Books Read 2010 (mini-reviews from memory)...

In the interest of finishing this little mini-review project I started a couple months ago I'm going to reel it in a bit. Instead of mini-review paragraphs I'm going with the mini-review sentence. So here it is, the rest of the books I read in 2010 with mini-review in brief.

56. Too Bright To See And Alma- Linda Greg

They should make a movie called The Marriage of Linda Greg and Jack Gilbert.

57. Combo #4

I've never had lunch with Bill Berkson. I have spoken with him on the phone a bunch though. Berkson once double parked his car in front of my building. He handed me a box filled with his new book. I think he was off to a museum or something. 

58. Half Set- Logan Kroeber

Patrick Dunagan is in the new The Dodos video.

59. Moving Pictures- Greg Fuchs

The only Greg I've ever known was a bully. I doubt that Greg Fuchs is a bully. 

60. Maybe A Painter- Christina Fisher

I have no recollection of reading this book. 

61. The Squalicum Harbor Suite- Anselm Parlatore

Big gothic poems, I think the cover is a bit ugly, Jared Hayes could throw a baseball as hard as I've ever seen. 

62. Picture Of The Basket- Sarah Mangold

Picture Of The Basket makes me think of Basket Case, an uneven horror-comedy.

63. Ted Berrigan An Annotated Checklist- Aaron Fischer

One of my staff picks at the last Open House, Alan Bernheimer bought two copies. 

64. Bombay Gin #30

I almost tore my ACL skateboarding home from The Catacombs after making out with a girl with a shaved head. I decided not to buy nachos that night. Logan took me to the hospital the next morning.

65. Try- May 10, 2010

The best way to distribute your new poems is to publish them in Try. But you probably won't get contributor's copies. Or even see the issue your poems were published in. Which is pretty fantastic in a way. 

66. Pastoral- Carl Phillips

I remember when Carl Phillips won $100,000 for some book he wrote.

67. Wilson- Daniel Clowes

I bought this from Comix Experience on Divis. I also bought white peaches, bananas and apples from the produce market next door. It was a Saturday. I think I also bought Big Baby by Charles Burns. For some reason I bought asparagus. I also bought the horrible Left Bank Gang by Jason. Here's a photo I took... 

68. On: Contemporary Practice #1

Michael Cross invited me to contribute to issue #2, but I never got around to writing anything.  Michael Cross has this great twinkle in his eye.

69. Combo #2

I have too many Combos. I finish one and pick up the next issue. It's starting to bother me.   

70. Heads Up Fever Pile- Karen Weiser (Belladonna #77)

I'm currently reading Rachel Levitsky's New Yipes Reader.  I have no idea what Elizabeth Grosz was talking about in that essay on nature and architecture.

71. Belleza Y Felicidad- Fernanda Laguna/ Gabriela Bejerman/ Cecilia Pavon- trans. Urayoan Noel

Some good sex poems. I like when the Beastie Boys talk about "sex raps."  There might not be any sex poems in the book. It's entirely feasible that I'm projecting. 

72. How To Read The Aura And Practice Psychometry, Telepathy and Clairvoyance- W.E. Butler

This book is mostly filled with bad advice. W.E. Butler was an interesting fellow though.

73. The Redneck Manifesto- Jim Goad

A polemic on the white working class. I read it on an airplane on the way to NYC for a little R&R.

74. Il Cuore: The Heart Selected Poems- Kathleen Fraser

Finished Il Cuore in the waiting room at the doctor's office. I had my lungs x-rayed by a doctor who smelled like Chunky's Pea Soup.

75. Transfer #61

Jesus Christ I can't believe I'm still reading Transfer. 

76. Torn Awake- Forrest Gander

Forrest Gander looks like he should work for the YMCA. He looks like he would know how to tie some complicated knots.

77. Zephyrus Image: A Bibliography- Alastair Johnston

Teeter Holbrook and Michael Myers were the dudes. I tried to ask David Highsmith about them, he obliquely avoided the question. Highsmith let's me use his restroom walking back from Dolores Park.

78. Temblor #2

I dislike Temblor enormously.  Was this the issue with the mind-numbingly, never going to end, my eye balls are bleeding puss and piss, prose experimentation piece by Johanna Drucker? Yeah, I didn't like this issue.

79. Hyper Glossia- Stacy Szymaszek (Belladonna #80)

I remember Stacy used to take a lot of self portraits. Doesn't she own a dog too? I feel like a lot of her self portraits were staged in her bathtub.

80. You But For The Body Fell Against- Nathalie Stephens (Belladonna #81)

I don't like this title. Reminds me of that Johanna Drucker piece from Temblor.

81. from Human Resources- Rachel Zolf (Belladonna #82)

I didn't meet Rachel when she read at Condensory a few months ago. I don't even remember what she looks like. 

82. The Beekeeper's Departure- Jennifer Chapis

Sounds like it should have been written by Margaret Atwood.

83. Lines #5

Aram Saroyan smoked hella weed. 

84. New American Writing #13

Didn't I already do a write up about this issue? I bought too many magazines as a lad.

85. ACTS #4

Benjamin Hollander wouldn't blurb my book. 

86. Combo #3

Fuck, not Combo again!

87. Been Raw Diction- David B. Goldstein

I also really don't like this title. Reminds me of Scott Walker's "Of Cossacks."

88. Poems Of The Black Object- Ronaldo Wilson

Among lot's of other things, Ronaldo knows how to write about Hip Hop without coming off as an awful person. No easy feat.

89. My Vocabulary Did This To Me The Collected Poetry Of Jack Spicer- Jack Spicer

I remember Peter Gizzi cursing pretty loudly in the Bancroft Library. I remember Kevin Killian disinterestedly listening to the Giants/ Marlins game with me in my car on the way to Berkeley. 

90. Ben-Hur- Lew Wallace

Top 5 worst novels I've ever read. I'm not sure what the other 4 would be, so maybe this is the #1 worst novel I've ever read. 

91. Stranger In Town- Cedar Sigo

Cedar is sad that I'm moving from SF. This makes me happy. That he cares enough to be sad. I'm only moving to Oakland Cedar! We'll just have to plan some sleepovers.

92. The Great Fires- Jack Gilbert

They should make a movie about Jack Gilbert's despair. They should call it Jack Gilbert's Despair. 

93. Shiny #12

Denver is not an impressive city. I really liked the High Dive though. Everyone was so nice and snowboard'y.

94. The History Of Hell- Alice K. Turner

I know more about the history of Hell than you do. 

95. Combo #5

ACK!

96. 26 #B

I was reading Andrew Joron's antiwar essay on my lunch break, and when I looked up from the book I spotted Andrew walking down 7th St. with Laura Moriarty. A very Jungian moment, like plum pudding or Alice In Wonderland.

97. Cows- Matthew Stokoe

I really did almost throw up 3 times while reading this book. Hagbeast. Hagbeast. Hagbeast. 

98. Evangeline Down- Micah Ballard

Micah texted me a "sup" on a Sunday while I was in the middle of reading ED. A very Jungian moment, like plum pudding or Alice In Wonderland.

99. Selected Mistakes- Chris Martin

Chris Martin and I talked about Anticon for half an hour in Jason Morris's kitchen. I haven't talked about Anticon since. 

100. El Golpe Chileno- Julien Poirier

My book of the year! I think I'm starting to creep Julian out with my praises. I feel like all of Julian's friends have fake names: Filip Marinovich and Eugene Ostashevsky especially. I'm not sure I believe those names belong to real people.

101. Medium Raw- Anthony Bourdain

I'm not sure how I feel about Anthony's wife. I like that if you watch enough No Reservations you start to catch on that Tony is a bit of a poseur. And that endears him to me even more.