Little, Brown Handbook (11th Edition), by H. Ramsey Fowler.
Also Exercises to Accompany the Little, Brown Compact Handbook.
By Jane E. Aaron

I used a library copy of the Fowler book when I practiced my English composition. King County Library System has some copies in its outlying branches. The LB Handbook is expensive, though: maybe some secondhand bookstores, university textbook resellers or Half-Price Book outlets will have discounted, used copies. The Exercises book retails for under $20.

There are many great works of historical non-fiction written to be accessible to a general audience. Probably a good idea to get one that is time/place/subject relevant, but some stand out for making a seemingly tough subject fascinating and simple.

One example would be Longitude by Dava Sobel.

John Lyons' Ground Control and Riding manuals are straight forward, thorough and less expensive than the merchandise rich Parelli stuff. Like him better personally too, his horses look happy, you know? Buck's stuff is fantastic also, the man is a god. Watching video will help you, Lyons (Josh and John), Ken McNabb, Dennis Reis, Buck Brannaman. Not as much of a fan of Parelli or Clinton Anderson and certainly not Monty Roberts (don't like they way they talk about the horses, and Parelli is just too much about money). I'm not at home at the moment so I can't get into books but I'll post them up when I do. Sally Swifts books for riding but I assume you are riding at an advanced level if you are starting greenies anyway so you probably don't need it. I assume you are attending clinics and such as well, or apprenticing. Go watch everyone you can. Talk to everyone you can. Stick with the people whose horses look happy and work easily and well. Don't know what you are looking at in terms of getting a horse, but definitely leasing is a nice intermediate step, especially if you may be able to buy the horse in the future. Vet checks before purchase, pro opinion on conformation re: discipline, return options (ex: can return horse in first month if any problems), don't ever buy from auctions, etc. Volunteering at horse rescues is great practice with behavioral problems/fear issues, restarting, etc. and I learned a lot from it, much more than just working with greenies, plus they need experienced hands. You might even find yourself a nice OTTB or something (we had several national level competitive reiners and eventers come through the rescue I used to volunteer at). Natural horsemanship stuff is applicable across all disciplines, or should be, it's pretty general stuff. True Horsemanship Through Feel (Bill Dorrance) is great, Tom Dorrance's stuff is nice too, also There Are No Problem Horses, Only Problem Riders by Mary Twelveponies. You really are going to learn the most from other people and from the horses themselves. Training wild mustangs is extremely educational if you can find one around (people often get them ignorant of the challenges and are eager for help, try your local horse rescue or maybe contact the BLM and offer to help). Training a wild burro would be useful too, and probably harder, they're are smart as hell. Also keep in mind the 15 minutes to backing kind of thing you see in natural horsemanship demos is not actually anything anybody should be doing at home, which the people who do it will usually acknowledge. Not that it's not doable, but it's not desirable if you've got the time to play with. If you can get RFDTV through satellite TV they have a bunch of training shows, Reis and McNabb are on it I think (also Anderson, but again, not a fan), and my local tack store rents out a lot of these guys training videos (and many many others), yours may too.

I bought last year's kindle as my boyfriend's birthday present, and he loves it. I definitely agree with David about getting a reader with an e-ink screen - I also use the kindle sometimes, and reading text on the e-ink screen is so much easier on the eyes than a backlit screen. You don't get color but it's worth it.

Because you want to read in the dark, look at getting a nice case with a built-in light. They're expensive - you'll probably spend $50 easy on that. If I want to read when my boyfriend's falling asleep, he puts on a sleep mask. I think you should ask your SO if this is an option - I didn't like the light from the little reading lamp, and sleep masks aren't that expensive.

In your case, I think you should look for the device that best supports the ebook formats you are already using. I think the Nook Simple Touch (e-ink) is your best bet - it's the same screen as the Kindle, it supports ePub, and it's only $99 ($79 in-store this Friday!). You don't need 3G, and the Kindle web browser sucks - it's really slow, and you can't access any non-Amazon sites on a 3G only connection.

I would say close 2nd is the Sony Reader, but do go and compare as David suggests. I like the design and feel of the Nook and Kindle better. 3rd choice is the cheaper Kindle - the ads are only on the screensaver and the index page, and if you do change your mind you can pay Amazon the difference to get the ads taken off.

There isn't any delivery charge to get library books on the Kindle, btw - I think the charge you saw was for transferring personal documents, which you don't want to do. However I have to say that I didn't see all that many ebooks available from the library that interest me.

I totally understand why you are having such a hard time choosing - the reason I went with the Kindle last year is because my boyfriend already had an Amazon Prime account and bought a lot of books from Amazon. I hate supporting devices that are obvious portals for one business, and Kindle is the epitome of this - if you like Amazon, you'll love the Kindle. But if you're not planning on joining Amazon Prime, there's nothing that sets the Kindle above the Nook.

One of my favorite Seattle coffee shops is the Starbucks on the 40th floor of the Columbia Tower (or whatever they are calling that building this week). It's one of Seattle's best kept secrets. You get a free view, and the prices are the same as any other Starbucks.

I don't know if I'd call it cozy, but if you like to read somewhere where there's something to stare at out the window while you contemplate, this one is a winner.

http://www.starbucks.com/store/9950

What makes a book valuable is when more people want to buy it than there are copies readily available. It's very difficult to predict. Generally speaking, books with small print runs are going to be more valuable than ones with large ones; but the vast majority of books of any kind, especially in the internet age, turn out to be completely worthless almost as soon as they are bought.

Signed copies are not in themselves valuable; it has to be an author with some cachet, or scarcity. In that case, it can make a big difference. Presentation copies (signed, with a handwritten dedication to another famous person) can be valuable too, but in general you sound like you're not in the market for signed editions, unless you are getting them signed yourself.

The bog-standard "collectible book" is a modern first edition, i.e., a novel written by an author of high stature. First novels are often good, if (but only if) you hit upon a first novel by a nobody in a tiny print run who turns out to be a superstar later. But if you just bought every first as it came out your investment would be wasted, because most of them will be worth $0.01 on Amazon within a year.

The other thing that matters so much is condition, condition, condition. Perfect books hold their value, and maybe appreciate; bent, knocked, or dented ones don't. It's as simple as that.

Genre fiction can be a good area to collect in, especially sci fi. Another area where books often appreciate is photography books, monographs of top photographers. They go out of print, and if the photographer is hot they can then sell for a ton of money. But again, you have to guess who's going to be hot.

In the internet age, all sorts of oddities are turning out to be hugely valuable, while the wide availability of other stuff that had previously been assumed to be fairly reliable has collapsed its prices. For instance, I've tried to sell some books in the past, and the only two I ever made a quick killing on were a rare aquarium book by this Japanese guy, and a collector's guide to Hamilton watches. I was shocked -- they both sold for over $100 within minutes after being listed. Loads of other really good collectible stuff never attracted any interest at all. Supply and demand.

The best place to learn is used bookstores, specifically ones that do a lot of collectible business. Go to Wessel & Lieberman in Pioneer Square, or John Michael Lang in Ballard, and just browse. Browse and browse and browse. Look at the books. Look at the prices. Find similar books where one is $10 and the other is $200, and see if you can tell why. Look on Ebay, and sort the books section by price, and see what goes for a lot of money, and why. Get ahold of bookseller catalogs, too -- same thing. Also, learn the lingo -- learn what words like "rubbed" and "chipped", "octavo" and "12mo" mean. Look on sites like Abebooks and see the difference in price between different editions (or even the same one) of something.

The trick is to find out what's available now for cheap that will be dear tomorrow. The only way to really do that is to learn the business a little. Ask questions; a lot of booksellers love to jabber endlessly about their trade, and most of them are pretty smart.

In addition to knowing books, you have to know your subject. If you're just wandering into B&N trying to guess what's going to make you rich, forget it. If you're buying SF, you have to REALLY KNOW SF, and you have to be able to tell what's good and what isn't. Same with photography or anything else. What are you interested in? Those are the books you should be looking at.

You probably won't find anything you're interested in on this blog, but you should read it, for his insights into what makes books worth more or less, and how that changes over time: http://www.bookride.com/

Go to the library and check out a few book-collecting books, starting with the classic "ABC for Book Collectors" by John Carter and Nicolas Barker and "Book Finds" by Ian Ellis, or whatever else they have. Be prepared for a lot of stuffy, stuck-up guff from some of these books, which sometimes appear to be written by semi-senile old duffers droning on and on about that 1732 Principia Mathematicus by Sir Ethelred Bunnywhip QV RSC Msc.PRSD that they spilled port on during that terrible thunderstorm in 1919, blah de blah de blah, but there's some good ones too. Carter is great.

Whatever you do, don't turn into one of those pricks who goes to yard sales and thrift stores with a scanner and scans everything and leaves it in a big pile afterwards. Everybody hates those guys. Yard sales are a terrible place to look for books, anyways, unless you're looking for 1980s college textbooks or the complete sermons of Billy Graham in two hundred baby-blue volumes. The only time you'll ever find a good one, it will have been dropped in a toilet. It's easier to find good books in a thrift store but you have to have the patience of Job. Stay out of antique stores.

Yes we've done True Grit.
No we have yet to choose the next book.

It seems like the participation in the book club is a little tepid - i.e. not much of it.

Based on that I haven't been rushing into choosing the next one. However, having lots of people participate is not a requirement, just enough to make it worthwhile for those who do.

So, I'll kick things off for #3 and see where it goes.

Thanks for asking.

Here are some of my favorite collections of Ghost Stories and collections of Horror Stories, A lot of great stuff for readalouds in there, for sure. One newer collection I'd add in there is Ghosts by Gaslight. Oh, and the library of America's new two-volume American Fantastic Tales. For novels, I might suggest Jon Harwood's The Ghost Writer, (or his The Seance), Francis Cottam's The House of Lost Souls, James Herbert's The Secret of Crickley Hall, to name a few.

I might suggest Kyril Bonfiglioli's antic mystery trilogy, Don't Point That Thing At Me, After You with the Pistol, and Something Nasty in the Woodshed. Funny, irreverent, Or for something a bit less rough edged, Ian Sansom's Mobile Library Mysteries might work, or maybe Connie Willis's Bellwether or Remake. Cooking with Fernet Branca, by James Hamilton-Paterson. The Ascent of Rum-Doodle, by W E Bowman.

i don't know if it works the same with literary stuff as visual, but a press release can be your new friend. look online for formats and tweak it a bit since it is not an event, or line up a book release party with a local store and then you DO have an event - hit up bookstores, community centers, coffee houses that do reading series or possibly some other placement depending on what the topic of the novel is there might be a good place that may not make the most sense for other book releases. also maybe try picking the brains of the people at hugo house. maybe they have space in their reading series or know of other places that are hosting similar events. then send your press release to the papers so they have the important info about the book (and event if you found a place) if you can afford it send a copy to them as well in case someone on staff wants to read it and maybe review it.

if you cant afford to send copies out into the world put some sample chapters up on the internet. getting a website for the book is helpful too so people aren't emailing you directly but can just go to a link to the book. web addresses and hosting are pretty cheap, you can get them for around 40 a year, some times cheaper if you get several years in a row, which will help tremendiously with getting your book beyond the city (there are free hosting places as well, but its nice to have just the name of the book or your name as the url without alot of other stuff in the url which screams you're to cheap to properly care for your creation. some places even have simple templates you can use if you're not web savy and toss a pic up there and some sample pages. then if any one in the future gets interested and writes about your book they have a reference point to easily get more info AND you can post the links of their reviews on your page. while social media is great, having something other than a FB page shows you're serious (i know some galleries won't look at a person's work unless they send a real website, it depends on the place but it just shows that you're willing to do more than post something on FB and that you take your craft seriously)

know any bloggers? send them the release and a link to where the book info can be found online. maybe they're interested and will write about it, and if they do post a link to their article on your website as well.

its too late for entries but you might want to go to http://shortrun.org/ and go to the small press event on november 12th that is being hosted by the vera project. start to make contacts in the self publishing world face to face. the lovely ladies behind short run are planning on doing it yearly so it could help you get your foot in the door to the process next year. even if you're not interested in tabling there will be alot of other people there from many ends of the self publishing persuasion for you to pick their brains and pick up some tips from them. there will be alot of zine and comic people there, but i know they also have a few tables of the literary bent at the event. there are also some distribution peoples who will be tabling, you could talk to them about who would be a good distro in another city or who you should approach with your content. i only know a bit about this side of things from conversations with my sister, but there are alot of ins and outs and people who want to help people who are trying to get their stuff out into the world. also talking to people there who have been through the process will help tell you what NOT to do or places that are flakey on writing checks.

if youre looking for funding to try and promote the book check out http://miraslist.blogspot.com/ there are tons of listed grants and residencies there as well as a wealth of information on HOW to apply for grants.

since your WA resident check out http://artisttrust.org/index.php/for-artists maybe write a GAP (grants for artists projects) grant next year to get some money to promote the book, or hire a professional web designer or some other related project (or apply for funding/residency to start your NEXT project) artist trust's 2012 fellowship includes literary media, thats a pretty hefty grant and relatively painless to apply -no fee, and i think its all the basic info you'll need for most grants (resume, statement and your work sample) without a ton of extra writing. and while youre at it check out their EDGE program - it teaches business skills to artists. so you can learn all the things you're supposed to do to take control of your work in the world. they also offer lectures and workshops (theres an upcoming one on health care for artists, so its not always the business side but also how to survive as an artist) they are a fantastic local resource and should be on your digital version of speed dial (in addition to several of their own grants and listings of calls from many others, they have a reading room full of information on how to do things like what you're asking, they have contact for pro-bono lawyers for the arts, they have listings of emergency assistance grants if your writing room floods or burns down plus tons more stuff) and i'm gushing about them even though i just got my rejection letter for the most recent GAP grant which should give you an idea of how cool they are.

Hi there-

Hre are a few books that you can try:
Best Friend on Wheels by Debra Shirley
Susan Laughs by Jeanne Willis
Why Do Some People Use Wheelchairs: questions children ask about disabled people

Hope that helps!

You can't swing a bag of cats without hitting a gritty person in this book. Mattie is hardcore, as is Rooster (though he's certainly wishy-washy on occasion). But LaBoeuf has metal as well, as does Lucky Ned Pepper. Now, Ned might not be the most upstanding citizen present, but he keeps his cool, no doubt. I think not losing your shit in tense and/or crazy situations scores a lot of grit points.

Since the book is from Mattie's point of view, and we're shown many sides to her (i.e. making the occasional foolish statement, her childish moment when she explains naming Little Blackie, etc.), I'd have to vote Mattie as the grittiest. Taking everything into account, she's got the biggest backbone, and her character is the most consistent.

She reminds me of Arya Stark from George R.R. Martin's Game of Thrones series.

The formal language was the first thing that stood out to me when watching the movie. Formal syntax or not, did people in Arkansas/Oklahoma of that time have such a great vocabulary?! Not just Mattie...everyone spoke like that.

It reminded me of Raising Arizona. "And the doc went on to explain that this woman, who looked as fertile as the Tennessee Valley, could bear no young. Her insides were a rocky place where my seed could find no purchase."

Whether or not it was period-accurate, I liked it. It just made all the humor that much more dry.

Hmmm. Had not thought of that. Maybe so. I read it more as a demonstration of Mattie's grit in the face of a terrifying situation. Not saying you're wrong, tho.

If a sacrifice was required, or there was some point Portis was making about the perils of revenge, Mattie sure did not learn the lesson - even years afterwards she still felt perfectly justified and proud of what she had done.

For fiction, in addition to the already mentioned Michener, I'd suggest the two novels of Alan Brennert - "Molokai" and "Honolulu" - which are quite good historical fiction on the islands.

The hot non-fiction book right now on Hawaii is Sarah Vowell's latest, "Unfamiliar Fishes." Here's from Publisher's Weekly: "Outrageous and wise-cracking, educational but never dry, this book is a thought-provoking and entertaining glimpse into the U.S.'s most unusual state and its unanticipated twists on the familiar story of Americanization."

Another non-fiction that takes a less traditional approach is Gary Okihito's "Island World: A History of Hawaii and the US" - first of a planned trilogy. Publisher's Weekly writes: " Okihiro combines human history, natural history and mythic Hawaiian folklore with interpretations of how Hawaiian cultural artifacts (such as surfboards) infiltrated American culture and vice versa. He likewise depicts the lives of Hawaiians who wound up in North America, either by choice or involuntarily. ... Okihiro places the story of Hawaii in direct and constant relation to the story of the United States. Some readers may find this eclectic mix of facts hard to follow and synthesize, but all will come away intrigued and enlightened." Looks like something you might enjoy, or that meets your desire to know not just what happened, but what's going on, at least in Okihiro's view.

I know of one such group that has been meeting for years and years, and is just wonderful: The Seattle Public Library's Poetry Appreciation Group, which meets at the Central library every Tuesday at noon. It has been some time since I've attended myself, but the group works really well. Basically they look at one or two poems each time - the poem is read aloud, there is some discussion of it, and then it is read again when people run out of things to say. It is like the world's easiest book group, and it is a very welcoming group to all readers at whatever level of comfort with poetry. They read a pretty wide variety of things as well, and members are welcome to suggest authors. The one thing the group ISN'T is a writing group: no poems that may have been written by group members are read.

If you'd like to know more, you can call the library at 386-4636, or just come by some Tuesday a little before noon: I believe these days they meet at a meeting room up on the 6th floor just opposite the elevators, and no advance reading is required.

He is fantastic. Where to start would depend on what you want.

If you want to be blown away with complex, deep, and transcendental writing then start with Perdido Street Station. Down side? It can be a tough read just because it is so dense, and to really appreciate the book you gotta read it like three times.

If you want to start with his more accessible books, but ones that will still let you see his genius and come to understand a bit of his writing style then I would recommend you start with Kraken.

Have fun!

To the many excellent responses here, I can only add: here are some other truly awesome old-timey Western stories:

Warlock, by Oakley Hall
The Track of the Cat, by Walter Van Tilburg Clark
The Big Sky, by A.B. Guthrie Jr.
The Searchers, by Alan LeMay.
Lonesome Dove, by Larry McMurtry
Deadwood, by Pete Dexter
Butcher's Crossing, by John Edward Williams
The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, by Ron Hansen.

All really good books; all old-timey westerns. Oh, and yes - it looks like there are copies available at the library.

I think the short answer is "Nobody has made that model work just yet, but reasonable and knowledgeable minds may and do disagree about whether it ever will."

Longer answer:

With the notable exception of the Wall Street Journal, few if any print publications have successfully implemented a paywall. The New York Times has tried a couple of permutations but none of them follows the model you lay out.

The "why" part of your question is too huge to summarize well here. Very crudely, most newspapers rely so heavily on syndicated or wire content that users can get the same info for free from other sources. Since papers usually get most of their revenue from ads rather than subscriptions, they're more concerned--broadly speaking--with circulation and CPM than with the size and quality of their own newsrooms. Sad to say.

I'm not sure what you mean by "community paper"--do you mean something like the Times or something more local, like at a neighborhood level?

For some really interesting thinking and explanation, I would start reading Steve Yelvington and Clay Shirky:

http://www.yelvington.com

http://www.shirky.com/weblog/

Yelvington started in newspapers and was part of the first attempts to take papers online in the era of CompuServe and BBSs. He still works for a newspaper pubisher (Morris Publishing Group) that is trying out some interesting models combining professional investigative reporters, expert commentator, and user-generated content (www.blufftontoday.com).

Other people, like Steve Brill, are debating the merits of setting up a micropayment model--i.e. I want to read this Economist essay or this Krugman column so I'll configure my PayPal or some other account and then pay $0.25 to read it. Some people think this has potential, some don't:

http://www.niemanlab.org/2009/06/micropayments-steve-brill-is-not-optimistic/

So do some reading and form your own opinion. It's a really interesting space to watch, especially up here with all the post-PI efforts springing up (Post Post Intelligencer, seattlepi.com, Crosscut, et al.).

What separates Charles from being a hack is that he's intelligent and he's a good writer, regardless of if you agree with his opinions.

So, no. Goldy is actually a less talented, less intelligent, less witty version of Charles Mudede.

Read: Hack.

That does not negate the fact that Goldy is also lazy, and that Charles sometimes doesn't even watch the films that he's reviewed.

In addition to what's already been mentioned here, there have been a couple of really good historical overviews just this past year: Demanding the Impossible: A History of Anarchism, by Peter Marshall (Publisher's Weekly: "Blowing away cobwebs of misunderstanding and misrepresentation, this is a stimulating portrait of a highly varied but distinctive political ideal, tradition, and practice arising from the enduring human impulse to be free.") and The World That Never Was: The True Story of Dreamers, Schemers, Anarchists and Secret Agensts, by Alex Butterworth. (that last isn't exactly about Anarchism, but it looks fascinating nevertheless, and got good reviews).

You should check out the catalog over at AK Press, which has tons of titles on anarchism. One that seems almost too big - and this purports to be just Volume One - but that I've been dipping into now & again is the mammoth Anarchist FAQ. Their "Anarchism Starter Pack" includes that, as well as Cindy Milstein's recent Anarchism and its Aspirations, and Daniel Guerin's classic anthology of anarchist writings, No Gods No Masters. Seems like a nice present to get for yourself, and all for a measley $50.

Finally, from what I can see, Anarchism: A Beginner's Guide, by Ruth Kinna looks quite good. (And the library will loan it to you for free: talk about anarchism!)

It's not really trashy, but have you read that biography of Julia Childs that came out last year? She was a spy in World War II and she was really fascinating all around.

In terms of trashiness, you can't get much trashier than Marlon Brando's novel Fan Tan: http://www.thestranger.com/seattle/the-best-worst-novel-ever/Content?oid=25742 Or Gore Vidal's Myra/Myron Breckenridge, which is sleazy and fun. Or Naked Came the Stranger by "Penelope Ashe" or Valley of the Dolls! Classic trash.

I can't remember precisely, but I thought Nick, Rachel's boyfriend, had something to do with the demon attacks?

Great, great question.

First off, it should be said that this is essentially an unanswerable query. Or, at least, the beauty of Pale Fire is just how many different ways it can opened up and plunged into. As is often the case, Nabokov practically double dog dares you into multiple reads here.

Or, as my supremely kind 2nd grade teacher often told me: "It is okay, Matthew. Every one of your answers are right."

That being said, my approach, and one that I found struck a great balance between Shade's controlled, melancholic voice and Kinbote's increasingly erratic, thoroughly entertaining ramble, was by reading the forward, then the first Canto in its entirety, then the footnotes to each line of that Canto in their entirety. Afterward, I went back to the second Canto and repeated my pattern.

This kept Shade's words fresh in my mind while exploring Kinbote's “explanation” of them. It also allowed me to absorb Kinbote’s labyrinthine tale in large chunks, which helped in stitching it all together at the end. Of course, I always, always, followed his recommendation in certain footnotes to see yet another footnote, which, of course, derailed my entire process.

But that’s part of the fun - completely surrendering to Kinbote’s logic. It has that mad, Willy-Wonka-is-at-the-helm-of-this-boat-and-driving-us-straight-over-a-chocolate-waterfall quality to it.

Hope you’re enjoying this book. I think it’s a pretty great one.

It felt to me like kind of a desperate but unconscious act on his part: like something he did out of a need for that kind of power we can only get by giving something to somebody else. Scotty clearly doesn't get to do that much in his current situation. The gift fish is a similar gesture: to have something to give seemingly erases Scotty's utter lack of status in his interactions with others: sort of swiftly levels the field. (There's a wonderful short story by John Cheever called "Christmas is a Sad Season for the Poor" which is all about the sense of power inherent in giving - 'licentious benevolence,' he calls it).

For Scotty, it seems to produce the effect he's craving:

"It had been a long time since anyone had thanked me for something. "Thanks," I said, to myself. I said it again and again, wanting to hold in my mind the exact sound of their voices, to feel again the kick of surprise in my chest.

Is there some quality of warm spring air that causes birds to sing more loudly?"

At the risk of wearing my heart on my sleeve, I have to say that in my work I get to have conversations with a lot of people who are basically marginalized or social outcasts, and have seen how that simple social validation - just to talk with someone as an equal and a fellow human being, about almost anything at all - seems to mean so much. Hard for many of us to imagine just how much 'thank you' can mean to someone who doesn't have anything to be thanked for most of the time.

Hi, sleepy book club! I was thinking about this question and was having trouble putting everything together. I suffer from a tiny brain, and in this kind of scattered narrative I find it difficult to keep track of who is who and what goes where, and so here are some notes I made in order to make sense of it. This isn't an answer to the question, exactly, and I don't know it will be helpful for anyone else to read, but *making* the notes helped me tremendously in seeing the through-lines. If it's not obvious, spoilers abound.

# Side A

1. Found Objects
- Sasha (late 20's?)
- Coz (Sasha's shrink)
- Alex

Sasha steals a wallet, hooks up with and allows Alex to shower in her kitchen tub with stolen bath salts. Includes a reference to "Rob, Sasha's friend who drowned in college."

2. The Gold Cure
- Sasha (30's, Sasha is Bennie's long-time assistant)
- Bennie
- Collette, Bennie's executive producer
- Chris (Bennie's son)
- Stephanie (Bennie's ex-wife)

Bennie goes with Chris and Sasha to visit a band about to be dropped from Bennie's record label. Bennie relives and silently freaks out about some of the shameful moments of his life. He eats flakes of gold to fight off impotence and anxiety, shares the gold with Chris and Sasha like it's candy. Drops off Chris with Stephanie, puts the moves on Sasha but is gently rebuked.

3. Ask Me If I Care
- Rhea (in high school; the narrator)
- Bennie, Scotty, Alice, Jocelyn (the other high-school kids)
- Marty (the punk violinist, in college)
- Lou (Older producer, mentor, letch)

The kids act like kids, meaning they all long for each other in impossible combinations, complain about how the world sucks, perform disastrously in a hardcore punk venue. They meet with Lou, a record producer. Jocelyn runs off with Lou.

4. Safari
- Lou (late 30's)
- Mindy, Lou's young girlfriend
- Charlene (Charlie) and Rolph, Lou's kids
- Albert, the safari guide
- Cora, Lou's travel agent
- Mildred and Fiona, the older women who join the group on safari
- Chronos, one of Lou's musicians
- Dean, an actor friend of Lou's, who amuses Mindy by saying things like "It's hot" or "Weapons are necessary."

The group goes out on safari, looking for lions. Albert and Mindy make goo goo eyes at each other, but are interrupted when Chronos gets himself munched by a lion. In the aftermath of the munching, Albert and Mindy become cool with each other. Rolph mentions to Lou that Albert and Mindy were acting weird, and Lou immediately gets what was going on. Later, Lou has sex with Mindy in order to show her who is the boss. Lou is.

5. You (Plural)
- Jocelyn (the narrator)
- Lou, old man in a hospital bed in his bedroom with tubes up his nose
- Rhea

Lou is old and dying. Rhea and Jocelyn are visiting him, paying their last respects. Jocelyn, who ran off with Lou at the end of Chapter 3, asks about Lou's son Rolph (one of the kids in the safari story); she has forgotten that he died long ago when he was 28. She has been long separated from Lou. Full of both pity and anger, she fantasizes about drowning him. She laments that when they first got together, Lou promised her the world and never delivered.

6. X's and O's
- Scotty (somewhere middle-aged? I'm bad at guessing ages. Scotty is the narrator)
- Bennie

Scotty is washed up, doing part time janitorial work to make ends meet. He comes across an article in Spin about his old friend Bennie, now a big shot record producer, and he writes Bennie. They arrange to meet in Bennie's office. Scotty, who fishes to eat in the East River, brings a fish to the meeting. In Scotty's world, among his friends, the fish was a real accomplishment (striped bass!) but in Bennie's world, out of context, the fish is weird and vaguely threatening. They talk about Alice, who divorced Scotty long ago and about whom Benny was crazy when they were kids in Chapter 3. Scotty leaves, confident that he has intimidated Bennie with his fish and crazy gap-toothed smile, and that in spite of Bennie's fancy office and good fortune, Scotty is the boss of Bennie and Scotty. Just before he goes, Bennie puts a business card into his hand and tells him if he ever has music he wants heard, call. The next day Scotty hands the card off to a couple of junkies, maybe musicians, and tells them to call Bennie, tells them, say Scotty sent you.

# Side B

7. A to B
- Bennie (middle aged)
- Kathy, queen bee of the country club
- Stephanie, Bennie's wife, publicist of Bosco
- Jules, Stephanie's brother and the journalist who attempted to rape Kitty Jackson, now out of prison
- Chris, Bennie's son
- La Doll, Stephanie's boss (La Doll is "Dolly," the General's publicist in Chapter 8)
- Bosco, washed up superstar musician
- Noreen, neighbor who peeks at them through the fence

Bennie and Stephanie live in a country club community, but worry it means they sold out. Bennie refuses to participate in country clubbish activities, but Stephanie tries to ingratiate herself with the community by playing tennis with Kathy, queen bee of the country club. She hides her tennis games from Bennie as if she's having an affair. She says she's going to pay a business visit to Bosco as cover for her tennis game, but when her brother Jules invites himself along she decides visit Bosco for real, if only to cover her lie. On the way to Bosco's place, Stephanie asks Jules what the hell he's doing with his life. He doesn't know.

Bosco tells Stephanie and Jules that he is going revive his career with a comeback tour, a "suicide tour," which means he's going to go on tour with all-new material and party like he did when he was young, which he expects to kill him, which will make a great documentary. He says the album will be called "A to B". Stephanie is dubious, but Jules, who up to this point was cynical and shiftless, becomes rapt and full of purpose at the idea of writing about Bosco's comeback and/or suicide.

When she returns to the house, Stephanie finds a bobby pin in her bed and realizes that Bennie has slept with Kathy. In distress and hoping to hide from her family, she wanders out into a far corner of the yard and has a strange little conversation with Noreen through the fence ("I like to sit in this spot," Noreen says. "I know," Stephanie says.)

8. Selling the General
- Dolly Peale, publicist for the General
- The General, genocidal dictator of some country somewhere
- Lulu, Dolly's daughter
- Arc, assistant to the General
- Kitty Jackson, charismatic, troublemaking starlet

Dolly is the American publicist of a genocidal dictator known as the General. The General has hired Dolly from afar so she can improve his image in the international community where opinion of him is less than favorable. Dolly has taken the job out of desperation; her career was ruined after she accidentally spilled scalding oil all over the guests at an A-list party she organized, a crime for which she served six months for criminal negligence.

Dolly communicates with the General through Arc, his assistant, via fax and phone calls. She advises him to make superficial changes, for example she urges him to wear a certain kind of hat. She decides later that he needs to have his picture taken with an American movie star and she chooses Kitty Jackson, super famous starlet whose career is nevertheless on the ropes because since she was attacked by the journalist Jules during an interview (which is about to happen in Chapter 9), she can't tolerate the Hollywood scene and frequently pitches fits on set.

Dolly, Kitty, and Dolly's daughter Lulu fly to whatever country the General is the dictator of. Dolly is extremely nervous because Kitty acts like a brat all the way up to the very moment they meet the General, and then suddenly she turns on her superstar charm, the faux-candid pictures of the General hobnobbing with the starlet are taken, and Dolly is relieved and proud of herself. Moments later, however, Kitty starts asking questions like, "Is this where you bury the bodies? Oh, was I not supposed to bring up the genocide?" The General's men take her away.

Dolly and Lulu fly back to the states without Kitty. The photos hit the paper and are a smashing success; the General gives Dolly a large cash payment and then terminates her services. The General and Kitty are seen together at other public events. I really do not understand what Kitty is thinking at this point. Dolly receives offers of employment from other genocidal dictators but she turns them down and instead opens a cafe.

9. Forty Minute Lunch
- Kitty Jackson
- Jules Jones (the narrator)
- Janet Green (Jules's ex)

Jules writes an article about an interview with Kitty Jackson. Throughout the article he makes copious references in footnotes to his own failed relationship with a woman named Janet Green. Near the end of the interview described in the article, Jules attacks Kitty and attempts to rape her, and the article is revealed to have been written from prison.

10. Out of Body
- Drew
- Sasha
- Rob Freeman (the narrator, who speaks in two-word sentences)
- Lizzie (age 20)
- Bix

All the kids get stoned. Rob is recovering from a recent suicide attempt. He reminisces about meeting Sasha, about swapping secrets with her (Sasha: had a problem stealing, ran away to Europe with a musican who dumped her and subsequently made her living stealing and turning tricks. Rob: experimented with gay sex, but he's not gay, really!). Rob is Sashas best buddy nonsexual guy friend, wishes he had made a move on Sasha but now it's too late because she's with Drew. But truly it's Drew he has a crush on.

At some point the gang goes to see the Conduits in concert. The Conduits are the band that Bennie discovered and will later make his career on, and they are the band that Bosco will later become famous with. Sasha meets Bennie for the first time at this concert and peels away from the group. By morning, it's only Drew and Rob left together. Rob says he wishes that he and Drew could live far away in a cabin together, and Drew deflects by saying how much he would miss Sasha. Rob says, okay, well, Sasha was a pickpocket and prostitute in Europe, did you know that? Drew says fuck you, get away from me. And then exasperated, strips off his clothes (the sight of which is a thrill which Rob had been longing for) and goes swimming in the East River. Rob follows, but he is a weak swimmer and he drowns.

11. Good-bye, my love
- Ted Hollander
- Sasha (Late teens, age 19)
- Beth and Andy, Sasha's parents
- Susan, Ted's wife

Sasha is in Naples, Italy, marooned after having been dumped by the globetrotting musician she ran off with. Ted is her uncle, sent to Italy by Sasha's parents to find her. After some days of hardly trying to find her, he stumbles upon her as she's buying cigarettes. She is polite but is anxious to get away, but in the end agrees to have dinner with him.

In the hotel room waiting for dinner, Ted thinks back to when he was in college and spent the summer with Sasha's family. Sasha's father was abusive and fought with Sasha's mother, twice dislocating her shoulder. Ted felt protective of Sasha and somtimes took her out to the lake to occupy and distract her while her parents acted crazy inside the house. Specifically he remembers taking her to swim, remembers that she wanted to go swimming, she was afraid of swimming, she was rebellious about trying.

At dinner, Ted and Sasha both are having trouble coming to terms with the fact that Sasha is an adult. She's got a limp from a recent accident, she's cutting her own arms, she's got a tenuous relationship with her friends. She says she fantasized about her Father coming to look for her; when Sasha asks her Uncle Ted why he's in Italy, he lies to her and says he's come to look at art. (Why does he say that?) She is upset but swallows her sad face and invites him to dance. Once he's dancing, she disappears with his wallet.

He manages to find her in her apartment the next morning, and her situation is even more desperate than he thought: it is evident she has no friends and no money either. (Rob, who drowned in Chapter 10, revealed that she resorted to prostitution during this time). They argue, but they reconcile. The chapter ends with a flash-forward: Ted, an old man, visits Sasha in California where she lives with her family.

12. Great Rock and Roll Pauses
- Alison (the narrator)
- Lincoln (Alison's brother)
- Sasha
- Drew, Sasha's husband, the same guy Sasha dated in Chapter 10

Alison describes her family: Her brother Lincoln is autistic and meticulously graphs the pauses in songs. Her father, Drew, has a difficult time – much more difficult than Sasha – coming to terms with Lincoln's obsessions. Alison, an anxious empath, is overly concerned for each member of her family. Sasha and Drew are both haunted by the drowning death of Rob, and so by extension is Alison. Drew comes to terms with Lincoln's music-pause obsession and it is unbearably sweet.

13. Pure Language
- Bennie (in his late 50's)
- Alex, the guy Sasha got together with in Chapter 1
- Rebecca, Alex's wife
- Lulu, the daughter in the 'General' story
- Scotty, Bennie's old friend who brought him the fish

Bennie has quit the big record label he founded in a huff over artistic integrity. Alex (of Chapter 1) had hoped to work for Bennie as a mixer, but Bennie instead hires him as a kind of viral marketer. Alex's wife knows he didn't get the job he wanted, but he hasn't told her that he was hired for the marketing job because he's afraid she'll see him as a sell-out. Lulu (of "Selling the General"), now a young adult, is a kind of Machiavellian overachiever, and works for Alex doing fake grassroots style marketing.

The event they're working to promote is a concert by unknown Scotty Hausmann (Scotty of the fish in Chapter 6). Scotty has been writing and hoarding songs, and Bennie has decided to make him famous. Thanks to the work of Alex and Lulu there's a large turnout for the concert, but Scotty is nervous and freaking out and doesn't want to perform. Bennie and Alex are trying to wrestle him into submission and it's going very badly when Lulu appears, instantly charms Scotty, and leads him onto the stage.

The event is a success. Afterward, Bennie and Alex remember Sasha and wonder where she is these days. Her old apartment building happens to be nearby, so they walk over and ring the buzzer but nobody answers. They hear someone approaching but it isn't Sasha; it's someone else, another young woman who is just starting out in New York.

I mentioned Louise Penny in a recent Shelf Talk post about "fair play" mysteries, which also mentioned Jane Haddam and Peter Lovesey. I also think you might enjoy L.R. Wright's series featuring Canadian Mountie Karl Alberg and Librarian Cassandra Mitchell, set in coastal BC, so it has a nice local feel. I'd also say such standbys as P.D. James, Donna Leon and Elizabeth George and golden age writers Dorothy L. Sayers and Agatha Christie might be worth a try. And finally, although less of a whodunnit, Minette Walters or Ruth Rendell might please for their rich psychological depth and unsettling atmosphere.

Disclaimer: I am a nerd for this kind of stuff.
I LOVE Cabinet Magazine. I have been a subscriber since issue 18. The collection of non-sequitur re-affirms my opinion that people are passionate about the most random things and the human race is just nuts! nuts! nuts!
Sometimes I read an article and think 'there can't possibly be such and such an organization, theory, or historical event', then look into it, and there is!
Admittedly, there are some articles I just cannot get through, no matter how many times I try - far too specific language about math or physics that I just have no clue what they are talking about.
But I think it is good mental exercise to challenge your brain with academic literature and get some of your culturing from (in my average person's opinion)
obscure sources like this super - cool mag.
That's my opinion..anyway. I love it.

Hey there Fenrox!

Sorry, but we don't have any immediate plans for a Kindle version. Would be cool, and we'll keep an eye on it, but not happening this week, anyway..

Thanks,
a