A Day No Pigs Would Die

This book is my personal no-cry challenge, and I fail every single time. It's about young Rob Peck saving a cow, getting a pig, and BECOMING A MAN. His dad is Haven Peck: the illest Shaker farmer/butcher in all of 1920s Vermont. Dear old Dad is illiterate, but that doesn't stop him from dropping mad knowledge bombs all over the place like steaming cow patties:

• "That's what being a man's all about, boy. It's just doing what has to be done." Haven, I'm all OVER this ish - you need a cow milked, I will milk that cow for you - or preferably whatever the urban equivalent is (latte run?).
• "Dying is a dirty business. Like being born." You're talking about poop, right? On second thought, let the details remain a mystery. Gross coming in, gross going out - got it.
• "Never miss a chance...to keep your mouth shut." Um, okay, this is good advice but I tend to favor the Real Housewives philosophy over the Shaker one in my own personal interactions: "She who out-yells everyone wins - but save some insults for the confessional." To each their own, Have. 

I'm sure you're intrigued already, and I haven't even mentioned the adorable pig named Pinky and the fact that uptight moms are constantly trying to have this book banned (banned books are the best books, obviously). Even if you're not into reading about porcine-boy friendships (WEIRDO), any time you need to feel again just grab a saline-stained copy and ride this novella to Tear Town, population: YOU. Better than a really good episode of Oprah, I promise you.

5 cow goiters out of 5 disgusting cow goiters. 

After the Apocalypse

I have definitely crafted an apocalypse survival plan with a few people ("you get the guns, I'll get the cans - we make our way north and rendezvous at my parent's cottage in Nova Scotia where we can seal off the only road onto the island.") But if zombies *actually* happened I would probably be caught wearing impractical high heels, ignore the warnings, and get taken down within the first 10 minutes while standing in line for an iced coffee.

We all think we're much more heroic and resourceful than we really are, and it's easy to picture ourselves rising from the ashes, the demise of processed food finally helping us sculpt some wicked abs, which we display at all times while wielding a machete and scavenging for supplies like a warrior princess (No? Just my daydreams? Cool). Maureen F. McHugh's nine stories, all set in some sort of post-apocalypse or dystopian future (those pesky zombies, dirty bomb attacks, economic depression, drought), immerse you in stories that feel much more realistic and more raw than those found in most end of the world dramas. There's nothing glossy or cartoonish about a resentful mother dragging her whiny teenager through a starving America, or a Mad Cow-like illness infecting the chicken nugget supply and damning a generation to a slow, paralyzing dementia. It would all be really, really depressing if it wasn't such a breath of fresh air in what can admittedly be a somewhat stagnant genre.

4 death-dealing processed nuggets out of 5! That is probably the way we're all going to go out, actually.

Lightning

Oh, Dean. What cruel twist of fate engineered the fact that you would be constantly preceded by Stephen King on the library shelves, forever doomed to be following in his footsteps in alphabetization as in life? Still, my brothers and I devoured all your books as teenagers*, so maybe you're better thought of as a gentle "intro to" dark adult fiction instead of a poor man's version of weightier author.

Anyway, you're a millionaire and churn out about a dozen books a year and I can barely do one review a month, so pretty sure you're doing alright.

Lightning was one of the first Koontzy's I read, and his tale of a love-struck time-traveling Nazi defector scientist held me in its thrall. I was going to re-read it but I'd rather review it from the perspective of an awkward teen than a confident and savvy adult (I am trying to incorporate my daily affirmations into these reviews. I can feel them working!). So, as a 90s teen, I cannot recommend this book enough and I really look forward to the movie adaptation, coming out in July 1999, starring Val Kilmer.

90s teen rating: 5 The Saint-era Val Kilmers out of 5. Suspected current Jane rating: 2 beach-ready Val Kilmers out of 5.

 *and we also had a weird obsession with the evolution of your author pic - in earlier editions, you had a mustache worthy of the Brawny Man and a receding hairline; in later ones, you were clean shaven but suspiciously thick-coiffed. This led to an attempt to speculate on your wikipedia page about a frenzied late-night mustache-to-pate home hair transplant, which remained in your entry for one tantalizing day before being edited into oblivion.

Ready Player One

This is a book perfect for gaming nerds, and I really enjoyed it - despite being TOO nerdy for it. See, I never played the adventure, shoot 'em up, wizard & dragon games. My favorite computer game was Civilization. Yes - you could spend the game waging war and taking over the earth, which I suppose would be pretty badass. I say "suppose" because I always preferred to win using SCIENCE and become the first civilization to reach Alpha Centauri. I WAS SUCH A GODDAMNED NERD.

Anyway, I have friends now and I have kissed a boy, so it's fine. And my lack of experience with 80s arcade staples and dice-based adventures did not diminish my enjoyment of Ready Player One. It's set in a dystopian future where everyone spends most of their time plugged into a massive online role-playing game. When the eccentric, 80s-obssesed creator dies, he wills his vast fortune and control of the game to whoever can first solve a series of clues that will lead them to three challenges, three keys, and three gates.

My only complaint is a pretty literal deus ex machina that pops up near the end - but by that time you're already casting the inevitable movie version of the story* so I guess I'll allow it.

4 epic Rush guitar solos out of 5.

*Wade = Donald Glover , Art3mis = Lena Dunham, Sorrento = Willem Dafoe. Are you telling me you wouldn't watch that movie? Exactly.

The Art of Fielding

This book is so wonderful and lovely, you should all read it.

"But Jane I don't like baseball -"

Okay, first of all: how very un-American of you. This country was cobbled together in a baseball dugout from cherry pie filling and bald eagle sweat. Still, even freedom-haters like you will find yourself engrossed in this bittersweet story set in a small Midwestern college. It's "about" baseball in the same way Moby Dick is "about" whale watching - it's all about the characters, knucklehead! Also there are a ton of Moby Dick references (the protagonist is named Henry Skrimshander. Skrimshander! Epic character names 101, have a goddamned seat).

If you are a human, reading this book will involve nodding along, chuckling, and maybe wiping away a tear, all while your inner monologue is saying over and over again: "I know that feel, bro."

This was Harbach's first novel I CAN'T EVEN.

5 out of 5 navy & ecru striped school ties.

Game Change

Reading this book is worth it for the moisturizing effects of the John Edwards chapters alone - the grease oozing off of the pages has made my skin smoother and my hair more lustrous (but not so bouncy that anyone would accuse me of a $400 salon visit).

There was enough drama, back-stabbing, and general bitchery in the 2008 elections to make an episode of the Real Housewives look like Romper Room. The highs were dizzyingly high (Obama's speech at the Democratic National Convention!) and the lows were mind-blowingly low ("I can see Alaska from my hooooouse!"). This book is the treasure at the end of the rainbow made of Hilary Clinton's pantsuits. Bring on November 2012 - this book already showed us Obama's faults & failings in the run up to the elections, so I really can't wait for the inside scoop on Mittens Romney - not to mention Herman "There's A Lot of Women I Didn't Sexually Harass" Cain, Michele "Crazy Eyes" Bachmann, Rick "Brokeback Style" Perry , Newt "Child Janitor" Gingrich, and Rick "Santorum" Santorum. OH GOD WRITE GAME CHANGE: 2012 IMMEDIATELY PLEASE.

4 "you betcha's" out of 5.

American Vampire Vol. 1 & 2 - a Bloody Books Twofer

This graphic novel series is begging to be made into an HBO show. True Blood x Deadwood + Boardwalk Empire/Girls. Okay, maybe not that last one, unless vol. 3 is set in 21st century Brooklyn. Actually, how has no one done a hipster vampire show yet? That's my idea now, I call dibs.

Skinner Sweet is a wild west outlaw who becomes the 'American Vampire' - the first of a new breed, he can walk in the sunlight, and he sure as hell doesn't glitter when he does. Vampires have had a reputation problem over the past few years. Remember when they were scary? Before Twilight turned them into players in a weird pro-abstinence teen romance? This series goes a long way to undoing that damage and reclaiming the idea of a vampire as something terrifying & grotesque. No one is swooning over Skinner Sweet, I promise.*

4 super-sized orders of garlic bread out of 5.

*And if you read them and find that you are, you need to look at your life. Look at your choices! Girl. *smh*

Fifty Shades of Grey

50 written works that are more erotic than Fifty Shades of Grey:
1. This sentence.
2. The obituary section of your local paper.
3. My last grocery list (Oooh...zucchini).
4. A seventh grade essay on Of Mice & Men.
5. The Obamacare bill.
6. The lyrics to Justin Bieber's opus, "Baby" (Baby baby baby ooh baby).
7. A note that reads "Will you go to Prom with me? Check yes or no."
8. The book of Leviticus.
9. An itemized check from a nice dinner out.
10. Box scores from a baseball game.
11. That crude piece of graffiti scrawled on the wall by your house.
12. Comments on YouTube videos.
13. Kirk/Spock slash.
14. The letters from readers published in People Magazine ("Thank you for such a nice piece on Jennifer Aniston!")
15-50. Everything. EVERYTHING.

Alright, I ran out of steam a bit there. But I still had more steam than the limp brained protagonist Anastasia Steele (ugh) and her robotic and laughably verbose suitor Christian Grey (UGH).

This book is so bad. Which, we knew it would be, right? WRONG. It is so much worse than you could imagine. Housewives of America! Step away from the washing machine and put down this book! If you are really craving some poorly written smut lacking any plotting or character development, may I introduce you to something called pornography? Look it up.

E.L. James, I am now dumber for having read your book. I award you no points, and may God have mercy on your soul.

0 "steely grey eyes" out of 5.

Columbine

This is a great book, for which I can't really write a quick & cute review. For obvious reasons, I hope. Dave Cullen is quick to say that he's never called this the "definitive" book on what's arguably the most famous school shooting in American history, but I can't imagine any one will write another one that unpacks the tragedy so eloquently and in such a deeply-felt way. I had a really weird, pained expression on my face the entire time I was reading this, and I couldn't put it down. It's also a great read for anyone interested in how the media gets it wrong sometimes; with insights into the 24 hour news cycle, eyewitness testimony, the power of a martyr, and much more.

5 stars out of 5.

The Devil in the White City

Fairs! What could be more fun?! Tilt-a-Whirls, that Viking Ship thing, and excellent representations from my favorite tiers of the food pyramid: Fried Things and Sugar Delivery Systems. I will always love getting effed up on some cotton candy and then being spun around violently by a ride that looks like a rejected transformer and is operated by a drunk teenager. That's just the kid in me, I guess! But this book taught me that fairs have a dark side, and it's America's First Serial Killer. H.H. Holmes was a scary dude with a literal house of horrors. He  would just pick off people at the fair as they exited the world's first Ferris Wheel, burning them with buckets of molten cheese. And that's why we call deep dish pizza Chicago-style! The end.

Nah, it was much less dramatic but still very gruesome and creepy. Erik Larsen doesn't talk once about pizza. Even though I really love reading about psychopaths (exhibits A, B, C...etc), my favorite part of this book was actually the Ferris Wheel stuff. There is a story about a guy who had a panic attack while it was rising into the air and basically tried to bust out one of the windows, just a little bit of history repeating.

4 mid-air freak-outs out of 5.

The Psychopath Test

This book has many rabbit holes for you to fall down. Every other page I had to stop and Wikipedia some passing mention of a horrible crime, or odd footnote in history or culture that I'd never heard about. Oh, you would never read up about an awful crime/criminal on Wikipedia because you find it distasteful and don't want to know any of the terrifying details? Well, you are better than me. Also, why are you reading this blog? You got lost here on the way to cuteoverload.com, didn't you? It's okay. Shh, shh, stop crying.

Jon Ronson gets tasked with tracking down the creator of a mysterious handcrafted book, and that case leads him into an investigation of psychopathy - what it is, what it means, who defines it, and who might have it.

I dug this book, and have already started to tell some friends which of our OTHER friends are psychopaths. Yeah, I'm onto you. So it's great if you just want a new way to talk about people behind their backs. Endless fun!

If I am murdered, the list of my friends who I suspect to be emotionless killers is hidden in the lining of my tuxedo jacket - avenge my death!

4 shallow affects out of 5.

Chrysalids

First of all, I chose to use this cover as illustration because, and I can't stress this enough, this book has nothing to do with human/praying mantis hybrids wearing fur ruffs and samurai armor, and brandishing spears. Not once does this happen. If there is a book about that, send it to me, because it sounds great. But it's not this book.

This book is about less-dramatic mutants (your six-toed individuals, your telepathic individuals...etc. Well, actually, that's pretty much it). Our telepathic friends are living in a post-,post-,post-apocalyptic USA, where deviation from the norm is not tolerated. I first read this book in high school, and with the wisdom I've accumulated since then I now see that they were trying to teach us a *very special* lesson about tolerance, conformity, and nuclear fallout.

But I have ALWAYS loved mutants, because my mom has two earlobes on one ear. So, thanks for wasting my time, high school English class.

To summarize, John Wyndham is great and you knew that since you read Day of the Triffids and realized that plants are plotting against us, and secretly that's the reason you eat salad, not to watch your weight like you tell everyone.

6 toes out of 5! Hmm, no, it's not that good. You could also mutate fewer appendages, couldn't you? 3 super-strong radiation enhanced super-toes out of 5.

I Don't Care About Your Band

"Girrrrrrl." - My brain, to Julie Klausner, while reading her horrifying tales of dating hipster douchebags and hateful depressives of every variety and flavor. It's like watching a slasher movie, except instead of yelling "Don't open that door!" you're yelling...okay well you're yelling "Don't open that door!" but the guy behind it just treats you like shit instead of murdering you. Which is SCARIER? You decide!

Actually my favorite part of this book is when she talks about how your twenties are the worst years of your life that at the time you think are great. God, hindsight's a bitch. I don't care about your band! Or your stupid accounting internship! That felt good, let the healing process begin.

3.5 late-night booty calls out of 5.

The Devil All the Time

This book is...what's the opposite of chick lit? And don't say MAN lit, if "man lit" is a thing it's a genre only comprised of those Uncle John Bathroom Reader books and the memoirs of Tim Allen. I just mean that I would pay good money to see one of the ditzy (yet lovable) stiletto-clad heroines whose first world problems dominate those pastel-covered books enter the dark and grimy world Pollock created. Hi-larious hi-jinks would surely ensue!

Deadly road trips, a blood-soaked prayer log, a predatory holy man, a crooked sheriff - no one in this book is a good person, everyone does horrible things, and you'll be left squirming like a preacher getting insects poured over his head (oh yeah, that happens too. I had to put the book in the freezer, Joey style, after that one).

4 sweaty, dirty men's undershirts out of 5. Ugh. Disgusting.

Zone One

Oh this book is great. Zombie novel-y enough to keep a buffoon like me entertained, but smart enough to make me feel smug reading it on the subway. In other words, this book is like:

• Donuts accompanied by 18 year old Glenfiddich
• Watching an amusing and, yet, incredibly moving and poignant Pixar movie. So, all of them, except Cars & Cars 2 (the headlights should be the eyes! The headlights!)
• Spending all afternoon reading Star magazines at the nail salon while getting a super classy French manicure
• Taking B.S. college classes like Pop Culture Studies where the homework is watching The Simpsons.

Read this book and fall in love with the Zombie novel again! I bet that quote makes the back cover of the paperback edition, mark my words.

4 out of 5 metaphors showing us that WE ARE THE ZOMBIES omg my liiiiiiiiife!

Dead Until Dark & Living Dead in Dallas

Sooooookay. Suh-kay. Suh-kaaaay. And Beeeel. Biiiilllll. Beee-luh? Lesson learned: it's hard to write in a Southern accent. So if you get annoyed watching True Blood and hearing Sookie & Bill dramatically call for each other, you might do better with the Charlaine Harris books the show is based on. However, although, take into account, the flip-side: there aren't enough adjectives in the English language to properly convey the glory of Alexander Skarsgard's giant, Swedish, and often nude form. So what will it be: brain candy books sans scenery-chewing or brain-candy HDTV with all its perks? I guess you can have both; you were never going to read War & Peace anyway.

3.5 Viking butts out of 5.

Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me?

The cover says it all - pink but not cloying, an awkward facial expression, and a title expressing FOMO. This taps into the slightly nerdy, slightly superficial, completely anxious 20-something female experience like nothing else!

Mindy Kaling got her big break by writing and performing in a play based on the idea that Matt Damon & Ben Affleck were trying to adapt The Catcher in the Rye into a movie when the screenplay for Good Will Hunting fell out of the sky into their laps. What's not to love? I have seen the play and it's great, and not unlike reading this book: full of pop culture references, short enough to not get bored with, and perfect to drop into casual conversations to seem smart but not pretentious.

The fact is that by reading this I learned that taking prenatal vitamins will make my hair thick and lustrous, and that's worth the price of a hardcover right there.

4 fad dieting books with titles like "Fat Brain, Fat Body: How Thinking is Sabotaging Your Skinny Soul" out of 5.

An Analysis of the Books I Read in 2011 aka Nerd Alert IV

Books read: 55

• Average # of books read/month: 4.6
• Non-fiction: 16 (29%)
• Fiction: 39 (71%)
• YA Fiction: 4 (7%)
• Books by male authors: 34 (61%)
• Books by female authors: 21 (39%)
• Disliked:14 (25%)
• Ambivalent about/sort of liked:9 (17%)
• Actively enjoyed: 32 (58%)

By Genre:

• Sci-Fi/Fantasy: 8
• Biography/Memoir: 7
• Science/Medical: 3.5 (I’m only counting the UFO book as half of a science book. There, are you happy skeptics???)
• Mystery/Thriller: 4
• Graphic novels: 0
• Spiritual: 1
• Poetry: 0 (This is bad/It makes me sad)
• Historical Fiction: 1
• Short story collections/Anthologies: 2
• Contemporary fiction: 5
• Books about food: 2
• History: 3
• Horror: 14
• Classics: 0 (Haha take THAT Literature!)
• Romance: 0

Compared to 2010:

• I read 23 fewer! Unbelievable. I blame society, and the presence of so many excellent scripted shows on television. Also I should probably stop re-reading huge, 1000+ page Stephen King books that I have already read. Especially when he’s still writing NEW 1000+ page books I have yet to read!/Give other authors a chance, Jane! (Ok my first book of 2012 was 11/22/63, but after that’s done I will branch out, I promise).
• I liked most of the books I read this year, a 20% increase over last year! If I was a company and those were my financial results, my shareholders would be rich! Which is to say, can I somehow make money from this book picking ability?
• I was all about revealing/trashy celebrity biographies this year - Oh-ooh-oh-ah-oh-prah's taking the cake, of course. Celebrities whose biographies I will seek out in 2012: Coco (does she have one? SHE MUST), Mindy Kaling, Darrell Hammond, Diane Keaton, Lucille Ball.

Notes & Superlatives

• Repeated authors: Stephen King (2 years running! I'm sure this means more to him than all his other accomplishments), and George R.R. Martin (ironic considering he finishes a book every 10 years). Wow this list is really earning it's nerd alert title.
• Authors I discovered this year: I'll definitely be picking up some other books by William Gay, Yannick Murphy, Ben Winters, and Jonathan Carroll.
• Favorite book of 2011 (fiction): The Call by Yannick Murphy. In a year filled with genre fiction this subtle epistolary story set on a farm surprised me with how much I enjoyed it and how much I kept thinking about it after the fact. I also really liked A Visit From the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan. I guess the Pulitzer Prize *does* mean something.
• Favorite book of 2011 (non-fiction): Bossypants! The only book I read last year to get 5 stars. Tina Fey you glorious monster, please never stop shining your light on our sad little world. I also really enjoyed Keith Richard's autobiography, if only for the pictures inside of a young, hot Keith, taken before his face turned into an old leather baseball mitt.
• Least Favorite book of 2011: Mini-Shopaholic. Maybe it was the recession but somehow I couldn't enjoy or relate to a book about an irresponsible twerp and her whiny brat shopping and having HIGH-larious misunderstandings and hi-jinks. OR Mockingjay, the third book in the Hunger Games series. This book should have never been written. If you do want to read the series (overall I give it a rating somewhere between a slightly interested raised eyebrow and a grunted "meh") stop after the second book. I beg of you!
• Funniest book of 2011: Bossypants. Even the cover with the disturbing man arms makes me laugh uncomfortably!
• Saddest book of 2011: The Long Goodbye, by Meghan O'Rourke. It's a memoir about her mother dying. I CAN'T. I love you mom!
• Scariest book of 2011: Bedbugs, by Ben Winters. I'm still feeling itchy and thinking every stray lint ball is the scouting party of a giant army of bloodthirsty insects.
• Things the books I read made me want to do this year: Go to Papua New Guinea, try umeboshi plums, check my mattress for bedbugs (see above), call my mom, be nicer to retail employees, add more sea vegetables to my diet, watch 80s movies, write more, and read more. Read everything!

What's your first book of 2012? Authors currently hanging out on my bedside table include Glen Duncan, Dorianne Laux, S.J. Watson, Mindy Kaling, Cormac McCarthy, Annie Proulx, and Louis de Bernières. It's going to be a good year....!

In sum: I love books. You should too. I now have a Nintendo Wii but I'll try not to let Mariokart eat into my reading time. YAY LIFE!