MobileRead April 2012 Mobile Read Book Club 1st Vote

[WT Sharpe]

Mobile Read Book Club
April 2012 Preliminary Vote

Help us choose a book as the April 2012 eBook for the Mobile Read Book Club. The poll will be open for 4 days, followed by a 3 day run-off poll between the two* top vote getters. The vote this month will be hidden.


We will start the discussion thread for this book on April 20th. Select from the following Official Choices with three nominations each::

The Ginger Man by J. P. Donleavy [issybird, orlok, Hamlet53]
Inkmesh search

Spoiler:

Set in Ireland just after World War II, The Ginger Man is J.P. Donleavy's wildly funny, picaresque classic novel of the misadventures of Sebastian Dangerfield, a young American ne'er-do-well studying at Trinity College in Dublin. Dangerfield's appetite for women, liquor, and general roguishness is insatiable — and he satisfies it with endless charm.

It's available at all the usual venues in the US and it's couponable at Kobo.

The Night Life of the Gods by Thorne Smith [GA Russell, Hamlet53, WT Sharpe]
Inkmesh search / Patricia Clark Memorial Library (MobileRead)

Spoiler:

Description: Thorne Smith's rapid-fire dialogue, brilliant sense of the absurd, and literary aplomb put him in the same category as the beloved P. G. Wodehouse. The Night Life of the Gods—the madcap story of a scientist who instigates a nocturnal spree with the Greek gods—is arguably his most sparkling comedic achievement.

Hunter Hawk has a knack for annoying his ultrarespectable relatives. He likes to experiment and he particularly likes to experiment with explosives. His garage-cum-laboratory is a veritable minefield, replete with evil-smelling clouds of vapor through which various bits of wreckage and mysteriously bubbling test tubes are occasionally visible.
With the help of Megaera, a fetching nine-hundred-year-old lady leprechaun he meets one night in the woods, he masters the art (if not the timing) of transforming statues into people. And when he practices his new witchery in the stately halls of the Metropolitan Museum of Art—setting Bacchus, Mercury, Neptune, Diana, Hebe, Apollo, and Perseus loose on the unsuspecting citizenry of Prohibition-era New York—the stage is set for Thorne Smith at his most devilish and delightful. From Amazon.com.

Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town by Stephen Leacock [nursedude, Asawi, issybird]
Inkmesh search

Spoiler:

Description: According to Wikipedia: "Stephen Butler Leacock, (30 December 1869 28 March 1944) was a Canadian writer and economist... Early in his career, Leacock turned to fiction, humour, and short reports to supplement (and ultimately exceed) his regular income. His stories, first published in magazines in Canada and the United States and later in novel form, became extremely popular around the world. It was said in 1911 that more people had heard of Stephen Leacock than had heard of Canada. Also, between the years 1915 and 1925, Leacock was the most popular humourist in the English-speaking world. Humorists admire other humorists, and greatly admire other great humorists. So it was that Stephen Leacock, in Toronto, was delighted to read the fresh humor and wit of a young man in New York named Robert Benchley. Leacock opened correspondence with Benchley, encouraging him in his work and importuning him to compile his work into a book. Benchly did so in 1922, and acknowledged the nagging from north of the border. Near the end of his life, the American comedian Jack Benny recounted how he had been introduced to Leacock's writing by Groucho Marx when they were both young vaudeville comedians. Benny acknowledged Leacock's influence and, fifty years after first reading him, still considered Leacock one of his favorite comic writers. He was puzzled as to why Leacock's work was no longer well-known in the United States. [5]During the summer months, Leacock lived at Old Brewery Bay, his summer estate in Orillia, across Lake Simcoe from where he was raised and also bordering Lake Couchiching. A working farm, Old Brewery Bay is now a museum and National Historic Site. Gossip provided by the local barber, Jefferson Short, provided Leacock with the material which would become Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town (1912), set in the thinly-disguised Mariposa. Although he wrote learned articles and books related to his field of study, his political theory is now all but forgotten." (from Diesel eBook Store)

The Revenge of the Radioactive Lady by Elizabeth Stuckey-French [JSWolf, hpulley, drofgnal]
Inkmesh search

Spoiler:

Description: This lively, intricately plotted, laugh-out-loud funny, and surprisingly touching family drama combines the wit of Carl Hiaasen with the southern charm of Jill McCorkle. Seventy-seven-year-old Marylou Ahearn is going to kill Dr. Wilson Spriggs come hell or high water. In 1953, he gave her a radioactive cocktail without her consent as part of a secret government study that had horrible consequences. Marylou has been plotting her revenge for fifty years. When she accidentally discovers his whereabouts in Florida, her plans finally snap into action. She high tails it to hot and humid Tallahassee, moves in down the block from where a now senile Spriggs lives with his daughter"s family, and begins the tricky work of insinuating herself into their lives. But she has no idea what a nest of yellow jackets she is stum*bling into. Before the novel is through, someone will be kidnapped, an unlikely couple will get engaged, someone will nearly die from eating a pineapple upside-down cake laced with anti-freeze, and that"s not all . . . Told from the varied perspectives of an incredible cast of endearing oddball characters and written with the flair of a native Floridian, this dark comedy does not disappoint. From the Hardcover edition. (from Kobo)

Sh*t My Dad Says by Justin Halpern [WT Sharpe, hpulley, orlok]
Inkmesh search

Spoiler:

Description: After being dumped by his longtime girlfriend, twenty-eight-year-old Justin Halpern found himself living at home with his seventy-three-year-old dad. Sam Halpern, who is "like Socrates, but angrier, and with worse hair," has never minced words, and when Justin moved back home, he began to record all the ridiculous things his dad said to him:

"That woman was sexy. . . . Out of your league? Son, let women figure out why they won't screw you. Don't do it for them."

"Do people your age know how to comb their hair? It looks like two squirrels crawled on their heads and started fucking."

"The worst thing you can be is a liar. . . . Okay, fine, yes, the worst thing you can be is a Nazi, but then number two is liar. Nazi one, liar two."

More than a million people now follow Mr. Halpern's philosophical musings on Twitter, and in this book, his son weaves a brilliantly funny, touching coming-of-age memoir around the best of his quotes. An all-American story that unfolds on the Little League field, in Denny's, during excruciating family road trips, and, most frequently, in the Halperns' kitchen over bowls of Grape-Nuts, Sh*t My Dad Says is a chaotic, hilarious, true portrait of a father-son relationship from a major new comic voice. (from barnesandnoble.com)

Mission Earth 1: The Invaders Plan by L. Ron Hubbard [voodooblues, John F, jemc]
Inkmesh search

Spoiler:

Description: The Voltar Confederacy has a long-range strategy to invade Earth and use it in their conquest of the Galaxy. However, with the discovery that Earth is being destroyed by incessant pollution, Royal Officer Jettero Heller is sent on a top-secret mission to handle this threat to the planet's life. But why is Lombar Hisst, head of the Apparatus, Voltar's deadly intelligence agency, determined to sabotage the mission and see it fail? Can Heller possibly succeed or will he fall into the web of intergalactic intrigue spun by Hisst and his devious henchman, Soltan Gris? Find out as you embark on this mission full of dynamic characters and packed with plenty of twists, action and emotion.

"...a big, humorous tale of interstellar intrigue in the classical mold. I fully enjoyed it." — Roger Zelazny "An incredibly good story, lushly written, vibrating with action and excitement. A gem." — A.E. Van Vogt "On our scale of 1 to 10,... The Invaders Plan comes out at a 10. Its fabulous and fun reading." — United Press International From Lord Invay, Royal Historian, Chairman, Board of Censors, Royal Palace, Voltar Confederacy: "Let me state it boldly and baldly: there is no such planet as Earth. If it ever existed at all, it certainly does not exist today or even within living memory. So, away with this delusion. On the authority of every highly placed official in the land I can assure you utterly and finally, THERE IS NO PLANET EARTH! And that is final!" With this emphatic disclaimer, we are introduced to Mission Earth, an epic told entirely and uniquely by the aliens that already walk among us. Earth is to be invaded and a Royal combat engineer must cross 22 light years to secretly infiltrate the planet. He is also crossing a scheme to use the resources of Earth's most powerful figure to overthrow the confederacy. With a convicted murderess who trains giant cat-like animals, a doctor who creates human biological freaks, a madman who controls Voltar's secret police and a clandestine Earth base in Turkey, a bizarre stage is set and narrated by an alien killer assigned to sabotage the mission and Earth—the planet that doesn't exist. (from Amazon.com)

A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole and Walker Percy [RoccoPaco, Hamlet53, WT Sharpe]
Inkmesh search

Spoiler:

Description: "A green hunting cap squeezed the top of the fleshy balloon of a head. The green earflaps, full of large ears and uncut hair and the fine bristles that grew in the ears themselves, stuck out on either side like turn signals indicating two directions at once. Full, pursed lips protruded beneath the bushy black moustache and, at their corners, sank into little folds filled with disapproval and potato chip crumbs." Meet Ignatius J. Reilly, the hero of John Kennedy Toole's tragicomic tale, A Confederacy of Dunces . This 30-year-old medievalist lives at home with his mother in New Orleans, pens his magnum opus on Big Chief writing pads he keeps hidden under his bed, and relays to anyone who will listen the traumatic experience he once had on a Greyhound Scenicruiser bound for Baton Rouge. ("Speeding along in that bus was like hurtling into the abyss.") But Ignatius's quiet life of tyrannizing his mother and writing his endless comparative history screeches to a halt when he is almost arrested by the overeager Patrolman Mancuso—who mistakes him for a vagrant—and then involved in a car accident with his tipsy mother behind the wheel. One thing leads to another, and before he knows it, Ignatius is out pounding the pavement in search of a job. Over the next several hundred pages, our hero stumbles from one adventure to the next. His stint as a hotdog vendor is less than successful, and he soon turns his employers at the Levy Pants Company on their heads. Ignatius's path through the working world is populated by marvelous secondary characters: the stripper Darlene and her talented cockatoo; the septuagenarian secretary Miss Trixie, whose desperate attempts to retire are constantly, comically thwarted; gay blade Dorian Greene; sinister Miss Lee, proprietor of the Night of Joy nightclub; and Myrna Minkoff, the girl Ignatius loves to hate. The many subplots that weave through A Confederacy of Dunces are as complicated as anything you'll find in a Dickens novel, and just as beautifully tied together in the end. But it is Ignatius—selfish, domineering, and deluded, tragic and comic and larger than life—who carries the story. He is a modern-day Quixote beset by giants of the modern age. His fragility cracks the shell of comic bluster, revealing a deep streak of melancholy beneath the antic humor. John Kennedy Toole committed suicide in 1969 and never saw the publication of his novel. Ignatius Reilly is what he left behind, a fitting memorial to a talented and tormented life. —Alix Wilber The Pulitzer Prize-winning novel with the sad history turns 20 (LJ 4/15/80). This story about a young man's isolation still rings true at a time when millions interact more with computers than with other people. This anniversary edition contains a new introduction by Andrei Codrescu. Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc. (from Amazon.com)

The Princess Bride by William Goldman [The Terminator, JSWolf, Nyssa]
Inkmesh search

Spoiler:

Anyone who lived through the 1980s may find it impossible—inconceivable, even—to equate The Princess Bride with anything other than the sweet, celluloid romance of Westley and Buttercup, but the film is only a fraction of the ingenious storytelling you'll find in these pages. Rich in character and satire, the novel is set in 1941 and framed cleverly as an “abridged” retelling of a centuries-old tale set in the fabled country of Florin that's home to “Beasts of all natures and descriptions. Pain. Death. Brave men. Coward men. Strongest men. Chases. Escapes. Lies. Truths. Passions.”

Idle Thoughts Of An Idle Fellow by Jerome K. Jerome [The Terminator, Asawi, hpulley]
Inkmesh search

Spoiler:

Idle Thoughts of an Idle Fellow is a collection of humorous essays by Jerome K. Jerome. The essays cover a range of topics from "On Being in Love" to "On Furnished Apartments" to "On Getting on in the World". Jerome established himself as one of England's favorite wits with his comic novel Three Men in a Boat.

Expecting Someone Taller by Tom Holt [orlok, issybird, fantasyfan]
Inkmesh search

Spoiler:

Malcolm Fisher inherits a magic ring from a dying badger and becomes the much-disputed Ruler of the World. Everyone wants the ring—despite the fearsome curse upon it. And Malcolm is about to learn that some are born to greatness, and some are, well, badgered into it.

The fine print:
*Should the first vote produce a 3-way or more tie for first place, or 2-way or more tie for second, the second poll may have more than two choices.

[Asawi]

I've voted, but at this moment votes are still visible, not hidden.

[WT Sharpe]

Originally Posted by Asawi

I've voted, but at this moment votes are still visible, not hidden.

Thanks. I was sure I had checked that option, but it should be fixed now. I'll need a non-mod to confirm that, as moderators can always see the votes.

[din155]

Now hidden..I can't see what I voted for..

[Asawi]

Yep, hidden! Maybe you should stick this one (and unstick the nomination thread) as well, so it doesn't get lost.

[WT Sharpe]

Originally Posted by Asawi

Yep, hidden! Maybe you should stick this one (and unstick the nomination thread) as well, so it doesn't get lost.

I always forget something! Will do. Thanks again!

[orlok]

For the first time in a while I've had a real problem choosing, as there are so many here I'd like to read, or indeed, re-read.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by orlok

For the first time in a while I've had a real problem choosing, as there are so many here I'd like to read, or indeed, re-read.

Yes, there are some good ones here.

[issybird]

I read Radioactive Lady after it was nominated in this category a year ago and I'm not interested in a reread; nothing would get me to read Hubbard and I'd rather stick to fiction this time around. But that still leaves seven in contention--shame Tom didn't leave the votes visible! Absent input, I'll stick toy own nomination of The Ginger Man.

[John F]

There are some good ones. Especially The Invaders Plan, it just oozes satire.

[sun surfer]

Wait a second, according to the schedule, April is supposed to be visible.

[Hamlet53]

Originally Posted by sun surfer

Wait a second, according to the schedule, April is supposed to be visible.

I was about to vote and then I saw this. I think I will hold of until that question is settled. I sure would prefer visible here. There are some great selections, some of which I have already read and some not. Just two of the ten are of absolutely no interest to me.

[issybird]

Glad I saw this. Also waiting.

[sun surfer]

Well, lol, glad I pointed it out for you guys, but I'd already voted!

This month really runs the gamut from sounding really interesting to...um, really not sounding interesting at all.

I voted for The Ginger Man. Never heard of it before but the description sounds great to me.

Also very interested in A Confederacy of Dunces, Night Life of the Gods, Princess Bride (love the film!) and Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town.

[Asawi]

I went for Sunshine Sketches, mostly because of availability. OK, no just because of that, but that in combination with it sounding like something I might enjoy. Some of the others... nah, not for me... I might consider reading them if I could borrow them at the library, but I'm not prepared to part with any money for them.