Contemporary Fiction: True Believers by Kurt Andersen

I decided to post about Kurt Andersen's latest novel True Believers. It is a reflective story about one woman's experiences growing up in 1960s America, and how her decisions back then led her to the life she is living now. One decision in particular will follow her out of the 60s, and lead her to another decision that could once again change everything.

The Situation: Karen Hollander has led in incredible career as a celebrated attorney...in fact, she is so celebrated and accomplished that she was recently nominated for the Supreme Court. She has even written several successful books, but has just now decided to wrote her memoirs. Her fear is that, as she gets older, the memories will be harder to recall with any real clarity. She is already 64, and has heard that memories can really start deteriorating around the age of 65. She admits (or boasts, it is hard to tell which) that she is reliable and conscientious to a fault, which comes in handy as she has kept years worth of notes she has taken, newspaper articles she has clipped out, and mementos she has been given, all to help her remember exactly what happened in 1968. If she is going to publish a tell-all book about the one moment that changed her life (and a few other lives), - the one main thing that motivated her to turn down the nomination to the Supreme Court - then she wants to get it right. As Karen begins telling the story of her life during the 60s, it all seems innocent enough as she describes herself along with her two best friends playing James Bond and executing fake missions that they came up with themselves during a period of being obsessed with the Ian Fleming books. 

The Problem: At some point, when Karen and her friends are no longer just children, and they have long stopped "just playing," things get very real and very quick. Karen and her two friends are now in college in Boston and have picked up a fourth member, and all four of them are part of the larger group of protesters in the 1960s who were against the Vietnam War. By 1968, the Bond villains they pretended to chase and the Bond girls Karen used to pretend to be seem like a supremely childish fantasy as there is the new villain of LBJ and his refusal to stop this war. So instead of pretending, Karen's little group decides to take real actions that have real consequences. Kind of adds a new twist to that line everyone hears as a kid (and sometimes as adults), "It's all fun and games until someone gets hurt."

Genre, Themes, History: This is a reflective coming of age tale told by someone looking back on their life during a specific decade, and in this case, that decade is the 1960s. It could be argued to be a historical fiction novel because of this, but I would also like to argue for it to possibly be an adventure novel or even a political one. From the time Karen and her friends start reading James Bond novels up until high school, they enjoy acting out fake missions throughout Chicago that they have put together themselves. They only stop doing so because, as everyone seems to do when they hit high school, they grow up and decide that this play acting thing is beneath them and, more importantly, they fear they'll be made fun of if anyone from their high school were to find out. But the book also starts to get more political as Karen talks about her teenage years, because this is when the Vietnam War, the rioting, the protesting, and the all-around craziness of the 60s comes in. General themes of luck, religion, and free will are discussed, as well as how different advancements (TV, the Internet, social media) have shaped how teenagers interact and respond today versus how they did when Karen was growing up.

My Verdict: I have very little to take issue with in this book. I enjoyed it a great deal, and especially appreciate the high attention to detail Andersen seemed to put into the story, specifically with the reflective parts that took place in the 60s. It sometimes read more like a memoir than it did a fiction novel, and for those of us too young to know just how crazy the 60s were, I feel like Andersen gives us a pretty fair representation that shows that while things may be crazy in the new millennium, that craziness isn't all that new to our society. The few things I do take issue with are the same things I take issue with in a lot of contemporary novels, and that is the seemingly trendy and popular literary device of having at least one homosexual character, and another that has turned their back on religion...and sometimes they are the same person. I give Andersen more of a pass because in his novel, these two characters are very well-developed and it does not at all seem like something he just wrote in there because everyone else is doing it. Andersen also puts them in the 1960s backdrop, which immediately gives these characters a different sort of depth than I have seen in other contemporary novels. However, everyone else is doing it, so that makes it hard to look past it either way. Even so, I enjoyed the book immensely and learned way more about the 1960s and James Bond books and movies than I ever thought I wanted to. The additional historical knowledge alone made the book worth it.

My Favorite Moment: When Karen admits that she and her revolution minded friends weren't as revolutionary as they thought themselves to be at the time. In reality, they were teenagers that just happened to grow up in the 1960s. And like every teenager throughout the history of time, they thought they had it all figured out, only to find out they don't, and acting like they did was going to cost them.

My Favorite Character: This was difficult for me since this is a mostly coming of age novel, and pre-teens/teenagers have the capacity to annoy me...especially self-righteous ones who think they're the only ones who truly "get it." So I chose Karen's sometimes boyfriend, Stewart, who is basically able to dig up the most hidden background information on pretty much anyone. He won't even say words and phrases like "FBI" or "CIA" out loud in public, can have what basically amounts to lie-detecting software installed on his phone at any time while having a conversation with you, and is the type to use disposable cell phones for certain types of conversations. Basically, Karen grew up to have a relationship with a very Bond-like person.

Recommended Reading: If I had read any of the Bond novels I would recommend one of them here, but I haven't, so I guess I really can't do that. So instead I will suggest Coming of Age in Mississippi by Anne Moody, an actual memoir written by an African-American woman who participated in sit-ins in the 1960s. I actually had to read this book for an intro history course and ended up enjoying it a great deal. It is a great first-hand account written from the perspective of a black person.

Classic Fiction: Brave New World by Aldous Huxley

Aldous Huxley's Brave New World is another one of those classic books that I was somehow never forced to read as a kid, but probably should have been. It belongs in that category with 1984 and Catch-22, but somehow not Catcher in the Rye, as I have come to believe that no one should be forced to that...ever. And with this being my first post of the new year, it felt appropriate to start 2013 off with a book about the future.

The Situation: Bernard Marx is a sleep-learning specialist in London, England. It is what would be the year 2540 to us, but the future society that Bernard lives in know it as the year A.F. 632 (A.F. stands for After Ford). Henry Ford, due to his discovery and advancements with the assembly line, has become a messianic figure to this world, as everything is now about efficiency and consumption and keeping everyone sublimely happy. The way they do this is by extensive conditioning from birth. Bernard is an Alpha, which places him on the top rung of society. But even if he was a Gamma or even an Epsilon, he would still be content with his station in life. In fact, he would be happy that he was not an Alpha, because he was conditioned to be perpetually content even before his birth. And with everyone content in their lot in life, and with everyone given a specific purpose and job in society, and with everyone encouraged, almost mandated, to have as many sexual partners as possible and to not limit themselves to one person ever, this is one of those "utopian" societies where everything does seem to be pretty perfect and everyone actually is happy. 

The Problem: Everything is not perfect. First, Bernard is not completely happy, despite being an Alpha, and despite being conditioned from birth to be content where he is. He is shorter than most of the Alpha males, and it is believed something went wrong during his early conditioning. While he gets a decent number of women, he doesn't get as many as other Alphas, and this has made him resentful and bitter. In fact, he is now resentful to the point that he has thoughts and ideas that undermine the practices of the society he inhabits. Eventually, while on holiday to a savage resort, where men and women are still born instead of manufactured through a tube, and don't have all of the advancements of the civilized society, he makes a discovery that brings him the fame and recognition he has always desired. But because of his own arrogance, his discovery not only brings down a few people in front of him, but may cause him to lose this society that has just started to recognize him - a society he now sees the value of, now that he is on top.

Genre, Themes, History: Brave New World is a dystopian novel that I would also like to put in the category of science fiction due to its taking place far in the future and describing technological advancements that we have yet to see in our lifetime. For me, the main underlying theme of this novel is that of free will. The people in Bernard's society do have free will, but they have been conditioned to only want to do a specific set of things, and they are truly happy despite their ignorance (in Huxley's novel, ignorance truly is bliss). The argument is that to go back to the way things were before Ford, where people could read Shakespeare, choose to worship God or Allah or whatever entity they choose, make groundbreaking scientific discoveries, appreciate art and music, etc, is to make people miserable again, which leads to strife and conflict and war. Also, if people are reading and listening to music, it is argued that they aren't consuming, and this society runs on consumption. It's like George Orwell's 1984, except most of the people are actually happy and the government tries to make sure they stay that way. It also appears that the entire world is on the same page. And those that don't conform to this world aren't exterminated as they would be by Orwell's Thought Police, but instead they are banished to an island to be with the other free thinkers. 

My Verdict: While the book didn't change my world or anything, I did enjoy it and found the dystopian society that Huxley presented here incredibly fascinating. It is hard to imagine a world where no one is ever a mother or a father because children are no longer born, but that is what Huxley presents to us here. And by presenting a society that actually tries to make everyone happy as opposed to just controlling them, Huxley gives the reader the chance to decide for themselves if forced happiness is better than true free will with all of its downsides.

Favorite Moment: When Bernard's friend, Helmholtz, is able to see right through Bernard for the hypocrite he is. All of a sudden Bernard is okay with this society he lives in only because he is currently its shining star.

Favorite Character: I would definitely pick Helmholtz. He actually doesn't have that big of a part in the book but he is somewhat of a free thinker like Bernard, but he isn't a hypocrite about it. Granted, he always enjoys more benefits than Bernard ever could, so he isn't bitter, but he still seems to be able to see society for what it is.

Recommended Reading:I can easily recommend George Orwell's 1984, as it is another dystopian novel set in England, but not quite as far in the future. Both books present a world very far removed from our own experience, but yet, they still manage to make us slightly uncomfortable because some of the issues and ideas hit a little too close to home, and may not be that far away from where we are now.

Historical Fiction: Loving Frank by Nancy Horan

Nancy Horan's Loving Frank is a historical fiction novel about the love affair between Martha "Mamah" Borthwick and the famous Chicago architect Frank Lloyd Wright in the early 20th century. The life and work of Frank Lloyd Wright is not something I am all that familiar with, but I was curious to get even a brief glimpse or snapshot into his life and maybe even how he worked.

The Situation: Mamah Borthwick and Frank Lloyd Wright met when Frank was designing her future home in the now famous Oak Park in Chicago. Frank had already designed a few of the houses in the area and would go on to design a few more. His artistry and genius were already well known before he and Mamah meet. And after realizing their attraction for one another, Frank and Mamah would take off on a tour of Europe before finally settling in Wisconsin. While Frank seems to be constantly thinking, designing, and building, Mamah indulges her own interests of writing and translating. She even takes classes while in Europe to learn Swedish so she can better translate for a well-known feminist writer. Frank and Mamah are undeniably in love with each other and are determined to attempt to build a life together.

The Problem: Both Frank and Mamah have already built separate lives with two other people that they are still married to, even after they take off to Europe together. The scandal makes front page Chicago news almost immediately, and no matter where the couple runs off to, the story follows them everywhere, as do the reporters. And while Frank and Mamah attempt to hide out everywhere but Chicago, the family that they have left behind, including their children, and Mamah's quiet, grounded, and somewhat guarded sister Lizzie, are left to deal with the scandal on their own. Mamah's two young children are left wondering where their mother is, and Frank's six children are left without their father. And while both Frank's wife and Mamah's husband are refusing to grant divorces, the scandalous couple are coming to the realization that what they abandoned their families for may not be what they thought it was. They each feel they have a right and claim to the true "free love," but what are they willing to sacrifice in order to have it?

Genre, Themes, History: As I already mentioned, Loving Frank is historical fiction. Frank Lloyd Wright really did have a love affair with Mamah Borthwick in the early 20th century, and while a lot of what Horan put down on paper is fiction, she does follow the major events of the couple's life, as well as their travels and their work. Even a few of the letters included in the novel come from real correspondence. And Horan claims that the newspaper articles included in the novel came from real articles that were published at the time. Themes include women's rights, family obligations, and the right to happiness. Even in Chicago, before she runs off with Frank, Mamah was heavily involved in women's rights and getting women the right to vote. While in Europe, she meets up with a well-known feminist writer and agrees to translate her works for her, even though there are some parts of her beliefs that she does not agree with. Also, all throughout the book Mamah struggles with her desire to be happy and be able to love who she wants, and the fact that she has basically abandoned her children in order to enjoy that right. It is a constant struggle, and it is one that Mamah has to constantly re-evaluate and reasses as she tries to make this new life work with Frank.

My Verdict: If Horan's goal was to make Mamah likable and relatable, then I am afraid she failed as far as I am concerned. It is a difficult thing to make someone who willingly abandons their children into a likable heroine, and I feel like Horan fell short. According to Horan's version of the story, Mamah does feel terrible about leaving her children behind while pursuing her relationship with Frank, and she constantly struggles with her decision and her desire to still be around her children. However, no matter how much she misses them and how bad she feels, she still refuses to return to Chicago, even though that is the only way she could be around them the majority of the time. Instead she hopes she can get more custody than her husband is ever willing to give, and she therefore ends up missing out on more and more of her children's lives. Instead of sacrificing so she can be with them, she decides the only way she can be with them is if she is able to keep the life she has been living at the same time. In other words, she is sorry her decision has taken her away from them, but not sorry enough to really do much about it. And even with all of Mamah's arguments about women deserving to be happy, even if that means they have to leave their husbands to do it, I just couldn't be on her side. And I couldn't relate to Frank either as he leaves his own wife and six kids, and is portrayed as a pompous genius who feels like people should feel privileged to have him work for them. Horan presented two main characters that I really didn't like, and that just ruined most of the book for me.

Favorite Moment: When Mamah realizes that the real Frank is very different from the man she left her family for. He is arrogant, selfish, self-serving, and cannot manage his money. It was basically the moment I had been waiting for during the entire book.

Favorite Character: I honestly didn't care for any of them. Frank and Mamah are at the forefront of the entire story and I was basically just waiting for their downfall. I did appreciate Mamah's sister Lizzie, who told Mamah upfront about how her decisions have affected all of them, and was probably the one who was able to get through to her sister the most.

Recommended Reading: If you're into historical fiction and like stories that also talk about the women's movement and women's freedoms in the early 20th century, then I would recommend Laura Moriarty's The Chaperone. I liked it much more than I did Loving Frank, as the characters are more relatable and the story is about more than just one couple.

Young Adult Fiction: Thirteen Reasons Why by Jay Asher

After reading the Future of Us, I decided to pick up Jay Asher's first novel, Thirteen Reasons Why. The premise alone - a young man learns more about the events that lead to a schoolmate's suicide through the prerecorded tapes she left behind - is enough to make most anyone want to know more. So I was curious to see how Asher was going to handle both this ambitious premise and the sensitive issue of teen suicide.

The Situation: Clay Jensen is your average teenage boy. Actually, according to pretty much everyone, Clay is better than your average teenage boy. No one seems to have anything bad to say about him. Hannah Baker was already pretty curious about Clay, and the lack of negative information about him only made her want to know more. Hannah and Clay have brief encounters either at school, or at the movie theater where they work, but unbeknownst to both of them, the other one desperately wants to have a deeper relationship. But on the day that Clay receives a mysterious package with no return address, that opportunity is already long gone with no hope of ever returning.

The Problem: The package is a set of seven tapes that Hannah recorded no more than a few days before she decided to take her own life. By the time Clay receives the tapes, Hannah has been dead a few weeks, and the school and community are still in mourning. But the tapes will bring a different sort of grief. Each side of the tape names a different person and event that Hannah blames for leading her to her ultimate decision. And the people that are receiving these tapes are the people she names on them, which apparently include nice guy Clay. And he will spend the next few hours, over the course of one night, starting from when he got him from school, listening to all seven tapes and finding out all 13 reasons why Hannah decided to take her own life.

Genre, Themes, History: This book is a young adult fiction novel which, to me, the overarching theme of is that hindsight is 20/20. And maybe also that high school, and the people in it, ultimately suck. Many of the events that Hannah recounts Clay was a witness of, and there are many things he starts to wish he would have done differently. And while I was definitely not a fan of high school while I was in it (or now even), it does seem to me that Hannah had to deal with an insane amount of awful people. I get it...teenagers can be cruel, but Hannah's high school seemed to have more than its fair share. And the book also throws out the idea that even if we could go back, knowing what we know now, would we do anything differently? And maybe more importantly, would it really matter? Would the outcome change at all? And how much of the stuff that happens to us are we allowed to blame on other people? At what point do we take responsibility for our own fate?

My Verdict: And it is those last two questions from the previous section that cause me to take issue with this book. Well, maybe not take issue with the entire book, but at least with the character of Hannah. It seems to me that of the 13 reasons why she took her own life, only four of them are actually a really big deal...and  two of those didn't even happen to her personally. In fact, she sort of serves as an accomplice. And with a few of these people, her argument is that they didn't care enough about her or about anyone outside of themselves to help her. But my argument is that this is the great lesson of high school...you kind of have to look out for yourself, because no one else is going to do it for you. And maybe that is the lesson of this book, that you can't really blame others the way Hannah does for stuff that happens to you. Because if the actual point is to say that Hannah is justified in wanting to haunt the people she blames for her decision to take her own life, then I take issue with that. But if it is something more along the lines of how everything we say and do to other people, and I mean everything, has an effect, positive or negative, then I could get behind that.

Aside from how I feel about how the book handled heavy issues such as bullying and teenage suicide, I also felt like there was more Asher could have done with this scenario. It is such a strong and interesting premise, and I feel like Asher just doesn't take it far enough. And for some reason, I don't believe Clay's emotional investment in Hannah's life. Some things just feel like they are missing here.

Favorite Moment: When Clay starts to realize that Hannah may be just as much to blame for her decisions as the people she names on the tapes. 

Favorite Character: All in all, Clay actually is a really nice guy. He's loyal, a good student, caring, empathetic...it makes sense why Hannah would gravitate towards him, especially considering her track record with other guys at her school.

Recommended Reading: I have to recommend Asher's book The Future of Us, which he wrote with Carolyn Mackler. With the use of Facebook, this book looks at what teenagers will do when given access to what their futures will look like as well as the ability to possibly alter it.   

Science Fiction: Angelmaker by Nick Harkaway

My selection for this week is yet another nominee for the 2012 Goodreads Choice Awards. Nick Harkaway's Angelmaker was nominated for the category of Best Science Fiction, but was beat out by Terri Pratchett and Stephen Baxter's The Long Earth. Even so, after reading the synopsis and the reviews, my interest was sufficiently piqued.

The Situation: Joe Spork is a clockworker attempting to live a quiet life in Britain, repairing clocks in his failing business and trying unsuccessfully to carry through assassination attempts on a local menacing cat. I say that Joe is "attempting" to live the quiet life, because his father was a well-known and notorious gangster. And a gangsters life is exactly the kind of life Joe wishes to avoid. He wishes to follow more closely in the footsteps of his grandfather rather than his father. It is his grandfather who taught him about clockworking, and he shares his grandfather's view concerning his father's life, and wants nothing to do with it.

The Problem: Another reason why I say that Joe is "attemtping" to live the quiet life is because it is his very trade of clockworking that gets him into trouble. One particular machine that a client has entrusted him with turns out to be a very important piece to a doomsday device. Joe eventually figures this out, but unfortunately, some other very interested parties, that are also very dangerous, have figured this out as well. Soon it appears Joe's father's way of life has found him after all, and only by embracing his family's history will he be able to save the world as we know it.

Genre, Themes, History: Angelmaker is science fiction with a fabulous amount of dry British humor. There is just the right amount of the absolutely ridiculous to make it funny without causing it to lean too much outside of the realm of believability. This book also approaches the idea of an apocalypse in a new and originial way...at least to me. The doomsday device that is supposed to bring humanity to its knees is like nothing I would ever have imagined, causing me to see Harkaway as an incredibly creative and inventive writer. Also, there are zombies at one point. They may not be the focus and only have a brief appearance, but they are there. Another theme that comes up is something that always makes an excellent, but also incredibly tiresome, supervillain: the desire to want to be equal to God, and to also live forever. These two desires in an inheritantly evil person never manifest themselves for the goodwill of mankind. And these villains are also the hardest to kill because they will literally do anything to make their dream com true, despite the fact that it is impossible.

My Verdict: I am always pretty wary of science fiction, but this was absolutely delightful. It was refreshing and not too confusing (there were a few paragraphs I had to reread because I would realize a few pages avterwards that I clearly missed something very important), and as I mentioned before, pretty funny. And the story has a little bit of everything: there are spies, gangsters, complicated doomsday devices, a complicated family history unveiled in a wonderfully creative way, scary monks, zombies, a heinous supervillain, a viscous but still incredibly loveable pug, and bees. Yep, bees. There isn't as much science as I was expecting for a science fiction novel, but I still think science fiction lovers will enjoy it.

Favorite Moment: When all of the pieces of Joe's family history, and the truth about his grandparents, all comes together for him. The way Harkaway reveals it all just blew me away.

Favorite Character: I really want to pick Joe. He is a bit boring in the beginning, but steadily picks up steam and becomes a serious force by the end of the book. But I also appreciate Polly, the sister to Joe's ganster lawyer friend, Mercer. She may be a pretty face, but she isn't one to be messed with either.

Recommended Reading: Due to my limited knowledge and exposure to science fiction, I don't feel like I can adequately recommend another science fiction novel, but I would like to recommend George Orwell's 1984. Certain parts of Joe's interactions with the creepy monks remind me of Orwell's thought police and their methods of torture. I know...creepy.

Nonfiction: Wild by Cheryl Strayed

Cheryl Strayed's Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail is the winner for the Goodreads Choice Award for Best Memoir & Autobiography. I only recently learned about people who will hike along the Pacific Coast for varying amounts of time and for varying distances, and the idea absolutely fascinates me, mostly because it seems so impossible, and yet people do it all of the time. Strayed decided to do this exact thing, and Wild is her account of what lead her to do it, how the experience went, and how it changed her.

The Situation: Cheryl Strayed is a newly single 26 year-old woman trying to navigate life without her husband, her mother, her siblings, her stepfather, and any real stability in the form of a job or education. She bounces around from one waitressing job to another, just as she bounces around from one city to the next. This spiral began with the death of her mother a few years before due to cancer. Strayed's mother was the strong and solid anchor in her life, and now that she was gone, Strayed seems to have lost all of her focus, as well as everyone around her that she was close to.

The Problem: If all of that wasn't bad enough, Strayed has recently become attached to exactly the wrong kind of man. After happening to pick up the Pacific Crest Trail, Volume 1: California while waiting in line at an outdoor store, Strayed is almost inexplicably compelled to come back to the book, purchase it, and read it cover to cover. Eventually, the curiosity that lead her back to the book would lead her to save up her money, purchase hiking tools and gear slowly over the course of a few months, and then, finally, she would do the almost unthinkable (at least to a city girl like me) and decide to hike the Pacific Crest Trail, starting in the Mojave Desert, and ending at the Oregon-Washington border at what is called The Bridge of the Gods. She would do it alone. She would do it without ever having done any major hiking in her life. Needless to say, instead of getting rid of her current problems, the PCT was really only going to present her with a set of new ones.

Genre, Themes, History: Wild is a memoir that takes place in a very specific amount of time during Strayed's life. Actually, I would say the book is almost evenly split between how much she talks about the hike, and how much she talks about her past life leading up to the adventure on the PCT. The main driving force behind the entire experience seems to be the death of her mother. Strayed paints a picture of what the grieving process looked like for her, and how it took over every aspect of her own life, and then seemed to reach out and effect those around her. Strayed also showed what the grieving process looked like for her brother, her sister, her husband, and her stepfather, and how ultimately, these differences in methods lead to the separation between themselves.

Of course, it is nothing new for people to hike the PCT for long distances. The trail was designated a National Scenic Trail in 1968, even though it wasn't officially completed until 1993. So while Strayed wasn't exactly doing something original, she was doing something fairly rare being a single woman hiking the trail alone...and being completely inexperienced in the area. She meets plenty of people along the way, both hikers and non-hikers, that help shape her experience. And while there a short spurts where she hikes with others, for the most part, she tackles the trail alone. She insists on it.

My Verdict: I was being generous on Goodreads when I gave this book three stars. The only reason I held off on only giving it two stars was because of that one thing I always value in nonfiction, and this is honesty. Strayed is upfront about several things that put her in a less than favorable light. Sure, she ultimately accomplished this amazing thing that most of us would never even think of, but she admits to being incredibly broken, unprepared (and yet strangely over prepared in some areas), naive, lonely, desperate, and dead flat broke during the majority of this experience. Even so, that admirable honesty was not enough for me to want to put this with my most favorite of books. Sometimes her lack of preparation would get on my nerves, as would her surprise when something would inevitably go wrong, or at least not go the way she though it would. And her constant need to almost cling to every other male figure that crosses her path was beyond annoying. Ultimately, it felt like one of those stories of someone going on this insane adventure to "find themselves," when really they only want to escape their problems. However, if I ever met Strayed, I would want to give her a high five and have her tell me more about it.

Favorite Moment: When Albert, one of the many other hikers Strayed meets on the PCT, helps her purge her almost comically overstuffed pack. One of the many items he point blank asks her if she needs is a roll of condoms.

Recommended Reading: Strayed starts her journey with certain books , and slowly gets rid of those book as she reads them, while acquiring others with every package of supplies she receives at stops along the way. One of the many books she reads is The Complete Stories by Flannery O'Connor, a personal favorite of mine (and hers apparently). While Flannery O'Connor's short stories have little (or nothing, really) to do with hiking, I figured I would go ahead and recommend it...mostly because I have absolutely no clue what else I could recommend. But the stories are so good that I feel comfortable in my recommendation anyway. 

Winners for the 2012 Goodreads Choice Awards

Whoo-Hoo! Congratulations to John Green for winning Best Young Adult Fiction in the 2012 Goodreads Choice Awards with The Fault In Our Stars. 

I also am super excited to congratulate Susan Cain for Quiet winning Best Nonfiction. I adored this book so I am glad to see many others did too.

I would like to extend congratulations to every winner. After over one million votes, every winner should be honored to receive this recognition in the only book award that lets the people decide. There was some really stiff competition, but the people have spoken,

You can see all winners here http://www.goodreads.com/choiceawards. Even if your favorite didn't win, I know you can at least get some ideas on some other fabulous books to put on your reading list.