 | Chimera by John Barth
Buy new: $10.17 / Used from: $0.99 Meta-fiction. Fabulous, but not for the weak-hearted.
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 | Bobos In Paradise: The New Upper Class and How They Got There by David Brooks
Buy new: $10.80 / Used from: $0.34 About how highly educated liberal people reconcile their ideals with high incomes. I identified with almost everything in this book. Oh my god - I'm a bobo!!
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 | The Confessions of Nat Turner by William Styron
Buy new: $10.20 / Used from: $0.75 I really like this book. It is so well written. It is a fictional account of the real event of a slave uprising in Virginia. The main character is so compelling. I do have to admit, though, that as far as novels about the implications of slavery, I do think Beloved is better. (I know, I know, art is not a competition....)
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 | Eats, Shoots & Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation by Lynne Truss
Buy new: $8.64 / Used from: $2.64 I am a dork and like this book about punctuation. Some historical, some practical and lots humorous. Now I'm paranoid about the punctuation in this review, though.
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 | Slow Fat Triathlete: Live Your Athletic Dreams in the Body You Have Now by Jayne Williams
Buy new: $11.48 / Used from: $5.16 I have started training for a triathlon. This book is more inspirational than informational (it does have practical information, but not really to be used as a training manual) and does give hope that it can be done by mere mortals like me.
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 | Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha by Roddy Doyle
Buy new: $10.20 / Used from: $0.01 I don't quite understand why this won the Booker Prize. It's okay. Maybe you have to have been a boy to understand...Sort of James Joyce-ish I guess. Captures getting into boy antics at that age.
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 | Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West (Harper Fiction) by Gregory Maguire
Buy new: $7.99 / Used from: $2.69 Best book so far this year. Meta-fiction for sure, but also has interesting social, political and psychological commentary. Of course, all from the point of view of the Wicked witch of the west (east?) who is a sympathetic character.
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 | A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole
Buy new: $10.20 / Used from: $2.68 Reread this book for the Book Contest. This is probably 6th or 7th time I've read this. Brilliant and funny as hell.
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 | She's Come Undone (Oprah's Book Club) by Wally Lamb
Buy new: $7.99 / Used from: $0.01 Ugh. just read for the Book Contest. It's some crap that Oprah would like and could be turned into a life time television movie. This is crap! How did it win awards? To be fair, an okay read and not pulp, but definitely not literature.
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 | The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini
Buy new: $9.75 / Used from: $0.01 I finally got around to reading this. I have to admit all the raves are valid-really excellent book. Really solid writing - not overly maudlin. I like the twist on the oedipal theme in the book. My BFF's favorite book.
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