Reading List + Recommendations (Revived)

Lincoln in the Bardo - George Saunders, 2017 - 2019 Book Ten

- Lincoln in the Bardo - George Saunders -

“In form, the novel is a combination of film script and Lincoln-focused scrapbook, alternating dialogue among the ghosts with excerpts from historical accounts of the Civil War era, some genuine and some invented.”

Lincoln in the Bardo by George Saunders

Ben H Winters.

- Ben H Winters

Opening Lines, Golden State, Ben H. Winters

“Imagine a country so traumatized by deception, lies and gaslighting that it opts to prioritize facts and truth-telling above all else. Here’s what your life would be like: Ubiquitous video cameras would capture your every word and action and feed them into a permanent record of all that is “Objectively So.” Like every other citizen, you would keep a detailed account of your life, gathering diary pages, receipts and annotated conversations, and sealing them in a Mylar bag each night. If there’s ever a question about what happened on a given day, this archive can be accessed to determine the truth. If you were found to have lied or fabricated any fact in the record, you could face imprisonment or even exile. And in accordance with the national ethos, all fictional storytelling — whether on the page, the stage or the screen — is outlawed. No novels, movies, plays or Internet. Would this be a paradise or a hell for you?”

Early Riser - Jasper Fforde, 2018 - 2019 Book Eight

Jasper Fforde

Opening Line - Early Riser - Jasper Fforde

Which is a shame. Early Riser has a lot to say and, for the most part, says it in an interesting way. The message, in short, is sound—but the medium, in this particular instance? Maybe not so much.”