My recent trip to NYC was highlighted by three top things — seeing Judith Schaechter’s stained glass show, scoring a 1st edition T.C. Boyle and trying Absolut Brooklyn. In no particular order:
Judith Schaechter is a stained glass artist from Philadelphia, (see Nature above). She is also a close friend of our friend Ted. Ted was [...]
Not ashamed to admit that I actually shelled out hard cash to attend Salmon Rushdie’s reading at Free Library of Philadelphia. An interesting thing I learned from Sir Rushdie is that there is no such thing in Indian storytelling as “Once upon a time.” Rather, what they have roughly translates to “It is so, it [...]
Free author event at Joseph Fox Books with one of my favorites, David Sedaris reading from his new release When You are Engulfed in Flames. This being my first time seeing David, I had to bring along all my first editions for him to sign. Unfortunately, I don’t have a first edition of Naked. This [...]
Also filed in
|
|
Friday, February 29, 2008
Miss Tallulah Bankhead by Lee Israel, pub. 1972
Purchased at the Annual Hamilton Street Porch Sale in West Philly’s Powelton Village. Nothing beats an understanding of film like a great biography of a legendary film star. I loved the chance of it all. I loved the high-style of it all.
Price: Flea Market $1
Einstein: His Life and [...]
Sunday, September 30, 2007
I enjoyed a very schizophrenic period this summer — Genius, Gay, Academic, Politico.
Beethoven: Biography of a Genius, George R. Marek, pub. 1969
Early this month, I just had to learn more about Beethoven after watching the 1994 flick Immortal Beloved. After much research, I discovered this is the only comprehensive resource [...]
Also filed in
|
|
Was a time I prided myself on the number of books I read. I read so few books now, I have to group them by season rather than month. Following are the books I read this summer:
Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee, Dee Brown, pub. 1970
Outstanding read. Great historical resource. Each chapter [...]
Also filed in
|
|
Didn’t get much reading in this spring. Well, actually, I did get much reading in, only I didn’t finish many of the books I started. Most of the books I purchase are from sidewalk sales, flea markets or thrift stores — hardbacks never cost more than $3, softbacks $1. At those prices, it’s easy to [...]
Also filed in
|
|
Last Thursday, May 10th Chuck Palahniuk did a book signing and lecture at The Free Library of Philadelphia. The place was filthly with major fuck-up, loser freaks, all co-mingled with some very elderly types, as Elmore Leonard was also conducting a signing and lecture that evening.
I arrived around 6pm for Chuck’s 8pm lecture and the [...]
Also filed in
|
|
Today two of my favorite authors released their newest novels. And while placing my book order, I noticed that another one of my favorite authors had a new release in mid-April!
Click the following links to read about the books. Flight by Sherman Alexie. The Yiddish Policemen’s Union by Michael Chabon. [...]
Also filed in
|
|
Wednesday, February 28, 2007
Greater than my love of reading, is my love of affordable reading. As coincidence would have it, all of my Winter 2007 reading came to me very affordably.
Falconer, John Cheever, pub. 1992
In 1993 I attended a Sherman Alexie book lecture, Q&A and signing in support of his Ten Little Indians. During [...]
Also filed in
|
|