Curated Bookshop.org Reading List
Independent bookstores are little pockets of community, learning, and free speech. With individual tastes, and sometimes the elegant, unusual suggestion? Best places cater to local tastes. Bookshop.org raised $50 million for local bookstores.
Curated Bookshop.org Reading List
- This is Shakespeare by Emma Smith
- Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert A. Heinlein
- Neuromancer by William Gibson
- Dreyer’s English by Benjamin Dreyer
- Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson
- Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas by Hunter S. Thompson
- Alburquerque by Rudolfo Anaya
Curated Bookshop.org Reading List
- This is Shakespeare I got to Dr. Emma Smith via her Shakespeare podcasts, and, so it seems, much of the book is drawn from her series of lectures about the individual plays, with the frame being a quick synopsis, then a off-center question that illuminates much about the play. But in a larger sense the text helped me explore approach, and framing of questions for more than just Shakespeare. Since I still use it as a reference, I have both digital and hard copy.
- Stranger in a Strange Land I didn’t get a first edition of Robert A. Heinlein’s classic, but rather a 10th round paperback. I already had a shelf full of his “juveniles,” space opera for young adults. This was a weird, underground hit from the mid-sixties, pushing thoughtful analysis about culture. Also? Invented waterbeds. Reread every few years, and it seems to hold up for me. Think I have two or three copies including a re-released uncut version.
- Neuromancer is still a standout. William Gibson mythology suggests the novel was written on typewriter while inventing the notion of “cyberspace.” Still, as the foundation of the Cyber Punk grouping in speculative literature, stylistically, structurally, it is an important novel. I’ll reread it every few years. Wish I hadn’t loaned out my first copy, a rare, first edition paperback that was rather beat-up. One of the best opening lines in “Science Fiction.”
- Dreyer’s English I only know Benjamin Dreyer by social media, and of all the grammar porn that I have? This is more than a favorite, I have it as both a digital book and hard copy. It’s a happy place for my inner copy editor.
- Snow Crash Neuromancer, mentioned above, paved the way for my encounters with Neal Stephenson’s body of work, starting with Snow Crash. I don’t know if it changed my life, but I was excited by the novel the first time, and each subsequent rereading is still as vibrant. One of the best opening scenes in a post-modern novel.
- Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas Hunter S. Thompson’s work should be closer to the top of the list, and I’ve enjoyed some of his latter works, but this was the one that sealed it. Stands up to a rereading every few years, as it is one of the classics of American Literature. One of the best opening lines in any modern novel.
- Alburquerque I picked up my copy at a bookstore after I graduated the university, remembering Rudolfo Anaya as one of the leaders of Chicano Lit. Read it on a whim, loved the nature of the story, the background I knew something about the characters where even New Mexico itself took on a personality. Someplace in the series, there’s a scene that has forever stuck with me, possibly magical realism, but really, just shows the “enchanted” part of “The Land of Enchantment.”
