1,001 Books to Read Before You Die Archives

Books I have read which appear on the list “1,001 Books to Read Before You Die.”

The Passion

Posted on April 24, 2015 by mizparker

“Love, they say, enslaves and passion is a demon and many have been lost for love. I know this is true, but I know too that without love we grope in the tunnels of our lives and never see the sun.”

1,001 Books to Read Before You Die, Fiction, Historical Fiction, Magical Realism

A Visit From the Goon Squad

Posted on December 15, 2014 by mizparker

In 1979 San Francisco, the punk scene is burgeoning and Bennie, Scotty, Jocelyn, Rhea, and their friends are on the front lines. Bennie and Scotty are the leaders of the Flaming Dildos, a band hopeful of making it big amongst the likes of their local idols Flipper, The Nuns, and the Dead Kennedys.

1,001 Books to Read Before You Die, Fiction, NYT Bestsellers, Pulitzer Prize Winners

Sexing the Cherry

Posted on January 6, 2014 by mizparker

Set in 17th century England during Oliver Cromwell and Charles I’s time, we are plunged into the world of Jordan and the murderous Dog-Woman; who is, in the author’s words, “perhaps the only woman in English fiction confident enough to use filth as a fashion accessory.”

1,001 Books to Read Before You Die, Fiction, Historical Fiction, Magical Realism

Less Than Zero

Posted on December 28, 2012 by mizparker

When Less Than Zero came out, it was held out by the baby boomers as what was “wrong with Generation X”, and Generation X decried it as “promoting ugly stereotypes.” Perhaps most disturbing (to me), Ellis has been credited in a way with inventing the Kardashians and Paris Hiltons of the world with his portrayal of wealth and narcissism amongst Hollywood youth.

1,001 Books to Read Before You Die, Fiction

Beloved

Posted on July 18, 2011 by mizparker

“She is a friend of my mind. She gather me, man. The pieces I am, she gather them and give them back to me in all the right order. It’s good, you know, when you got a woman who is a friend of your mind.”

1,001 Books to Read Before You Die, Fiction, Nobel Prize Winners, Pulitzer Prize Winners

Trainspotting

Posted on June 17, 2011 by mizparker

Where Welsh really shines as a writer is that despite the fact that every single character is either a junkie, a criminal, an asshole, or some combination of the three, you can’t help but sort of like most of them.

1,001 Books to Read Before You Die, Fiction

Lady Chatterley’s Lover

Posted on April 15, 2011 by mizparker

When Constance Reid marries Lord Clifford Chatterley, she has the somewhat dim view of sexual congress between men and women that the odd affair in college has afforded her.

1,001 Books to Read Before You Die, Fiction, Romance

I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings

Posted on April 1, 2011 by mizparker

Angelou’s writing lends a poetry to her life that makes the terrible things somehow okay, and the good things even better. Caged Bird is stunning portrait of a young black girl’s place in not only the south, but the greater world beyond it, and is a VERY worthwhile read.

1,001 Books to Read Before You Die, Biography, Memoir, Nonfiction, NYT Bestsellers

Love in the Time of Cholera (El Amor en los Tiempos del Cólera)

Posted on March 29, 2011 by mizparker

Dr. Urbino eventually passes away and Florentino, having waited sixty-odd years to be near Fermina Daza, re-enters the picture. In their old age, they are able to tentatively explore the romance that she denied them in their youth.

1,001 Books to Read Before You Die, Fiction, Nobel Prize Winners, Romance

The World According to Garp

Posted on March 25, 2011 by mizparker

“A book feels true when it feels true,” she said to him, impatiently. “A book’s true when you can say, “Yeah! That’s just how damn people behave all the time.” Then you know it’s true,” Jillsy said.

1,001 Books to Read Before You Die, Fiction, NYT Bestsellers

The Graduate

Posted on March 1, 2011 by mizparker

Mrs. Robinson, you’re trying to seduce me, aren’t you. Aren’t you?

1,001 Books to Read Before You Die, Fiction

Naked Lunch

Posted on February 28, 2011 by mizparker

” ‘Well,’ Doc says, ‘there was a feller in here this morning. City feller. Dressed kinda flashy. So he’s got him a RX for a mason jar of morphine….Kinda funny looking prescription writ out on toilet paper….And I told him straight out: “Mister, I suspect you to be a dope fiend.” ‘

1,001 Books to Read Before You Die, Fiction, Satire

The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle

Posted on February 23, 2011 by mizparker

Toru learns one day that an elderly acquaintance of theirs, Mr. Honda, has passed away and left a remembrance for him. Delivering the package from Mr. Honda is a Lieutenant Mamiya, a prisoner of war during WW2 who was tortured by the Soviets. Lieutenant Mamiya tells Toru a fascinating story about how he came to know Mr. Honda, and gives him cryptic advice: When the time comes, go down into the deepest well and stay there.

1,001 Books to Read Before You Die, Fiction

Reasons to Live / The Collected Stories of Amy Hempel

Posted on January 21, 2011 by mizparker

When I go to sleep, I sleep on the side of the bed my mother used to sleep on. Sometimes, at dawn, I wake up and find myself in the pose my mother died in — lying on her side, her arm reaching from under her head as though she were doing the sidestroke in a pool, the pills she had swallowed weighing her down like so many pebbles in her pockets.