December is the cruelest month...

Not really, but since I am not going to (in all likeness) be able to finish my reading list this year (by four books), I now declare December a hostile month. Just kidding. I know T.S. Eliot had more to say about April than I have to say about December, so I'll leave it at that. I have been reading "On Bullshit," by Harry G. Frankfurt. The volume is a quick read through an intensely high discoursed theory on why is there so much bullshit in the world. It may or may not be humorous to some, but the fact that one can tell its "tongue in cheek" suaveness is a real treat. Prof. Frankfurt aims to answer "what is it, what it does and why is there so much of it." I have been touch and go in my reading of this, but I should be done before the week is out.

Since I have so much to do before "The Silence of this Wall" comes out in print, my reading list for the year 2008 is rather limited in scope. I will be reading "classics" primarily, but I have added some re-reads to the list because I feel they are essential to my growth as a writer. One of these is a beautifully, mint-condition, first printing of Umberto Eco's "Foucault's Pendulum." If you have never read it, I can only describe it as magical. It is really one of the most fantastic and well-written books in the world (no exaggeration, as the NYT once said about "One Hundred Years of Solitude," "This book should be required reading for the entire human race."). My love for "Foucault's Pendulum" grew out of a road-trip I had with a very wealthy friend who, while being in college, had a $85,000 car. We took his BMW all the way to Washington, DC all the while listening to Tim Currey masterfully reading it in Audio Book (here is a sample reading). I was hooked immediately. If you have read that book by a guy named Dan Brown, then you'll know where all those accusations of plagiarism came from if you read "Foucault's Pendulum." At any rate, that and some other "classics" will be my reading list for next year: some Dickens, more Brontes, Tolstoy, etc.