oprah and pulitzer agreed

In preparation for book club this evening I revamped our list of maybes. Every couple months I have everyone send me a couple of picks that they are interested in reading and then put them on our 'maybe' list. Then at the end of each meeting we pick from that list. We try to give everyone an equal chance to have their picks read. I think only MB gets shafted here and that is because she is a political addict sometimes, and the rest of the time will read whatever, so us loudmouths take over. So - to MB - I am sorry you get shafted.

My picks come from an amalgam of sources. What I happen to see in the book store, what I read about in the book reviews, what has been nominated for a big prize, and sometimes stuff suggested from Good Reads or Amazon.

Now here's the kicker. I disagree with critics ALL the time. Not a little, a lot - a whole lot. I am not happy with the folks who said that The Savage Detectives (last month's book club read) is awesome. Because it was not. It was well written, yes. But it was also convoluted and it became work to read it. To me, great literature should be well written and feel effortless to read. If I have to make myself read a book, then it does not go up there as a great book in my book.

Try as I might to pretend that critics will not shape my choices I still look on the Pulitzer site for book ideas, even though they are the same people who gave Doubt a prize over The Clean House! A travesty I tell you! I try to tell myself that it is never a waste of time to read a book, but then I read Ghosts by Banville and I realized - I will never get that time back. I could have been reading Zadie Smith or Jeanette Winterson.

Yet I cannot stop myself. I fall victim to the mindset that if the powers that be say something is good then I must partake. Lemming. It is a lemming mentality. I try to fight it, but I always go back. I wish I had a perfect tailor made hpmelon oracle for recommendations.

'Oh oracle, I am in the mood for something witty and irreverent, with a soupcon of danger. What do you recommend?'

Nice.