Accidental Bookworm

Friends,

I am an impossibly slow reader. At least I think I am for a grad student, and I just tremble at the reading lists my doctorate seeking friends are going after because there is no way in hell I'd be able to tackle all of that stuff. So today, I pulled the impossible. I picked up a book and read that sumbitch cover to cover.

I had only done that one other time with the Marilynne Robinson book Housekeeping (I might have mentioned this title a time or two before). And that was because I had to for a class. I enjoyed the book, and I have read it again since, and dug it even more the second time. It will be read again, and soon. I will warn you though, if you choose to pick this thing up, it doesn't exactly move at a whizz-bang pace...you could even call the pacing glacial or Haley's comet-esque. It's a stunning read though, just be paitient with it.

I pulled this trick again today with Diablo Cody's memoir Candy Girl. Go figure. I didn't intend on doing that today, in fact, it was probably the least productive thing for me to do. But, Melissa Brandt told me that I should read that book since it deals with strippers, some bizarro sex fetishes, filthy turns of phrase and other things I find appealing. I bought it Barnes and Noble this afternoon, finished it this evening. And, turns out she was right, and I did enjoy the book. Was it enjoyable on the same plane as Housekeeping? Nope. But I dug it, if for anything else the humanity behind it...and it made me feel guilty for all the times I told a stripper that I didn't want a lapdance.

I know this makes it sound like I'm some kind of stripclub regular, but that's not the case. I haven't been to one since, jeez, three or four years now. I actually get kind of sheepish in those moments when propositioned, especially when they sit on your lap uninvited. I have no stripper patter. I got nothing to say to women who want twenty dollars so I can have their breasts on my face for three and a half minutes. I don't mean that condescendingly, it's just that I don't buy into any flirty fantasy that some strippers try to cultivate...both parties know of the business transaction that's about to take place, so let's drop the theater.

Anyway, the lurid stuff of Cody's memoir isn't anything I haven't read about before in the articles of Dan Savage (yes, even the story Cody tells about the guy who used to show up in her nudie booth to lick the semen of other men off the glass...heard of that back in the 90's). But to normal people, I imagine some of that stuff is a little left-of-center. The voice was spunky and familiar to me, like if my old friend Sarah was a touch more literate, luscious and lucky. (I haven't written much about Sarah, and I'm sad I lost touch with her for the most part [we'll trade an odd e-mail once every six months or so, but that's barely anything], but she's pretty amazing in my book...maybe I'll think up some Sarah stories to tell). So reading it for me was a little nostalgic, a little thought provoking, and above all fun, not hilarious, but a good time (plus, the way Jonny treats Diablo in this book makes him a total sweetheart...every woman deserves a Jonny if they want one)....and it was nice for a change to drop my MFA analyzing hat and just read something for the sheer enjoyment of it.

Here's a video of Diablo Cody being interviewed about this book on David Letterman:


Viva reading!