Knopf 100--Day 8

Every now and then a book sings to me. I like a lot of books, but a few rise into a different category, the books that make me happy that I get to work with books everyday. Here are a few of the books that mean the most to me.

25. The Hakawati by Rabih Alameddine, originally published in 2008. Part retelling of The Arabian Nights, part history of Lebanon, part family story, all twisting and turning into a narrative that spins into stories within stories within stories. Pigeon wars in the skies of Beirut, hellish imps and the hand of Fatima, and a son returning home to see his dying father--these are just a few of the things I love about The Hakawati. "Hakawati" means "storyteller," the term for the Scheherazade-type entertainers in the tea houses of Lebanon, spinning yarns each afternoon that end with cliffhangers that keep people coming back every day for more. The Hakawati is particularly significant for me because I read it (and then sold it) in the year I started working for Random House and became a focal point of how I could find my place in this job.

26. Wild by Cheryl Strayed, originally published in 2012. Cheryl Strayed's memoir of hiking the Pacific Crest Trail hit several nerves for me. I have always liked memoirs about strong women. I'm a huge national parks fan and particularly love the Sierra Nevada mountains. Strayed's memoir is about struggling with the devastating loss of her mother to cancer and the downward spiral that death created. I read Wild before it was published (like most books, we read them in advance), while on a plane in April, 2011, on my way to Yosemite National Park. At the time my mother was dying from terminal cancer. While my relationship with my mother differed from Strayed's, my mother was an English teacher and did foster my love of books. This book became a marker for that period of my life.

27. Anti-Intellectualism in American Life by Richard Hofstadter, originally published in 1963. I didn't expect to be a History major in college. I expected to be an English major and successfully channel my love of books and lack of career aspirations into....little. I expected to die young, but well-read. There was an American History professor at my university, though, that was the finest teacher I've encountered. She inspired me and challenged me and scared me and called bullshit when I was being an asshole, and because her classes were so great, I ended up with a double major. One of the works she introduced to me was Hofstadter's classic Anti-Intellectualism in American Life (she introduced me to a lot of great books, but they aren't all on the Knopf list). Hofstadter looked at the rise of "practical" American life and with it the dying of philosophy, looking at the effects in culture, education, politics, and business. For his efforts, this book won the Pulitzer Prize in 1964. I think about this book quite a bit, particularly when watching election cycles play out. The smartest person doesn't win an election most of the time; it's the guy who is "relatable." Didn't Americans want to have a beer with George W. Bush, folksy former playboy? Didn't Rick Perry run an "oops" campaign? Yeah.

28. The Trial by Franz Kafka, originally published in 1937. Okay, so as much as I loved the history classes I took in college, that's how much I hated the foreign language requirement. I could passably translate on paper the German I slogged through for four semesters, but the speaking part still gives me nightmares. Sprechen Sie Deutsch? NEIN. (I don't even know anymore if that's proper German grammar.) Anyway, in the third and fourth semesters we began reading texts that were pulled from actual German books. The one I remember most vividly was a section of The Trial by Franz Kafka. There was this guy at this door and he couldn't go through the door or wouldn't? Try making sense of this story when you aren't even sure you know the words. I went back and read the English translation of the novel to figure out what the hell was happening. Kafka's work is one of those classics you should read in order to understand the futility of bureaucracy and also so you sound intelligent in parties...not that I attend parties.

Good and Cheap (Books)! Day 21

This is how St. George's Day is celebrated
in Barcelona. If/when I go to Spain, I will go
on April 23rd. (Hey Gianna--vacation?)

Okay, I'm currently digesting a meal of shrimp and grits, with a chocolate peanut butter lava cake dessert. You know what's great about going to the South? They can make nasty things like grits and mushrooms taste divine. Normally I'm the Foodie Anti-Christ, but today is special. It's St. George's Day, also known as International Day of the Book, also known as World Book Night, also known as Shakespeare's birthday. In this, the cruelest month, today is that one bright spot that keeps me from playing with polonium. (For the record, I have no means of acquiring polonium and don't advocate radiation poisoning...but if you need a hit list, I might have one of those.) Anyway, this is my favorite day in April and one of my favorite days of the year. You're supposed to give books to people today. It's a lovely gesture. The most gratifying part of working in the book industry in any capacity is being able to hand a book to someone and say "You have to read this book!" It's the book nerd's way of expressing love and baring our souls.

Here you go. This book was the first one I went ape shit crazy over after I started working for Random The Hakawati. I know that I mention it about as often as Gianna talks about Gail Caldwell, but the books that connect become part of a person. This book reminds me of losing myself in books when I was a kid, like throwing my hands up in the air when riding in a wagon down a hill. Trust gravity (or in this case Rabih Alameddine, the author), thrill at the speed and rhythm and slight fear when you fly into the air, hope that you'll land safely. And when you're done, you want to go again. Welcome to The Hakawati.
House. I love it. You HAVE to read

A hakawati weaving his tale.
Hakawatis are storytellers who
entertain crowds with stories in the
cafes in Lebanon. 

Here's the deal--this is a book about storytelling and families. It's a mixture of Arabian Nights, full of demons and jinns and imps and princes and thieves and legends, and a history of a Lebanese family gathering in Beirut at the bedside of a dying relative. It's a book where racing across the desert into battle could fall within pages of the pigeon wars that captured the skies of Beirut (similar to the kite wars described inThe Kite Runner except, you know, with birds), which could be on the same page with the story of a son grieving for his father. This is literary magic. "Hakawati" means storyteller, and that's who Rabih Alameddine is.

New Year, New 30 Day Book Challenge, Day 13

Day 13: Your Favorite Writer

Gianna:

My favorite writer is Flannery O’Connor, but I’ve written about her too many times on this blog. In fact, her estate in Milledgeville has asked me to stop. [I'm keeping all of our cease and desist letters in a large file.]

Miranda July

Instead, I thought this was a great excuse to write about my favorite writer this very minute, Miranda July.  She’s a genius, a creative monster, and a tour de force. She’s filmmaker, a writer, and an artist. It’s actually pretty sickening. What I love about her, well one of the many things I love about her, is that she takes art very seriously, even when she’s being absurd. She’s someone you can’t imagine ever not being creative. She’s inspiring. 

From July's Website 

Geez, now after all that I hope you’ll give her a chance. She’s written and directed two films, Me and You and Everyone We Know (starring John Hawks, yea, I love him too) and The Future. I highly recommend both films.

It Chooses You

Now, since this is a book blog, let's get to her books. She published a fantastic collection of short stories called, No One Belongs Here More Than You. It’s just breathtaking, and is in my top 50 books of all time. No Liz, we shouldn’t do a month long blog listing our favorite books in order. No. [Too late. I'll remind you repeatedly that it's your idea, too.]  

She wants to be my friend

Last year she published a book, and this is going to sound weird, but it's related to her film The Future, but she called up people who were advertising items for sale in the local The PennySaver newspaper, and asked if she could interview them. I know, it sounds trite, but these interviews, these stories are, sure, at times funny, but mostly just really moving. Anyway, it’s called It Chooses You.

One last thing about Miranda: please check out her website. It's really fantastic and she has lots of cool things including video of some of the folks she met while writing It Chooses You, and she answers readers' mail. [Really? Will she answer my questions? Like, why doesn't Gianna appreciate my singing?]

If  you like Karen Russell, George Saunders, Jennifer Egan, Chris Adrian, Sheila Heti, or Aimee Bender, Miranda July is for you. 

Rabih Alameddine

Liz:

Virginia Woolf, Joyce Carol Oates, Margaret Atwood, Toni Morrison, Jennifer Egan, David Mitchell.  None of these people are surprises really. We do seem to write about this topic quite a bit. That's fine. One should never shy from praising wonderful books. Still, for the sake of variety, I am going to pick the guy I most wish would complete a new book.

Rabih Alameddine wrote a book that held me in awe when I read it--The Hakawati. I couldn't shut up about it. It's been five years and I am still obsessed.  I love books that weave together layers of stories, and The Hakawati (which is Arabic for storyteller) manages to blend more threads together than any other novel I've read.  It's the story of a man returning to Lebanon to be with his dying father and his family.  It's the story of a land told through myth and history and culture, told through the hakawatis who entertain listeners everyday in the tea houses of Beirut.  It's Arabian Nights, and jinns, and princes, and Scheherazade. It's an adventure story, a drama centered around the aerial battles of the Beirut pigeon teams, a war story in a land of religious turmoil, a romance, a comedy, a tragedy.  But like my favorite books, The Hakawati isn't just a feat of literary magic.  It has a soul, and Alameddine treats history, country, and characters with compassion.

I, the Divine is divine.

But let's go back. Before I read The Hakawati, and before I was a Random House rep charged with selling it, I was a bookseller and stumbled upon a book called I, the Divine.  I'd never heard of the author, but the premise sounded interesting and I gave it a shot. The main character here is Sarah. This is a novel, the story of Sarah's life, as told through her attempts to write her memoir. The problem, though, is that Sarah never manages to get through the first chapter of her book, so through her false starts we slowly discover her whole life. It's innovative and moving.  (The title is a reference to the "divine" Sarah Bernhardt, what Sarah the protagonist's grandfather used to call her.) After I'd read and fallen for The Hakawati, it dawned on me that the author's name was familiar, and I realized that Rabih Alameddine had also written I, the Divine.

Alameddine has written other books too--Koolaids, his first novel, and a collection of short stories called The Perv. But four titles isn't enough for my obsession. My question is, Rabih Alameddine, what are you writing for me now? I'm not known for my patience.  I can be whiny.

30 Day Book Challenge: Day 27

Day 27: Favorite Fiction Book

Gianna:

In my quest not to repeat, I won’t pick O’Connor or Toni Morrison here (but forced to pick I would have to say that Beloved is my favorite novel; we will stretch the meaning of this question as always). Too many great books to really pick, so I again thought of something I couldn’t let go of in recent memory.  I came up with Dan Chaon’s Await Your Reply. I still get a bit giddy when I get to talk about this book. It is so delicious, beginning to end, that it makes me sad that I will never get to read it again for the first time. It is a book that at the end you say “son of a bitch!” and then if you are anything like me, you start backtracking. In a word, the novel is about identity, but it is oh so…chilling. Here are the first few lines, and if you can move on with your life without wanting to read more…well…I don’t know if Liz wants to be friends with you.  [In general I probably don't want to be friends with you, but I do love this book too.]

We are on our way to the hospital, Ryan’s father says.

Listen to me, Son:

You are not going to bleed to death.

Ryan is still aware enough that his father’s words come in through the edges, like sunlight on the borders of a window shade. His eyes are shut tight and his body is shaking and he is trying to hold up his left arm, to keep it elevated. We are on our way to the hospital, his father says, and Ryan’s teeth are chattering, he clenches and unclenches them, and a series of wavering colored lights – greens, indigos – plays along the surface of his closed eyelids.

On he seat beside him, in between him and his father, Ryan’s severed hand is resting on a bed of ice in an eight-quart Styrofoam cooler.

The hand weighs less than a pound. The nails are trimmed and there are calluses on the tips of the fingers from guitar playing. The skin is now bluish in color.

This is about three A.M. on a Thursday morning in May in rural Michigan. Ryan doesn’t have any idea how far away the hospital might be but he repeats with his father we are on the way to the hospital we are on the way to the hospital and he wants to believe so badly that it’s true, that it’s not just one of those things that you tell people to keep them calm. But he’s not sure. Gazing out all he can see is the night trees leaning over the road, the car pursuing its pool of headlight, and darkness, no towns, no buildings ahead, darkness, road, moon.

So yeah….Await Your Reply by Dan Chaon is my favorite fiction book of 2009 and certainly makes the list of all time.

Liz:

Listen. Allow me to be your god.  Let me take you on a journey beyond imagining.  Let me tell you a story.

As I read the opening lines of The Hakawati by Rabih Alameddine I knew I would be in the assured hands of a master storyteller, and I knew that this novel would hold a special spot among the many great books I've read.  "Hakawati" means storyteller, the traditional storyteller who, like Scheherazade, spins stories ending with a cliff hanger each day to lure back listeners, and Alameddine's book is a splendid weaving together of multiple tales and the history of a modern Lebanese family.  Here are tales of the Arabian Nights and genies and great warriors and cunning princesses given a modern flavor as they relate to the story of a young man returning to his native Beirut to help with his dying father.  Here are stories of the wars in Lebanon and the great pigeon wars that take place over the buildings of Beirut and of princes and demons and magic carpets.  I was mesmerized.

I had really just started at Random House when I read The Hakawati, with the company only about a year.  I had stumbled across Rabih Alameddine's earlier novel, I, the Divine years earlier when I was a bookseller and loved it (that book is the story of a woman's life told through her multiple attempts to write her autobiography but she only ever writes the first chapter), so when I learned that Knopf would publish his new novel I dove right in.  The Hakawati was my favorite book I read that year, one of my desert island book picks, and the book that helped me realize what the most rewarding part of my job of a sales rep is.  I have the power to discover incredible books and then spread that love to the right booksellers.  The pleasure of working with the books I most love makes my job, for all of the frustration I sometimes feel, magical.  Booksellers at BookPeople in Austin, Brazos Bookstore in Houston, and Lemuria Books in Jackson, Mississippi, in particular, all shared my passion for The Hakawati, and through their efforts numerous readers across my territory discovered themselves the genius of The Hakawati.