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Customer Reviews (10)

One of a kind!
Tastes great!Less filling!

Ok.This is the first BANR I've actually read (2007 version), but I'm so glad I bought it.It's a popcorn read in that it's often lighthearted, somewhat irreverant, but it's so much fun.For those of you who want to be serious all of the time, or feel that every read must be "literary", buy it anyway.

I especially liked the Personal Ads (the British ones were the most inventive), the graphic novel that was anything but comic, and the memoirs in six words.I actually challenged my students to come up with memoirs of themselves in six words.Hmmmm, they tried. They're young and need to season a bit.

If you want to expand your reading horizon, entertain yourself, and even stand/sit in awe at the sheer brillance of many (unknown) writers, pick this book up.

San Francisco-centric, youth-centric collection
Dave Eggers very openly describes the process by which he leads the team of Bay Area young adults in choosing the pieces included in the "Best American Nonrequired Reading" series, and sure enough, bios are provided of the selection committee, and they do indeed all hail from the Bay Area.Still, it was surprising to me just how San Francisco-centric and youth-centric this collection is.As one strays farther from those two epicenters, in space or time, one is less likely to find this collection appealing or satisfying.

San Francisco youth culture can be somewhat nihilistic, and a number of the selections embrace themes of death and failed institutions, and offer a pessimistic outlook on life.This viewpoint is explicitly described in the first long piece in the book, Jonathan Ames' "American Gothic", an article about goth culture, but it is prevalent in a good number of other selections.Scott Carrier's "Rock the Junta", an article about the most popular rock band in the authoritarian country of Myanmar, has the underlying assumption that rock and roll music can change the world and bring about revolution, a viewpoint that is more popular among youths than history professors.There is even an article about Barry Bonds, Lee Klein's "All Aboard the Bloated Boat", that favorably compares Bonds and other steroid-ingesting athletes to musicians like Jimi Hendrix who took drugs and then produced classics of rock music.This article didn't at all change my opinion of Bonds, but it did make it clear again why Bonds finished his career in front of adoring fans in the city of San Francisco, which is much more tolerant of drug experimentation than other major league baseball cities.

There are several very enjoyable pieces in this book, starting with Sufjan Stevens' introduction, in which he describes how he transitioned from being a non-reading third grader in a Waldorf school, with hippie-esque parents, to the harsh reality of a traditional American public school, where (thanks to a teacher and American pop culture) he was able to catch up in his reading in a hurry.

Other pieces I enjoyed include:

-- The Edge Foundation's "What is Your Dangerous Idea", which asked that question of some distinguished scientists, and then collected their responses;some of them are quite thoughtful and provocative.

-- Jennifer Egan's "Selling the General", which, although a bit fantastical, nevertheless makes some very telling observations about our celebrity-laden culture.

-- Conan O'Brien's "Stuyvesant High School Commencement Speech", which wraps some pretty common life advice in humor and poignancy, thus engaging and moving the listener/reader.

-- Mike Richardson-Bryan's "Best American Names of Horses Expected to Have Undistinguished Careers", which is the funniest (albeit shortest) piece in the book.

But all in all, this volume is likely to be most appreciated by younger readers, especially those who call the Bay Area home.

Maybe if you take it in small bites
Meh. The idea for Best American Nonrequired Reading is interesting: take a group of bright high school students, have them read everything published during the year, and let them decide what is to be included in the book. Essays, short stories, non-fiction articles, comics - as long as it can fit in 20 pages, it's fair game.

Maybe this was a good book; maybe other people would really enjoy reading it. I didn't, mostly. Maybe it's the sort of book that you need to leave next to your reading chair and dip into periodically over a period of weeks. But as a cover-to-cover read it became tedious less than halfway through. I did enjoy the introduction by Dave Eggers, and Conan O'Brian's Stuyvesant High commencement speech was fun. Other than that, there were a couple articles that were vaguely interesting, and some short fiction that I really did not enjoy.

A tad uneven, but good overall
This is a collection of off-beat and overlooked pieces--short stories, essays and various articles--from a wide range of 2007 publications. A tad uneven, as this kind of collection is bound to be, it still has some great pieces. My favorite was Winston Brown's "Ghost Children," about African-American boys becoming men. It is non-fiction at its best--as entertaining and poignant as the best fiction, while also carrying the weight of truth. I also liked Kevin A. Gonzalez's "Loteria," and Conan O'Brien's commencement address to Stuyvesant High School. The excerpts from the book WHAT'S YOUR DANGEROUS IDEA? were good, and I put that book on my wish list because of it. A few selections of this anthology were a little too clever for their own good, but overall a pretty enjoyable read. The fact that reviewers are calling out different favorites should be seen as a strength of the book.

Dissecting narratives
Sufjan Stevens tells amusingly of his Rudolf Steiner childhood in the introduction.By third grade Stevens was attending public school and couldn't read.A teacher explained how we are surrounded by words.

Goth is dying, most bands are industrial, an informant tells Jonathan Ames in his piece entitled 'Middle-American Gothic'.The graphic story by Alison Bechdel concerning a father's intentional or accidental death is engrossing.D. Winston Brown, in 'Ghost Children', opines that time can transform violence.

Burma, the size of Texas, called Myanmar, is a place of absolute government control.Scott Carrier, 'Rock the Junta', claims he lied on his visa application to get into the country.Incipient consumerism, a condition he has encountered in other parts of the world, confronts him as he goes in quest of political truths.Foucault described the effects of surveillance.The Burmese poeple, it is asserted, suffer from surveillance.

In the main, women are empathizers and men are synthesizers, (from 'What is Your Dangerous Idea?').Query--will human beings understand the universe, ever?Reasonably considered, scientific knowledge may be pursued only for its practical applications.In 1900 most inventions involved physical reality. In 2005 they revolve upon virtual entertainment.Today a technological elite owns the country's intellectual property.

Stephen Elliott, 'Where I Slept', had been a known drug user and eighth grade drinker.At least two characters in this collection wear sleeping masks.In 'How to Tell Stories to Children' two of the characters determine that they have forty minutes before the perishables perish and so they have time for tea.

Lee Klein, in 'All Aboard the Bloated Boat' compares Barry Bonds to Jimi Hendrix.Maybe Bonds in a scapegoat.An NGO, Darfur, a mission to make a record of the evolving crisis reveals that the emptiness of the region is disconcerting.Airplanes are referred to Antonovs, (Russian).The marauders are the Janjaweed.

The jarhead underground is a tale of Marines.In 2006 there are shifts in the action.In Iraq information is tribal.Control of Fallujah is turned over to an Iraqi brigade.Then the Marines are called upon to deal with the insurgents.

The collection is a joy.Basically it is a clutch of the products of youngish, cospmopolitan, emerging writers. ... Read more

Product Description

Customer Reviews (2)

3 Book Army
McSweeney's 26 comes in 3 books - two paperbacks (if you cut a normal book in two horizontally that's the size of the paperbacks) and a hardback. The hardback is the least interesting here as it's called "Where to Invade Next" and is a non-fiction look at countries in the Middle East and North Korea and profiles the despots and regimes, giving statistics of how brutal life in their societies is and haunting statistics like how many die from starvation, etc.

The way the paperbacks are designed is to mirror the Armed Service Editions from WW2 where servicemen were given pocket paperbacks to take with them so they'd always have something to read. The militaristic theme continues with each story separated by a painting done by a former soldier after WW2.

So onto the fiction. There were only 2 of the 11 stories here that really caught my attention. Ismet Prcic's "Porcus Omnivorus" tells the story of a Slav who, after escaping his war torn homeland, settles into a life in the United States. Making his way home from a party one morning he encounters another Slav who takes him to his house for a party. When there the man realises that these people, whom he thought were fellow comrades, turn out to be the enemies he fought against. Prcic builds the tension nicely as he has his protagonist slowly realise this and then tries to escape. Great story, well told.

The other stand out was John Brandon's "Arkansas", an excerpt from his novel of the same name. Two drug runners in the South meet their new boss, their new lodgings, and go on a drug deal, unexpectedly bringing back an unwelcome visitor. Brandon's two main characters are well realised and the dialogue is very believable. The fast moving story taking in all aspects of low-income living in modern America is fascinating and I loved it so much I ordered a copy of Brandon's book.

McSweeney's 26 looks nice and is well designed but overall most of the fiction here is average to crap besides the two gems found here. Probably give this a miss, there are better McSweeney's out there.

Take It and Leave It
Certainly not the strongest of the McSweeney's, Issue 26 comes in three parts, featuring two minibooks with stories "from our shores" and "from overseas." The third part is Where To Invade Next, and it's dead serious indeed, a humorless and unreadable collection of countries the U.S. could invade next, given the Pentagon has anywhere near as much time on their hands as did the editor of this useless dud. Unbearable topicality, anyone?

But the real problem with Where To Invade Next is that it takes away from the stories. You just don't get that much reading after you slough WTIN.

Call it ethnocentric, but most of the better stories are from the Our Shores minibook. There is a goodly portion of John Brandon's novel Arkansas, which is terrific as that entire book is, a story about educated and aimless drug runners in the deep South. Amanda Davis has a nice flash fiction piece about being haunted by a dead girl's couch, and Wayne Harrison has a great story about a mechanic who gives a rehab refugee a pity job. It's a unique, perceptive story about the hazards of charity, of being swindled by the obligation to be too nice. Michael Gills has a short 'n' good piece about high-school athletes waiting out a tornado as well.

There are two stories spread across both minibooks, of very different quality. Ismet Prcic's two stories form a very nice juxtaposition, both about Bosnians, the first part set in Bosnia and filled with war, squalor, and loss, the second set in L.A. and focused on the seemingly trifling but enormous mistaking of a Bosnian for a Serbian. The other double-story, by Uzodimna Iweala, is a facelessly typical foreign-woman-out-of-her-element story taken from The New Yorker template. Nothing new or interesting there.

The overseas stories are more of a minefield. They run the gamut of bewilderingly terrible (Dana Mazur's story, about a Kazakh shaman) to downright charming (Frank Lentricchia's story of a disenfranchised Italian filmmaker). Stephen Smith writes a compelling story about a seven-year-old journalist phenom receiving his first hate mail, and Garry Powell has a goofy story about an Emirati man desperate to cheat who gets tricked by his wife.

Overall, though, there's just not enough fiction, the more maddening because the space that could have been used for stories (or something else compelling) was robbed by that book of Invadables.

... Read more

Product Description
What is the What is written as an autobiography of Valentino Achak Deng, but authored by the American writer, Dave Eggers. Mixing fictional and non-fictional elements, Eggers tells the story of Valentino's long and arduous journey from his hometown in Southern Sudan to his present home in Atlanta, Georgia in the USA. Valentino suffers hunger and disease as, with thousands of others, he walks through his war-torn country to refugee camps in both Ethiopia and Kenya.

This study guide includes the following sections: Plot Summary, Chapter Summaries & Analysis, Characters, Objects/Places, Themes, Style, Quotes, and Topics for Discussion. ... Read more

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Product Description
The Alternative Version of the author's debut novel. Called "Hand's Revised Edition", this is, in effect, a new work, not just another edition as some have called it. Limited Edition of 2000 signed copies. Hard boards with the first paragraph of the novel on the cover, as issued. Text by Dave Eggers. Without DJ, as issued. Eggers' novel is, in many ways, a further exploration of the themes of his breakthrough memoir, "A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius". Eggers's ears are keenly attuned to the malaise as well as the redeeming possibilities of contemporary American life. Not surprisingly, he is also a convincingly charming, playful, self-styled iconoclast who, in this book and in his McSweeney's Quarterlies Series, is clearly making fun of collectors: Their obsession with a book's condition and the very notion of "first edition". The book is deliberately produced as a cheap book (but beautifully so, with handsome red cloth spine) and two editions were published simultaneously, one with and one without the indication, "First Edition". Now comes yet another version: "This one is about 60 pages longer, the added pages having been written by the book's other primary character, Hand. His insertion, which occurs two-thirds of the way through the book, in many ways refutes the way the story was originally told. The new version of the book has a new title and many more photographs, all in color" (Publisher's blurb). Ironically, all this Rashomon-style variant storytelling has made the book and Dave Eggers much more collectible than it or he would have been had he followed hallowed publishing conventions. A work of staggering ambition. © 2005, ModernRare.com ... Read more

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Customer Reviews (5)

Fabled excellence
McSweeney's 28 is made up of 8 small hardbacks contained within a cardboard container. The two sets of 8 books make up two fantastic painted covers, one of which is the one you see as the main cover, of a boy with his ear to the ground while a fire or a tree radiates from him.

The books are very short, about 14 pages each with lots of illustrations, so this is probably the quickest issue of McSweeney's you'll read. That said, some of the stories here are quite brilliant.

Brian Evenson's "The Book and the Girl" is about a girl surviving a terrible event with her trusty book, proving that books are far more practical than previously thought.

Ryan Boudinot's "The Guy Who Kept Meeting Himself" is my favourite of the 8 stories, about a man who at various stages in his life meets a version of himself a few years older who then tells him something about his future that helps (or doesn't) in the present. Fantastically imaginative, great ending, brilliant illustrations.

Daniel Alarcon's "The Thousands" is the story that feels more like a fable than any other here, about a group of people who arrive in a land where the government tries to get rid of them. They construct rudimentary lodgings and stay.

Sheila Heti's "Two Free Men" is about two lost souls finding themselves and peace through acceptance.

Sarah Manguso's "The Box" is about a man who becomes an exalted leader through not telling anyone what's in his box. It's the funniest story here with a great message.

Arthur Bradford's "Virgil Walker" is the battiest of the bunch, about an abandoned octopus who breaks out of a pet shop with a turtle and starts a life of his own after escaping prison.

The stories are all wonderful and great to read but it's over all too quickly. That said, the presentation is enough to buy the issue. The hardbacks are well produced and everything is so well put together that it becomes an object of beauty as well as a collection of excellent short stories. McSweeney's 28 is one of my favourite issues of McSweeney's and is recommended to all book lovers.

The Fable Issue
McSweeney's 28, like issues 13 and 19 and to some extent 17 and 22, is one of their anomalous issues, one seemingly more focused on presentation than content. It's important to realize what you're getting into here: There's not a whole lot of writing; the whole issue can be read in about 20 minutes, but that's not really the point. The issue consists of eight tiny books held in a frame, which can be puzzled together in groups of four to form two nice artpieces. The eight tiny books each feature an illustrated fable by a different author. The fables are all good.

Merely "reading" this issue is a fun hands-on experience, both very innovative and hell, actually pretty delightful. It might have been nicer with 12 or 16 fables, but these fables are rereadable and the whole thing is a treat--to anyone with a sense of discovery and a regard for imaginative design and a love of great fiction, this will be like a literary toy.

...but I ALWAYS love McSweeneys
I have been collecting them since issue 8 and I love that they are all so different. This one reminds me of the adventure story issue, because that one was paperback and someone complained that this issue was too short. It may be short (eight illustrated fables in individual books), but it's potent and thought provoking. As always fabulous artwork too.

Let Down
After being such a huge fan of #27, this issue was a big disappointment. Maybe if I liked Children's Lit more, I would have enjoyed this, but the "fable" genre just strikes me as almost stupid. The covers were great.

Good stories, not a whole lot of material
I'm a relative newcomer to McSweeneys, having started reading about McSweeneys 25 or so.As far as literature periodicals go, it's one of the most consistent and the best in terms of writing craft and interesting stories.This latest one, like so many others, is full of interesting stories in an attractive, unique box with puzzle-matching individual books for each story.

The issue is dedicated to fables, and they're all really good.They range from surreal to quite classical.The thing is, though, the eight stories in this collection are all really short, and even with taking the time to read the foreward inside the cover of the case and look at the different illustrations (most of which are fantastic), this edition doesn't take very long to get through.I don't want to stress quantity all that much, because frankly McSweeneys is an enjoyable experience for anyone who reads, but this volume is a little expensive for about an hours worth of reading.

Nevertheless, one of the neat things about McSweeneys' various ways of printing multiple books and the like is the ability to split up the stories and send them on different paths.One of my favorite things to do with the periodicals is pass them off to friends, though not always in their complete forms.With eight different fables all independently bound, the quantity can be made up by sending different stories to eight different friends, and letting them all pass them on independently as well.It's a fun way of seeing which people end up with what story and introduces a lot of people to some decent writing, so that they can get interested too.No better way to get things read than passing it on, right?

--PolarisDiB ... Read more

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Customer Reviews (2)

Warts and all
This is an incredible buy to get the first three issues. They are now on issue 33. Even as reprints, you get to read and see them just as they were, warts and all. There are 1.7 lbs and 500 pages of paper. It's not all going to be great. Less than a penny a page. And McSweeney's has always been for readers, even if they are reading facsimile advertisements as one issue was.
I have "The Better of the First Ten Issues" and now I get to read the dross. Hooray for McSweeney"s.Mistaking these as the first three actual issues is a moot issue. It never crossed my mind that these were reprints.

I'm just going to start at page one with a bookmark and read until I get to page 500. And if something disappoints me I'm not afraid to skip to the next story. This book just feels wonderful in the hand.

Where On the Ad Does It Mention that these are Reprints?

It's McSweeneys and to some extent it's what I would expect: a mix of very good and interesting (and occasionally not) pieces of writing. I have heard that the earliest volumes were more uneven than the later. But my problem is not with the writing but that fact that these are reprints and nowhere in the advertisement for these did I see that mentioned (clearly or otherwise) so I bought two.

I love my McSweeneys but I don't love how Amazon have advertised this particular set of mags. As soon as I have the time to work out how to get a refund I intend to pursue one. ... Read more

Product Description
McSweeney’s began in 1998 as a literary journal, edited by Dave Eggers, that published only works rejected from other magazines. But after the first issue, the journal began to publish pieces written with McSweeney’s in mind. Soon after, McSweeney’s attracted works from some of the finest writers in the country, including David Foster Wallace, Ann Cummins, Rick Moody, Heidi Julavits, Jonathan Lethem, William T. Vollmann, and many new talents.

Today, McSweeney’s has grown to be one of the country’s best and largest-circulation literary journals. The journal is committed to finding new voices, publishing work of gifted but underappreciated writers, and pushing the literary form forward at all times. McSweeney’s publishes on a roughly quarterly schedule, and each issue is markedly different from its predecessors in terms of design and editorial focus.

Issue 17 is not an ordinary issue of McSweeney's. It is, however, an ordinary bundle of mail, stacked and rubber-banded, containing the usual items: a recent issue of Yeti Researcher, a sausage-basket catalog, a flyer for slashed prices on multi-user garments, a couple letters . . . the usual. Also: the debut of a DVD quarterly, featuring never-before-seen work by Spike Jonze and David O. Russell. Also: stories. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (6)

17 is an interesting age...
McSweeney's 17 is designed to look like a bundle of junk mail. So you have a couple of letters which are actually stories, you get a clothes catalogue for conjoined twins, attractively designed chocolate baskets brochure, a Yeti magazine, a magazine of short stories called "Unfamiliar", and a manila envelope with beautiful artwork printed on card. Suffice it to say, no one is doing what McSweeney's is doing in the literary world.

And some might well roll their eyes at the list above but chances are you're a fan if you're even reading this. McSweeney's is always concerned with the design and presentation of their quarterleys as much as the content but this edition is mostly concerned with presentation.

The two stories I enjoyed, out of a dozen or so, was an extract of a novel by Peter Ferry called "Accident", which takes the form of a letter. It's a meandering story of a teacher telling his class about an accident he witnessed and about his life. "Handlebar" by Eric Hanson in the magazine "Unfamiliar" is about George W Bush growing a handlebar mustache and thus distracting the nation from heinous activities his administration is committing. It's a witty satire and well written.

It's almost worth it just to spend the time unwrapping and exploring the various bits and pieces that make up this issue. It's like a literary toy. It would've been nice if there were some great stories here but unfortunately most are just average.

Unlike Else
McSweeney's 17 may feature the most innovative packaging of any of the issues, and is for that reason in itself worth owning. It's an issue made to look like a bundle of mail, with plenty of things to explore and discover.

I will spoil some surprises: The "Pantalaine" catalog in the picture is a very funny fake catalog of conjoined clothing meant for group wear. There's also a "Tyrolian" catalog of different artful sausage baskets, a private investigator's photographs of red cars and perch, several art cards on posterboard, and a copy of Yeti Researcher magazine, with, apparently, nonfiction articles about honest-to-goodness yeti research. Obscurantism at its most inscrutable, but with a spirit of care, creativity, and joy in its conception.

As far as what's here to actually read, the fiction in 17 is weak and sparse, with about 10 very short, mostly blah stories, one awful graphic short, and a memoir by Peter Ferry, which comes as a typewritten letter introduced as a Bangladeshi woman's favorite short story. Again, concept is king, and it's very well done here. The innovation of presentation is the point.

All ideological tirades against materialism aside, this is a superb Thing to Own. Very creative, very enjoyable, a delight to open and explore.

Best family night entertainment ever
We picked this up at a book fair where the publisher had a booth. For the entire time we looked at the various McSweeny, Believer and Wholpin wares, I thought this shrink wrapped packet was the usual packet festival promoters give vendors. All of a sudden it occurred to me that it might an actual issue of theirs and I asked. What a refreshingly funny idea!

I'm a person who would have trouble resisting a package left sitting on a bus bench, and have to play the warnings I've read all over London in my head to avoid opening such things. Naturally this bundle called loudly to me - and to my daughter. Not so much my husband - not until we got home and opened it, that is. The three of us laughed - no - guffawed - over the junk mail for over an hour. We haven't even gotten to the books yet, and the thing has been well worth the price already. Where else can you get therapy for three for so little?This stuff (and their other issues) is so good we subscribed to McSweeney's - and Wholpin - and Believer - and their Book Release club. Bravo! Dave Egger and company.

BTW - the Wholpin debut dvd comes with issue 18 - which can be found here:http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1932416382 I don't know where it says it comes with issue 17, but it probably wasn't ready in time for publication so they put it in the next issue.

In the spirit of fun and surprise, I'm not going to tell you what comes in the issue 17 bundle, let alone critique each item. Other reviewers have done so, which I think is unfortunate. This is the sort of item you have to buy on blind faith, take as a whole, and not nitpick which items are worth reading and which aren't. Some will love it, and others won't but if you really hate it, it's the perfect gift for your neighbor who reads all her junk mail.

Best issue of McSweeney's
I find most issues of McSweeney's unbearable-- the stories a pain to read, the gimmicks self-indulging and vain, and a putrid hipster aura oozing out of the copyright page and whereever David Eggers can manage to squeeze it into the margins. When I saw this issue, though, I was fascinated with the prospect of creating such an absurd pile of mail. Three years later I finally ordered a copy and I was not disappointed. There really are a lot of brilliantly creative minds at McSweeney's, for all its failings, and in this issue someone's fantastic pipe dream of an idea was realized. The gags are funny, each piece of mail brings new surprises, and while I am reluctant to spoil it, the very scientific-looking Yeti Researcher journal immersed me so completely I was wondering whether it was real, and the story in the Nigerian scam letter was so good that I went out and preordered the full version from Amazon. This issue is everything the packaging promises, and well worth the price. Buy it as a present for yourself, or for anyone you know who would appreciate such a quirky fantasy.

Breaking all the rules of lit mags
Breaking from their standard issue of a hard-bound book filled with stories and other writings, McSweeney's #17 is perhaps the most daring way to market a literary journal yet. Unlike other issues, you can't flip through this one for four hours at the bookstore, so either satisfy your curiousity and buy it or let it remain a mystery. However, once you get over the packaging and presentation, it's still a traditional issue of McSweeney's, complete with a book of stories, a tongue-in-cheek "Yeti Researcher" (similar to the article about Giant Squids in issue #11) which will be an excellent "gag" to slip on your local library's magazing rack, beautifully reproduced art (this time in color: a bonus) and a few other extras.It is these "extras" that makes McSweeney's stand out from any other lit mag--more so than its fiction.

If you're new to McSweeney's, this might be a good issue to start with, especially if you're more visually inclined. However, if you're a short fiction purist, preferring substance over style, start with issue #11.

Note: NO DVD INCLUDED in issue #17. If the package included a DVD, made to look like an AOL free-trial CD, I would wholeheartedly give issue #17 five stars. ... Read more

Amazon.com Review
Book Description

Maurice Sendak′s classic book Where the Wild Things Are follows the adventures of Max, a headstrong young boy who leaves home after having a fight with his mother, only to find himself in a mysterious forest bordering a vast sea. Misunderstood and rebellious, Max sets sail to the land of the Wild Things, where mischief reigns. But how do you turn one of the world′s favorite children′s books into a movie?

An Introduction with Spike Jonze and Dave Eggers	Planning with Storyboards	Production Sketch

... Read more

Customer Reviews (6)

Great book
My only complaint regards condition. The book was obviously new but had a pen stripe on the cover. Since this was a gift for someone,I found this very annoying.

Heads Up!
A pleasant little surprise, //Heads On and We Shoot: The Making of Where the Wild Things Are// from the editors of McSweeney's is a quaint and entertaining title. Designed like an accordion, //Heads On and We Shoot// consists of three sections, or "books," that are back to back and separated by a zig-zagging spine. The three books center on pre-production, production, and post-production, respectively, and the way that they and the entire book is set up is quite creative.

Each book goes through every step of its respective process, from the book concept all the way to the final pieces of post production, and does so with a variety of different and interesting techniques. Interviews with staff, cast, and crew give a multitude of individual accounts that highlight just as many different nuances about the production of the film. Photography of the set shows day to day activity both on and off the various shooting locations, and really ties the book together.

For those interested in the film, in the book, in Dave Eggers, in production processes of movies, or in photography //Heads On and We Shoot// is a great little gem of a book.

Reviewed by Jordan Dacayanan

Just fantastic
Anything having to do with the making of movie is going to be an interest to me, but this book was just so well made. I really enjoy putting faces to parts of the movie like editors and sound directors. You don't realize how important these people are until you can really see what they do and I think having a face for them makes them seem even more important.
Overall the book is amazing, the movies amazing, and the people who worked on it are absolutely fantastic. It's a good buy.

Unique, creative and beautiful book
Watch Video Here: http://www.amazon.com/review/R3M697AA0UNKDY I was pleasantly surprised with this book because it has a unique binding. If you open the book slightly looking at it from the front and top, it's bound like the letter M, with the pages fitting in the openings, on the front and back sides. It's first of its kind.

This is the movie production book is split into three sections or "books" as it's referred to on the contents page. It looks at the preproduction, production, and postproduction. Everything about the production is in, including sound mixing and the animation part. Because of the binding, you have to turn the book over to get to the third "book". Very cool.

The commentary is in conversational style, with stories and insights from the director, actors, production crew and author Maurice Sendak himself. The production process is seen from so many perspective and it's really interesting to read about all the incidents that happen behind the scene. There are horror stories like how one camera man almost drowned in the sea during the storm and logistic nightmares when Wild Things suits have to be redone because they were too heavy. There's a good deal of stories on how the crew interacted with one another, with all the crazy things they do to relieve stress.

The high resolution set photos included are beautiful and filled amazing details. There's one with a costume designer working on a foot almost the size of her body and you can see foot's skin texture, the thick veins and the slightly yellow toe nails which have some bits chipped off. It's interesting how filming is done and the location shots with crew doing their stuff.

This movie companion is very well done, extremely creative and beautifully laid out.

(More pictures are available on my blog. Just visit my Amazon profile for the link.)

A Wild Ride Through A Wild Production!
A beautiful and honest account of 5 wild yet painfully tough years of labor of love for Spike Jonez and the hundreds of unbelievably talented people involved in the production of this masterpiece! ... Read more

Product Description

Customer Reviews (2)

The Rarity of a McSweeney's Dud
This is one of the weakest issues of McSweeney's, possibly the weakest, though it's still slightly redeemed.

First of all, here's what you get:

1. A small bound collection of sketches and doodles with "funny" captions. This is art at its laziest and least enjoyable, using old funny goofy art (Duchamp, Magritte) to justify newer versions of the same, minus the effort of imagination. Not worth the two minutes it takes to read.

2. A new Art Spiegelman sketchbook. This is a larky enough lark, but teeming with inessentiality. There are some decent licks 'n' gags in it, but overall, it's someone else's sketchbook, or, a self-admittedly manque artist doodling some aphorisms he recalls.

3. And then there's the issue itself, which is shortened to six stories by the content mentioned above. The stories have a lot of making up to do for items 1 and 2, and do little of that making up. The fiction collection does feature an excellent work of art by Scott Teplin, an architectural reappropriation of the word "McSweeney's Twenty-Seven," which is worth mention, but the stories...

The stories are quite tepid. In one, a girl cares for her grandmother and young son in a story completely competent, sterile and dull. Liz Mandrell does a back-and-forth excerpt story that's an argument against excerpt stories, where the audience is deliberately uninformed the whole way through. Mikel Jollett's story may be most offensive of all. It's about a group of L.A. kids who are clearly the author's own group of L.A. friends, and it's a painfully misguided listing of all the wacky, "random," "hilarious" activities they get up to. "Oh my gosh, I can't believe they dressed up like astronauts' wives and harassed Scientologists! Incredible!" The dialogue is as straight-up dumb as dialogue comes, and there is heaps of failed comedy.

There are a couple of winners, namely Stephen King's novella about a man trapped in a Port-O-San, and Jim Shepard's very difficult if exceptionally well-written, unique, and beautiful story of a religious child murderer set in the early 1400s. There's also a story about a '20s/'30s-era gangster falling in love, which is decent.

Overall, though, this may be the weakest McSweeney's. Proceed with, you know, caution.

Great Stories, Great Graphic Design
My first foray into the world of McSweeney's has me totally sold. This issue comes with three parts.

1.) Art Spiegelman's notebook of sketches he used to keep himself drawing with no intent of publishing. It's a fun, quick read and a charming look at something private from someone I love.

2.) A small booklet of "funny" art that includes art with text in it. The intro is really full of itself, since it's written by Dave Eggers. C'est la Eggers.

3.) Short stories, which are mostly mind-blowing; I've used several of them teaching college literature already. Stephen King's story isn't exactly new territory for him, but reading him is always a pleasure. My personal favorite was Jim Shepard's "Classical Scenes of Farewell," which was outrageously dark but just straight up amazing. Also of note is "The Crack", the story of a group of terminal patients who form a friendship and venture into a fissure in a busy street and find a huge cave. If this sounds like the Goonies, the fact that none of them will live more than five years makes the whole story horrifyingly tender. ... Read more

Product Description
Norman Moonbloom is a loser, a dropout without even the determination of a genuine deadbeat. His brother, a slum landlord, hires him to collect rent from his tenants. But as Moonbloom makes the rounds among them - as he hears the complaints, and then the stories, of a wildly varied and brilliantly described assortment of urban characters - he finds himself drawn back into the circus of life, with all its unforeseen responsibilities, in spite of his best judgment. This astonishing comic tour de force from the acclaimed author of The Pawnbroker is a neglected masterpiece of 1960s America. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (9)

A New York Novel
There are novels that could be set anywhere at anytime , this is isn't one of them.Your'e in New York , somewhwere between 1958 and 1962.That is that. If you don't know New York and have some idea as to what it was like at that time , you may not particularly enjoy this book.It reminded me in various ways of a number of other books set in post WWII New York such as I.B. Singers New Yorkfictions,L.J. Davis' A MEANINGFUL LIFE and even Patricia Highsmith's late novels DOGS RANSOM and FOUND IN THE STREET and Samuel DelaneysMOTION OF LIGHT ON WATER. Chances are if you likethose books you'll like this andviceversa.New York exists here as a living, breathing character , the stongest character in the book.If you want a contrast consider Saul Bellows novels .New York turns up all the time but it's merely incidental to say,HERZOG.Even in SEIZE THE DAY or MR.SAMMLERS PLANET New York is really a backdrop.Not here.
The novel ends on a comic moving grace note that is funny and really quite a triumph.It gives you a sense of why you were reading this book in the first place.Wallant's early death was a tragedy.

characters
My husband and I both loved this book. The characters were extremely well developed. The plot was very realistic and the combination of oddball characters made the story full of life and humor. Easy to appreciate, whether you live in New York City or not.

A lucky find
I found this book amid my wanderings and grazings in the library and was deep in the story before I knew it. "How the heck did that happen," I wondered, looking at my finger marking the place past the middle of the book.
I was surprised that Wallant could make his ghostlike protagonist so easy to keep company with. Moonbloom has some interesting people to puzzle out and be touched by, in spite of his interior distance, and that's part of what makes this a compelling read, but it's Moonbloom himself, in his innocent emptiness, becoming stained by life, that gives this book its poetry.
Wallant writes some beautiful lines, ways of seeing that are another seduction. He makes the characters grotesque in the most human ways, describing the tenants in all their peculiar, disturbing complexity, finding details that fascinate as a child is fascinated by the strangeness of the world.
The story tips over at times into what you could call sappiness, but it's the kind of sappiness you find in the best depression era movies--it makes you feel good in spite of all the crap and misery you rub up against
I'd love to see this book transformed into a play, it's got great emotion in the language and the scenes, in the movement of the plot.
As I read I floated effortlessly along, enjoying the great injections of Wallant's love of the world and humankind, crud, mud, cuts and all, shining with nobility and dignity in the lowest places, arriving at the end with tears of laughter. I love art that draws together the extremes and in the contrast breaks you open with beauty and grief. Wallant pulls this off, and he's not subtle about it. I'm glad he had the guts to be so transparently transcendent.
That's not for everyone, but probably most people who open this book and start reading will want to keep reading, and will be sorry that the story can't keep going for a while longer.

A little-known masterpiece
Before picking up this book to read for a book group discussion, I had only vaguely heard of Wallant. I now see what I had been missing. Had he lived, Wallant would have found a significant place in 20th-century American literature.

Having read the book, I am convinced that Wallant was an American original with a distinctive voice. Not much happens in The Tenants of Moonbloom. Most of the action is interior to the characters, who are living their days in quiet desperation. Wallant is able to show humanity as it is -- no retouching here -- without succumbing to cynicism. He cares deeply for all his characters, with all their flaws and errors.

At the center of the action is Norman Moonbloom, who finds a secular religion and acts upon it. He is one of the more unforgettable characters whom I have encountered.

A tour de force of how to overcome life's conditions
NYRB Tenants of Moonbloom

I don't remember how I decided to buy a copy of The Tenants of Moonbloom--but it no longer matters.Perhaps because the main character Norman Moonbloom is a rent collector and agent for his brother Irwin's tenements, and two key characters are the superintendent and a plumber, I sensed that the Manhattan experience might shed some light on my parents' motel in Colorado.The back cover blurb of the novel says that, as Moonbloom collects the rent money, he hears the tenants' "cries of outrage and abuse[;] he learns about their secret sorrows and desires[.]And as he grows familiar with their stories, he finds that he is drawn . . . into a desperate attempt to improve their lives."In my parent's motel, as in the narrative of Moonbloom, no one is ever anonymous when rent is collected in person or repairs and renovations are made while the tenant is on the premises.Things aren't done so personally anymore, and as a result, with this novel of 1963, we get a peek into the past.However, nothing in this novel is like anything I've ever read.In retrospect, this novel is so unique and unclassifiable that none of the jacket blurbs or commentary can tell the reader exactly what it's about; truly, one must read the novel.

Norman on himself: "Oh me," he said shrugging."I'm New York's most educated rent collector.I'm trying to make what I'm stuck with into a vocation" (48).

The Tenants of Moonbloom raises many questions for readers interested in the craft of writing.To me, New York City, and Manhattan in particular, have always represented cultural diversity; when all other places seemed homogenous, one expected a crazy mix in NYC.Wallant's task was difficult: How does a writer craft episodes with ethnically, racially, or emotionally diverse people while avoiding stereotype?These kinds of diversity, in Tenants of Moonbloom, appear kooky or kinky and exotic to the reader not from New York, but the characters' misery and alienation makes the ending almost necessary.This might be the only novel--that I recall--that reconciles these wide differences and links the fate of the characters.

Until this novel, it had never occurred to me that renovating and cleaning rentals could be a spiritual experience.The Tenants of Moonbloom could be New York City's quintessential existentialist novel.Does it depict a kind of crazy, insanely inspired religious experience?

Edward Lewis Wallant's choice of words, his idiolect, his phrasing is at times so unusual that it took my attention away from the action and characters, but I would not have it any other way.Here are a few of Wallant"s images: "Turning, he [Beeler] motioned Norman to sit on a tortured ottoman" (39); "His stomach was used to food prepared for mass lack of taste" (42); "He began to laugh, caught himself, and shivered the mirth to a stop" (171).

Wallant's powers of observation:Norman with Bodien, the plumber, in the smelly, grimy basement, as they inspect and fix the water pipes: "Norman looked up with him at the dark ceiling of the cellar, as though he could see the metal veins carrying the flow through the body of the house, and pictured the sudden resumption of things in all the apartments" (76).

One of Wallant's gemstones: His rendition of writer James Baldwin as Paxton.

Wallant is specific about the location of the Moonbloom tenements.Maybe a reader in the NYC area can shed light on this:70th Street, Mott Street, 2nd Avenue, and 13th Street. ... Read more

Product Description
BELLOW EVOKES ALL THE RICH COLOR and exotic customs of a highly imaginary Africa in this acclaimed comic novel about a middle-aged American millionaire who, seeking a new, more rewarding life, descends upon an African tribe. Henderson’s awesome feats of strength and his unbridled passion for life win him the admiration of the tribe—but it is his gift for making rain that turns him from mere hero into messiah. A hilarious, often ribald story, Henderson the Rain King is also a profound look at the forces that drive a man through life. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (81)

Henderson The Rain King
I was diappointed that this audio book would not work inside my car DVD player.
I had to play it on my computer.The main reason I order on line with Amazon is to
hear the book while driving my car during long trips which are usually long hauls.

Save time by skipping this dud
Maybe this book resonated with a few people in the 1950s, but there's absolutely nothing in it that resonates with me.Besides being tedious to read, the caricaturing of Africans and women was beyond the pale.It wasn't funny, informative, thought-provoking, or entertaining.With all the great books available to read, don't waste your time on this one.

Remarkable Performance
Joe Barrett's voice left me with a less than appealing first impression. But over the course of the novel it grew on me, and gradually it dawned on me that the rough and expressive contralto is sort of perfect for Henderson--the first person narrator.

Barrett also manages the voices of other characters seamlessly. Many male audiobook narrators have an annoying habit of overdoing female voices--not so Barrett.

Henderson the Rainking is an old favorite novel of mine, but this recording renewed my appreciation with an enchantment all its own.

Epic Tale of 1950's Urbanite in Old Africa [21] [80]
Middle-aged and mammoth-sized protagonist Henderson is the 1950's version of American Renaissance man whose insights are both abrasive and totally American: "I have made some clear observations. " First of all, few people are sane. . . Next, slavery has never really been abolished. "

When confronted by midlife ennui to a woman whose allegiance to he is about identical to his to her, and all contrasted to the birth of twins who have yet to commence elementary school education, he does what wealthy people in those days could do when all things are not rosy at home: take a trip to the far edge of the world to see the man on the mountain and maybe come back with imprimatur or actual learned knowledge from the Swahili or whoever caught his attention.

In this novel, the trip is to Africa, where he soon hires a local man to translate and lead to villages which never have known white men, never known the concept of tourism and which are devoid of modern day elements.He sees two.In each, his greatest moments are not the villages or villagers - but instead he relies upon their leaders whose educations in Europe have made each a cross cultural icon to whom the large white man must gape at in amazement and awe.They are wise as the Oxford's finest - full of old world concepts sprinkled with modernism's sciences.One king tells Henderson, "Man is a creature who cannot stand still under blows.Now take the horse - he never needs a revenge.Nor the ox.But man is a creature of revenges. . . He cannot get rid of the punishment, his heart is apt to rot from it."

As the story unfolds, Henderson receives some physical, but mostly emotional blows.And, as his wisdom increases, he learns not to seek revenge -a reflex action he held when living in America as a northeastern socialite - but instead learns to deal with the bruises as medals of knowledge.He grows.As he tells his wife in a letter, he matured 20 years in 20 days with these kings.

But, he learns the elders of one village are as painstakingly evil as Cain.They deliver blows to their leader to capture his kingdom, and lead Henderson to conclude that, ". . . inside, my heart ran with human feeling, but externally, in the rind if you like, I showed all the strange abuses and malformations of a lifetime."He is broken hearted.

In the end, we learn the maturation and trip are both real and well received by the character who divulges many inner and private issues with the reader.We are happy for him as he is a better person because of the wisdom of the leaders of what white men refer to as savages.

Like The Adventures of Augie March, Bellow takes us on a journey all over parts of the globe ordinarily not known or seen - especially to Americans at the time of the author's publications.To date, the trips in each are still unique and romantic to the 21st century reader and make such ventures great topic for literature, which combined with Bellow's prose, make complete and excellent fiction.

A Philosophical Roar
"I was not the lion, but it fell to me to give the lion's roar." ~Winston Churchill

Henderson the Rain King is the story of Henderson, a middle-aged man, who despite his wealth is unsatisfied with his life. He feels unfulfilled and continues to hear a voice in his head that says, "I want, I want, I want." In his quest for meaning he travels to remote African villages for spiritual and emotional enlightenment.

Henderson is a pretty unlikeable character at first as he is is selfish and uncaring. He has a lot of faults as Bellow lets us into his personal thoughts. He becomes more and more likable as the book progresses. He has a real desire to help people; the problem is he is like a bull in a china shop and is in such a rush to help he tends to make things worse. Along the way Henderson unknowingly does something that makes him the Rain King in one remote village. He becomes fast friends with the native king and they spend hours discussing philosophy and the meaning of life. The king spends hours with him and a tame lion teaching him how to become like a lion and to cast off his former self.

This book was ranked #21 on Modern Library's list of the 100 Best Novels. It was written in 1959 and is considered by many a modern-day classic. I enjoyed many aspects of the book, especially the story and the excellent writing; however, I had a difficult time with the pages upon pages of philosophical reflections. It got pretty mind numbing to me. That's a possible reflection on my somewhat short-attention span but I found myself falling to sleep over and over in the middle of these ongoing ramblings. It took me a long time to read but I think it worthy of a recommendation if only for the powerful and imaginative writing. ... Read more

Product Description
Since its inception in 1915, the Best American series has become the premier annual showcase for the country's finest short fiction and nonfiction. For each volume, a series editor reads pieces from hundreds of periodicals, then selects between fifty and a hundred outstanding works. That selection is pared down to the twenty or so very best pieces by a guest editor who is widely recognized as a leading writer in his or her field. This unique system has helped make the Best American series the most respected -- and most popular -- of its kind.

The Best American Nonrequired Reading 2002 is a selection for young people of the best literature from mainstream and alternative American periodicals: fromthe New Yorker, Jane, Rolling Stone, Zyzzyva, Vibe, The Onion, Spin, Epoch, Time, Little Engines, Modern Humorist, Esquire, and more. Dave Eggers has chosen the highlights of 2001 for this genre-busting collection that includes new fiction, essays, satire, journalism -- and much more. From Eric Schlosser on french fries to Elizabeth McKenzie on awful family to Seaton Smith on how to "jive" with your teen, The Best American Nonrequried Reading 2002 is the first and the best. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (13)

Highly Entertaining
This is a highly entertaining collection of essays that by and large deploy a humorous and discerning eye on modern American culture.

The three strongest essays are David Sedaris' hilarious discussion of the popular crowd in junior high school, an article from the Atlantic about how well engineered MacDonald's french fries and other processed foods are, and a beautiful extended story from Sports Illustrated about a black high school coach's ability to touch a rural community.

I rather liked the introductory story, though it doesn't really serve as an introduction.And unlike the other readers, I find anything from the Onion to be highly worthwhile.

VERY pleasantly surprised
very funny, very interesting. appeals to all ages. I find it more interesting being in college than i would have in highschool. the whole series is perfect to take on the bus/train or to sit on the park or on the beach for a half hour reading a few chapeters.

Good, but much worse than the '03 edition
If you're trying to decide between this book and the '03 edition, get the '03. This one's good, but contains far too many magazine articles and not enough fiction. The stories it does feature are mostly very short and pack nowhere near the punch of the '03 selections.

Memories
The problem with some of these collections is that many of us who read magazines have already read those articles that appear in these end of year collections. The piece about Marilyn Manson was also in the Jonathan Lethem music collection too. It's good that Eggers has included some stuff for McSweeneys.net, comic books, and other non-mainstream sources. Those are usually the better ones anyway. I like Marc Bolan too.

Eclectic and Powerful Collection
Some highlights of this collection are:

Higher Education, the profile of Reese Perry, an African American high school basketball coach who shows up in an all-white midwest small town and, through his altruistic love, transforms them from prejudiced tribalists to open-minded cosmopolitans, a heart-breaking essay.

Bomb Scare, a graphic or comic book style story of a high school where all the kids and their parents lack a moral compass and surrender to nihilism, the inability to transcend their self-centeredness.

Why McDonald's French Fries Taste So Good, an excerpt from Fast Food Nation, which explains how the food industry uses sinister science to secretly make us addicted to the chemicals the food companies put in our food.

Stop That Girl, a short story about a ten-year-old girl whose mother marries a rich man and ends up in a False Eden where playing house leaves her feeling abandoned and unloved.

My Fake Job, an essay in which Rodney Rothman simply walks into a tech office and feigns being an employee, an act of charlatinism that isn't questioned by anyone at the office, casting light on how these fly-by-night business operations are so disjointed and full of isolated employees who suffer so much transience and alienation as the employers don't commit to them in the slightest.

Toil and Temptation, an essay about a Mexican immigrant who slowly gets caught up in consumerism and becomes more of a slave in America than he ever was in Mexico. ... Read more

Product Description
BRAND NEW 2010 PAPERBACK EDITION. SOME SHELFWEAR MARKS. OVERSTOCK MARK ... Read more

Product Description
How We Are Hungry is a gripping, lyrical and soulful collection of stories from the acclaimed author of A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius. Ranging from a doomed Irish setter’s tales of running and jumping (“After I Was Thrown in the River and Before I Drowned”) to a bitterly comic meditation on suicide and friendship (“Climbing to the Window, Pretending to Dance”), and from the Egyptian desert to the asphalt of Interstate 5, these stories are Eggers at his finest. By turns devastating, clear-eyed and funn– incredibly funny – this collection is a marvel. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Left "Hungry"
Dave Eggers first caught the world's attention with the semi-autobiographical "A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius." With the release of "How We Are Hungry," we get to see Eggers in a slightly new light -- these stories possess his usual postmodern skill and pensive intelligence, but lack the gentle humor and wit.

In this collection, Eggers examines various people who try to escape their difficulties, whether climbing mountains or roaming through rural Scotland. These people may be searching for love, for glory, for release, a burst of adrenaline in the desert, or for just a fling by the beach -- however, their problems and pasts will not go away.

Eggers does occasionally dip into gimmickry, such as "There Are Some Things He Should Keep to Himself." Don't expect much -- it's a few blank pages, which made me smile. But I feel a little cheated. He's at his best when he's unconsciously quirky, such as a cute conversation between God and the ocean in one short story.

Eggers has done well in his past novel and memoir, but some of the themes of "How We Are Hungry" feel worn -- this man has a unique writing talent, but writers have to grow, and this writing doesn't show his mind or soul growing. The themes have not changed, and that lack of movement and growth makes it feel like he's just... stuck.

That said, Eggers' writing is genuinely compelling and rich; in his rambly way, he's incredibly eloquent. His descriptions have a raw energy that can take your breath away, such as riding a horse in the desert. At the same time, he can wrap his characters in so much finely-drawn misery that it is difficult to not be moved by them. It's also the one area where Eggers stumbles -- despite the whimsy of the occasional "gimmick" story, the writing is dark and rather depressed. I'm not asking for sunshine and butterflies, but it lacks quips, wit and human insight.

Those characters tend to feel like reflections of Eggers himself -- rather world-wear and melancholy. One woman, who climbs a legendary mountain in search of a purpose, is perhaps the richest character -- her inner thoughts are so real that they fly off the page. And she, like all the other characters, is hungry. Not for food, but to fill some emptiness inside that can't be named.

Perhaps it's that inner hole that preoccupies Eggers' work, and the endless search is what keeps it from exploring the world. Despite a hint of stagnation, "How We Are Hungry" is a rich and engaging collection of stories. It leaves me wondering where -- if anywhere -- Eggers will go as a writer. ... Read more

Product Description
High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! Dave Eggers (born March 12, 1970) is an American writer, editor, and publisher. He is known for the best-selling memoir, A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, and his more recent work as a screenwriter. He is also the co-founder of the literacy project, 826 Valencia. ... Read more