Some books are like orange vegetables

Oh, don't worry - the dinosaurs were a one-time gush of hindsight. Don't we all think "What if...?" and imagine we are world-renowned doctors or engineers... or archaeologists? Since world-renowned archaeologists are rare, perhaps (wait for it) extinct(!), I would have my pick of endorsements: concentrated sugary drinks aspiring to be fruit juice, outdoors wear, watches or casinos. I imagine I would be famous for uncovering the metal skeleton of a robotic dinosaur, somewhere with a temperate climate, hot water and fuzzy duvets. ('Imagine' being key when considering my mental health. I don't really believe my car could transform into a laser canon-wielding Autobot and my best friend. Unfortunately.)

Ok, ok, I'm done. But remember this when next your inner child pipes up because you confiscated her toys.

For cutting me short (you), here is a list (even the word sounds ominous, as if a vowel has been snatched from between the 's' and 't', and so the book lists (har!) to one side). A listing list of books I hate. Truly hate. We say things like "I love your blend of wit, sarcasm and cynicism" or "I loved reading Night Film" when really (as someone pointed out to me) 'love' is an emotion belonging to relationships that is best wielded with caution (you may lose something, like a vital organ). With animate beings. Not made of metal.

But 'hate' is more versatile. It covers everything: "I hate orange vegetables" or "I hated reading Atlas Shrugged" (not really. Because I haven't read it yet). Listing the things you hate is easier and more productive than listing the things you love. Unless you are one of those unblemished souls who have yet to encounter the pains of hindsight. "I am soooo happy for you," I mumble through clenched teeth. Also, 'love' and 'hate' are not exact opposites: I hate orange vegetables, but that doesn't mean I like yellow ones (actually, they fall in the same class, like poisonous caterpillars).

While I could do this all night (I am a font of positivity tonight because I only had two cups of coffee today, followed by a chocolate muffin), you no doubt have many Important Things To Do today, after this Very First Important Thing (reading my blog, you!). But first a quiz to see whether you have been listening, or are just a good guesser: rank these books from Hate to Tolerate to... Love.

A   Something Happened by Joseph Heller
B   Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert A Heinlein
C   Kafka on the Shore by Haruki Murakami
D   The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen

You know me too well: D is a red herring. If you have been studying my blog (I am offering a course on Coursera next semester), then you know I am still reading The Corrections and have not formed a clear opinion although I can predict bouts of boredom and character bashing. The other three you can figure out yourself (you need to earn your credits) by looking left and then all the way down to the bottom, to the cloud of gnat-like tags.

My point is that the bit about love does not apply here because I love all books, even the ones I love to hate. Books stand apart from all reason. In towers that by the laws of physics should topple over but by the laws of knowledge and 70 gsm paper and PUR binding don't. And way in the distance is a stack of 10 books, like children being disciplined, but children who deserve to be in juvenile detention. From weathered top to sand-encrusted bottom, they are:

1. Atomised by Michel Houellebecq. This is hands down the most gratuitous collection of violence and sex called a plot I have ever. Ever. Read. Although the conclusion (only worth two pages or so) is enlightening, it will never clean those blackened charred nerves in my prudish brain. The copy sits on my bookshelf and I do not know what to with it. Read only if you can read American Psycho in one go.
2. Boyhood by JM Coetzee. The writings of my favourite 'refugee' have in the last decade experimented with memoir (ah, how post-modern) and how memory is at least partly fictionalised and vice versa. This memoir about Coetzee's childhood is enlightening - most children become less egoist as they grow up and encounter a more selfish world. Not him! No! He is the character from Disgrace, which is deeply disturbing. There is a second, sequel, apparently. Read the Wikipaedia page instead. 
3. Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert A Heinlein. See above. You know where to look.
4. Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad. We studied this book in my first or second year, as part of a course in post-colonialism (they picked topics for which they had lecturers, methinks). A man travels to the swamps of Africa where he meets mute, lazy Africans and decisive colonialists and catches some illness, from the swamps, but doesn't die. I agree with Chinua Achebe (he says Conrad was racist (which I think is a no-brainer) and other people say he was a product of his times (which were racist)), but partly because the prose is exhausting, like listening to a person on the brink of death breath for days and days. And days. And days. Read Achebe's criticism instead.
5. Gulliver's Travels by Jonathan Swift. Confession: I have never read the adult novel, but we did study it and that was enough to remind me why I didn't like the children's version. I don't know why I don't like the children's version, actually, except that it is creepy. This man lives among pygmies and giants, whose communities he will never be part of. The pygmies and giants have a beef with each other, but why they would bother to fight each other when neither has anything the other wants is beyond me. Then there are some other societies with unpronounceable names (except Japan) and with minute political subtexts that, frankly, I don't care about. Read the picture book.
6. Mao's Last Dancer by Li Cunxin. I was sick when I read this weighty book (weighty because it was printed on paper that 'bulks' well i.e. looks thicker). Desparately sick. My sinuses were attacking my brain again and then relying on my lungs for cover and my throat had been lacerated in the war and my stomach was marching in protest. And I was alone over a long weekend with not even a cat to comfort me. I thought I felt bad. Then I read this book. And realised that I was living a dream life because life in China is apparently unbearably bad. All the time. But the real dream life is in America with apartments and fast food and Oprah. Read only when you are the kind of calm that can stare down a refugee camp during a civil war.
7. Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by David Eggers. Another varsity setwork, but part of our third-year Post-modern course (we worked our way along the eras). This book is so consciously self-conscious and reflexive and self-deprecating and full of the apathy of the children of the last 25 years and oh so smart and oh it knows it's oh so smart and all the rest of these things. Describing it and why I hate it is like a rabbit hole. What upset me (and was supposed to) was that he was so glib about serious issues. I think that there are some topics that should only be played with under extreme circumstances and then sparingly. Cancer is one of those. Considering what a great writer he is, this could be overlooked, except he sews up all his writing with his smartness, and very little truth. Read and add snarky comments in the margins.
8. Cold Mountain by Charles Frazier. Oi, this one... I read this the year between advertising college and my first year of my BA. It almost put me right off studying literature (actually my intention was to study Applied English but then they moved the course to the education faculty and I hoped no one would notice the 'literature' bit). This novel is as long as the winter spent on that mountain. Which is very cold and is cold in other ways, because this is literature and literature uses metaphors. I did not have the energy to watch the movie but I hear it is shorter than the book. Watch the movie.
9. She's Come Undone or The Hour I First Believed by Wally Lamb. Contemporary American authors have the Suburb Disease. This disease is an ill-defined malais suffered by people who have enough of everything but have a nagging feeling that this is somehow not enough. The first book is about an obese women and the second about 9/11. That is all I remember. There is a third novel, which is excluded here because I enjoyed the ending (and no, not just because it ended!). Read only if you have lots of time to squander.
10. The People's Act of Love by James Meek. Because I did not and will never write this book. Read and read and read...

Disclaimer: These comments became far more sarcastic and perhaps nasty than originally intended, and all are meant to be taken with a pinch of salt (from the sandy seashore as you reach to pluck no. 10 from its unruly peers) and your own opinion, except Boyhood, because I mean that and could be nastier. I can think of at least one person who will disagree with my opinion of every book, except Atomised, because I do not fraternise with such people. And look, not once did I write: I hate this book with the voltage of the lights in Wanderers Stadium. I didn't write it, but I thought it.

I also thought: "I love Kafka on the Shore" and "I would love my car to transform into a laser canon-wielding Autobot and my best friend." 

The romantic Mr Hitchcock

Where the Wild Things Are is one of my favourite movies. Which is surprising because David Eggers is one of my least favourite writers (and one of the writers of the screenplay. He also wrote a book based on the movie. Not the book the movie is based on). It is adapted from the children's book by Maurice Sendak. One of my favourite quotes (yes, I'm committing the great sin of any blogger; beginning with a quote. But, folks, this really is just the beginning) from that mean old man is that fear "is truth".

He also says that parents who think the movie is too scary should "go to hell" and the children should "go home. Or wet your pants."

Alfred Hitchcock, apparently, was just as mean an old man. His ideas on fear resonate with those of Sendak, for example: "Fear isn't so difficult to understand. After all, weren't we all frightened as children?" Then again, there are few ways to understand fear, its meaning being in the name, and any person with a memory of their childhood will admit to being afraid of cupboards and curtains. (My particular fear was of the foot of my bed. I thought a witch (closely related to the fairies on my duvet and matching curtains) waited there to snack on my toes (as if I could reach the bottom of the bed).

I have watched four Hitchcock movies this week - including those classic horrors Birds and Psycho. The other two were the thrillers Vertigo and Rear Window. I admit I hid behind my hands more than once during the first two. And maybe I pulled my feet up onto the couch and cringed a little. Maybe. But the emotion that affected me most wasn't fear and suspense; it was love. (No no, that's not when I pulled my feet up. Cringed maybe, but not in the foetal position.)

Hear me out! I am the first one in line at the Cynicism Convention scoffing at poems about roses and summer's days. (There's a guy here who's gifted in parodies.) Love is a chemical, and when it wears itself out, you have to still be best friends with that person and come to terms with the facts that said other person's hygiene habits and eating noises and how they spend money, annoy the heck out of you. The poems should be about socks on the floor and replacing toilet paper rolls and hot water in the morning.

Yes, I'm a romantic. Seriously, hear me out!

My favourite ending of the four was Birds'. (I shall try not to drop spoilers, if you try not to step in them.) The movie begins with a montage to the heroine's flippant but endearing approach to life. (What first endeared me was her wardrobe.) She pranks the leading man by pretending she is an attendant in the bird section of the pet shop. And he's pranking her by going along with it because he knows who she is: he's a lawyer and she recently went to court regarding some prank involving a smashed window (I imagine there's a car involved).

MITCH (talking about preserving bird species)
I imagine that's very important. Especially in moulting season.
MELANIE
Yes, that's a particularly dangerous time.
MITCH
Are they moulting now?
MELANIE
Oh, some of them are.
MITCH
How can you tell?
MELANIE
Well, they get a sort of hangdog expression.

'Melanie Daniels'

Melanie Daniel's (the heroine's) pleasure in a good joke (a woman after my own heart - I learnt a thing or two, so be warned, you in egg-throwing distance. No worries, I have a poor throwing arm) isn't portrayed as a heartbroken young woman's attempt to distract herself from her loneliness. If it is, I may have missed the point entirely. (A hadedah bird just cawed above me. Oh dear. Now there's a bird that would strike terror into my bleeding heart if a flock swarmed into my living room. One tried to carry my cat off once.)

Long story short, she arrives at Mitch Brenner's (the hero's) family home carrying two lovebirds, a graze to the head and the jealousy of the local schoolteacher. (She also steers a boat, in a suit and heels.) Mitch's mother hates her and doesn't bother to disguise it any more than Mitch tries to disguise his lust. (Interestingly, Mitch is a stereotypical playboy, as are most of Hitchcock's heroes (stereotypical, I mean).) Melanie is intrigued rather than perturbed (she rarely seems perturbed. Even when she's falling into a coma).

Turns out there's some weird Oedipal thing going on, from the mother's side, and Melanie seems confuzzled but still unperturbed. The birds attack (really, so many options: crop dust their asses, stay inside until they go away, army tanks, cut down all the trees (then they can't see you approach)), first Mother gets jealous, then she has a breakdown and leans on Melanie for support, then Melanie saves her child. Saves both of them, you could argue.

Here it is, despite the deceptive introduction, the relationship being explored is between a mother and her daughter-in-law. The look between the two in the very last scene (second last frame I think) is genuinely heartwarming - not schmaltzy or in need of words or unnecessary. That one look tells a whole new story, where it took an hour and a half to tell its prequel. (And where most movies today would need a script that fills every moment of that hour and a half. And be schmaltzy. And be reviewed as 'feminism revived'. And end with all of the characters on the floor covered in dirt or flour, laughing. Or something.)

Where the Wild Things Are offers something slightly different. While the undercurrent of Birds is a relationship, Where the Wild Things Are is about a child's psychology. Which is what makes it deeply frightening. It is about a boy's impulses and emotions as he grows up (not quite into a man) - how unpredictable they can be, as if they were a host of irrational creatures in our brains. We pretend we 'own them' (apply ghetto accent). But really, we're just scared they'll turn on us.

The heartwarming bit is where the boy reaches an unspoken agreement with these creatures and swiftly rows off to the safety of his mother's arms. (Hello again, Oedipus. I thought your name was Mitch?)

I lied. I lied, but not intentionally.Self-preservation I argue, Judge. Fear is not a self-explanatory emotion. We can be afraid of different things in different ways. I could be afraid of birds pecking my eyes out, but that's different from being afraid of a daughter-in-law (luckily I'm not afraid of either). Hidden behind these could be a hundred different sources or manifestations or triggers just waiting like landmines to be stepped on (have I mentioned the suit and heels?). And then there are fears not hidden behind anything, just careening through a highway of abandoned cars.

Now take this all with a pinch of salt and throw it over your left shoulder (or your right if you're left-handed): I have not read up on Mr Hitchcock. I do not know whether he was married and how many times, whether he really was mean or just honest, or whether I am reading too much into what are just thrillers and horrors. (Although I don't think I am.) I found that quote by Gurgling "alfred hitchcock quotes' (search engines don't care about caps).

If I am afraid of anything, it is my sub- and unconscious in a way that beats the snowriders in furry white 80's suits in Inception. Because I don't have two seconds to live faced with that twisted mess of perception, without my more empathic conscious to intervene. I have evidence. This mess is the star of Where the Wild Things Are and that is what guides my reading into Hitchcock's pure works of art. Don't tell anyone; they won't let me into the Cynic Convention next year.

The list of magnanimity

Dear reader, have you been paying attention? Have you? Here's a test: do I prefer chocolate or strawberry ice cream? You could answer: by 'I' do you mean the tapper of keys behind this blog or the one who just took a sip of coffee? When in doubt always answer a question with a question. (Just one of the many nuggets I have pilfered from The Office.)

That's not the test. The answer is obvious: chocolate. We'll tackle this later. Now, the real test is whether you have noticed that I have been speeding through some of the classics and some of the strawberry-flavoured books in my local library. Your reply? Should I have noticed? You learn well, my young padawan.

My number one survival strategy is lists, whether written down and colour-coded or mental and therefore quickly lost. This is core to my zombie apocalypse slash hunger games strategy, so I will tell you only that it involves post-its and a tree.

Anyway, last post I abused Borges' library, a really innocuous building that happens to have swallowed all eternity. Which should be paradise for us bibliophiles. (Dibs on 'F' in the fiction section. Ok, fine, 'M' then.) It isn't. It is terrifying. You've heard about the marketing study where they found that too much choice actually drives consumers away. And every salesperson knows to only give a person three options and to place the option that gives you a higher commission first.

The scale of published fiction in the last 100 years is like counting the human population since we first started practising pressing the buttons of video games with our thumbs. Confining the headcount to literary fiction, I mumble guiltily, still doesn't help. This isn't a choice between different scents of floor cleaner (FYI, no scent, especially not made-up ones like Bright Sunshine), no, this is literature!

This eternal library is a case of survival. Instead of killing zombies and other children, we must read everything. That's an exaggeration, you snort (I can hear you, through the microphone, so be please be polite about my bibliophilic delusion).

In the absence of chocolate and strawberry coloured stickers along the spines to guide my quest, I have made a list. Ok, many lists and some were colour-coded. Some are stuck on my fridge but are so faded and blotched with coffee stains you can't read them, others are pinned to a ribbon knotted onto my bedroom door handle, and some are lost in the right hemisphere of my brain, because that's where lost and found is.

The winners of this game are the titles posted on this blog, to the right >>, and those saved on my phone. The one occasion I deviated from this list ended badly, not in a zombie bite, but in disappointment. Point proven; lists are the key to survival. Also, apparently, technology.

Now that I have distracted you from the impending reappearance of the Dreaded List on this blog, here is a condensed list of my approved reads (and future reviews), gleaned mostly from the internet (the most trustworthy, obviously) and recommendations (a mixed bag, except for the ones on FB, obviously):

• 1Q84 by Haruki Marukami (unread; alternate history) I think I've bored you enough with my ravings about this and Kafka on the Shore. That's why bloggers use labels (below right)
• Chronic City by Jonathan Lethem (unread; cross-genre) having read a couple of his other novels, I wouldn't rank him above David Mitchell in this category, but then I don't think many short of James Joyce could
• Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury (read; dystopian) the character of the girl at the beginning cinched this novel for me, although I wasn't so thrilled with the book-burning
• Flaubert's Parrot by Julian Barnes (unread; literary) I hereby admit that I have never read this classic novel
• A Hologram for the King by Dave Eggers (unread; post-modern look how smart I am) we studied A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius and I hated it for exactly the same reason others adore it: the the iconoclastic, self-conscious self-deprecation, but I'm willing to give him another go. I'm magnanimous like that
• The Maddadam books by Margaret Atwood (two of three read; apocalyptic) post in proximity, so work, you
• The Member of the Wedding by Carson Mccullers (unread; literary) I'm magnanimous but not perfect. I hate Mccullers just a teensy bit because she published The Heart is a Lonely Hunter, which is beautiful, at 23. Pure jealousy. I will read this but I will feel sorry for myself the entire time, so prepare yourselves
• The Postman Always Rings Twice by James M Cain (read; noir fiction) only 116 pages but perfectly paced. I don't usually enjoy crime novels but this was a satisfying, meaty use of the conventions
• Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut (unread; satire) I have faith but I need it because I read Cat's Cradle recently. It is a few marbles short of Philip K Dick's drug-fuelled novels. So, yes, I need it
• Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert A Heinlein (partly read; science fiction) the beginning reminds me of A Brave New World, although I can't say why. Also reminds me of the soundtrack to Lost Boys: "People are strange when you're a stranger"

My closest library loans out books for two weeks at a time. That gives me 16 weeks to finish all eight of the unread books. But don't worry, I'll sneak in some unexpected reviews just to see if you've been paying attention. You.