As Constant Reader prepares to turn the final pages on 2011, it's time once again to lead you fellow book lovers through some possible books to wrap and give to friends and loved ones over the holidays. Some are recent books published in this past year, but also included are some classic favorites that make a nice addition to any bibliophile's collection.
One area I will not be addressing is the relative benefits and deficiencies of e-readers like the new Amazon Kindle Fire, the Barnes and Noble Nook or other tablet reading devices. This is largely due to space limitations, but also it's too deep a topic to address in a few paragraphs, but there is plenty of information available at the local bookstores or online for readers who are interested in these devices.
Books covered in this article are available at local booksellers and via national websites such as barnesandnoble.com and amazon.com, often at up to 50% less than the listed publisher's price.
First, I want to suggest a series of books related to the late great magazine National Lampoon which hasn't published a monthly issue in more than a decade. Thankfully, all of the 246 issues from the premiere issue from April 1970 until the final edition 29 years later have been collected onto National Lampoon, The Humor Magazine Complete Collection on DVD-ROM ($44.99, National Lampoon) that should still be available online through Amazon.com.
While it doesn't have any of the multiple special editions such as the 1964 High School Yearbook parody by Lampoon founder and Animal House co-writer Doug Kenney and celebrated humorist P.J. O'Rourke, it's still a great way to enjoy the classic issues of the first 15 years of the magazine featuring writers and artists like Kenney, O'Rourke, Henry Beard, Chris Miller, Brian McConnachie, and many others.
Last year Review Magazine featured a major article reviewing Drunk Stoned Brilliant Dead: The Writers and Artists Who Made National Lampoon Magazine Insanely Great ($40 hardcover, Abrams Publishing) edited by classic Lampoon writer and artist Rick Meyerowitz. The book is a great bargain and a gorgeous coffee table book featuring all of the best writers and artists who contributed to the magazine.
Also worth buying for yourself or as a gift are the biography of Kenney, A Futile and Stupid Gesture: How Doug Kenney and National Lampoon Changed Comedy Forever($16.95 paperback, Chicago Review Press), the novelization trade paperback of National Lampoon's Animal House (under $10, National Lampoon Publishing) written by the film's co-writer Chris Miller , and finally Miller's own true tales of his Dartmouth fraternity life in the early 60's The Real Animal House: The Awesomely Depraved Saga of the Fraternity That Inspired the Movie ($14.99 paperback, Back Bay Books). Careful readers of the paperback edition of Miller's “mostly lucid memoir” will find a glossary at the back of the book that was compiled with the assistance of Constant Reader himself (blush).
But the gift of humor and laughter can be found in many places and one of the funniest books I've read in the past decade is Me, Cheeta: My Life in Hollywood ($13.99 paperback, Ecco Publishing) , a faux memoir of Hollywood Babylon written from the viewpoint of the ape that portrayed Tarzan's companion in the movies. The book is side-splittingly funny and will be of special interest to fans of the early glory days of the film business.
After winning a bucket load of Emmy awards for writing and producing NBC comedy hit series 30 Rock and shaking up the last presidential campaign with her dead on Sarah Palin impersonation on SNL, Tina Fey has turned out a delightful book about juggling her life as a writer/actor/producer and her roles of wife and mother. Bossypants ($26.99 hardcover, Reagan Arthur Publishing) will make a fine gift for Fey fans and especially working mothers.
Constant Reader's last humor suggestion comes with an NC-17 warning. It's a parody of children's books with the killer title Go the F**k to Sleep ($14.95 hardcover, Akashic Books) written by Adam Mansbach and perfectly illustrated by Ricardo Cortes. The book was conceived when helpless father Mansbach was frustrated by his inability to get his daughter to fall asleep. He posted the joking title as a facebook status and the overwhelming reaction led him to realize that he might be able to turn his quip into a humorous book for other beleaguered parents. It shot to the top of the Amazon bestseller list months before being published and the real gem is the audio download version read by Samuel L. Jackson.
Constant Reader has a fondness for humor and parody, but there are more serious and darker reads that are just as satisfying to recommend.
If you are a fan of police procedural shows like CSI, or Law and Order and wonder what life is like for the Saginaw area's law enforcement community, I strongly recommend Beyond Hope?: One Cop's Fight for Survival in a Dying City ($16.95 paperback, Infinity Publishing) written by Saginaw officer Michael East. The cover art is the headstone of Karen King, victim of the most brutal, heartbreaking and horrific murder of the last twenty years in this area.
This is East's second published book about life on the mean streets of Saginaw, but while his job is a harsh and taxing one, he manages to hold on to hope and optimism that his work and that of his fellow officers makes a vital difference in the lives of the citizens they serve and protect.
For a closer look at East and his writing Constant Reader suggests Review readers visit www.radioexiles.com where this writer posts a podcasts of interviews with other writers. The site archives old podcasts and you can search for my hour long interview with East done earlier this year.
If there is someone on your gift list who is a news junkie, Constant Reader has two suggestions: SEAL Team Six: Memoirs of an Elite Navy SEAL Sniper by Howard E. Wasdin and Stephen Templin ($26.99, hardcover, St. Martin Press) and Steve Jobs, a biography by Walter Isaacson ($35 hardcover, Simon and Schuster).
The first is benefiting from the timeliness of the book's release happening just as the news broke that the famous elite Navy squad took down Osama Bin Laden.
The second has been in the works for years with the author boasting of forty interviews over two years with the notoriously private Jobs. It also hit bookstores just as Jobs passed away due to liver cancer, giving the kind of media boost publishers dream of.
The holiday season also features great deals on box sets of bestselling series and two in particular are getting a lot of buzz. George R. R. Martin's series is called A Song of Ice and Fire ($137, hardcover, Bantam Publishing).
Martin is a master of fantasy with a strong historical influence and his books which are being adapted for an HBO series read like a more adult themed Lord of the Rings (featuring strong violence and sex scenes including incest). The author has also told his fans that the European War of the Roses was a partial basis for the tale of warring families in a feudal fantasy world complete with dragons.
In fact, the fifth and latest book in the planned seven book series, A Dance with Dragons ( $35, hardcover, Bantam) appeared in bookstores and online a few months ago, timed nicely to coincide with the HBO series based on the first book in the series, A Game of Thrones. The show's success propelled the first four books in the series to the top of the paperback bestseller list and Time magazine declared Martin “an American Tolkien”.
Tweens who have enjoyed the Harry Potter or the Twilight series should be interested in The Hunger Games trilogy box set written by Suzanne Collins ($53.97 hardcover, Scholastic Press). Set in a dystopian future where the world is divided into districts which each year must send a teenager to fight to the death in a reality show style battle royale. The first movie adaptation is set to be released soon which should boost interest in the series, which is already a bestseller.
Millions of Stephen King fans may have trouble keeping up with the prodigious output of the popular author, and his latest offering is getting a lot of media attention. 11/22/63 ($35, hardcover, Scribner) is a thousand page time travel epic story that is being hailed as one of King's best, as a school teacher has the opportunity to travel back to 1958 and change the future by preventing the Kennedy assassination.
AMC has been producing some of the best drama series on television, so if there is a fan of The Walking Dead on your gift list you might consider buying the graphic novels that the series is based upon. There are already more than a dozen graphic novel collections of the monthly comic published, but start with Volume One: Days Gone Bye ($9.99, paperback, Image Comics).
Although Constant Reader is an Atheist, books on religion and philosophy are of special interest and the most interesting book in this area from the past year is Pastor Rob Bell's Love Wins: A Book About Heaven, Hell, and the Fate of Every Person Who Ever Lived ($22.99, hardcover, Harper One). Bell is the young minister of Mars Hill Bible Church in Grand Rapids, Michigan. He questions the most popular assumptions about Christianity's teachings about Heaven and Hell and what determines the fate of believers and non-believers.
The recent passing of two immensely talented and influential authors, mystery master Robert B. Parker and the famously reclusive Catcher in the Rye author J. D. Salinger was a huge loss for the literary world. Parker's final story featuring wise-cracking P.I. Spenser is Sixkill ($26.95, hardcover, Putnam Adult). It is a violent but oddly touching story as the veteran detective mentors a young celebrity bodyguard as both work to determine the facts in the mysterious death of a movie star groupie. While a little thinner than some of his classic Spenser stories, it is a fitting coda to a celebrated series.
Salinger's death was soon followed by the publication of a thick and meticulously researched biography of the hermit like author, Salinger, A Life by Kenneth Slawenski ($27, hardcover, Random House), covering his early life as a successful short story writer, Salinger's involvement in World War Two's D-Day landing, the Battle of the Bulge and liberation of a Nazi concentration camp. Returning to civilian life, Salinger published Catcher in the Rye ($16.95, hardcover, Perfection Learning Publishing), and a series of stories about the Glass Family before disappearing from the public scene in the Sixties. His fame never waned and his books will be read for years to come.
Music lovers in general and fans of Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band were saddened by the sudden loss of Clarence Clemons, “The Big Man” and saxophone player in the band. But before his passing Clemons wrote a hugely entertaining collection of stories from his life, some true, some spun into tall tales of questionable truthfulness, yet it's a fun read in any event. Big Man: Real Life and Tall Tales ($26.99, hardcover, Grand Central Publishing).
And finally, one personal favorite to add to your shopping list, perhaps as a gift to yourself: F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby ( $25, hardcover, Scribner Classics). It's has been hailed as The Great American Novel and tells the story of a mysterious figure who appears to win the love of a former lover who is married to a brutish unfaithful bully. The books is filled with stunning prose and a tragic finish, but is a must read for serious fans of American fiction.
Whatever your reading preferences and budget is this season, Constant Reader wishes a merry holiday season to all Review readers and hopes that this guide will prove helpful in selecting quality books for the readers on your gift list. And as Tiny Tim says in Charles Dickens classic A Christmas Carol, “God bless us, every one.”
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Dec 08, 2011
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