Tag, I'm it.

Books books books...Tracy tagged me, and boy is she going to regret it. Books are my life, so every question has multiple answers. Much like life.

1) One book that changed your life.

There isn't only one, sister...

The Moon is a Harsh Mistress and Stranger in a Strange Land, Robert Heinlein (Ideal Sci-fi)

Death of a Beekeeper,Lars Gustaffson (Ideal book structure)

Interview with a Vampire, Anne Rice (me, and gay men everywhere)

Sherlock Holmes series,Arthur Conan Doyle (finally, I had a hero)

Crime and Punishment, Dostoyevsky (just a brilliant damn book)

2) One book that you'd read more than once.

The James Bond series by Ian Fleming. I've read them each 3-4 times, and every time, they're new. I never see the sharks in the pool coming...but they do, and James always escapes. I dream of James and Moneypenny. Actually, I dream *I'm* Moneypenny.

Also the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series. Brilliant.

3) One book you'd want on a deserted island.

Gorky Park by Martin Cruz Smith. Because there's lots of snow in it. Lots.

4) One book that made you laugh.

Every freaking book from the Spenser series by Robert B Parker has made me laugh. My biggest wish is that I could have the poetic wit he does, and the propensity to use it on really tough guys with guns aimed at my head. That, and I'd like a big black man named Hawk to follow me around and protect me. Sweet.

Anything by David Sedaris, Douglas Adams. Oscar Wilde makes me giddy - flippant SOB.


5) One book that made you cry.

The Year of Magical Thinking, Joan Didion. It's all about the death of her husband, analyzed moment by moment, broken down like math. It's how I think, and how I live life...and it paralleled something I felt for someone that destroyed me.

In the Matter of J. Robert Oppenheimer' - A travesty of 'patriotism'.

6) One book you wish you'd written.

The commuters by Cheryl Klein. Because a real person I know wrote a whole book. And it's good. You have no idea how odd that is to know a real writer!

Really, I have to say I'm impressed with Austen's Sense and Sensibility and Pride and Prejudice. Also, The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath. Anything by James Ellroy. Brilliant prose. I'm impressed with things that there's no possibility I could have ever written, or come close. Through no calculated structure of words or random monkey typing could I ever compare with those. Things like Waiting for Godot blow my mind, and it's something I could never write. I'm an optimist, so I would have changed the ending. Godot shows up. With candy.

7) One book you wish had never been written.

Any book written phonetically. Or in Medieval English. Or about God. I hate Boethius' the Consolation of Philosophy because it's all three of those. Stupid Middle english phonetic religious poets. Where's Chaucer when you need him?

Also I really cant stand Uta Hagen's 'Respect for Acting'. Sorry to all the actors out there, but I have no respect.

8) One book you're currently reading.

Just finished 'I feel bad about my Neck' By Nora Ephron

Just started the Sherlock Holmes series again with Study in Scarlet.

Have Hunt for Red October by Clancy on my nightstand to re-read.

9) One book you've been meaning to read.

I still haven't read Dumas, and I need to get off my butt and do it. Didn't finish L'Morte de Arthur by Sir Thomas Mallory...need to do that too. I also have some Basic Writings of Nietzsche, but it sits there staring at me...and I'm afraid.

So many books, so little time.