s Day, which is fortunate, because I love reading copy with my food and drink. Here is the history:

After the death of his wife, Henry Jackson Smart was left to raise 6 young children alone. His courage, love, selflessness and dedication inspired his daughter, Sonora Smart Dodd, to organize the first Fathers Day on June 19th, 1910. In 1924 President Calvin Coolidge proclaimed the third Sunday in June as Fathers Day. President Nixon, in 1972, established it as a permanent day of national observance.

Nixon! What a softy. Anyway. I’m going to drink this now and write about the experience in real time.

Malt liquor is traditionally served in its selfsame bottle or can, with the special accoutrement of a brown paper bag. However, out of respect for Rogue Brews–they make great beers–I’ll pour it out into a nice glass. Here goes.

7:56pm: Open the bottle. The nose is reminiscent of, uh, like a quart of Mickey’s (the “gentleman’s malt”). Not a good sign.

7:57pm: Pour. The color is gold, of course, a little darker and more opaque than a standard American lager.

7:58pm: Taste. First impression: This isn’t Olde English, but it’s hardly Rogue’s Juniper Pale Ale.

7:59pm: Oh shit! The Simpsons is going to come on (yeah, I still like The Simpsons).

8:00pm: I missed the couch gag. Hang on, a trailer for Hellboy 2. This looks pretty good. But back to the malt.

8:03pm: The beer has a good taste in the mouth, but it has that undeniable corn-burn aftertaste, which is kinda unpleasant, and kinda makes you want to keep drinking the beer. Homer kills his father–but it’s just a “wonderful dream.” Dark.

8:08pm: I haven’t had malt liquor in a long time, actually, probably like seven years. When I was a college student I used to scrape together seventy cents and go to the gas station next door and get myself a quart of Hurricane (to more cosmopolitan readers: in Florida we don’t have beverages in the forty ounce variety, popularly called “forties” –we have quarts. Because that extra eight ounces will, like, really tear you up). The trick with Hurricane–or really any quart, especially malt liquor, is to drink it really, really fast, before it gets warm. When it gets warm, it’s really, really bad. Also, the last portion is no good to drink, but may be respectfully tipped out in memory to one’s fallen comrades (the “homies,” if you will). Lisa said “southern-fried succubus.” Excellent.

8:17pm: A little internet research reveals that Anheuser-Busch still makes Hurricane. Also, Hurricane received a 2.125 rating (5 is the best) at BeerPal. What kind of a loser takes the time to review malt liquor online? Dad’s Little Helper got a 3.0. Here’s a quick control: My go-to beer of choice, Sierra Nevada IPA earned a 3.355, and Budweiser, the self-proclaimed “King of Beers” earned a 1.866.

8:26pm: The Dixie Chicks, Colonel Homer…and Major Marge! Seriously, the show is way past due for being taken out back and gently shot between the eyes. Seriously.

8:30pm: King of the Hill. This show is still good. And “What Would Hank Hill Do?” is a personal motto of mine.

8:35pm: This malt liquor is only 22 ounces, not 34, but it’s never taken me this long to drink one before. I’m kinda old, I guess, or I just don’t drink that much anymore.

8:36pm: My wife appears from the baby’s room. She has put the baby to sleep (that’s not a metaphor. We’re excellent parents). She asks about the malt liquor. “It’s a malt liquor,” I say. “It’s pretty good.” She asks me why I’m smiling. I think the brew is working some magic on me.

8:40pm: Micturition imminent.

8:43pm: God, I hate Peggy Hill.

8:45pm: My wife informs me that this Rogue beverage costs the same as other Rogue beverages (like five or six dollars). So, there. There’s some info in the review.

8:46pm: I haven’t talked about the label. Who is this guy? He’s on a couple of the Rogue bottles, but it strikes me now that he looks like Tom Selleck. Or, really like Magnum (P.I.). Magnum in three ties.

8:50pm: It occurs to me now that my best friend gave me a subscription to a microbrew of the month club, where I’ll receive several microbrewed beers in the mail every other month. So, I could do reviews like these, you know bimonthly (I suppose there’s nothing to stop me from doing them all the time–still, there needs to be an occasion. I’m kinda rambling now).

8:56pm: Okay–so, as it warms, Dad’s Little Helper conforms to standard malt liquor rules–but with greater resistance. There’s a possibility of this tasting like ass pretty soon, though, I fear. I need to pony up and get down to brass tacks.

9:02pm: Final verdict: This beer will give you a buzz, but so will Hurricane, paint thinner, and standing up too fast. A lovely Father’s Day gift–who wouldn’t want malt liquor?–but not on par with Rogue’s other brews.

At Mount Zoomer

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The first five seconds of “Soldier’s Grin,” the first track on At Mount Zoomer, Wolf Parade’s second LP, consist of a spindly synth and guitar duet that announces the program of the rest of the album: tight, lyrical, melodic prog-punk-pop that gets plenty of mileage out of old keyboards and crunchy guitars. This welding of synth with indie-rock guitar reflects the split songwriting duties of Wolf Parade. Like its predecessor, 2005’s Apologies to the Queen Mary, the new record is split almost evenly into songs written and sung by keyboardist Spencer Krug or guitarist Dan Boeckner. The slight stylistic differences between Boeckner’s and Krug’s songs are unified on Zoomer by drummer Arlen Thompson’s big, warm production. Songs like “Call it a Ritual” and “Bang Your Drum” propel on tense, jumpy punk rhythms before letting loose into brief moments of pop satisfaction–a formula that worked so well for the band on Queen Mary. The best moments of the record come though when they try something new. On longer songs like “Fine Young Cannibals” and epic album-closer “Kissing the Beehive” Wolf Parade play with trickier melodies and leave more open space in their music, letting the rhythms and melodies coalesce into tight, beautiful pockets that aren’t overwhelmed by big synths or vocal growls. That’s not to say there isn’t something sublime about thicker numbers like “The Grey Estates,” a keyboard-driven ditty that recalls The Cars, or “Language City,” a song that channels (if not flat out rips off) The Moody Blues’s “Your Wildest Dreams.” Still, there are a few missteps here: “California Dreamer” aims for motortik tension but falls instead into annoying territory, and the first half of Krug’s “An Animal in Your Care” is the worst in indulgent glam-emo. However, “Animal” picks up in its second half, evolving into a crisp stomping guitar and piano workout–but on an album with only nine songs, each one should be perfect. Ultimately, Zoomer won’t disappoint its intended audience. Wolf Parade make the best sort of indie rock comfort food, the kind that recalls the classic bands of the genre (Pixies, Sonic Youth) while also hearkening to the earlier days of college rock (Talking Heads, Television). Really, nothing here pushes boundaries–Wolf Parade’s biggest trick is making you forget that what you’re listening to is really as safe as milk.

At Mount Zoomer will be released June 17 from Sub Pop records.

The Believer’s 2008 Reader Survey: (What Some Jokers Thought Were) The Best Books of 2007

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The current issue of The Believer features the results of the reader’s poll, as well as the editor’s top pick, for the best books published in 2007. The editors chose Tom McCarthy’s Remainder, which we haven’t read, and the readers picked Junot Díaz’s The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, probably because the hero is such a nerd. The list follows with our comments; titles are linked to our reviews.

  1. The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao—Junot Díaz
  2. The Yiddish Policemen’s Union—Michael Chabon: We didn’t like this book and are frankly astounded at all the praise it’s garnered.
  3. The Savage Detectives—Roberto Bolaño: It’s in a stack waiting to be read. The stack is very big though, and the book is very big, so, who knows (in all likelihood it will beat out last year’s reader fave, Pynchon’s impossibly large Against the Day).
  4. Tree of Smoke—Denis Johnson: We loved it. Top pick of the year. Very divisive, strangely–just read through the Amazon reviews.
  5. Then We Came to the End—Joshua Ferris
  6. No One Belongs Here More Than You—Miranda July: Oh my gosh. Seriously? Really? I read half of this at a Barnes & Noble, no exaggeration. I sat and drank coffee and read it. I’m not saying that a book has to take a while to read in order to have weight or substance, but in this particular instance, no, nothing, fluff. This is the kind of thing that people who quit reading after high school mistake for literature.
  7. On Chesil Beach—Ian McEwan: The library has this on CD; I’ll listen to it this summer. I’ve grappled with the first five pages of Atonement too many times to bother, really. And then I saw the movie, and it sucked. So…
  8. Zeroville—Steve Erickson
  9. Like You’d Understand, Anyway—Jim Shepard
  10. Slam—Nick Hornby: We suspect that The Believer‘s readers are partial to Hornby; would they have given another Young Adult novel a nod? We doubt it.
  11. Divisadero—Michael Ondaatje: Also in the stack.
  12. Bowl of Cherries—Millard Kaufman: A pamphlet containing the first three chapters was published as an insert in an issue of McSweeney’s. It was pretty funny.
  13. Varieties of Disturbance—Lydia Davis
  14. The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian—Sherman Alexie: This was fantastic. And it was YA! We rescind our Hornby complaint.
  15. The Abstinence Teacher—Tom Perrotta
  16. Call Me by Your Name—André Aciman
  17. After Dark—Haruki Murakami: Murakami is the writer we wished that we love but we just can’t get into. We remember reading some of his short fiction years ago, in Harper’s and other places, but even The Elephant Vanishes was a trial to get through.
  18. Darkmans—Nicola Barker
  19. Diary of a Bad Year—J. M. Coetzee
  20. Falling Man—Don DeLillo: Dry, self-important, rarely engaging, and not nearly as good as it was pretending to be, Falling Man was only a step above its dark twin, Cosmopolis. Continue reading “The Believer’s 2008 Reader Survey: (What Some Jokers Thought Were) The Best Books of 2007” →

To the Castle and Back — Vaclav Havel

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Václav Havel’s latest memoir To the Castle and Back plays as a strange series of paradoxes. It’s elliptical and fragmentary yet thorough and exhaustive; it’s personal and introspective yet political and social; it presents a total picture of Czechoslovakia’s 1989 Velvet Revolution and the subsequent dissolution of Czechoslovakia into the Czech Republic and Slovakia, yet it repeatedly admits to being unable to convey the full story. The narrative of the Velvet Revolution is fascinating even for those who aren’t political junkies. Make no mistake though–To the Castle in Back will be most enjoyed by people who can’t get enough of world politics. The book is larded with dry political details, and Havel the poet and playwright, Havel Lou Reed’s buddy, Havel the Zappa enthusiast–in short Havel as hipster–is largely absent from this text. Instead, we get journalistic accounts of Havel as politician and speech maker interwoven with Havel’s own commentary and even interoffice memos. At times the level of detail is almost excruciating, but Havel seems to understand this. His preface to the book actually serves as the best review (and guide) possible:

If you occasionally feel like putting the book aside because it seems to skirt some of the world-shaking events that I lived through, or to burrow too deeply into exclusively Czech or Czechoslovak matters, I urge you to skip ahead. It’s easy to do because the book is divided not only into chapters but into short sequences, separated by horizontal lines.

Late in the memoir, Havel writes that for all of his life, he’d “longed to write a brutally honest diary, something in the style of Henry Miller, Charles Bukoswki, [or] Anaïs Nin.” And while To the Castle and Back hardly approaches the rough and scandalous material of that mid-century triad, it does contain something just as honest perhaps: an unglamorous, unromanticized accounting of the past told at all times with the caveat that this story is not history writ large, but rather the perspective of someone who lived through it and acted upon it. Honest, moving, often humorous, and, yes, occasionally dull, To the Castle and Back is probably not a book for everyone, but for those interested in the man and the events of the Velvet Revolution it makes a competent introduction.

Five Great Recent Comedies, All Underappreciated, All Worth Watching

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Perhaps no comedy best exemplifies “the little film that could” syndrome as does Mike Judge’s Office Space. Although Office Space died in the theaters, this movie about three fed up cubicle drones quickly regained a second life as a cult film classic before eventually becoming a quotable cultural touchstone on par with Caddyshack. Judge’s next film Idiocracy followed the same pattern, and while it’s not likely to ever hold the same prestige as Office Space, movies like Super Troopers and Wet Hot American Summer continue to show us that a film can die at the box office but have a second life as a cult favorite. We present to you five future classic comedies, all underappreciated, all worth watching.

1. Beerfest (2006)

Drunken Lizard’s Beerfest details the experiences of two brothers and their friends who travel to Germany to enter an underground beer-drinking competition in order to restore both familial and patriotic glory. Despite the silly premise, the movie is nonetheless an epic adventure story that dutifully moves through each phase of Joseph Campbell’s hero’s journey. It’s also, of course, very, very funny.

2. Hot Rod (2007)

Hot Rod was in the theaters for about five minutes last year and was unfairly criticized for being derivative of every other sports spoof ever made. Sure, Andy Samberg was following a model that anyone who’s ever seen a Will Ferrell comedy will be familiar with, but it’s the small touches, the strange little nuances that make the delicious dumbness of Rod Kimble’s sorry attempts at dare-devilry so funny. Ian McShane (Deadwood‘s Swedgin) is fantastic as the malevolent stepfather and Chris Parnell is too fucking funny in his bit part.

3. I Think I Love My Wife (2007)

Everyone knows that Chris Rock is hilarious, so why did no one go see I Think I Love My Wife? Well, it could be that the story of an African-American executive who feels constricted by his upper-middle class lifestyle, kids, wife, etc. and daydreams of having sex with lots and lots of other women simply couldn’t find it’s niche; I Think I Love My Wife is a cult film with no cult. In an interview with the AV Club last year, co-writer Louis CK says that he warned director/writer/star that the film would be a mistake to make. I think he’s wrong. Although the film is very much a monoglossic, one-voice escapade–this is Rock’s tale, of course–that voice is funny and insightful, and often says things that most married men are apt to feel on a daily basis (but not me, honey!)

4. Crank (2006)

Crank should be taught in film classes. In the most wonderfully stupid plot imaginable, professional assassin Jason Statham (who’s made a career out of these kinds of roles, it seems) is injected with a lethal poison. Here’s the twist: if his heart rate drops too low, he’ll die! For the next 90 minutes, he engages in every kind of adrenaline-jumping escapade imaginable including drinking lots of Red Bull, snorting mounds of cocaine, driving really, really fast, and, uh, fighting all the time. Lots and lots of fighting. In one memorable scene, Statham publicly schtups his annoying girlfriend while a busload of Japanese tourists cheers him on. Why this film didn’t win an Oscar, I’ll never understand.

5. Southland Tales (2006)

I’ve already reviewed Southland Tales but it belongs on this list. For all its many, many faults, Richard Kelly’s sprawling opus is a weird, sardonic mess of smart satire and goonish toilet humor, the kind of movie that seems to be mocking both itself as well as its audience at every turn. Not everyone will get this movie, but there are some of you out there who will love it even as it bewilders you.

Summer Reading List: Anthologies to Know and Love

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No summer reading is complete without imbibing the variegated prose of an anthology. The following are the literary equivalents of skillfully-detailed mixtapes, made by a friend who wishes to communicate only that he or she has your best interest at heart.

The 2008 O. Henry Prize Stories anthology is a great way to play catch up on all of the reading you missed last year. Culled from publications like Zoetrope, Harper’s, Granta, and Tin House, this anthology features established masters like William Gass and Alice Munro along with newer voices. There are plenty of highlights and no duds. Sharon Cain’s “The Necessities of Certain Behaviors” explores an amorphous world of gender-bending, while Stephen Millhauser’s “A Change in Fashion” imagines a new mode where women cover every inch of their flesh from the gaze of men. Lore Segal’s “Other People’s Deaths” perfectly captures the painful awkwardness and shame we experience when encountering, um, other people’s deaths. Similarly, the title of Tony Tulathimutte’s “Scenes from the Life of the Only Girl in Water Shield, Alaska” is spot-on, and Gass’s contribution, “A Little History of Modern Music,” is the funniest monologue we’ve read all year. But our favorite in the collection has to be Edward P. Jones’s “Bad Neighbors,” which examines the changing fortunes of an African-American neighborhood in Washington, D.C. A great collection, and if a story disappoints you, there’ll be three to make up for it.

In the ultimate in lazy reviewing, we will let the title of McSweeney’s kids anthology Noisy Outlaws, Unfriendly Blobs, and Some Other Things That Aren’t as Scary, Maybe, Depending on How You Feel About Lost Lands, Stray Cellphones, Creatures from the Sky, Parents Who Disappear in Peru, a Man Named Lars Farf, and One Other Story We Couldn’t Quite Finish, So Maybe You Could Help Us Out stand as its own summary. However, this is a beautiful book with lots of lovely pictures, and the collection is worth it for Nick Hornby’s story alone. Good stuff.

Edited by superstar Chris Ware, The Best American Comics 2007 serves as a delicious tasting menu of some of the best comix published in the past few years. Although hardcore comix fans will no doubt have already read the selections from Charles Burns’s Black Hole and Adrian Tomine’s Optic Nerve, there’s plenty here for aficionados and newbies alike.

Chances are you’ve read a number of the canonical texts in 50 Great Short Stories, but it’s also likely you haven’t read them in years. We’ve had this book for years, and have revisited often to indulge in old favorites for new inspiration. Classics like Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery” and Hemingway’s “The Three-Day Blow” nestle up against lesser-reads like Edmund Wilson’s “The Man Who Shot Snapping Turtles” and Francis Steegmuller’s “The Foreigner.” And have you read Flannery O’Connor’s “A Good Man is Hard to Find” since high school? No? Shame on you! What about Carson McCuller’s “The Jockey”? Dorothy Parker? Kipling? Consider it a light crash course in great literature.