Plot Schmot, Mr. Bigshot: A Box of Matches by Nicholson Baker

In her 2003 review of A Box of Matches, Salon.com writer Amy Reiter nominated novelist Nicholson Baker for the title of "Grand Poo-bah of the High Art of Navel-Gazing." She meant it as a compliment, since "no one gets more out of his navel- and head and life and ever-evolving sense of time and space- than Baker. A Box of Matches is basically just a really lovely and almost plotless novel about our ordinary and short lives.

Emmett, the narrator in Baker's novel, wakes up every morning before dawn, makes coffee in the dark, builds a fire in the dark, and then sits in front of that fire and thinks. It's his "fire journal" that we're reading. What does a married medical textbook editor with two children, a cat, and a duck think about? Well, his growing children, belly button lint, and death, obviously.

Emmett on his growing children, sparked by noticing his son's ability to touch both ends of the bathtub: "I remember how proud Phoebe was to be able to touch both ends of the tub, too—‘Nice growing!’ I said to her. And I even remember how proud I was myself to touch both ends of the tub.”

Emmett on belly button lint: "While I stretched...my hand strayed under my pajama top and my middle finger found its way to my belly button where it discovered some lint. I rolled the lint into a tube, as one does, and having done so, I became curious about what such a tube would look like if burned. I tossed it into one of the spaes between the coals. It went orange for a moment, fattened, and then darkened. It is still there now but it will be lost when I stir the coals."

In Baker's hands, a passage about burning belly button lint becomes one about the unrelenting passage of time. His fires, in fact, represent not only destruction, but also the search for warmth and love, as well as for some sense of our own purpose and our desire for a lasting impact. Don't believe me? Here's Emmett history and death, being completely direct:

"The ungraspableness of history, which can seem thrilling or frightening depending on your mood, can assert itself at any moment. I just found another small bedroll of lint in my automatic lint-accumulator and I tossed it into the fire; there was an almost imperceptible flare of differently colored fire--ah! lint fire!--and it was gone. That is part of why I like looking at those burning logs: they seem like years of life to me. All the particulars are consumed and left as ash, but warm and life-giving as they burn."

There's something really comforting about this book. It's nice to take a break from the constant fear of being bland and unremarkable, and just enjoy the beauty of the ordinary.

Balls Plus Brains Equals Me, Swooning: Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell

Hey. Huh. So. This is awkward. It's been, what, six months or something? In that time, I've read far too many books to write about in any kind of impressive detail, so I'll do a bunch of short posts about the unremarkable ones, and longer posts about the others. This torturous game of catch-up is actually fine with me, considering the reason for my long absence (new job 2 hours away) and the reason for my reappearance (the desperate need for some sort of life outside of working and travelling to and from work. This need became very clear last week when I basically lost my mind and sobbed for 2 straight days). So yes, I will blog. And no one will read my posts except for my friend Duff (hi, Duff!), but that's okay with me too.

Anyhow, I read Cloud Atlas back in November. It was my first experience with David Mitchell, and I had been unsure of what to expect. I might have even been resistant. See, people are always raving about Cloud Atlas, but every time I picked it up and read the back cover I thought to myself, "Huh. This looks a bit too much like work." Of course, this is coming from the woman who not-so-recently downloaded a copy of Eastern Promises and then let it sit, unwatched, on her desktop for something like two months before finally watching it and having her mind blown by the greatest naked knifefight in the entire history of nakedness and knives and fighting. That's sort of how I felt after finally getting around to Cloud Atlas: Why the hell did it take me so long?

Here's the thing: Cloud Atlas is not one story, but six. And by six stories, I don't mean that the book is a story cycle or a novel with five subplots. It actually takes us to six different but equally intensely imagined and detailed worlds. Six different time periods, each with its own vocabulary and literary style. In one story, Mitchell is summoning Evelyn Waugh. In another, a Grisham-like writer of thrillers. In still another, Martin Amis. The last two stories are the most frightening, and call to mind Philip K. Dick and Cormac McCarthy. We're taken to each world twice, with the exception of the sixth, as the novel follows this format: 1 2 3 4 5 6 5 4 3 2 1.

1. Adrift in the Pacific in 1850, a Yankee notary named Adam Ewing sojourns on the island of Chatham, where he surveys the impact of colonialism.

2. Robert Frobisher, a penniless cad and criminal, travels to Belgium in the 1930s to track down a reclusive, ailing composer. He succeeds, starts working on "The Cloud Atlas Sextet," and seduces the composer's wife. He also finds a book, annoyingly torn in half, called "The Pacific Journal of Adam Ewing."

3. A journalist named Luisa Rey uncovers a corporate nuclear scandal in 1970s California, and is at constant risk of assassination. One of the scientists who she speaks with is Rufus Sixsmith, who had been Robert Frobisher's lover in the 1930s. She also purchases a record: "The Cloud Atlas Sextet."

4. Timothy Cavendish is a vanity publisher in London in the 1980s. He has a found manuscript called "Half-Lives: the First Luisa Rey Mystery," that he thinks will get him out of debt, but ultimately ends up trapped in a retirement home.

5. Sonmi-451 is a cloned slave in some future state who has acquired intelligence and vision. She is soon to be executed, and her dying wish is to see the end of a film (films are called "Disneys" in the future) she once started to watch called "The Ghastly Ordeal of Timothy Cavendish."

6. Zachry is a tribesman in an extremely violent postapocalyptic society on the island of Hawaii after the fall of civilization. His narrative is told in a thick dialect that is difficult to read. Somni-451 returns here as a hologram and ultimately as God for Zachry.

What connects these stories- what effectively prevents the book from being a collection of (brilliantly written) short stories or novellas- is a peculiar reappearing birthmark and, more compellingly, the unifying theme of the endurance of and our need for human communication between generations.

Cloud Atlas is hilarious and terrifying and beautiful and huge. It's also a literary experiment that would be a total slog if it were written by anyone else but the insanely gifted David Mitchell. As it stands, it's a challenging read but enormously entertaining and each story is equally engaging regardless of the reader's personal feelings about the literary genres represented. For pulling this whole thing off without resorting to gimmickry, David Mitchell gets a spot on the top five.

Points for Creativity: The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger

Oh, Hi! I think I used to have a blog here. It's been a busy month. I got hired at a new library, quit my old one, fell into a lethargic depression as a result of the weather, and also did some rather interesting binge-drinking. Of course I read too, but more slowly than usual. This book, which should probably be read in only a few sittings, took almost a week. Note the illustration to the right. I selected it for two reasons: First, we've all seen the real cover by now because "The Time Traveler's Wife" was enormously popular when it was published a few years ago and second, the real cover (think knee-socks, mary-janes, and a thermos) is too hideously cutesy to contemplate. This illustration is cutesy too, but at least we haven't seen it hundreds of times.

It's possible that I selected this book because I wanted to give something a bad review, and I was sure I'd hate it. I'm always avoiding books with titles like this (The So-and-So's Wife, or The So-and-So's Daughter) because they annoy me. Also, according to the back cover, "'The Time Traveler's Wife' is a story of fate, hope and belief, and more than that, it's about the power of love to endure beyond the bounds of time." Am I a jerk for finding that description irritating? Am I alone in this? Anyhow, it's not that bad. It's hugely imaginative, and the characters are all unique and likeable. But take away the (admittedly pretty awesome) fact that Henry is an unwilling time traveler (which, by necessity, actually gives the book a really interesting structure), and what are we left with? A saccharine story of epic and fated love which I don't really feel is enough for a book to be about. Don't get me wrong- I don't believe that writers should ever write with a particular message in mind. The best writers don't because otherwise it would feel forced, but they at least communicate something larger and compelling by accident and then fine-tune in later drafts. There's not much of anything being said here other than "Henry and Clare have a profound romantic connection that you, reader, will never in your life experience because it's completely false and ridiculous. Sorry!"

Am I being all sour grape-y? Not at all. I completely prefer love of the ugly, improvised, and uncertain variety. I want to love the hell out of the wrong person and make it work. Fate is just so boring.

The Highest Standard: To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee

Everyone had read this book but me. Friends who recently saw me with it in my hands said, "You're reading that again?" and I replied, "Nope, I'm reading it for the first time." Then they'd ask, "Didn't you have to read it in high school?" and I'd say, "No, we didn't read books with female characters" (this is mostly true, though I didn't even realize it myself until years later).

But I wish we'd read "To Kill a Mockingbird." I don't mean to suggest that I was unmoved by what we were required to read, but I was admittedly an atypical case as a total bookworm. "To Kill a Mockinbird" seems to me like the perfect book for high school students to read, and I'm glad that some are still required to. My evidence: At work I'm always getting surly-looking, uninspired teens trudging up to the reference desk asking for it. Now (as in this past week) I tell them, "You're going to love it," and they look at me like I'm approximately 85 years-old and therefore completely unqualified to comment on what they might like. I wish just one of them would come back and tell me that they loved it, because it would at least confirm my suspicion that it's exactly what we're hoping for whenever we open a book. I'm going to repeat that because it's important: I suspect that "To Kill a Mockingbird" is exactly what what we're hoping for whenever we open a book. It is the standard to which I'll now hold everything else I read.

Without going on about the plot and the characters and the themes (I'm sure it's unecessary because, like I said, everyone had read this book but me), I'll just back up my theory by saying that it's a hugely complex book about ugly realities, and it still somehow manages to be the most enjoyable entertainment. It's perfect. Obviously it goes to the top of the list. I can't believe it took me 27 years to pick it up.

"To Kill a Mockingbird" won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1961. Enormously influential, it stirs readers in all directions to this day: It has made the American Library Association's annual list of banned/challenged books almost every year since its publication in 1960. Again, "To Kill a Mockingbird" is exactly what we're hoping for whenever we open a book.

Silk Has a Secret: The Human Stain by Philip Roth

I love Philip Roth, but don't necessarily love reading him. That is, I appreciate his intelligence. I appreciate his ability to weave together a number of incredible stories, each with its own complexity, and link them all thematically. The trouble is that I rarely feel like I'm really enjoying myself. While i'm admiring of his craft, shouldn't he be tricking me into not noticing it? There, I said it, and you can all hate me if you want to.

"The Human Stain" is a fantastic book, no question. It takes on far more than the other books I've reviewed here and handles its massively complicated subject matter wonderfully. It's a novel about political correctness, judgement, aging, race, and the American quest for individualism. Set in 1998, with president Bill Clinton's impeachment hovering in the background, and sanctimoniousness in the air, "The Human Stain" follows protoganist Coleman Silk through his success as an academic, his disgrace as an accused racist, and his bizarre death at the hands of a troubled, jealous, and very violent Vietnam War vet.

What you probably can't see on the cover up there are the words "Everyone Knows." They're scrawled on a piece of paper and tucked inside an envelope, which is seen from above. Get it? It takes a minute to understand what you're looking at. Whoever designed that cover did a great job because those are easily the most important words in the novel. "Everyone knows you're sexually exploiting an abused, illiterate woman half your age" is a message that Coleman Silk receives anonymously in the mail one day. He is, in fact, sleeping with an abused, illiterate woman half his age, but that's not really anyone's business. Everyone loves crucifying a success, and especially one who has already lost his job, wife, and good reputation because of false accusations of racism (Coleman, a respected Classics professor and former dean at a New England liberal arts college, referred to two absent students as "spooks"). But what no one knows is Coleman's biggest secret- a secret he's spent decades worrying that everyone will find out: He has spent almost his entire life passing as a tan-skinned Jew, when he is in fact a light-skinned African American from East Orange, New Jersey. For one thing, this makes his being an accused racist all the more surreal, but it also introduces another layer of complexity to the book. What appeared to be a novel about political correctness and sexual morality in Clinton-era America, is actually much bigger. It's a novel about the American impulse to shed one's skin, start over, and succeed based on one's merits, despite the fact that it's nearly impossible to do so.

While Coleman's decision to abandon his ancenstry and live as a white man is enormous and shocking, other characters are reinventing themselves: Faunia Farley, a damaged, abused, and illiterate janitor who Coleman is sleeping with; Les Farley, a deeply traumatized, unpredictably violent war vet; and Delphine Rioux, a French academic who despises Coleman and leads all charges against him for her own personal reasons.

Roth's writing is expert (Faunia, for example, has "the laugh of a barmaid who keeps a baseball bat at her feet in case of trouble") and at times infectiously frantic. The gradual unravelling of Coleman's past, narrated by Nathan Zuckerman (a recurring Roth character), is slow, detailed, and gripping. The final scene, in which Nathan Zuckerman is both threatened and a threat, is exquisitely imagined, tense as hell, and probably more visual than any other scene in the book.

Writing this is making me love the book, and I know it's the smartest book I've read so far for this award. It's without a doubt the most ambitious. I just didn't have a great experience reading it, so I'm not sure what to do with it. I'm putting it on top. Roth is risking more than every other author on this list so far, and he still comes through with a novel that I can't find a single specific complaint about. It would be crazy to put him below Natsuo Kirino, and maybe I just read it at the wrong time.

"The Human Stain" won the PEN/Faulkner Award in 2000.

Whatta Guy: Engleby by Sebastian Faulks

Which cover is better? I'm partial to the one on the left. The one on the right is a bit too tra-la-la for my taste, and is totally misleading in light of the book itself. The book is not, after all, about a loveable, wholesome English farmer who cycles between villages selling eggs from a basket. It is about a madman who-- and I sincerely hope I'm not the only one to have found this-- is enormously charming.

By the time we find out that Mike Engleby is a freak and a murderer, Faulks has made quite sure that we're in a position where we'll find this difficult to accept. Engleby is our narrator, after all: He's the fictional author of the fictional "autobiography" we're reading. Unreliable narrators are nothing new to the literary landscape, but this one is so confessional to begin with, so intensely likeable, that when we figure out his true nature, we're disappointed, embarrassed, and worried by the fact that we fell for him hook, line, and sinker.

By the time we find out that Mike Engleby is suffering from "schizoid personality disorder...will elements of narcissism and antisocial personality disorder", we've learned about his difficult, impoverished childhood (no self-pity, though!). We've accepted his snobbish, blasé outlook of academia ("'The Crucible'...is about a group of American Puritans called Goody this and Good that; it has self-righteousness and modern parallels. Students like it because it makes them feel enfranchised") as typically adolescent. We've accepted his shoplifting and pickpocketing to be a result of class resentment and basic need. The way he describes his drug and alcohol addiction is actually kind of hilarious and anyhow, it's the seventies, and he's an undergraduate and Cambridge. In a voice-driven book, Engleby's voice is welcome, appreciated, and enjoyed. He's unintentionally hilarious and hugely entertaining.

Gradually, things get suspicious. Engleby has only one friend, and it becomes painfully clear that they're not even that close. There's a girl, too, and Engleby describes her as being close to him, even a girlfriend, but she can't really be more than a casual acquaintance. When she disappears and is presumed to be dead, the gaps in Engleby's memory, coupled with his dillusional view of their relationship, and his occasional rages, become worrisome, but the case goes cold, and Engleby is accused of nothing. Later, as an adult, we see him settle into life as a journalist ("It's basically quite unbelievably easy"), and are distracted by his success. We're charmed again by his cleverness. Even though he's a suspicious oddball, we still want to hear his opinion about everything: Inane dinner parties, English politicians, journalism, you name it.

It isn't until close to the end of the book that we get a portrait of Engleby from another character's point of view. The dissonance is very disconcerting, perhaps partly because it's been right under our noses- albeit between the lines- the whole time.

That "Engleby" is dark goes without saying. I was reminded instantly of Ian McEwan, although to my knowledge McEwan has never written a fictional "autobiography." Who has? William Boyd, apparently, but I've never read it. "Engleby" is like nothing I've ever read before. I spilled beer all over the library's copy of this book, and will probably have to buy it, but I don't really mind.

A Woman's Work is Never Done: "Out" by Natsuo Kirino

I'm basically in love with Natsuo Kirino. A hugely famous and well-respected literary novelist from Japan, Kirino was introduced to North America in 2003 when "Out" was translated into English. Earlier this year, I read her second novel to be translated: "Grotesque." It knocked me straight onto my (formidable) ass- I had never before met such a spiteful, unlikeable, complicated main character. Sadly, because I read it in the early summer, it's ineligible for a clammy. Picking up "Out" was, in a way, my strategy for making Natsuo Kirino eligible. Frankly, I think I like "Out" better than "Grotesque," which is an enormous compliment because both are brilliant.

"Out" begins in a bleak box-lunch factory in the suburban outskirts of Tokyo, as four women- Masako, Yayoi, Yoshie and Kuniko- work the night shift together. Simultaneously grueling and tedious, the work is awful, but all four women need to do it for their own reasons. Masako is hardly on speaking terms with her husband and son, so she's there in order to work opposite shifts from them. Yayoi, the young and pretty one, is helping her husband save money so they can move into a new apartment with their young kids. Yoshie is widowed and taking care of a teenaged daughter and invalid mother-in-law. Kuniko is fat and vain, obsessed with fashion, makeup, and imported cars, and is understandably struggling under a mountain of debt.

One night, when Yayoi's husband comes home drunk, admits that he's spent all their savings on gambling and prostitutes, and then hits her, everything changes. In a strange, surreal moment of rage and psychosis, she strangles him with his belt. Later, at the factory, she confesses to Masako who, for reasons she herself is unsure of, agrees to take care of everything. The four women cut up Yayoi's husband's body in Masako's bathroom, divide the pieces among themselves, and scatter them in dumpsters across the suburbs. What follows is a grisly, disturbing novel as the women get away with the crime, but are ultimately found out by the man who was accused of it and later released for lack of evidence.

While Yayoi, Masako, Yoshie, and Kuniko are given almost equal narrative attention, this is really Masako's story. Masako is the one woman out of the four who originally insists on not being paid for her part in cutting up and disposing of the body. What's more, through crossing this line, Masako finds that she has a predilection for sociopathic behaviour. She encounters another criminal- a thug she crossed paths with in an earlier career- and realizes that they have a lot in common. Together with Yoshie (by far the most financially desperate of the women), they start a business cutting up and disposing of bodies for a Tokyo gang, all the while being stalked and threatened by the man who has found them out.

It would be easy enough to say that "Out" is propelled by shock-value alone, but that isn't really the case. There is nothing gimmicky about Kirino's clever depiction of a bleak world where a woman's choice of husband determines her destiny. This book is as much theme-driven as it is plot-driven, being ultimately about perverse feminism, vigilante justice, and our own potential for evil. In one of the most memorable scenes in the book, Yoshie flatly says that cutting up bodies isn't so different from changing her mother-in-law's diapers or working the line at the boxed-lunch factory. It's the work no one else wants to do.

A few critics have argued that the prose is flat and wooden. It sometimes is, but I'm tempted to blame the translation. Even the Guardian's Stephen Poole, in a lukewarm review, admits that the "flat, funtional prose" is occasionally illuminated by a strange lyricism. I was particularly impressed by this line about the gradual deadening of expectations and hope in the women's suburban lives:

"When stones lying warm in the sun were turned over, they exposed the cold, damp earth undernearth; and that was where Masako had burrowed deep. there was no trace of warmth in this dark earth, yet for a bug curled up tight in it, it was a peaceful and familiar world."

"Out" won Japan's top mystery award when it was published in its original language in 1997.