Brian

Brian’s Bookshelves

to-read‎ (246)
currently-reading‎ (2)

read‎ (39)
kindle-book‎ (35)

to-re-read‎ (31)
lost-in-the-flood‎ (5)

in-shopping-cart‎ (4)
a-stash-book‎ (2)

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Brian is Currently Reading

Brian is currently reading

The Adventurers

by Harold Robbins

bookshelves: to-re-read, currently-reading

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Brian said: " On my To Re-Read Pile:
I read this book in 9th grade. A the time, I had to read it when I could not get caught with it. Even though I had read other books by HR, THIS one was forbidden and vanished. When I found a copy in a used book store, I bought i On my To Re-Read Pile:
I read this book in 9th grade. A the time, I had to read it when I could not get caught with it. Even though I had read other books by HR, THIS one was forbidden and vanished. When I found a copy in a used book store, I bought it and sneaked it home. So, I had to read it in 10 - 20 page installments.
It was brutal and bloody. As we were involved in Vietnam at the time, this book made it clear that war was NOT the sterile thing that the war movies and TV shows I had watched made it out to be.
In those Pre-Sex Education days, I learned about sex the old fashioned way; listening to the guys who were "worldly wise" discussing it in locker rooms or behind someone's garage while they smoked. This book made it plain that they didn't know ANYTHING at all.
Now, I have been going back through some of the books that I read during that era to see how well they hold up. I hadn't planned to re-visit Robbins but several things lead me back to him.
In retrospect, this book seems to be at the peak of Robbin's career. I've seen several reviews stating that his first three books are classic and it was downhill from there. Without knowing for certain, I would suspect this is true for several reasons. They were written about the place and time where he grew up (NYC) and populated by people probably much like people he knew. They had the feel of their time. Later books were thinly veiled biographies of well known personalities. Secondly, as a budding author, he likely had a good editor. Authors had a hate-hate relationship with editors. Once they start hitting the best seller list, they have enough clout to say, "Editors. I don't need no steenking editor." And their publishers seem to go along. (If you saw how this review originally went, you would see that I edited about 90% of it out.)
From what I am seeing, The Adventurers is an awesome 400 - 500 page book, but it is unfortunately approaching 800 pages. This seems to be a major trend in publishing. Put together with a talent writer, an editor can turn good books into great ones.
So time to dig in to see how the book holds up. ...more "

Mar 19, 2015 12:45PM · see review

Brian is currently reading

Lilith

by J.R. Salamanca

bookshelves: currently-reading

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Brian said: " When I can get my blog up and running, people who are interested will be able to read my story of how I discovered my father's stash of dirty books. This was one of them. I can't find the cover from that particular edition listed, and I don't have it When I can get my blog up and running, people who are interested will be able to read my story of how I discovered my father's stash of dirty books. This was one of them. I can't find the cover from that particular edition listed, and I don't have it available, so I used the cover of the edition that I recently purchased. But that cover was a black cover, with the picture of a woman's picture who was obviously nude, but the lettering covered the stuff that I wanted to see. (How RUDE!) I flipped through, looking for interesting stuff, but didn't find anything. So I put this one aside.

The name Lilith fascinated me; the way it tripped over the tongue. But when I looked it up in our baby names book, it wasn't there (apparently it was not deemed to be a name you want to call a child. Looking the name up in an encyclopedia led to even more confusion. It said she was a succubus (whatever THAT was) and Adam's first wife (!!!!????). So I dutifully looked up succubus which turned out to be "a demon who visits men in the night (See Lilith)." To the best of my knowledge, this was the first instance I had of doing research and learning even less than I started with. I made the mistake of asking the school librarian if she knew where I might find information and she freaked out on me, telling me that I was better off following my studies instead of having my mind on "dirty" things. And this conversation was probably 7 - 10 years after this book had been published. Later I discovered that Warren Beatty had starred in the filmed version as Vincent, which aroused my curiosity further.

So the name Lilith languished in my mind for nearly 50 years, along with the word succubus, either occasionally coming to the forefront when I encountered them in reading, and slowly, I began to get a better picture of what all the subterfuge was hiding.

About 6 months ago, I decided to write a horror novel based on a motion picture that I had seen, but been dissatisfied with. The movie never even attempted to explain why the villain was doing this, or what he expected to gain from it. So I decided to add a succubus that he was trying to please who was also the source of his power. So what should I name her? Hmmmmm.... Lilith was supposed to be the first succubus, so let's go for it. So I formed a legend from the few bits and pieces that I was able to discover. A bit further research, and I discovered that several other writers had put the same pieces together in similar stories. Which led me back to this book.

Lilith is the story of Lilith Arthur who might or might not have been placed in an institution because she bucked the system (which would make her identify with the original Lilith as the legend goes that Lilith disdained the missionary position and left Adam to become a prostitute, later a succubus). I have read quite a fair amount of literature where an individual from a rich family is institutionalized because they are an embarrassment to their families. In sixth and seventh grade I had a friend whose mother had been institutionalized for many years and was sent home lobotomized. Reading between the lines, I suspect that she was an abused woman who was "sent away" by her husband because she tried to escape the marriage along with her two boys, but that is my second novel.) Given her name, Lilith Arthur identifies with the original Lilith and goes against the mores of her time.

The book was actually published in 1961, when I was first entering elementary school, and it was a very different publishing world from the publishing world of today. Mothers were considered to be a failure if they didn't fit the June Cleaver or Donna Reed mold. (I knew my family was a failure because neither parent was even CLOSE to the Cleaver mold.) The sexual revolution was still years off and would be 15 - 20 years before frank, honest sexual scenes were written in books that sold well. While I am aware that there had been attempts by such noted authors as Lawrence, Proust, and Joyce, these were still (and still are) outside of the common cannon.

At this writing, I am about 60 pages into the book and it is beautifully written. In the current publishing world this book would not be printed. Up until now, everything has been showing who the character is, and subtly cycling around to the asylum. I feel compelled to post the first paragraph from this book as I think it is one of the best ones I have read in a long time:

I grew up in a small Southern town which was different from most other towns because it contained an insane asylum. At the time I was growing up there, however, I did not think of this as a distinction. As we were aware of it from birth, it had for us who lived there no aspect of novelty; it was simply one of the facts of our existence, and belonged with the fire station, the clinic, the schoolhouse and the granary, among those elemental institutions by which life is both sustained and interpreted. I thought all towns had asylums. With the equanimity of a child I accepted the fact that there was madness everywhere, just as there were conflagration, illness, ignorance and hunger. I can, indeed, remember being disconcerted, somewhere around the age of twelve by the discovery that other towns did not have asylums and engaging in much troubled speculation as to how the insane people of these communities were disposed of.

The telling word here is "disposed". It obviously is meant to mean placed in it's particular proper place, but the more popular meaning of "discarded" is a subtext. In addition, Vincent points out 5 issues that need to be dealt with and only his town cares for all five, leaving him wondering how other towns deal with insanity. But the fact that he leaves out spiritual longing and the church is more revealing in what he does not include in his list of issues that society needs to deal with. This book needs to be read carefully as there are many words that I believe were carefully selected with multiple meanings.

Later, Vincent becomes an attendant at that asylum. He is obviously highly sexually and emotionally repressed himself. While the story isn't told, Vincent's father abandoned his young family and they are cared for by Vincent's grand parents. From an incident early on, it is obvious that female sexuality and madness were equated in that time. So one wonders if he is drawn to the asylum with the intention of exploring his own issues.

More as I get deeper into it. ...more "

Mar 25, 2015 08:29PM · see review