August 30-September 7 Reads

While many of these are just completions of books I had already begun or were short (under 200 pages), thanks to the Labor Day holiday weekend and a lessening in grading duties (sadly, this week will be a killer for me, though), I managed to complete the following books:

284 Alissa Torres, American Widow (non-fiction; graphic novel).

285 Janet Chui and Jason Erik Lundberg, A Field Guide to Surreal Botany (illustrated book, already discussed back on August 15 - enjoyed the book quite a bit).

286 Vladimir Nabokov, Pnin (This short novel made me smile, before realizing just how heart-rending it was in places. Need to read more Nabokov, I see).

287 Fernando Pessoa, The Book of Disquiet (stream-of-consciousness collection of this Portuguese master's thoughts on a whole host of issues)

288 Richard Parks, The Long Look (ARC for a September 2008 release, this book about an "evil" magician cursed with a sense of premonition which forces him to act to avert even more heinous events was a very good read, although there were places where the dialogue seemed to need a bit more polishing. Still, a worthwhile read.)

289 Alan Moore, Watchmen (graphic novel; this might be one of my favorite reads for this year so far. More later, if time will permit in the coming weeks)

290 Orhan Pamuk, My Name is Red (novel set in 16th century Ottoman Istanbul in which a murder mystery is revealed among a discussion of representative art and the furor it aroused at the time. Enjoyed the book, will certainly re-read it in the coming years.)

291 Fábio Fernandes, A Revanche da Ampulheta (Brazilian SF novella that I'll need to re-read more carefully in the next few months, as while I got the gist of it, much of the story's meaning has fled me during the passage of the past week, since I don't think in Portuguese. I do recall enjoying what I understood of the tale though and I hope I'll have something much more substantive to tell Fábio in the coming months when I re-read that and his other two stories that he sent me last month.)

292 Salman Rushdie, The Enchantress of Florence (while not his best work, I found it to be a well-written tale, but more on it later, I hope.)

293 Naguib Mahfouz, Children of the Alley (this Nobel Prize-winning Egyptian author's allegory about the feuds and fighting among the three main Abrahamic faiths is moving without ever being maudlin. Highly recommended.)

294 Jeff VanderMeer and Rose Secrest (eds.), Leviathan: Volume Two (this 1999 anthology didn't work as well for me as did the 3rd and 4th volumes, but perhaps the fact that I read it during the week while tired from school duties might have something to do with my lack of enthusiasm for stories by authors such as Stepan Chapman and Rhys Hughes that I normally enjoy greatly.)

295 George MacDonald, Lilith (this 1895 novel was lyrical and its prose held up rather well for me, but the story ultimately was a bit sparse in places.)

296 Milan Kundera, The Joke (just finished reading this earlier today. Much to think about, but the levels of meaning behind the word "joke" throughout the multi-PoV story make for a reflective, often devastating read. Kundera, along with Mahfouz, are two authors that I glad I discovered this year.)

In Progress:

297 Tim Powers, The Stress of Her Regard (recent reprint of a 1989 release, I am roughly 25% in and enjoying it so far. More later, time permitting this week.)

For the record, I've read 4 books the past couple of days and barely anything during the workweek. I tend to finish off the remaining 150-200 page chunks of novels rather than read all of them in a linear, serial fashion.