I enjoy books about working in America. In 1906 Upton Sinclair's novel The Jungle showed what it was like to work in the Chicago stockyards. It caused a sensation and launched a government investigation into the meat business. In 1992 Ben Hamper tells all about working at a GM plant in Michigan. In Rivethead: tales from the assembly line, the author is honest and has a bitter sense of humor. (Reviewers compared him to Hunter Thompson and Ken Kesey, although this is a nonfiction work that today would share a shelf with Barbara Ehrenreich's Nickel and Dimed.) It's an especially interesting read today, with the bailouts, looking back at what GM was up to all those years ago when Hamper, a second generation employee, worked there. 
The Sun Also Rises is the only Hemingway I've gotten through besides his short stories and the novella (required reading in high school) The Old Man and the Sea. Inside my copy of The Sun Also Rises I found a clipping I'd put there in 2001. (a Hemingway look alike contest group shot.) I Asked my significant otter to list ten American authors that he would put on his own personal favorites list, he said "hmmm.... Amy Tan, Joseph Wambaugh, Herman Melville, Pearl S. Buck, Michael Crichton, Paul Theroux, E. Annie Proulx,
Stephen King, Sinclair Lewis, Ray Bradbury, Mark Twain, Harper Lee, Douglas Unger -"
"Thirteen - that's plenty," I interrupted. I'm sure he could go on and on, but it's a pretty good 'off the top of my head' list. What authors are on your list?
Amy Tan speaks on creativity and Inspiration. (24 mins.)
7 comments:
Living:
Tobias Wolff
Lydia Davis
Steven Millhauser
George Saunders
Mark Richard
Julie Hecht
Ron Carlson
Dead:
William Steig
Bernard Malamud
Flannery O'Connor
J. F. Powers
Peter Taylor
Henry James
Mark Twain
1. John Grisham
2. Scott Turow
3. John Updike
4. Pico Iyer
5. Ann Rice
6. David Sedaris
7. John Steinbeck
8. Raymond Chandler
9. John Irving
10.James Patterson
I think these are all Americans.
Thanks Kurt-- (frantically adding to library list)
Anon never heard of Pico Ilyer (off to look at Amazon )
not to buy just to look ...
In alphabetical order:
Joan Didion
Louise Erdrich
Jim Harrison (can he count for two?)
Denis Lehane
Jack London
Annie Proulx
John Steinbeck
Mark Twain
Edith Wharton
RL-- which Louise Erdrich do you suggest if I were to only read one?
On my way to a couple of area libraries right now...
av: that's a tough question. It's a toss-up between Last Report on the Miracles at Little No Horse and The Plague of Doves.
I didn't know the first thing about Erdrich until I was introduced to The Plague, then went on to read Last Report. If you can really only choose one, I say: shuffle the books behind your back and pick the one in whichever hand you've decided. You can't go wrong anyway.
Beatrix Potter - wrote Squirrel Nutkin
Grace Spruch -Squirrels at my Window:Life with a REMARKABLE Gang of Urban Squirrels.
Graham Taylor- wrote about Squirrels
Kim Long-- squirrel writer
Dian Swanson- Welcome to the World of Squirrels
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