If anything, this proves my contention that I don’t Google myself: I found out from a poster here that I have won the ORBA (the Only Real Book Award) for having balls. (The link is entered in the comments section of the previous entry, for those who are curious.)
Of course, I’m flattered, although — neurotic, paranoid person that I am — I worry it’s a hoax, a very sophisticated way of mocking me. Have I made rash, self-important statements about having balls? (I know I made some about Barbie dolls in hardboiled novels, but that was years ago.) About literature and my role therein? (Pretty much none, in my recent natterings.) I also wish my friend, Elaine Viets, hadn’t been singled out as someone who criticizes awards for overlooking women. I think Elaine is very brave, speaking her mind. Then again, anyone who criticizes Elane is kind of brave, too, as Elaine is the walking example of what doesn’t kill me, makes me stronger — and then I kill it. I’m pretty sure Elaine has balls.
As do other female writers, complicated compliment that may be. Generally, I know being credited with gonads is always a compliment, and I’m cool with it. My language peeve is with “ball busting,” which I think men use a little too indiscriminately, until it becomes a way of saying “A woman disagrees with me.” I don’t think challenging a man on his opinion means challenging his masculinity. But I digress.
So, all in all, an honor. Thank you, anonymous committee, even if it does turn out that I have missed the joke and am actually being ridiculed. (I confess to skimming the blog, as I’ve actually been on a hiatus from reading anything about publishing and have even stopped reading positive reviews, as I found them inhibiting.) Thank you to the poster, who pointed the way.
Meanwhile, I’m going to go back to brooding that there’s something wrong with me because I read for story. Is it wrong to read a book such as Charles Baxter’s The Soul Thief largely to find out what happens? I love language, but it can’t sustain me through a novel, even a short one. Does that make me defective? Why do we read what we read? Not a rhetorical question, and I hope people will have something to say in the comments section.
Sarah,
I think we’ve emailed about this privately, but James Wood’s review of Lush Life just drove me around the bend. It not only ignited all the usual anger over the denigration of genre, but also made me feel insecure and stupid, as if I’m not a sophisticated enough reader. To me, Lush Life is a great achievement, I really have trouble faulting it. (And I definitely disagree with the reviewer who didn’t like
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Still, these reviews have made me wonder if I’m thinking enough when I read.
I read quickly, probably a little too quickly, which is arguably unfair to the writer, but perhaps more unfair to me. To say I went through CERTAIN GIRLS like a a hot knife through butter is not only a cliche, but it doesn’t get to how quickly I gulped that book down, greedy to know what happened to Cannie. I also think that Jennifer Weiner does something extraordinarily brave in the book, something so unexpected (and something that few would ever associate with chick fic) that I found it more moving and profound as a result. I’m being ellipitcal here, so as not to spoil the book, but it really messed with my head in a good way. It gets at one of those basic truths of life so simply; instead of stating a cliche, it shows how true some cliches are.
I too often read too fast, and in a way that feels greedy and nosy.
A high school English teacher once told my class that every choice limits future choices. That horrified me. Later, I discovered the quantum theorists’ idea of an infinite number of parallel universes, in which an infinite variety of possible outcomes play out — and that felt so right to me that it seemed to explain _everything_ I do, and most of all why I read.
In this life I will never be a gymnast or a bank robber or a Victorian soldier or a slave, but in the time it takes me to read a book, I can imagine what that might be like.
The best reading, for me, is an exercise in imagination and empathy, a way to ask what Simone Weil called the most important question: How are things with _you_?
Clair–your comments are amazing–thank you.
Why do I read what I read? First of all, I NEED to read–I get cranky if I’m not reading enough
. I read mysteries because of characters, to find out what happens, and because most of the time, something is resolved by the end of the book. I’ve be totally captivated by a science fiction series by Karen Traviss–I believe I was lead to these by a review in Locus Magazine, but I cannot put them down when I’m reading them. My husband has asked me to buy them because he wants to read a SF book (or two) that I find so enjoyable. Another amazing book I just read was These is My Words by Nancy Turner; it was recommended to me by a library patron years ago, but I picked it up now because it’s the One Book, One Arizona selection. It’s a wonderful book written in diary form by a pioneer woman in the late 1800s settling in the Arizona Territory. I am currently reading award nominees and winners of children’s books, as I have applied for 1 of 2 children’s librarian positions. Those are some of the reasons why–also I like to stay current with favorite authors. In an another interesting situation, I’ve been reading Bill Pronzini’s Nameless detective series, and there is one title where his character teams up with Colin Wilcox’s police character, giving me a whole other series to read. How does that parallel universe thing work again, Clair?
Happy Readings to All!
Patti
I’m feeling like a really insecure and unsophisticated reader; I couldn’t get through Lush Life OR the Woods review!
And comments like this one in the review, “Price has greater novelistic ambitions than his genre can accommodate” really make me scratch my head in confusion. I’m obviously missing something. I mean, I recently reread Crime & Punishment for a book group. It was as intense and fabulous this time around as I remembered it being years ago but it is a crime novel. The ‘genre’ can accomodate quite a bit.
I read because I love to read. I read everything – cereal boxes, newspaper ads, instructions, even, but mostly mystery books. As the experts say, I probably read because, as a child, I got tired of trying to get my parents to stop reading and do something else, so I joined them.
As a Math major in college, I bought all the English Lit. books from the bookstore – they never figured out why they couldn’t order enough for the classes.
I love and admire good writing – but I require a good story!
I plan to go and read some of the authors mentioned above – thanks for the hints.
By the way, the ORBA committee did ask for other women in the genre who are pushing themselves to write great books. I’ll throw out Jan Burke, S.J. Rozan and Margaret Maron as three women who meet those standards. And Val McDermid. Those are the first names that came to me. Not trying to start a contentious debate, or looking a gift (award) horse in the mouth, but I sincerely believe there are many, many more.
“Why do we read what we read?” I get obsessed with topics and start a reading jag on that topic..I’m loving the John Adams miniseries, which lead me to pick up the book, which lead me into reading Cokie Roberts’ Founding Mothers and Hitchens’ slim bio of Jefferson, which then lead to a book on the history of Freethinkers…..and so on. At least, that explains the nonfiction. Hey, we’re ALL neurotic!
Fiction is completely different, unless I read something by some author who is new to me, and I like it, then I’ve got to read everything else that author has written.
Not that I’m OC or anything.
I have been reading ever since I learned I could, around age 4. The only thing I had to read back then was my older brother’s textbooks. It wasn’t until the 5th grade that I discovered the library, got my first library card and have been going at it since then. I read because I am curious, daring, nosey, bold and because I love a good story. Maybe it’s in my DNA. My dad used to tell good stories that held us captive (literally and figuratively).
Audio books entered my realm a few years ago and now I find if the writer can’t capture me by the end of the first disc, I take the whole thing back to the library. And I love a good mystery. Even my own. Which is why I catalogued my books out of curiosity and was alarmed that I had 1100 and no space for more bookshelves. Now I donate books, but I buy more books. My stack to read is around 25 and I intend to read every one of them. I want to know what those writers have to say and how they say it.
Yes, I still go to the library, too, but that’s because I am controlling my reading habit. .
First of all Laura I don’t think you’re defective, what ever gave you that idea. (rhetorical question but you do with it what you will if anything, nothing is ok)
Why I read what I read or at least an inkling of such. I haven’t read others responses yet so as not to be influenced by a bunch of oh yeah right ons that may go through my head.
I’m an action junkie and love stories that have lots of stuff going on with great characters and settings. On the other hand I’m a cerebral reader too. I like it when it’s obvious that the writer has expansive thinking and shows that without writing a book that I wouldn’t be able to lift.
When I was very young I loved the Dumas stories and anything with pirates and musketeers, you gie the idea. The Man In The Iron mask was one of my all time favorites as a young girl. Now that could be considered weird.
When I got older I liked to read Tolkien although more of a saga than action. Herbert was great for me I loved Dune the book not the movie. Didn’t care for the sequels much. Some of my current favorites apart from you Laura, Nicola Griffith, Lisa Scottoline, David Rosenfelt, Felice Pecano, Val McDermid, SJ Rozan, Bill Moody, just to name a few but there are really a lot more. Rozan was the first writers who made me jump out of my chair while I was reading when she used Scriabin as a composer that Bill Smith was trying to perfect. He did this when he was thinking things through. I couldn’t believe that she didn’t use some other more well known classical composer, it gave me great respect for her not dumbing down a reference like that.
What I want when I read is story and character and setting and of course lots of action when it’s appropriate. The reasons I read are to go someplace I wouldn’t normally go or to reinvision places I’ve been, and to share how words are grouped together and the interpretations of any given writer of words.
So I guess in the final analysis I’m a story person. Also I can forgive a lot of things in a book with a great story that I might not do if the story is just so-so. But then if that were the case I probably wouldn’t finish the book.
I’m getting too old to spend time on books that don’t live up to what I look for to be my companion for several hours. Oh look there’s another reasn I read, for companionship especially that isn’t personally demanding of this rather selfish loner.
Linda I like those books too and have most of them. I have a special section in my bookcases for biographies — auto and otherwise.
Clair I just have to say how profound and right on your post was for me, and to say yeah me too!
Maybe I should have read the posts first so I wouldn’t be posting again. Oh well I’m too clever for my own good I guess.
Am glad to see that Laura reads fiction for the story.
Beautiful precise language is a joy, but if it doesn’t tell me a compelling story, I don’t care.
I began reading one of the Edgar nominated best first novels and gave up after a few pages. It was so obviously, patronizingly, and pretentiously literary that I gave up. At my age, if a story doesn’t draw me in with a few pages or teach me something I don’t know, I just don’t have the time.
Congratulations on the award, Laura. And enjoyed your comments on Elaine Viets. She has courage.
People who write lyric things that go nowhere should stick to under 18 lines. Or get out of my sandbox.
Humans have been saying “tell me a story” for thousands and thousands of years. I think one of the reasons that mysteries as a genre are popular and successful is that mystery writers haven’t forgotten that, the way so many modern “literary” “novelists” have. (I’ll except out the Edgar nominee Doris Ann is talking about)
Laura isn’t the only writer I’ve heard say that they wanted to write, but got bogged down in stories that went nowhere until they wrote a mystery.
Another segue back to Laura’s talk last week – I think, Laura, you get called “sir” because you do have balls, and speak with authority. Alot of people still react to authority and confidence as if they were male attributes.
Boring people are boring no matter how beautifully they’re boring.
I locked horns with Elaine Viets early on when I started reading her gang-blog, The Lipstick Chronicles (She’d made some generalized disparaging comments about lawyers to which I took exception). Later I had the distinct pleasure of meeting the lady in person, and she was nothing but gracious and friendly. Now I’m a stalwart fan, and I can honestly say: Elaine Viets has balls bigger than my head.
And if there’s something wrong with reading for story, then I guess we share the same affliction. I recently told a young aspiring writer who’d asked me to read his work, “you’re so in love with your words you forgot to ask them to tell a story.”
I compare some so-called “literary” fiction to be-bop jazz, or, for more modern listeners, to the drum or long guitar solo on a live rock album. Okay, I can appreciate the musicianship and the skill involved to play like that. But it’s a cold, purely intellectual appreciation. It doesn’t do anything for me emotionally.
Likewise, I read some fiction and go ‘yes, yes, you really have quite the way with words there, but is anything ever going to happen that I’m going to care about?”
Um, why is reading for story wrong? Or at least, reading with the idea that something has to happen? Even the most post-modern of post-modern stuff works best because there’s some narrative thread happening, no matter how frayed or strange it is (see Markson, David, though it’s no accident he broke into publishing with pulp fiction.)
As for the ORBAs, there is a faint whiff of playful hoaxishness going on, but I can’t say I blame the anonymous creators for it.
I read the James Woods review of LUSH LIFE and the piece in the Times (I think it was in the Times) and they both made me feel like an idiot. I guess maybe I’m just not that sophisticated when it comes to reading and books. But that’s fine — I never claimed to be.
I like good stories, I like interesting characters. I like a book that holds my interest from the first page to the last. That’s what I read for: I want to be entertained. It’s okay if I’m dazzled or impressed or enlightened or educated. All that stuff is cool, too. But, please, entertain me.
I’m an ultra-fast reader, but I qualify this by saying some books lend themselves to a near-skim or one-sitting tear and others take more time (recent one-sitting tear: Marcus Sakey’s new book GOOD PEOPLE. Taking more time: Peter Robinson’s FRIEND OF THE DEVIL. No rhyme or reason, it just worked out that way.)
But the reverse also cracks me up, where books that are purported to be highbrow and are reviewed that way really aren’t all that deep. Which is why reading Keith Gessen’s ALL THE SAD YOUNG LITERARY MEN puzzled me because so many reviews mined depth that just wasn’t there. Sure, Keith’s writing about hyper-intellectual people but it had about the same level of vapidness that Jennifer Weiner is accused of, but really doesn’t have.
I agree with Claire that “The best reading, for me, is an exercise in imagination and empathy” but have to add that for fiction to keep my attention, there must be a story and complex, interesting characters.
I often read in chunks: maybe a bio of a writer and some of his/her works, or a bunch of books (fiction, nonfiction, poetry) about the Transcendentalists or WW1 or southern Italy — I like to stay in a place (whether location, time period or idea) longer than one book, it seems. Having just entered Wm Kent Krueger’s Minnesota for the first time, I’m reluctant to leave and am devouring his books.
BTW to me the compliment that went with the ORBA means having a certain reckless courage. Your writing, Laura, is certainly courageous, but by no means reckless. It is far too well-crafted for that.
Now they’ve given an Orba to Jason Starr for being sexy!
Laura has balls, and Jason is sexy. I’m liking these awards.
These awards have prompted me to consider adding a new category to the Gumshoes:
Writer with the Biggest Ovaries
I’m thinking Lee Child should be the first recipient. His work has always seemed to have a certain feminine sensibility to me…