I'm doing 17 things
10. Why Not Me? The Inside Story of the Making and Unmaking of the Franken Presidency, Al Franken. I spaced out about a third of the way through but finished it anyway out of obligation. Would have been funnier as a skit.
11. Teacher Man, Frank McCourt. I’m thinking vaguely about applying to Teach for America, so I checked this out from the library. I never read either of his previous two memoirs, but I kind of feel like his publishers were looking to wring one last bestseller out of him, so they asked him if he could squeeze anything out of this period of his life. Some moments were sweet, but it was pretty underwhelming. Probably I just expected more, after all I’ve heard about him.
12. Renegade: The Making of a President, Richard Wolffe. Got this for my birthday! It’s about the Obama campaign, but although I’m a huge political junkie – or maybe because I’m a huge political junkie – it didn’t really do anything for me, because it didn’t tell me anything I didn’t already know, as an obsessed follower of the election. My favorite part of the book: learning that Obama laughed when he saw an Everybody Chill the Fuck Out, I Got This macro of himself.
13. Lies (And the Lying Liars Who Tell Them): A Fair and Balanced Look at the Right, Al Franken. I’m a political junkie but apparently political books aren’t my thing. I don’t know…I really wanted to like this, because I figured it would be less gimmicky than Why Not Me?, but it just didn’t feel important in a post-2008 political landscape.
14. The Bus Driver Who Wanted to Be God and Other Stories, Etgar Keret. These stories are SO FUCKING WEIRD. None are longer than a few pages, save for a novella at the end, and they’re all told in this loose, conversational style that totally calls all the more attention to the bizarro shit that goes on within the story. It’s very Donald Barthelme. I’m really excited to check out what else he’s done.
