inspired by unsay and the bookyoucrew...
My top 20 books I've read... sentimental, skewed towards books art and sexy women, and not really for a lit crowd. But then again, I'm a different sort of bookish than that...
1. The Three Incestuous Sisters, Audrey Niffenegger - One of the 10 originals, bien sur!... leather, letterpress, original prints... though I'm still holy-fuck glad that they released it in a mass edition after the success of Time Traveller's Wife... now I can get (a sort of bastardized verson of) one of my very own for less than 10 grand!!!! Wheeeee!
2. Red Earth and Pouring Rain, Vikram Chandra - I do love it for way more than the secret-message-coded-printing and metal-type-eating, though that part was exquisite.
3. Incest: The Unexpurgated Diary of Anais Nin from 1932-1934 - This one specifically... Henry&June is blah, Fire is whiny, but sex with your estranged dad? Hot!
4. Into the Forest, Jean Heglund - Speaking of incest... yay, apocalypse! Let's live off the land and be primal women! Seriously, though... made me want to leave the city and get near some freaking woods a.s.a.p.
5. Codex Seraphinianus, Luigi Serafini - Del-or-ciously beautiful and weird. So hard not to steal this from the university library. Can you say, "collectible"?!
6. Structure of the Visual Book, Keith A. Smith - so important! All book art people must read. Now. 2nd, revised ed. is actually better than 1st.
7. "The Hunting of the Snark" from The Complete Alice, Lewis Carroll - Steadman illustrations, natch.
8. Pattern Recognition, William Gibson - Neuromancer is ok and all, but hey, Cayce Pollard is so very me, and who doesn't love to read about themselves?
9. My Year of Meats, Ruth Ozeki - yeah, just general fiction. But general fiction that includes filming vegetarian lesbians as an 'all american family' in a subversive move against the Japanese beef industry that follows the mantra, "Remember: Pork is Possible! But Beef is Best!"
10. Love in the Time of Cholera, Gabriel Garcia Marquez - mmmmmmm.
11. The Dead, James Joyce - LAST. SENTENCE. SLAYS. EVERY TIME. I wish my visual poetry/letterpress project of this turned out better. And speaking of calligrams...
12. Guillaume Apollinaire's visual poetry/calligrams - 'il pleut'? totally ripped off so many times, and for good reason.
13. Transmetropolitan (the collection), Warren Ellis/Darick Robertson - kinda guilty pleasure, but the first graphic novel to grab me by the (virtual) 'nads.
14. A Hacker Manifesto, McKenzie Wark - yes, I fetishize hackers. A read-in-progress right now, but I'm expecting great things.
15. The Book of the Courtesans: A Catalog of their Virtues, Susan Griffith - I serendipitously read this in tandem with Look At Me by J. Egan. Fleshed out some ideas on persona, manipulation and social competition.
16. Cruddy, Lynda Barry - Achy feeling for days after finishing this. I heart Lynda Barry.
17. Griffin & Sabine, Nick Bantock - Errr... this is kinda like, hmm, the Oprah's Book Club selection of the visual book world. But it's still cool. So it stays. So there.
18. The Innocent Libertine, Colette - favorite of what I've read, though still have to get to the other Colette books I have before this particular title is definitive. But Colette stays in regardless.
19. The Garden of Forking Paths, Jorges Luis Borges - I got a teeny crush on the professor who chose this as reading material for our interactive/web design class.
and last but not least....
20. The Hat. A book of woodcuts, Seymour Chwast, printed/bound by Leonard Seastone - really not interested in the book content (though the cult of Chwast is strong!) but, like, I helped Leonard print the one spread! We danced with the press! My split-font inking skills are teh awesome! And it's currently selling for 750 bone. Sweet.
1. The Three Incestuous Sisters, Audrey Niffenegger - One of the 10 originals, bien sur!... leather, letterpress, original prints... though I'm still holy-fuck glad that they released it in a mass edition after the success of Time Traveller's Wife... now I can get (a sort of bastardized verson of) one of my very own for less than 10 grand!!!! Wheeeee!
2. Red Earth and Pouring Rain, Vikram Chandra - I do love it for way more than the secret-message-coded-printing and metal-type-eating, though that part was exquisite.
3. Incest: The Unexpurgated Diary of Anais Nin from 1932-1934 - This one specifically... Henry&June is blah, Fire is whiny, but sex with your estranged dad? Hot!
4. Into the Forest, Jean Heglund - Speaking of incest... yay, apocalypse! Let's live off the land and be primal women! Seriously, though... made me want to leave the city and get near some freaking woods a.s.a.p.
5. Codex Seraphinianus, Luigi Serafini - Del-or-ciously beautiful and weird. So hard not to steal this from the university library. Can you say, "collectible"?!
6. Structure of the Visual Book, Keith A. Smith - so important! All book art people must read. Now. 2nd, revised ed. is actually better than 1st.
7. "The Hunting of the Snark" from The Complete Alice, Lewis Carroll - Steadman illustrations, natch.
8. Pattern Recognition, William Gibson - Neuromancer is ok and all, but hey, Cayce Pollard is so very me, and who doesn't love to read about themselves?
9. My Year of Meats, Ruth Ozeki - yeah, just general fiction. But general fiction that includes filming vegetarian lesbians as an 'all american family' in a subversive move against the Japanese beef industry that follows the mantra, "Remember: Pork is Possible! But Beef is Best!"
10. Love in the Time of Cholera, Gabriel Garcia Marquez - mmmmmmm.
11. The Dead, James Joyce - LAST. SENTENCE. SLAYS. EVERY TIME. I wish my visual poetry/letterpress project of this turned out better. And speaking of calligrams...
12. Guillaume Apollinaire's visual poetry/calligrams - 'il pleut'? totally ripped off so many times, and for good reason.
13. Transmetropolitan (the collection), Warren Ellis/Darick Robertson - kinda guilty pleasure, but the first graphic novel to grab me by the (virtual) 'nads.
14. A Hacker Manifesto, McKenzie Wark - yes, I fetishize hackers. A read-in-progress right now, but I'm expecting great things.
15. The Book of the Courtesans: A Catalog of their Virtues, Susan Griffith - I serendipitously read this in tandem with Look At Me by J. Egan. Fleshed out some ideas on persona, manipulation and social competition.
16. Cruddy, Lynda Barry - Achy feeling for days after finishing this. I heart Lynda Barry.
17. Griffin & Sabine, Nick Bantock - Errr... this is kinda like, hmm, the Oprah's Book Club selection of the visual book world. But it's still cool. So it stays. So there.
18. The Innocent Libertine, Colette - favorite of what I've read, though still have to get to the other Colette books I have before this particular title is definitive. But Colette stays in regardless.
19. The Garden of Forking Paths, Jorges Luis Borges - I got a teeny crush on the professor who chose this as reading material for our interactive/web design class.
and last but not least....
20. The Hat. A book of woodcuts, Seymour Chwast, printed/bound by Leonard Seastone - really not interested in the book content (though the cult of Chwast is strong!) but, like, I helped Leonard print the one spread! We danced with the press! My split-font inking skills are teh awesome! And it's currently selling for 750 bone. Sweet.