The Best American Nonrequired Reading 2011

The Best American Nonrequired Reading 2011

This years addition was amazing, per usual. As always, the book is sectioned off into 2 sections with a shorter quirkier one to start and then the longer pieces later. There were 2 introductions that were pretty funny too by David Eggers and Guillermo Del Toro. Apparently no one reads them per Eggers so I thought I'd point out that they're there. I'm super jealous of Guillermo as he reads a book a day. Crazy fast reading has always been a dream especially when I'm reading word up magazine.

SECTION I

My favorites this year from the front of the book were;

Best American WikiLeaks Revelations
Who knew that world dictators can get personal concerts while on vacation in St. Bart's by Beyonce, Usher and other musicians? Figure they need some r&r after committing atrocities against there people.

Best American Lawsuits
I love hearing about frivolous lawsuits.

Best American Call Of Duty Handles
personal favorite- Your mom

Best American WiFi Network Names
personal favorites;
reciprocate-BringPiestoApt5 (New York)
Icanhearyouhavingsex (Seattle)
Idonthearyouhavingsexatall (Seattle)

Best American Mark Twain Quotes
Who knew he was so funny?

Best American Poems Written in Response to Arizona Senate Bill 1070
My favorite was The Border by Jose Hernandez Diaz


SECTION II

Daniel Alarcon. SECOND LIVES
This story was also chosen for 20 Under 40: Stories From The New Yorker so it was the second time I read it. Good little story about a family from Latin America who send their oldest of 2 sons to the US.

Adama Bah. AN ORAL HISTORY OF ADAMA BAH
Interesting story about injustice after 911. Adama was a 16 year old Muslim girl when she was arrested under unfounded suspicions of being a potential suicide bomber. Fairly predictable once it got going but good example of the US cutting legal corners and doing whatever they want in trying to catch terrorists.

Tom Barbash. THE WOMEN
Amazing story about a man in his early 20's from a rich family in NY right after losing his mom to cancer while his dad deals with the pain by aggressively womanizing. Moving and extremely well written.

Clare Beams. WE SHOW WHAT WE HAVE LEARNED
Bizarre story about a 5th grade teacher literally falling apart. Quirky and metaphory in a really good way.

Joshuah Bearman. ART OF THE STEAL
Possibly the best true story in the book. This is about an international thief, his story about his crimes and being caught. I'm surprised his life hasn't been made into a big budget movie yet.

Sloane Crosley. LE PARIS!
Sloane is an extremely endearing woman traveling to Paris dealing with some funny trials and tribulations.

Tim Crothers. GAME OF HER LIFE
This story is about Phiona Mutesi, a young, poor girl from Ugandan who is a chess virtuoso. Anyone who isn't rooting for her after reading this article is pure evil or possibly a cartoon villain.

William Deresiewicz. SOLITUDE AND LEADERSHIP
Great speech given to cadets at West Point about how the current culture deters innovation and thinking.

Anthony Doerr. THE DEEP
Second time I've read this one as well and it's amazing. About a young terminal man being overly protected by his mother struggling to live his life. Just stupid good.

Neil Gaiman. ORANGE
First off, I wasn't aware that Southwest Airlines put out a magazine. Secondly, they can certainly pick talent to write a story. Neil told this story as just the answers to investigators written questionnaire. Reminds me of a great Daniel Bartholome story about a body guard that was also all answers without the questions. This one's about an alien abduction and was #$%@ awesome!

Mohammed Hanif. BUTT AND BHATTI
Another great story. This one is about a gangster in love with a nurse who accidentally causes a riot. Have to read to get the dets.

Chris Jones. ROGER EBERT: THE ESSENTIAL MAN
I'm not usually a big biography guy but this was well written and interesting.

Charlie LeDuff. WHAT KILLED AIYANA STANLEY-JONES?
True story about Detroit and the police killing a little girl through negligence. Mostly it was about how shitty Detroit is.

J. Robert Lennon. WEBER'S HEAD
This one was ok. It's about 2 weird roommates living in a remote town.

Mac McClelland. FOR US SURRENDER IS OUT OF THE QUESTION
True story about a girl teaching English to refugees from Burma. So I'm glad I don't live in Burma.

Joyce Carol Oates. A HOLE IN THE HEAD
She is a ridiculously talented author. This story was about a cosmetic surgeon who is unraveling and his patients are trying to talk him into performing dangerous unnecessary surgeries that involve drilling holes into the skulls of his patients.

Michael Paterniti. THE SUICIDE CATCHER
True story about Mr. Chen, a guy in China who stands on a bridge to stop people from committing suicide by jumping off of said bridge.

Henrietta Rose-Innes. HOMING
This story is about an elderly couple where a hotel is built right across the street from them. Well written, kind of sad. Not my favorite but worth reading.

Anjali Sachdeva. PLEIADES
One of my favorite stories in the book. It's about a group of genetically engineered septuplets who are dying off one by one. Such a great story!

Olivier Schrauwen. THE IMAGINIST

One of 2 comics in the issue. This one is about a disabled man's imagination creating a great dream world. Touching and fantastic.

James Spring. MID-LIFE COWBOY
Another true story, this one is about a former meth peddler who goes to Mexico as a response to a mid life crisis to try to track down 2 murders who are on the run. Guy's got some balls and in the end is really conflicted about what he did. Great story about how complicated life truly is.

James Sturm. MARKET DAY

Another great comic. Really good story and art in this comic about a rug maker going to the market to sell his rugs.

Joan Wickersham. THE BOYS' SCHOOL, OR THE NEWS FROM SPAIN
This story is about 1 of 2 girls going to an all boys school and a couple of teachers who run into scandal when the woman teacher is accused of sleeping with the students. Interesting way to tell the story, telling it from this girls point of view.

McSweeney's Issue 38

McSweeney's Quarterly Concern Issue 38

Another fantastic issue. This quarter they go back to a basic book with the cover art designed by Jessica Hische that has a great retro look & texture. My only complaint is that they included the Jungle as an insert between pages 192 & 193 which created this awkward gap while the book was open. I would have preferred the cartoon just be part of the book instead of being a distraction as I read. The return of the letters section these last few issues has been a nice lighthearted way to start things off. After that the issue included;

Where He Fell by Ariel Dorfman
Great story about an artist in Paris doing an art instillation on the anniversary of a family tragedy. There is a lot going on in story and the author does a great job weaving it all into a compact space.

The Special Populations Unit by Chanan Tigay
This quarters obligatory anti war peace/minorities are treated like shit is about Arabs fighting for Israel while at the same time being discriminated against by the Israeli people. Hipsters everywhere are gleefully weeping at the irony. Seriously shitty situation though and I feel for them.

The Northeast Kingdom by Nathaniel Rich
Loved this story about a man who is in great health as he ages into his 100's. Everyone is trying to get his secret of longevity including shady family members. One of the best short stories in this issue.

The Hens by Roddy Doyle
Who but Roddy Doyle could write about a Polish immigrant working in Dublin for a crazy woman feuding with her neighbors over chickens. There were other stuff being feuded over but mostly it was over chickens chickens. Hilarious story & spoiler alert, there's an awesome housewife knife fight!

Rapunzel by Steven Millhauser
Millhouser's take on Rapunzel. He's definitely one of my favorite short story authors. Despite this one being relatively tame his imagination is ridiculous. So fun to read.

The Jungle by Jack Teagle
This is the previously mentioned comic insert about a man and a cat living in the "wild" Good addition to the issue despite being the annoying insert as the comic was funny and well written. Not my favorite style of art but works telling the story.

Cred by Adam Levin
Hilarious 2 page short story about a man obsessing about the fact that his girlfriend looks like she has a bulge above her groin in pants but does not in fact have a bulge sans pants.

Of Women and Frogs by Bisi Adjapon
Another strong story. This is great little story about about a young African girl of 9 then 11 trying to figure life out in a bad home life. Her dad is a womanizer, her mom left when she was really young and her so called aunts are abusive even though she doesn't understand that. Sad in a really good way and speaks eloquently about the challenges in growing up as a girl.

The JPEG by Rachel B. Glaser
I loved this story as well. Glaser's style reminds me of a slightly restrained Miranda July. The story is about a recent art graduate who is lost in the real world trying to connect to life through attempts at reconnecting with an ex boyfriend. I never though a passage about deleting contacts in your phone could be as powerful as it is in this story.

Talat Hamdani by Alia Malek
This oral history of a woman who lost a son on 9/11 only to see his name slandered as a potential terrorist when he was completely innocent. Even though the agenda pieces aren't my favorite reads it was interesting and my heart goes out to this family.

Chapter One by David Eggers
This is the first chapter of an upcoming book by Eggers and from what I can tell it will be about a lonely divorced man down on his luck with one last chance to salvage his life, prove to his daughter & himself that he still has value & maybe get some while he's in the middle east trying to land a big deal as a salesman and make lots of money so he can avoid foreclosure but he'll probably just fail and hipsters will rejoice along with the 99%.

The Paris Review Book of Heartbreak, Madness, Sex, Love, Betrayal, Outsiders, Intoxication, War, Whimsy, Horrors, God, Death, Dinner, Baseball...

The Paris Review Book of Heartbreak, Madness, Sex, Love, Betrayal, Outsiders, Intoxication, War, Whimsy, Horrors, God, Death, Dinner, Baseball, Travels, The Art of Writing, and Everything Else In The World Since 1953.


Now this is an anthology! Weighing in at 890 pages it included stories from absolute legends in the literary world covering all the topics listed in the insanely long title. I've been reading this off and on since the beginning of September as I was mixing it in between other things. I started to write my favorite stories but there were way too many of them and I started to bore myself. So what I'll say instead is that literally every piece is fantastic, some I didn't connect with as much as other but there's not a single mediocre piece. Lot's of authors in there I've wanted to read but hadn't gotten around to yet which is always fun. I was kind of surprised that I liked the art of writing pieces in here as much as I did. As someone who is just a reader with no ambition to write I figured there wouldn't be much that I'd get out of them but they were all insightful and interesting.