What We’re Reading This Week

~ BEN
Watership Down by Richard Adams

“This book is pretty awesome. It’s like Benjamin Bunny meets The Epic of Gilgamesh. This twitchy nosed adventure is full of bunny mythology and twists galore. Don’t miss out on it, and don’t think it’s just for kids, either. The best part is, you get to learn bunny slang! There’s ‘pas hraka’ (meaning poop), ‘hrala’ (engine). My favorite is they count up to 4, but to number anything more than that is simply ‘hrair’ meaning a lot. Fiver is my favorite character. I don’t understand why everyone goes on and on about Hazel. Fiver is definitely the best character.”

~ VIRGINIA
Bluebeard by Kurt Vonnegut

“This is the story about the life of a man, and it’s one of my favorite Vonnegut books I’ve ever read. It’s really good and really intriguing. This guy — his parents are immigrants and he wants to be an artist. But, of course, that’s tough to make a living as in America. He follows a ‘false’ artist for a while in Newark before he realizes it’s all a sham. So, he has to start his journey of discovery over. Eventually, he meets his wife, gets married, divorced, and then marries again, this time a rich woman who can support his artwork. Vonnegut is can be vulgar, but you can tell he’s settled down a lot for this one. He’s a bit more tame, but he still keeps his same style — all the emphasis on the story.”

~ STEVE(N)

Play It As It Lays by Joan Didion & David Thomson

“A tense account of privileged angst in the 1960s, Play It As It Lays translates shockingly well into the modern mania and neurosis of the millennial bookseller. This modernist nightmare is as compelling as it is frightening. That I’m only 30 pages in and I know it’s going to become an often revisited favorite is a good sign.”

~ CONSUELO

Autobiography of Malcolm X

“This is my second time reading this book. The first time I read it was maybe ten years ago. It’s interesting to read it again older, as opposed to a younger, more impressionable version of myself. I remember reading it before and being all, ‘yeah! right on!’ I still think that, but now I’m able to see the extreme bias in his words. It’s fascinating. I’m looking forward to reading the Pulitzer Prize winning biography that was written about him. Before, I didn’t understand why they would bother with his autobiography being out there. This time, I see how complicated of a man he really was. There has to be more to what happened than just his side of the story. We are going to have a lot to talk about at book club.“ The Required Reading Revisited Book Club meets the second Sunday of every month at 5PM. They’re meeting next on Sunday, Jan 12 at 5PM. Make sure to check them out!