What author do you own the most books by?
It’s a tie between Anne Rice and Janet Evanovich. There are two writers who, if they were more prolific, would take up the most space on my shelves: Larry McMurtry and Tom Robbins.
What book do you own the most copies of?
I have two copies each of several books. I don’t think I have three or more of anything except Hamlet.
Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?
As a matter of fact, yes.
What fictional character are you secretly in love with?
(That’s another question that ends with a preposition. Just sayin’.) He’s in a book that hasn’t been published, so his name would mean nothing to you.
What book have you read the most times in your life?
Yikes. Either Gone With The Wind, Pride and Prejudice, Jane Eyre, The Sun Also Rises, or something by Mary Stewart or Elswyth Thane.
What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?
Little Women.
What is the worst book you’ve read in the past year?
I’ll never say.
What is the best book you’ve read in the past year?
The Audacity of Truth. It felt like someone in a position to change things actually thought a lot like me.
If you could force everyone to read one book, what would it be?
To Kill a Mockingbird.
Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for literature?
I’d need to be reading more literary fiction to answer that question. Right now, I’m all about reading for escape or entertainment.
What book would you most like to see made into a movie?
One of my own, of course. With a big fat option check for me.
What book would you least like to see made into a movie?
Anything with a serial killer in it.
Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.
Just last night, my dream was a version of Heart of Darkness with Robert Pattinson (no, I haven’t seen Twilight) playing the part of a wealthy young man who gets buried alive in some South American ruins.
What is the most lowbrow book you’ve read as an adult?
Undoubtedly a tell-all about some celebrity.
What is the most difficult book you’ve ever read?
Any novel by Faulkner.
What is the most obscure Shakespeare play you’ve seen?
I’ve never seen an obscure Shakespearean play. Or maybe I didn’t realize it was obscure.
Do you prefer the French or the Russians?
Russians. (Er, we are talking about novels, right?)
Roth or Updike?
I like both, but give Updike the edge.
David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?
Haven’t read either. (Yes, I heard that collective gasp from certain readers of this journal.)
Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?
Chaucer.
Austen or Eliot?
Austen.
What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?
Moby Dick, which I’ve started and enjoyed a number of times but have somehow never finished.
ETA 2022: I have since read and loved this book!
What is your favorite novel?
To Kill a Mockingbird, although A Confederacy of Dunces often shoves its way into sharing that position.
Play?
Both Angels in America: Millennium Approaches and Perestroika–to read and to see.
Poem?
Robert Frost’s “Birches” and Langston Hughes’ “Poem” are tied.
Essay?
James Michener’s “On Wasting Time.”
Short Story?
Possibly James Thurber’s “Sitting in the Catbird Seat,” although there’s a story, “The Absolute Worst,” by Jameson Currier, that just crushes me whenever I read it. And if Ethan Mordden’s Buddies books are seen as a collection of short stories, then those would have to be at the top of my list.
Work of non-fiction?
That’s kind of broad. In art, probably my two volumes of The Art of Florence and a biography of Mark Rothko. Other favorite biographies include books on Thomas Jefferson and Harry Truman. In pop culture, a book about the Beach Boys called Heroes and Villains. Then there’s just about anything Hunter S. Thompson ever wrote.
Graphic novel?
I got nothing.
Who is your favorite writer?
There are just too many. Among my literary favorites are Hemingway, Steinbeck, Fitzgerald, Austen, Larry McMurtry, Tom Robbins, Andrew Holleran, Ethan Mordden. Yet there are popular writers whose books I love because they make me laugh or cry or both.
Who is the most overrated writer alive today?
I don’t publicly criticize other writers regardless of how little I like their work.
What is your desert island book?
I’d take those three volumes of Remembrance of Things Past because that may be the only way I’ll finish them.
And … what are you reading right now?
I’m between books.
If you could force everyone to read one book, what would it be?
To Kill a Mockingbird.
Oh, suuuuure: Side with a fellow southern belle writer! 😀 This novel is on my To Read List. I’ll get to it sooner or later.
A Confederacy of Dunces is just brilliant and so funny. I’ve reread a bunch of times since first reading it a few years back. Thank God Poppy Z Brite talked it up so much, which made me go check it out.
I first encountered James Thurber’s “Sitting in the Catbird Seat” when I was in 10th grade and heard it read over the partition wall from the class next door. I thought it was so neat that I went and asked the teacher after class the name of the story, which seemed to surprise her. Maybe she got used to apathetic students! Recently I remembered this story and found a copy of it online and save it to my computer.
I’m also planning on getting to Jane Austen and the Bronte sisters.
The wonderful thing about great books you haven’t read is–you still have them to look forward to! They’ll always be there.
Yep, us Southern belles do have to stick together.
I’m glad some of my favorite stuff is some of your favorite stuff!
Am I the only person that loves the play Blythe Spirit?
I’m afraid to read Confederacy -because what if I’m the only person that doesn’t like it …
and I see a trend most southerners seem to read GWTW a LOT … I know I read it every year, although more often I wonder what happened to the secondary characters like the Fontaines and Cathleen Calvert
Oh, poor Cathleen. All the Calverts.
I’m sure there are lots of people who don’t like A Confederacy of Dunces. I just don’t know if I would invite them to dinner at The Compound. 😉
I know I always get misty when Cathleen comes over to say she’s marrying the yankee to improve their situation and Cade is dying … but I also love the fiesty attitude of the Fontaine’s
I always admired Mrs. Tarleton, too. She was one tough cookie.
I get flack for never having read To Kill a Mockingbird yet I stroll in here and no one’s raking you over the coals for ignoring David Sedaris. I must learn this magic spell you have over people….
WHAT?! you’ve never read ‘to kill a mockingbird’?!
you’re killing me…
i have read sedaris and i love his sister, so i can give you grief on this. 😉
Don’t make me turn you into a newt, okay?
You NEVER What?!?!?! I can’t believe she’s not read Sedaris, either, though.
Look, Mark G. Harris, if you get flack here for this Mockingbird thing, you have no one to blame but yourself. I didn’t tell!
oh mark, even I’ve read Mockingbird …
i think you are the 3rd person recommending ‘confederacy’ here in the past few months.
it’s on my list!
now, you haven’t read anything by david sedaris, but how about augusten burroughs? ‘magical thinking’ had me laughing out loud.
No Sedaris and no Burroughs.
I know, I know.
Don’t ever watch the movie version of Running with Scissors. They turned a darkly comic memoir into a drippy drama.
Is that the one with Annette Bening and Jill Clayburgh? If so, I saw it. Barely remember it.
Yes, unfortunately, that’s the one. I only remember it because they buthcered a great book.
The last time I was in Borders, I was wishing I could call you and ask you (and n8an) some of these questions, to help me with my selections. It was so much easier before I started looking all around the store and looking at all of the fiction and novels one-by-one.
I’m printin this out and puttin it in my purse to use for shopping advice 🙂
I know! I get very overwhelmed when I’m in a bookstore, mostly because I’m a “run in, get what I want, pay, and run out” shopper. So time to browse ends up confusing me because there are too many choices!
That’s why shelf talkers and good staff are a huge help.
What are shelf talkers?
They can be staff picks or excerpts from reviews or bestseller lists cut from a newspaper, for example. I hope this picture doesn’t disappear from the Internet, as it illustrates the concept:
Oh yeah, I know the kind of thing. 🙂
Off-topic
Another Reading is Hot book for you. This one’s *yours*.
http://www.ravensrange.com/reading-is-hot/
Re: Off-topic
I LOVE that photo! You look so relaxed.
Re: Off-topic
It was a nice day. 🙂