Election Night Distractions...

I'm listening to some political commentator jackasses trying to justify their jobs by guessing, second guessing, and then analyzing their guesses while waiting to hear back from each state about the election. These people have got to be snorting coke in the bathroom and mainlining Jolt to keep the inanity flowing with so much excitement for so many hours. What an interesting career choice.

Well, here in the real world, my world anyway, it's new book season, so I thought I'd throw some new titles out that I'm kind of excited about:



Serena by Ron Rash.
Publishers Weekly (Monday , May 19, 2008):Depression-era lumber baron George Pemberton and his callous new wife, Serena, are venality incarnate in Rash's gothic fourth novel (after "The World Made Straight"), set, like the other three, in Appalachia. George who coolly kills the furious father of Rachel Harmon, the teenage girl pregnant with George's bastard son is an imperious entrepreneur laying waste to North Carolina timberland without regard for the well-being of his workers. His evil pales beside that of Serena, however. Rash's depictions of lumber camp camaraderie (despite deadly working conditions) are a welcome respite from Serena's unrelenting thirst for blood and wealth; a subplot about government efforts to buy back swaths of privately owned land to establish national parks injects real history into this implacably grim tale of greed and corruption gone wildand of eventual, well-deserved revenge. "(Oct.)" Copyright 2008 Reed Business Information.




Country Music: The Masters by Marty Stuart

One of the best covers I've ever seen on a book.
Publisher blurb:
A photographic love letter to the founders and legends of country music by musician and storyteller Marty Stuart.
When Marty Stuart first entered the Hard Rock Cafe, he was impressed to see the work of rock preservationists, yet realized that the artifacts of country music were being lost or destroyed. He set out to change that, becoming a leading curator of roots music memorabilia and photographer of roots founders.
After years of careful preservation, Stuart brings the early days of country to vibrant life again with Country Music: The Masters. In a unique pairing, completely original for a photography book of this scope, an integrated audio CD is included featuring 60 minutes of the fascinating stories behind selected photos. Stuart, a born storyteller, gives readers a glimpse into the subjects and the photograph at the moment the shutter snapped. The CD includes "Dark Bird," an unreleased song dedicated to Johnny Cash, written by Stuart after Cash's death. This new recording marks the first-ever commercial release of the song.






The Romantic Dogs by Roberto Bolano

Possibly the most badass writer to ever come outta South America.
The publisher says:
Discover Roberto Bolano as he saw himself, in his own first calling as a poet. Roberto Bolano (1953-2003) has caught on like a house on fire, and "The Romantic Dogs," a bilingual collection of forty-four poems, offers American readers their first chance to encounter this literary phenomenon as a poet: his own first and strongest literary persona. These poems, wide-ranging in forms and length, have appeared in magazines such as "Harper's, Threepenny Review, The Believer, Boston Review, Soft Targets, Tin House, The Nation, Circumference, A Public Space," and "Conduit," Bolano's poetic voice is like no other's: "At that time, I'd reached the age of twenty/and I was crazy. /I'd lost a country/but won a dream./Long as I had that dream/nothing else mattered...."

More later. There're always more books...