Entertainment Recommended Books

The Game by Neil Strauss

One of the benefits of having a flatmate employed by a good publishing house is the stream of books available to borrow. The most recent of these which I have taken advantage of is "The Game" by Neil Strauss [Amazon UK | USA].

Neil Strauss delves into the bizarre underworld of 'pick-up artist' - men who have devoted their lives to different techniques of seducing women. These are men with their own vernacular and codes of honour, who operate on-line and in person, who are so committed to honing their strategies that they give each other seminars and live together in shared houses - or 'Projects', as they like to call them.

I didn't imagine that the book would actually be particularly good, it having been described to me as a cross between a self help book and the braggings of a 'Pick Up Artist'. It is actually more of a expose of a sub-culture, an anthropological account of group dynamics and individual vulnerabilities. And it is funny, shocking, saddening, eye-opening on every page. Which makes for fairly compelling reading. For 'Heat' readers it has a liberal sprinkling of celebrity cameos by the likes of Courtney Love, Tom Cruise, Britney Spears and Paris Hilton.

Although the subject matter of the book is both manipulative and creepy, the thing that makes this book fascinating is the human angle. The notion that throwing money and time at a conference or course in picking up girls will be anything but detrimental plays itself out time after tragic time through the 450 or so pages. And I can only think Neil Strauss knew this before he started and set out with the intention of writing the book. How could he not have?

Regardless, The Game by Neil Strauss is nicely written (a reality novel), amusing and gripping. You should check it out.

The Wisdom of Crowds

The Bridges of Madison County: a book by Robert Waller

I picked up this book the other night at home, thought it might help me sleep. Obviously I'd heard of it but I knew nothing more about it. Like that it is the best selling fiction book of all time and it spent three years on the NYT bestseller list.

Sideways by Rex Pickett

A friend left Sideways (Amazon, £8.99) here at New Year and I've been meaning to read it since then. A couple of days ago I delved in and read it in a couple of days.

It is the story of Miles and Jack and a road trip they take through the Santa Ynez wine region of California to celebrate and commiserate Jack's looming marriage. At times funny, the book charts a course through the events which take place the week before the wedding. It gives insight into the seemingly successful but delusional Jack and the failed, almost broken and undoubtedly alcoholic Miles as they cling onto the past bonding, like junkies, only through successively more pathetic events. Only reluctantly, and in some cases by accident, are fresh beginnings seized. And only once every other opportunity to wallow in the mire has been exhausted.

I thought this was a pretty amusing book with fairly tragic characters. The back cover says that it is "thought provoking" and it certainly is that. It also says it is raucous and surprising. I don't know that I found it particularly surprising but it certainly had its raucous moments. The story of the book is surprising, seemingly partly autobiographical the author spills his soul into Miles with the same abandon that Miles spills wine into himself. In vino veritas?

I'm told that the movie of the film starts slowly but is a definite must-see. I'm also told that the movie improves upon the novel. I'm planning to see it soon so I'll post my thoughts when I have - the Sideways DVD is out on the 16th of May. I'd say that the book is definitely worth a read though.

The incidental wine references have been talked about much and they do add a little to the book, though this is by no means a wine textbook. It might endear to you a tasting trip however. Pick your companion wisely.

Snobs by Julian Fellowes

I read Snobs (Amazon £5.59) on the plane back from the US. The NYT said of it, "When you read a book, you're lost in time. All the more reason to read Snobs. It will distract you pleasantly. It's like a visit to an English country estate: breezy, beautiful and charming."

It is funny, sad, alarming, cringeworthy all at the same time. It makes you laugh at the pretences of the pretencious and wonder at the things people do for social advancement. And though these people own estates and what not their foibles are the same as people you know. While it is a book about Snobs, it is really a book about human nature and that we can all relate to.

Their is nothing very weighty about this, unless you get the hardback, but it is certainly a pleasant enough way to spend some time! And Julian Fellowes has a nice writing style, relaxed and very funny.

A Confederate General from Big Sur by Richard Brautigan

While I'm thinking about Books, I must tell you about "A Confederate General from Big Sur" which I read in the space of one journey up the A9 just before Christmas (it is only 150 pages, but still represents amazing value!). I bought it a few months ago because it was a Rebel Inc. book which (apart from Ask the Dust) I like a lot, and once I eventually got around to opening it I was enchanted. Richard Brautigan's first book to be published features short chapters and abstract ideas made and melded to form beautifully poetical prose. The back cover describes the story thus,

Jesse and Lee share a house owned by a very nice Chinese dentist, where it rains in the hall. They move to cabins on the cliffs at Big Sur where the deafening croaks of frogs can be temporarily silenced by the cry, 'Campbell's Soup'. Ultimately, we learn how the frogs are permanently silenced ... and dreams disperse around a fire into 186,000 endings per second.

In anticipating flower power and the ideals of the Sixties, Brautigan's debut novel was at least ten years before its time and remains a weird and brilliant classic.

I liked that not much really happens in this book. Sure, thing happen, but nothing of much significance. People sat around and chatted and smoked and went for journeys and just had a nice old time of it. And for convenience they did it in a pretty funny fashion.

The Broker by John Grisham

Oh, oh, a new John Grisham Book - The Broker is out. Now I know that these are kinda trashy but... can I resist buying it!? I'm kind of stuck bored in the middle of John Fante's "Ask the Dust" at the moment.

With fourteen years left on a twenty-year sentence, notorious Washington powerbroker Joel Blackman receives a surprise pardon from a lame duck President. He is smuggled out of the country on a military cargo plane, given a new identity, and tucked away in a small town in Italy. But Backman has serious enemies from his past. As the CIA watches him closely, the question is not whether he will be killed, but rather who will kill him first.

How to Lose Friends and Alienate People by Toby Young

I recently finished reading Toby Young's 'How to Lose Friends and Alienate People' [Amazon UK|US] - an autobiographical account of what happens when journalist Toby Young uproots his life in London to go and work as a contributing editor for Vanity Fair in New York. Toby Young seems to be one of those people who doesn't really understand why some behaviour in certain situations might not be appropriate. He hobnobs with celebrities and moguls and usually offends them just prior to falling out with them or their minders. He is continually outperformed in the US by his contemporary Alex de Silva, and indeed by pretty much everyone. Naturally, his relationship with Vanity Fair, as with countless dates and the 'best' bars, ends badly.

This is quite a funny book both because the author is decidedly odd which tends to lead to ridiculous situations. I think the author maybe thinks he's pretty funny too. His writing is amusing and throughout the book he uses footnotes to gives historical or political context, e.g. many references to Alexis de Tocqueville, the American dream and the idea that the US is a meritocracy.

The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown

Recently my friend Michael told me about a book called 'The Da Vinci Code', a thriller which so inspired him he booked a trip to Paris to check out the details. Not many books have that effect on people and I thought it worth checking out. In the bookstore yesterday I asked the first assistant I saw whether they had a book called "da vinci code.., or something like that." She smiled knowingly, apparently it contrives to somehow "fly off the shelves." The Assistant told me she was half way through its almost 600 pages, there are 10 million copies now in print and it recently became the best-selling hardback novel ever. While said assistant and I chatted, lady bystander picks up the book too, "Now you've got me interested!"

So I bought it and I read it. I'd only got to Chapter 6 by bedtime, but by 8am I was somewhere around Chapter 73 and by this evening the secrets had been spilled, I was finally able to put it down. The Da Vinci Code is a gripping story; a story of cryptography, art, religion, history, secrets, science and the Holy Grail. Based around facts and locations around Paris, London and Edinburgh, the book equips its reader for an arborescent voyage of discovery through future further reading, viewing and contemplation.

While The Da Vinci Code [Amazon UK, US] may well be open to charges that it is at times implausible or that the writing is perhaps not in itself a masterpiece, the book has other merit. Simply, it allows you to happily ignore everybody around you, delve headlong into the Holy Grail controversy and come out the other end with a new bunch of stuff you know you know too little of.