Moneyball

Over the week I finished reading Moneyball by Michael Lewis. It's a biography/informational guide on baseball and the genius general manager of the Oakland A's, Billy Beane. The book may be about baseball, but Lewis's approach is a more intellectual take. He views it from the outside and yet it's obvious he loves the subject. The book focuses on many older and younger players including greats like Miguel Tejada, Ray Durham and Nick Swisher as well as prospects and players who are less renowned like Jeremy Brown, Scott Hatteberg and Chad Bradford. At it's heart this book is about underdogs, the Oakland A's have the lowest payroll of any major league team, but using baseball savvy and common sense they found themselves in the playoffs three years in a row. The reason for their success is Billy Beane, a man who could have been anything except for a pro ball player and he chose to be a GM. Beane is the most interesting character, a failed prospect himself who looked to change the way baseball is managed. Beane doesn't care about home runs, singles or steals. He only cares about one thing: outs. As long as you tried to maximize all twenty-seven outs given to your team you can maximize your chance of winning. Winning is the most important thing to Billy Beane, and like Billy Beane, Moneyball is a winner.

Fear and Loathing

Over this weekend I finished reading Hunter S. Thompsons masterwork: Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas: A Savage Journey To The Heart of the American Dream. I loved every second reading this book. It's a debauched lurid tale of two men, Raoul Duke a doctor of journalism and Dr. Gonzo a doctor of law as well as an ample prankster. The book is too much of everything and yet it's still not enough. Everything about is fierce and funny, the book may seem stupid because of the obvious mass amount of narcotics taken to write it, but don't be fooled... it's genius. The tale represents the peace, love and music of the 60's and it's hard transition to the drugs, sex and rock n' roll of the 70's. The men in the book are pure evil, men who relish hurting others and laughing about it, all while visiting an anti-narcotics seminar. The men do many wrong things including taking a couple on a meth induced joy ride, eating the adrenal gland of a former living person, drugging a defenseless woman and fooling the cleaning lady of the Flamingo Hotel into thinking that they are two narcotics officers, to explain the drugs on the floor. The book has pieces that are incoherent and odd, but when it hits it's stride and becomes un-put-downable. Without any suspense, or mystery Thompson has crafted a novel that is a complete page turner that even though it reflects a bygone era it could easily take place in 2009.

My Week in Reading

I finished Dearly Devoted Dexter, by Jeff Lindsay last week and it had a very good end, but it was sort of unnatural. I felt as if I was being pushed into reading the next book in the series, which isn't horrible as the "Dexter" series is pretty good every time I read it. I decided it was a time for a break from Dexter so I picked up a new book. It's written by the good doctor himself, Dr. Hunter S. Thompson, and it's a memoir about his trip to Las Vegas. The book itself is called Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, as is I'm very excited to read it. Hopefully it'll keep my interests. I have many books I hope to read, one being the book Moneyball about Billy Bean the genius general manager of the baseball club the Oakland A's. Another book is Ayn Rand's seminal classic, Atlas Shrugged, which has really caught my attention even though it's incredibly long. Two other books I'm interested in are The Bicycle Diaries by David Byrne, and The Tao of Wu by The RZA, a rapper who is the pioneering founder of The Wu-Tang Clan. As my reading of the Thompson novel progresses I'll definitely record another entry in my blog.

Still Devoted

As of right now I'm about half way through my current book Dearly Devoted Dexter and i plan to finish it by next week. The book took a sharp left turn when Dexter went from a serial killing nutso with a conscience to a stay at home mom for his girlfriends kids. The sequel has to do with Dexter Morgan the fun loving serial killer who only murders bad guys. A new killers on the loose and he's really messed up. The CIA calls him Dr. Danco because he was a med student who decided to put his surgical talents to better use... torturing rebels in South America for the government. He was sold out by the government and was forced into a prison camp. He's back and he wants revenge so he's picking off his former acquaintances. The CIA sends a guy named Kyle Chutsky to help out Dex and the rest of the Miami Metro Police police, but Chutsky goes missing and later his finger is mailed to Dexter's sister Deborah, a close friend of Chutsky. The whole revenge-betrayal saga is interesting and Dexter's character isn't as dark, but the move from realistic fiction (about a killer) to police procedural isn't that great when the original formula worked so well.

Darkly Dreaming Sequel

This week I dumped the slogging Inherent Vice, and tried to pick up a fresh start with the sequel to Darkly Dreaming Dexter, called Dearly Devoted Dexter, so far I'm very happy with the results. It gives you the same amount of goosebumps as the last book, but there is something missing. This book gives you more laughs, but it lacks the discovery of Dexter Morgan, i guess that's what you get when you read a sequel. Dexter has become somewhat of a couch potato, instead of slaying baddies he's at home with his girlfriends kids playing around trying to act normal, but how normal can you be when you're a serial killer. In this book, author Jeff Lindsay really ups the ante with the killing, but it's not so much Dexter. There's a new kid in town and the way Lindsay describes the crime scene is masterful. His words have always been very playful which adds light to the otherwise pitch-black story. It would be a police procedural in anyone elses hands, but in Lindsay's the book's satire is as strong as the Miami sun that shines down on Dexter. The book maybe gruesome, but it really rewards you with its sparkling wordplay, and chilling sequences. If you want a literary roller coaster than you'd better start reading the "Dexter" series.