May: Week Five (and a couple of days of June)

Books Read:

• Catch-22 (Joseph Heller)
• Bossypants (Tina Fey)
• The Silver Linings Playbook (Matthew Quick)

I can't believe I haven't bought any books (not counting books for school or research) in weeks...I guess that's the benefit to living close to a public library.

Catch-22 is one of my dad's favorite books, and I finally checked it out from the library. This is one of those "classic American" novels that everyone is supposed to read at some point, and I'll agree with that. It took about 150 pages for me to become invested in this book (out of 450+), and I might have been tempted to stop reading it did I not trust my dad's recommendations. I'm glad I persevered - definitely worth the read. (Plus, isn't it interesting that the catchphrase "catch-22" came from this book? How many other titles of books have become parts of our everyday language?) I'm generally not a fan of war novels, but this isn't what you would usually expect from a war novel. If you're interested in the book, it's worth checking to see if your library has the 50th anniversary tradition - the essays in the back of the book explore what makes Catch-22 such a different book. Also, I 100% agree with the Harper Lee quote on the front of the book that says, "Catch-22 is the only war novel I've ever read that makes any sense." (I had to look up the author of the quote because the Leon County library put a barcode sticker over her name.)



Bossypants is a pretty different read from Catch-22, although, like Heller, Tina Fey does explore serious issues (mainly feminism) in a comedic fashion. Mostly, though, this book is just funny. I only watched SNL for a brief period (while I still lived at home), but that was when Fey came back to do her Sarah Palin impersonations, so I enjoyed reading about that time.

I haven't seen the movie version of The Silver Linings Playbook yet, but I've wanted to for a while. Once I found out it was based on a book by Matthew Quick, I decided to read the book first. It's a quick read - I read it in two days - and I thought it was well done. The characters have depth, especially Pat and Tiffany (although I would have liked to have read more about her - it'll be interesting to see what they do with her character in the movie...and I'm looking forward to see Jennifer Lawrence play her). Some of the supporting characters initially seemed to have stock personalities, but there were some surprises further into the book. I'd recommend it!