Mycroft Holmes by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Anna Waterhouse

Well I like Sherlock Holmes. And I'm a fan of Kareem Abdul-Jabbar... so a book written about Sherlock's brother by Kareem is something I'd have to read. Mycroft Holmes follows the famous detective's older brother on an adventure early in his life that helps to explain why Mycroft is how he is in the Holmes stories. The main mystery about why children are being killed kind of peters out near the end and involves an easily discovered conspiracy, but still I enjoyed the book. It isn't anything great but it was still a fun read. B-.

Book # 97 - The Magic Mountain by Thomas Mann

It has been a couple days since I finished reading The Magic Mountain, by Thomas Mann, and it is still sitting there in my brain slowly being digested. Before starting it someone told me that it is one of those books that doesn't directly say what it is really about. The Wikipedia page describes it as "ambiguous" and even the book's introduction says that if you're reading it just for the plot you'll be disappointed and won't get much from the book.

In thinking about "the plot" in order to summarize it, I realize that there is technically a beginning, middle and end, but the "action" never builds to a climax and just like in real life it is just a serious of events with both ups and downs. The book starts somewhere around 1905 with Hans Castorp, a young German man, going to visit his cousin that is staying in a clinic high in the Swiss Alps to treat his tuberculosis. He plans to stay for three weeks but ends up being diagnosed with the same illness and ends up living there for seven years. Finally he leaves to go fight in WWI.

During his time there he meets a variety of characters, makes friends, falls in love, deals with death, discovers new music, ponders his own mortality, has strange dreams, and sees time slowly passing by. The book could be about so many different things every reader will probably interpret it differently. And the Wiki page is right... it is ambiguous. Some parts of it reminded me of my own twenties, and I found the passages about the passing of time especially meaningful. After a few years Hans gets to the point where everyday is just the same for him and distinguishing time becomes difficult and suddenly years have past by.

Even though it is a huge book without an exciting plot I enjoyed it immensely. There may have been a few parts that dragged a bit (mostly the discussions between his friends Settembrini and Naphta) but there is just so much to ponder here and take in. Mann once said that to really understand his book you'd need to read it twice. I guess someday I'll have to pick it up again and hopefully I'll get even more insight into it. A+

Book # 60 - A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man by James Joyce

A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man isn't exactly a page turner... not to say that I didn't enjoy it in some way though. It is written in a stream of consciousness style and tells the story of a young man as he grows up Catholic in Ireland and falls away from the church only to go back to it and then leave it again. It was interesting getting in this guys head and seeing what motivated him but at times I found they style too hard to follow. Also it seems like most of the secondary characters weren't really necessary and weren't interesting. I'd also mention that the book has completely unnecessary maps of walks that the character took... I just don't get it... the maps are pointless. Also it mentions The Count of Monte Cristo.  A-

Book # 17 - Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen

Let me start my saying that Pride and Prejudice is Lucinda's all time favorite book... and since she wants to see Pride and Prejudice and Zombies this week I figured now would be a good time to re-read the book. I've probably absorbed a good bit of knowledge about the book through osmosis from my wife so the whole book felt pretty familiar while I was reading it (Examples of how that osmosis occurred.... viewing the film version, vising the Jane Austen center in Bath, seeing films like Austenland, playing the P&P board game, etc). It was also interesting seeing how I thought of the book now versus what I thought about it as a teenager when I first read it. As a kid I wasn't really into it, but now I see that it is quite funny and there were several passages that made me laugh. So I can see how it is Lucinda's favorite book... Basically it is just an old-timey romantic comedy in which the boy and girl meet... don't like each other at first... and eventually realize they love each other... Pretty much the synopsis of every Hallmark or Lifetime movie. I'll have to give it an A.