Books I Read December 30th, 2023

Happy near New Year. I spent the last few weeks baking and cooking and eating far too much and catching up with family and old friends and enjoying the silvery east coast light. I hope that you enjoyed some of the same. I also read...

Vernon Subutex 3 by Virginie Despentes – The final volume in the history of the Subutex, ex-record store owner, homeless wastrel and prophet, and his band of belligerent misfits/acolytes. These are a treasure, fun and weird and cool and sad and smart. I bought the first volume for a friend for Christmas, you could do a lot worse than picking one up for yourself.

Sleep Has His House by Anna Kavan – A re-imagining of the author's miserable childhood and lonely adolescence re-interpreted through a series of surrealistic shorts. Evocative if a little predictable.

In A Lonely Place by Karl Edward Wagner – Short horror.

Cahokia Jazz by Francis Spufford – In a world where the great mound-building civilizations of North America survived smallpox, a jazz-age detective investigates a murder which threatens to throw the eponymous capital into chaos. A top notch thriller in an interesting and original setting, good stuff.