Conveniently, Robert Jordan could not be reached for comment

I already retweeted and screenshot this last night, but some of you non-Twitter users might enjoy this joke. I just need it to live here forever. (Via @RowanKaiser)

Read it again, for the first time.

The A.V. Club posted a call for the books people have most re-read as adults. My knee-jerk reaction was to start naming off the paperbacks I read over and over when I was young, before I noticed the phrase in the original question, "not counting books read in childhood" -- and honestly I don't know how books in my adulthood will ever catch up to those anyway.

I wish I had time to do more re-reading than I do. It's sort of like eating out: You eat at a restaurant, and it's really good -- the kind of place where you would like to be a regular and be friends with the waiters and everything, sort of a kitchen-away-from-home. But hey, look at that new cafe over there -- don't you want to know how it is? Maybe you'll like it better than your regular place! In the end, though, there are a limited amount of meals you can eat out a week even if you are a billionaire or Adam Richman of "Man vs. Food."

I find this metaphor appropriate because in writing reviews I sometimes think of not just reading the latest and greatest but, in a gut sense, of digesting them. (Definition 3, not 5.) I love getting through the stack of "What We're Reading This Summer" and being able to see the big picture; it's why I am generally obsessed with best-of-year lists, even the kind that come out in October and include books that aren't even out yet (ahem, PW). I have no regrets about this, but I have to balance some other stuff in order to keep current.

That said, here are a few books I find myself reading over and over again recently, maybe because I think they will make me wiser, but we'll see where that goes: 

• Margaret Atwood, LADY ORACLE
• Bill Bryson, THE LOST CONTINENT
• Gail Parent, SHEILA LEVINE IS DEAD AND LIVING IN NEW YORK
• Rona Jaffe, THE BEST OF EVERYTHING (although I haven't in at least a year; I guess it's that time again?)

A few twists on this question which I'm pocketing for future posts:

1. Adult books you read and re-read when you weren't quite old enough 
2. First books or book series you remember re-reading (beyond picture books) (again with the limitations)
3. Books you were forced to re-read in school
4. Books that fell apart on re-reading (a sad list)

Care to share your re-reads?

Oh, these pants? Why, they're...

I don't do this a lot but please to read my review of Tina Fey's book BOSSYPANTS over at The AV Club. I didn't so much sweat bullets as entire magazines over this because my first draft looked like:

Tina Fey is really awesome, right everybody? So cool. Pretty much the neatest lady ever. There aren't even words to describe how awesome she is.

If that doesn't entice you to check out the finished product I don't know what will.

Titus Andronicus samples Charles Bukowski

...at the beginning of their garagey cover of "Birdhouse In Your Soul":


Titus Andronicus covers They Might Be Giants

I'm biased, but I thought it was a cool piece to weave in.

Refilling the overflowing coffers

It took me less than a week after I moved into my new place to start buying books again. You thought I was going to quit? Well... I sort of thought I would, too. Eyeing my newly organized bookshelf I thought, "I can't wait to read these and make a little room in here." Then I went out and bought another book anyway, because the A.V. Club book club calls.

The downside to cutting back on buying books is that, olde-timey as it sounds, I genuinely like book shopping. I went to a few different stores, looking for the book, and it was a relaxing errand (granted, I made the time for it to be). None of this is surprising but I guess I forget when the easiest method is to steer away from temptation entirely. Incidentally, the soon-to-be-announced next pick (a first novel by an author whose second novel I really liked) has a bunch of $5.95 copies at the Strand if you're in the market, when the time comes. 

Unbookening went on a magical journey

Checked out 4 books from the library
Got 8 to review
Received 1 as a gift
Bought 1 (THE BLIND ASSASSIN, for Wrapped Up in Books -- since the last time I read it, it was with a library copy)
14 in

Donated 26
Gave away 8
Returned 3 to library
37 out

Technically, my moving effort to get rid of as many books as possible paid off: I was able to slightly downsize my collection to fit into a slightly smaller shelf. (Not perfectly, though -- there are some stacks and outliers.) In doing so, though, I was able to reorganize everything with a nerdy, nerdy glee. How do you have your books organized? Or do you let the pages fall where they may?

NYC: Come see Maria Schneider and Nathan Rabin tonight

Shameless plug! Readers in the vicinity should plan to hit the joint Onion-A.V. Club reading at the Borders in Columbus Circle at 7PM. Schneider created the Onion columnist Jean Teasdale and has a collection of "her" work out now called A ROOM OF JEAN'S OWN; Rabin published THE BIG REWIND last year and MY YEAR OF FLOPS this year.

Nudge, nudge

I'm over at the A.V. Club this week talking about THE INTUITIONIST.

Hint: It's not about vampires. (Or anything Halloween-related.)

If you please, mosey on over to The AV Club to find out what my book club pick for October is. There's already one hater in the comments, but the fifth one wins a pizza!

Administrative note: Baseball Week: The Vengeance is being pushed back to Aug. 9-15, for the 1.68 parties interested. I have nothing to say for myself, July just got away from me. If you need something to do, might I suggest picking up David Mitchell's excellent CLOUD ATLAS for the AV Club's book club next week? (Plug city! But honestly, it's going to be really fun.)

AV Club in Los Angeles April 1: It's No Joke

Well, there will probably be a lot of jokes. But if you think I'm pulling your leg about this AV Club reading in L.A., you will be very sorry on the 2nd.

Go meet my coworkers, friends and heroes at Echoplex, 1154 Glendale Blvd, at 7:30PM on the 1st. (That's between Silver Lake and Echo Park, near Dodger Stadium -- thanks, Google Maps!) You can buy your advance tickets here. Bring your copy of INVENTORY, still available in the best bookstores everywhere, and I bet they'll sign it.

Want to talk about MASTER AND COMMANDER?

Chat about Patrick O'Brian with me today at 4:30 PM EST (3:30 CST, 1:30PST, 11:30AM Hawaii time, 10:30PM CET -- is that everybody?). Look for the link over here.

(This is what my copy looks like, displaying the episode in the book where the "Sophie" is menaced by Russell Crowe's ginormous head and epic seriousface.)

January Unbookening got it all wrong

An inauspicious beginning to the new year:

Checked 18 out from the library
Got 13 to review
Bookmooched 1 (Patrick O'Brian's MASTER AND COMMANDER, for Wrapped Up in Books)
32 in

Returned 14 to the library
Donated 8
Lent 2
Gave 2
26 out

Ouch! I didn't even buy anything! (But not for lack of trying; I hit a few bookstores over the weekend looking for WINTER'S TALE, without success.)

The reasonable explanation for this is that at the end of December my cache of review books was pretty empty, and then starting in January books for the next few months flooded in. But I knew that was going to happen, and I could have made more room. Well, better luck next month.

Not counted on either list: the e-book I checked out from the NYPL (yep, I'm getting back on that horse!) or the book I finished on the Kindle. I'm not sure how digital books should factor in given that the original goal of this enterprise was to reduce or manage my physical book collection. At the same time, buying or borrowing a lot of e-books also creates a kind of clutter. What do you think?

That was after the Internet called his house 20 times and hung up

Joshua Ferris (whose second novel THE UNNAMED came out last week) recently recommended some "on the road" books in a piece on Goodreads. But it's not clear why they decided to name the article in question "'In Bed' With Joshua Ferris."

Discussing Ferris' first novel THEN WE CAME TO THE END with The AV Club this week won't secure you a place in his affections, but we may have some elbow room in ours. The live chat is Thursday at 3:30 CST/4:30 EST.

Ferris is also on book tour right now, including stops in Philly, Chicago, Denver and Los Angeles; check his website for details.

FTC cover-assery: I got a free copy of THE UNNAMED.

NYC: A.V. Club Reading December 7

I'll just point out at the top here that I am massively biased. While I didn't contribute to the A.V. Club's new collection of "obsessively specific pop-culture lists," the authors include my Wrapped Up in Books co-panelists, former and current bosses and people I look up to in general.

So it's for them, not for me that I beg you to come to the book tour's only NYC stop next Monday, December 7 and let these very, very funny people entertain you for free. It's at 8PM at Union Hall (702 Union St., Brooklyn) and yes, there will be a Q&A afterwards.

If you don't live here, you can still buy and enjoy the book.

The most important book ever comes out today

I am extra-super excited about the A.V. Club's INVENTORY collection given my obsession with lists and my massive conflict of interest.

Running second to the most important book ever: Eoin Colfer's AND ANOTHER THING... is the first authorized sequel to Douglas Adams' HITCHHIKER'S GUIDE TO THE GALAXY series about reluctant space traveler Arthur Dent (and a lot of other stuff). The last volume Adams published was MOSTLY HARMLESS in 1992; he died in 2001. Colfer is best known as the author of the ARTEMIS FOWL series, which may mean more to you than it does to me, but describes himself as a huge Douglas Adams fan. So we'll see.

Wrapped Up in Books Meets Michael Chabon

I said I wasn't going to nag any more -- but I'm sure you will understand if I do it one more time.

This week at the A.V. Club we're discussing Michael Chabon's THE MYSTERIES OF PITTSBURGH, which is MY pick. Come over and let me tell you why you should read this book if you haven't already! If you have, even if you hated it, please comment freely.

If I have already pestered you about it somewhere else, sorry for the rerun. I'll go e-mail my mom instead.

Get thee to a naggery!

Hey, so you know how I've been running bits and pieces about the AV Club's book club, Wrapped Up in Books, on which I am a panelist? I have good news and great news. The good news is that I will be posting about it less often on here, because -- and this is the great news -- Wrapped Up in Books now has its own Facebook group. Join now for regular reminders from me on book chats and upcoming picks, including the two-week book warning enabling you to never again miss a discussion.

Even if you haven't participated in Wrapped Up in Books before or aren't sure you have the time, we'd love to have you. Besides, the next book we pick could be your favorite, and you wouldn't want to miss our praise for it, would you? Please come over and invite all your friends. And hey, if you want to send me a message, feel free to do so. Except for whoever came to this blog yesterday from the DOJ -- for your purposes, I'm in Montenegro, forever.

Post-Its: Better than direct mail from John Grisham

I received a charity letter "from" John Grisham on behalf of the Southern Poverty Law Center in the mail while I was gone. Putting "Author" as part of your return address is a great way to get me to open your unsolicited mail; thank goodness spammers haven't caught on. (J.M. Coetzee wants to help me with the ladies? Sweet.)

• Because a lot of people are winding up here looking for it, my Frank McCourt note from a few weeks ago has been updated with public memorial information, as current as I could find. Not afraid to be servicey!
  


• My copy of LOLITA which I admitted to re-purchasing several months ago has still not turned up. I think it either has been lent out for a long time or got mixed in with another family member's books. I may even have been the forgetful lender; that's where my copy of THE AMAZING ADVENTURES OF KAVALIER AND CLAY was all this time, on the nightstand of the West Coast bureau (who has since finished it). Meanwhile, another book has pulled a disappearing act when I most wanted it, which is why you're not currently getting "Incomprehensible Notes From My Adolescent Copy of LEAVES OF GRASS."



• This Times article on how serendipity is becoming extinct has so many techspletives in it it's practically unreadable. But I'm posting it because "serendipity" is one of my favorite words, and I see no reason that we have to let the concept or the term go. Now get off my lawn.


• "If Nora Ephron had been born buxom, what else besides that article might she not have written?" I'm just catching up to Ariel Levy's profile of Nora Ephron in the New Yorker from a few weeks ago, whose second paragraph can only be described as an equal-opportunity offender for the ladies, but if you can make it past that there are some nifty tidbits about her life as a writer. Related: Tina Fey's forthcoming book (!!!) was described at deal time as being "in the style of Nora Ephron."
  


• INFINITE JEST corner: What the hell do you say when people unfamiliar with the book ask what it's about? This has happened to me several times and my latest answer was the best, but I feel as if I owe people more than a shrug and a smile. (Let us not speak of the back-cover copy, which is atrocious.) My latest answer incorporated the current situations of the various Incandenzas and, since I passed Interdependence Day a while back, a smidge of the alternate-reality politics going on behind them. The last thing I want to do is deter anyone from reading it, which a vague answer or an "It's extremely complicated" might.


• Finally, shamelessly, self-promotionally: The AV Club's latest Wrapped Up in Books round begins Aug. 17 on John Crowley's LITTLE, BIG. That's two weeks from now. It is possible that you have not started the book yet, and I am not judging you, promise. But now would be a good time to start it!

Wrapped Up In Books: The AV Club chooses its next selection.

Starting June 8 we'll be virtually discussing Cormac McCarthy's BLOOD MERIDIAN, OR THE EVENING REDNESS IN THE WEST. (The extended title is for badassery.)

Since I didn't get around to reading it after reading NO COUNTRY and watching the movie or naming THE ROAD one of my favorite page turners of last year, I am very excited to be forced to do so now.

cover: angusrobertson.com.au