On Their Nightstand

I still don't have mine back yet, or a place to put it, but thankfully the reading is just as good from Dad & Sue's! With any luck we'll get ours back soon.

I just finished A Million Little Pieces, the autobiography of dubious authenticity by James Frey. Thanks to all the recent hubbub over the book I spent a fair amount of time trying to figure out which parts were "embellished", which was a little distracting. Who knows if I'm right, but some scenes (admittedly the most exciting ones) seemed right out of a screenplay rather than a true-to-life account. Overall I liked the book though, and the portrayal of the addicts and rehab seemed believable enough.

On a sidenote, I noticed last night that Amazon has contracted Frey to be a guest reviewer. I wonder if that deal was struck before or after the controversy bubbled up, and whether they thought about pulling out of the deal. Or maybe the attention has helped, who knows!

I'm also still knee-deep in The World Is Flat, which is definitely a worthwhile read but at times his revelations are a little too "golly gee!" and too blatantly a pursuit of an idea he's already decided is true. I suppose that's how most things evolve, but I'd still prefer it to be more of a discovery rather than "I had this thought then ran around gathering info to prove it." The facts and ideas are still fun to read, and overall the book is exciting and even inspiring at times, but maybe a little too simplified and watered down to fit his gimmicky "flat" concept.

Sophie's getting to be quite a reader too, and enjoys going through several books at bedtime now. For a stocking stuffer we bought a 12-pack of little Sesame Street boardbooks that are all only six pages each. They're small enough for her to really manipulate, and short enough for her attention span at this age. Some nights we've gone through each of them three times apiece before turning out the light.

On the other end of the spectrum, some of those Dr. Seuss books are a little too wordy for her. The other night I was getting into Red Fish, Blue Fish and she literally leaned forward and turned around to glare at me, which I interpreted as, "You're just making it up now! There's no way all these words can be on one page!" But indeed, they are.