A Zombie Ate My Bestseller

My good blog friend Barbara tagged me with a literary meme and I'm happy to comply.

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Which book do you irrationally cringe away from reading, despite seeing only positive reviews? Anything by C. S. Lewis. The god squad drones who I went to college with always tried to push his books at me, I think they hoped I'd get all saved and shit if I read that Christian allegory crap he wrote. It didn't work then and it won't work now. I won't see movies based on his books, or even movies about his life. I'd rather gouge my bowels out with a rusty tin can lid than read anything by C. S. Lewis.

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If you could bring three characters to life for a social event (afternoon tea, a night of clubbing, perhaps a world cruise), who would they be and what would the event be? With so many to choose from it's hard to decide but if pressed I'd go with:

Clara Bowden from White Teeth. She's a hip free spirit yet serious when she has to be woman who is also spur of the moment funky fun. (White Teeth is in my list top ten favorite novels of all time.)Sissy Hankshaw Gitch from Even Cowgirls Get The Blues. Everybody wants Sissy, guys, gals, senior citizens, and endangered birds. She's smart, sexy, and a blast to be around. (Even Cowgirls Get The Blues is my favorite novel of all time.)
Oskar Matzerath from The Tin Drum. Any person who can stop growing and who is the conscience of a country in the grip of an insane right wing dictator is my kind of person. Sure we'd have that language thing to work out but I think young Oskar and I would get along fine.

Now, since we'd have a juvenile in our party we'd probably do something like go for a picnic, probably on a beach somewhere, maybe Atlantic Beach, NC even. We'd hang out, swim, talk, play games, collect sea shells, and then we'd all go back to the condo we rented and I'd cook up some seafood and we'd drink beers and shoot the breeze until the wee hours of the morning.

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You are told you can't die until you read the most boring novel on the planet. While this immortality is great for awhile, eventually you realise it's past time to die. Which book would you expect to get you a nice grave? I'd go with Pilgrims Progress. It's the only way I'd ever read it and I'd burn through it knowing that the sweet release of death awaited me.

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Which book have you pretended, or at least hinted, that you've read, when in fact you've been nowhere near it? In college I was supposed to read The Children of the Light and the Children of the Darkness by Reinhold Niebuhr and do a oral presentation on it. Every time I opened it and tried to read it I hated it. So I skimmed it and tried to bluff my way through the oral report on it. I got busted for not reading it and I got slapped with a "D" on that project. I still hate German theologians to this day because of that incident.

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As an addition to the last question, has there been a book that you really thought you had read, only to realise when you read a review about it/go to 'reread' it that you haven't? Nope.

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You've been appointed Book Advisor to a VIP (who's not a big reader). What's the first book you'd recommend and why? Hands down I'd recommend this novel:

It's DeLillo's best in my opinion and it tells the story of the events of the JFK murder from the perspective of Lee Harvey Oswald. It's chilling and stunningly good how DeLillo took what I thought was material that had been hashed to death and somehow turned it into something fresh and urgent and compelling. I gained alot of sympathy for Oswald after this novel.

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A good fairy comes and grants you one wish: you will have perfect reading comprehension in the foreign language of your choice. Which language do you go with? Spanish. It would be great to read Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Mario Vargas Llosa, Cervantes, and Che in Spanish.

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A mischievous fairy comes and says that you must choose one book that you will reread once a year for the rest of your life (you can read other books as well). Which book would you pick?
I've already read it four or five times and I know I'll read it a couple more times before it's all said and done.

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What's one bookish thing you 'discovered' from book blogging (maybe a new genre, or author, or new appreciation for cover art-anything)? I've discovered that my love of books and reading is shared by some of the smartest and nicest people I've ever known. I love all the blog posts by people on my blogroll about the books they read and how infectious the love of the written word is among all those smart people. It's refresing to see that so many of us still love to read and discuss and share with others what we read.

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That good fairy is back for one final visit. Now, she's granting you your dream library! Describe it. Is everything leatherbound? Is it full of first edition hardcovers? Pristine trade paperbacks? Perhaps a few favourite authors have inscribed their works? Go ahead-let your imagination run free. It's in a big well lit room that has comfy chairs, perhaps recliners, in it. The walls are lined with built in bookshelves and on those shelves are books that intrigue, entertain, and fascinate me. Also there are graphic novels on the shelves and several shelves are lined with DVD's, because you have to do something when your eyes get tired from reading. My computer is also in there and a big well stocked kitchen in the next room.

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Thanks for the tag Barbara! Since I got tagged by a hot babe, I'm going to pass this meme along to some hot babes on my blog roll, MNmom, Suzy, and my book lovin' Georgia blog gal pal Beth can do this meme if they like. Have at it ladies.