OK, so I have a problem. I like to read crappy books. Maybe "like" isn't the correct word as I really don't get much pleasure out of it. Maybe "feel compelled" is a better phrase. I just finished the latest book by John Sanford. He's a Minnesota author who wrote a series of books with "Prey" in their title. He's so cliche, predictable, and trite, and I can't keep myself from opening his books. When I'm done I feel dirty. I think so lowly of him and transfer that to me. I want to say that it's like a drug addiction but don't addicts actually feel good while they're high? And it's not like I don't know better. There are good writers that I enjoy: Shusaku Endo, Dostoyevsky, Chuck Klosterman; but I just can't say no to Mr. Sanford. Do other people do this too?

No.
you are a bad person.

Actually, the closest I can come is either Stephen King (who I love reading though, but wish I had spent that time reading something of more substance), or perhaps even closer would be christian books (I mean books sold in christian bookstores - not referring to Buechner or Merton or anyone of substance like that) - books that got onto my shelves before I knew there was better stuff out there and now I feel compelled every once in a whiile to read them, to sort of "catch up" and get them out of the way or something. I have a REAL hard time just taking a new unread book off my shelf and getting rid of it because I'm not interested in that sort of thing anymore.

Yes, other people do this too!!!!!

Oh my goodness, shame on Brook, he is a book slut too and he doesn't even know it! He reads all his B List books to get them out of the way before reading the Best Ones! Perhaps we should be reading the best books all the time but there is a time and place for everything.

Tonight at my family Christmas party, my conversations about books all revolved around authors and books I don't read much anymore. One cousin reads John Grishom and luckily I had read Bleachers b/c a friend had lent it to me and I actually enjoyed it quite a bit and he talked about how much he loved sports and related to the book. Do I consider that a classic? No, but I am so grateful I read it and connected with my cousin about it.

I love reading Nicholas Sparks and enjoy talking to my girlfriends at work about his books. They make us cry and stir up emotions...we can relate to these books and make connections to our real lives. My cousin's wife is really into the Confessions of a Shopoholic books and my other friend has told me about them. No, I haven't read them...yet. However, if enough people I care deeply about read them, even if they are not the most "respected" book, I will take the time to read them- and probably enjoy.

My cousin also had read Angels and Demons and was so excited about it. I had read Da Vinci Code and so again we had a great conversation about it. He actually causes me to think about reading it, in spite of the fact that I also want to read Crime and Punishment. He loves the version that came out with pictures to go along with it. An uncle brought me two books tonight. He knows I enjoy learning about history, so he brought me a James Michner book called Caribbean and a Stephen Ambrose book on Lewis and Clark (which actually looks very good!). Friends and family bring me books often and it is yet another opportunity for connection and that's what reading is largely about...connecting with the world.

More and more I feel out of the mainstream...I hear of authors that are "big" and mostly I don't have time to read them b/c I am reading the stuff that really reaches the deepest parts of me, challenge and excite me. However, at one point tonight I felt completely out of touch with the "literary" conversation, even though I know I read a million times more than my family! I never want to be so elite that I can't carry on a conversation with my family members.

When I was a child I read anything and everything even if I didn't know what it said! I find pleasure and relaxation in the act of reading. As children learn to read they often fluctuate between very easy material and more challenging. It is part of the natural process to go back and forth on this spectrum and actually necessary. Rereading is critical for children and rereading easy material! Does anyone remember how often you read Green Eggs and Ham? Who read Dick and Jane books?

My thought is, stop feeling guilty, just make sure to balance your book candy with substance! Enjoy your Sanford books and remember to try and find someone else that likes him too and have a conversation about it!

(*ahem*)

I'll have you know that my "B" list books are far superior to most people's "A" list books...
in fact, I don't know if you could truly find many "B" list books on my immaculate shelves...
they are overcrowded with nothing but the best...
a "B" list book to me is like Dostoevsky's Notes From Underground before I read the "A" list stuff like Crime And Punishment...
and I don't own one single god forsaken copy of anything Dan Brown has written...
NOR have I EVER read anything by TIM LAHAYE (unlike SOME people I know)...
If YOU want to go on letting illiterate people bully you into reading shite for the promise of their temporary acceptance of you, well that's your choice. I choose rather to sit in silent judgement on them. ("You enjoy that Left Behind / DaVinci Code / Stephen King (or...er...I mean...um...John Sanford) garabage?!? You're pathetic! I loathe your presense. Don't touch my books with your filthy illiterate hands! don't even LOOK at them! Leave my literarily superior presense and go do a Where's Waldo puzzle or something...")
I am NOT a book slut, I am an elitist snob. big difference. my way is better. superior
now if you'll excuse me, I have to go finish rereading Ulysses...

Nice, Brook. OK, what does it say for my slutdom that I can't even remember the guy's name. It's Sandford, not Sanford.

Everyone has their own guilty pleasure although you say you derive none. I'd still class him as one for you.

Cher

Sandford's main character in the "Prey" books is a Minneapolis cop named Lucas Davenport. He's independently wealthy, drives a Porsche, dresses in Armani, and in every book nails some chick and either shoots someone or gets shot. I also read another Minnesota author, Chuck Logan, whose main character is a cop from the nearby town of Stillwater. At a crime scene in one of Logan's novels, a Minneapolis cop who is obviously Sandford's Davenport makes an appearence and is ridiculed by the other cops. They make statements about him carving notches in his gun and on his penis. It's pretty funny, especially as a librarian once told me that the Minnesota authors' guild thinks Sandford is a total chump.

I wouldn't say you are a book slut, just that you have varied tastes. Just because someone enjoys the latest action/adventure/shoot'em up movie doesn't mean that they don't also enjoy a complex, plot driven movie with well constructed and developed characters in it. So too your love for cheesy detective novels doesn't make you a bad person. I have read/read lots of technical/scientific stuff every day. So for me, its nice to read something simpler with characters that are interesting and and a plot that moves relative fast, yet there isn't "Scarlet Letter" deep symbolism to it that I have to spend forever in a frickin day to understand.

Have you read any of Sandfords computer hacker/spy novels: "The Fool's Run","The Empress Files", "The Devils Code"? I like the protagonist Kidd, he's kind of an antihero. And the characters that he associates with are kinda interesting too.

Speaking of Minnesota authors, have you read anything by William Kent Krueger? He has written a fairly good detective series with a sheriff (Cork O'Connor) who is half Indian. I thought they were pretty good books myself. He's also written a few other books too, though I've only read one, "Devils Bed".

You know, I can't remember if I've read Sandford's computer hacker/spy novels. I do like PJ Tracy--they are a mother/daughter pair from MN that write mainly about a computer hacking team called MonkeeWrench. I haven't read Krueger, he sounds interesting, I think my librarian friend has mentioned him. I'll have to check some of his stuff out.

Yeah, but I bet he's laughing all the way to the bank! Somebody out there is obviously buying his books. I've never read one, but I've seen them.

Is he really that much different from Koontz, Turow, Grisham, King, Grafton, Doyle, Christie, etc.?

Cher

yes, yes i do indeed think you are a bit of a slut...

but so am i.

i love book sales -- have a shelf of books yet to be read.

have read some grissam(om, im, em..??) that i dug --most is crap.

have about 4 different copies of shakepear's sonnets.

there are worse things you could sale yourself for.


sluts are us!

peace,
zayne

there's nothing wrong with enjoying a bit of "trash". I was a lit major in college- but I'll read just about anything as long as I find it well written. that's the best thing about all kinds of "art," beauty is in the eyes of the beholder. true for everything from scifi channel fan fiction to derrida's lit crit. (sadly, I'm not well versed enough on either to do more than reference here. )
it's just like taking OtR out of your cd player to pop in the Black Eyed Peas or leaving the Louvre (ooh alliteration, how you make me smile) to admire graffiti on the outside walls. The variety is what makes the spectrum- and I find, each piece of art individually- richer.

That being said, come dump on my head for not being enough of an elitist, Brook.

I would never dump on anyone's head for not being an elitist...
there can only be so many of us before the word loses its meaning and appeal

hahahahahaha

[hijack]
brook,

you split my sides. thank you.
d.
[/hijack]