JoV's Book Pyramid
America
A decade on…… I am still affected
What do all these books had in common? These are books which drew 9/11 as the main theme and became instant national bestsellers. There may be many more that I have failed to mention, and there are books which include mere casual mention of 9/11 in the characters’ conversation. I remember reading many books like … Continue reading
Sunset Park by Paul Auster
I picked this book up by random at the featured new book shelf of the library. The blurb key word : “families who have abandoned their houses due to debt or foreclosure during the banking crisis.” caught my eyes. I devour the book within two days. Sunset Park is about 28-year-old Miles Heller who is … Continue reading
Legend of Suicide by David Vann
I first saw David Vann’s Legend of a Suicide on my colleague, Alexandra’s desk. I was enticed by the beautiful cover, shinny red and blue, not noticing that the body of the fish were actually guns in several rotations. I borrowed it from Alex and walked into the book with no clue what it is about. All … Continue reading
Time Is a Goon: A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan
The main character is a young woman called Sasha who we learn early on is a kleptomaniac as she discusses her problem with a therapist. Each chapter is narrated from a different person’s perspective and leads the reader to think about the relationship of each character to the ones in previous chapters. As the book … Continue reading
The Accidental Billionaires by Ben Mezrich (The Founding of Facebook)
Are you a Facebook user? Do you love it? Or are you sick of people talking about and being in the Facebook all the time? Facebook is the biggest thing of the century, next to Google of course. I don’t use Facebook very often, I tried not to get addicted to it, although I know … Continue reading
Rabbit, Run by John Updike
The novel opens, aptly enough, with a basketball game being played by a few children on a street in Mt. Judge – the suburban home of our hero, Harry Angstrom. Harry is nicknamed “Rabbit” for his awkward looks. He was once the star athlete of his high school, a great basketball player prized by his team … Continue reading
Zeitoun by Dave Eggers
Abdulrahman and Kathy Zeitoun are residents of New Orleans, with Kathy’s son from first marriage Zachary, and Nademah, Aisha, Safiya and Ahmad. The Zeitoun runs a Painting and contractor company. A hardworking and honest man, his typical day begin with getting the kids ready to school and picking up phone calls from workers and customers … Continue reading
Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck
Of Mice and Men is a novella written by Nobel Prize-winning author John Steinbeck. Published in 1937, it tells the tragic story of George Milton and Lennie Small, two displaced migrant ranch workers during the Great Depression in California. George Milton, an intelligent and cynical man, and Lennie Small, an ironically-named man of large stature … Continue reading
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
“Whenever you feel like criticizing any one…just remember that all the people in this world haven’t had the advantages that you’ve had.” – Chapter. 1, said Carraway Senior to Nick Carraway. Nick is a young bachelor who graduates from Yale [New Haven] in 1915, he moves to New York City to “learn the bond business” … Continue reading
The Catcher in the Rye
The Catcher in the Rye opens with the first-person narrative of 16-year-old Holden Caulfield’s experiences in New York City in the days following his expulsion from Pencey Preparatory school. Holden talks to you in his most casual ways about his classmates in Pencey irreverently, whom he criticizes as being superficial, or, as he would say, “phony”. Most … Continue reading
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Reading, after a certain age, diverts the mind too much from its creative pursuits. Any man who reads too much and uses his own brain too little falls into lazy habits of thinking. - Albert Einstein (1879 - 1955)
JoV's Book Pyramid 
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