Resolution52 – Brian Utley & Jenny Dalton

Christmas morning. I don’t remember the exact words, but it was something along the lines of “it looked like something you’d be interested in”. A present from Jenny. The book was VERY interesting, one of the most engaging books I’ve read in a long time, with a cast of authentic and relatable characters. While reading a book that focuses on how little people really know about each other, I reflected, in turn, on how well Jenny did know me, with the book as solid proof right there in front of my face. Jenny and I are different in many ways, but we know each other. She knows enough to read a few words on a book cover and know it’s right up my alley. I’m glad I have that in my life.

I was primarily impressed by the imagination of the author, writing from the perspective of so many different people, and doing it so aptly. It never seemed like it was a single author writing about several different characters, using only his limited knowledge of life gained from his own experience. It ALWAYS seemed like a very personal 1st person narrative. Each writer brutally honest, sincere, and completely revealed, with all their faults and weaknesses. To quote NYT: “[the book] is so good I had to read it twice simply to figure out how he pulled it off. I still haven’t answered that question, nor do I know how someone so young … could have acquired such a precocious grasp of human foibles. The novel is alternately hilarious and heart-wrenching, and it’s assembled like a Rubik’s Cube.”

The views were refreshing. We all struggle. We all have fears and pain and fight the feeling of loneliness. These characters buoyed me not by telling me the loneliness was going away, or that there is always a resolution, they buoyed me because in a lot of ways we are all the same, we all have our frailties, and because of this, we’re not alone. We all fight the good fight, and even though the book was filled with failure and ineptitude, could there be any other single unchangeable thing that we all have in common and ties us all together than our lack of perfection?

I get trapped in the idea of judging myself in many areas based on the relative “distance” I am from someone else in those areas. For instance, if I wanted to be an accomplished author, I picked the wrong book to read because the author is a couple years younger than me and has written a bestseller. Some of the characters were the same, measuring their success on how successful those around them are, or have been. The reader’s advantage is being able to see all the characters from above and see that when comparing people, success, happiness, there is no usable metric. I can’t help but feel that if someone tried to use a metric, deep down inside it would be skewed to side of “I’m not doing enough”. There’s the young, rich publisher who is as alone and as empty as Scrooge himself, and then there’s the old, destitute, and redundant writer who finds safety in a charitable and unconditionally loving son. And who’s better off? Money, family, career, love, accomplishments….In the algorithm of life and happiness, which elements are worth more than others?

2012, Book Thoughts Brian Utley, the imperfectionists

So here I am, 732 days later.  I’m gonna do something again.  Coming into December I’m always thinking of the past year and the year ahead, and much like December of ’08, I’m thinking about resolutions and accomplishment.  It has been a couple years since I was last here and now I am returning.  I remember ’09 to be a great year filled with lots of amazing memories and images conjured by the 52 books.

This attempt will be a little different than ’09 though, this time I won’t be doing it alone.

Jenny is a mother of two and owner of many books.  She graduated Summa Cum Awesome with a degree in English Literature and has earned several teaching certificates.  She is a voracious reader, follower of celebrity gossip (of which she keeps me well informed), and has an estimated IQ of 213 (I’m good at estimations)  So yea, she’s a genius, and the funniest  person I know.  A small portion of Jenny’s appeal is her lack of concern about publishing her life online, coincidentally, she has NO online presence.  But if there is one thing she loves, it’s literature, so she agreed to be a part of Resolution52, ’12 and I’m very excited because of it.  The site will no doubt be richer, more insightful, and funnier than it currently is, and you will, in time see that.  I’m very excited. It’s a natural partnership.  From the day we met, one year ago, with help from Hornby & Sedaris, books have connected us.  One of  our favorite pastimes is discussing books and authors.  Visits to the Beehive Tea Room are often followed by trips to the used bookstore of Ken Saunders, where we peruse the shelves and recant memories and events that certain books bring up from the past.  And what she says captivates me.  What she says tells me I’m not alone.  And in a certain way, her views and her intelligence and her passion for understanding that is beyond explanation, draws me to her constantly.  We explore our past as we explore the shelves and then leave hand in hand knowing more about each other and knowing more about literature.  Of course there is more to Brian & Jenny than that, but this is a website about literature, not couplehood.  But with her I don’t need to explain what I’m explaining.  She is a woman of unique insight, of incomparable intelligence, and visits to the bookstore are like a cheat sheet into understanding the power that she possesses, the understanding of the world that she holds close and on rare occasions lets me have a quick peak.  And what I see is wondrous, and I beg for more, more of this woman that is unlike any other, a woman that I’ve only imagined in once-thought impossible worlds.

We began reading together a few months ago, without a thought about Resolution52.  I began reading The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes and shortly after, she began reading Murder of The Orient Express by Agatha Christie and followed that up with The Murder of Roger Ackroyd as I was finishing Holmes.  Them we swapped.  She told me I would enjoy Agatha Christie.  It was that simple.  See, Jenny knows things.  She knows what’s important and enjoyable and rewarding.  She also knows me better than most people.  So when Jenny says I would enjoy something, I don’t need convincing.  If she thinks it, I know it will be so.  So, I read my very first mystery novel ever.  EVER.

And I’m entranced.  I’m entertained.  I’ve learned once again that this woman will bring amazing things to my life.  I know she knows me.  I know she’s seen my collection of books (which she helped shelve), listened to me pontificate, and because of the trust I have in her, she wouldn’t say something is good unless it is.  And this is my new gospel.  And her recommendations are held in the highest regard, as I hold her character, which is as close to flawless as I ever thought possible.

This year we will share with you what we find in literature, in ourselves, and occasionally, if you’ll allow us, in each other.  And I know she’ll pester me about how many commas I just used, and I’ll smile when she does, knowing that she’s probably right, and knowing that I’ll work on it.  Because she’s smarter than me, smarter than most, and having her in my life will reap rewards beyond what I can express in a blog post.  But this much I can tell you, she sees things that only the unique and gifted can see.  She’ll entertain you and teach you and keep you coming back.  Because she’s that type of woman, with exquisite taste.  She doesn’t waste her moments of reading, each word counts for her.  It’s worth it to listen to what she has to say, and I for one can’t wait to hear what that is.

Book Thoughts, Mystery Novels Agatha Christie, Brian Utley, Jenny Dalton, Resolutions, Sherlock Holmes

I’m really tired but also a little anxious and quite a bit relieved. Reggie and Bob weren’t doing it for me either. A commenter posited that it was so hard to find a book because #52 was supposed to mean something more, something to speak for the previous 51 books, to represent. And yes, I agree. I couldn’t choose a book that seemed appropriate for the final book.

I was avoiding reading In Our Strange Gardens because of it’s length. It’s only 80 pages when translated from French. How could I end the resolution with an 80 page book? But all day today I was telling myself that the resolution was over, that 51 had to be where it ended. I even got into bed telling myself it was over, you can relax now, it’s done and 51 is just fine. I hadn’t completed a book in almost a month.

Then I looked over at the book that my sister let me borrow and I just started reading. She really beamed up when she loaned it to me, and I still hear those words that I so often say to other people, “I can’t tell you why I loved it, I just did”. I guess that stuck with me.

So, resigned to failure I started reading the book and a few hours later I had it finished, and yes, it is a wonderful book. So simple and true, and much more full of life than other books with a higher page count with more to say that is quickly forgotten. But not here, not with these characters and these sacrifices and how the story is told, with the end at the beginning, the beginning in the middle, and the end back where you started the whole thing. And through this whole circuitous read you are totally engaged, and time fades away, and before I knew it, I had my 52 books.

Book Thoughts

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Book Thoughts

So it took me longer than usual to finish Ghost. It wasn’t that it wasn’t enjoyable, because it was. It was everything that I thought it would be. I just got busy, as people do. While I was in the middle I did pick up a book about baseball. Sometimes that just happens. I read a collection of essays by the late Yale President and Baseball Commissioner, A. Bartlett Giamatti called A Great and Glorious Game. I started that book on 11/21 and finished it on 11/24. I started Ghost on 11/16 and finished on 12/02. It wasn’t until today, 4 days later, that I decided on what book to finish the year with.

I’m gonna challenge myself a bit and end strong. Right now I’m not really feeling the joy of reading as much as I usually do. Reading is tough work sometimes and lately other things have just taken priority over it. So I’m ending the year with the largest book I’ve read this year, a biography of Einstein. Hopefully by undertaking this large of a book I’ll get the drive back. I’ve been wanting to read an Einstein biography for a long time and I’ve heard great things about this particular one. And this biography is relatively new.

So, 704 pages in 25 days. Only two books this year, NurtureShock and The Fountainhead, have taken me longer than 20 days. The Fountainhead took the longest to read at exactly…25 days. For the first 51 books it took me, on average, 6.8 days per book. Wish me luck, I’ll need it for this one.

Book Thoughts

Take my word for it, Einstein’s Dreams is one of the coolest books on the planet. If you don’t believe me, read it. If you read and don’t like it, well I guess that’s ok.

I don’t always keep up with the latest books from my favorite authors. There are many favorite authors. Alan Lightman sneaked one past me called Ghost. And it’s already in paperback so I’ve been clueless for quite some time.

So it’s fitting that BIG #50 is a book by one of my favorite authors. Fifty is important, especially with several weeks left in the year. And as always I’m pondering what’s next. I haven’t come to any sort of conclusion for ’10 but I’ll think of something. Or not.

Book Thoughts Alan Lightman, Einsteins Dreams, Ghost