The one book I do remember reading – and flying through – was Jeffrey Eugenides’ Virgin Suicides. Sometime earlier this year, I became obsessed with the soundtrack from the movie Virgin Suicides which was done by the band Air. It was beautiful and compelling and became a large part of my morning ritual. The last track on the score was a song called “Suicides Underground” which took excerpts from the movie and thrust them into a powerful audio landscape. When I learned that Sophia Coppola used actual excerpts from the book for the narrative of the movie, I decided I needed to read the book. I checked it out of the library and read the novel in less than 20 hours.

The book is the kind of book that I would want to write. It’s prose is simple but powerful. It’s descriptive nature tugs at the emotive nature of language without feeling forced. Eugenides’ first novel is almost perfect – taking a complex voice (it’s narrative by a “group”) and telling an emotional story of youth, love, and the way the world was slowly changing.

In the end, it’s a simple book worth reading. For me, the ending is so powerful – so I’ll include an excerpt from that here that I hope summarizes the book as a whole. Enjoy:

“It didn’t matter in the end how old they had been, or that they were girls, but only that we had loved them, and that they hadn’t heard us calling, still do not hear us, up here in the tree house with our thinning hair and soft bellies, calling them out of those rooms where they went to be alone for all time, alone in suicide, which is deeper than death, and where we will never find the pieces to put them back together.”

Trust Agents – Chris Brogan/Julien Smith
The New Community Rules – Tamar Weinberg
Putting the Public Back in Public Relations – Brian Solis/Dierdre Breckenridge
Sticks and Stones – Larry Weber

Now, I’m not sure if these will be good books but most of these authors are people that I know or admire greatly – so I’m expecting great things.  I often wonder what kind of lessons and knowledge I could spread about my experiences in a book, but it’s probably far too early in my career to look into that.  Anyway – I already have Putting the Public Back in Public Relations, so I am reading that now.  I’ll update with any nuggets and opinions that I find in the book.

I’m also reading “Pride and Prejudice and Zombies” – which is a hilarious adaptation of the famous Jane Austen novel.  For a great review, check out my friend Nate’s website Gas Lantern – Putting the Gore in Victorian

I did this before.  After I graduated from college the thought that I no longer had a structure that focused on learning terrified me.  While a decent student, I never attacked my studies with much passion.  This thought woke something inside of me.  In the six months after my graduation, I had read over 150 books.  They were all kinds – “required” reading for high school, reference books, autobiographies, 20th century french literature, American classics, banned books, bestsellers, pop garbage – it didn’t matter what it was, I consumed it and, surprisingly, started to retain it.

That lasted for a few years.  I went to grad school because of it – my love for cultures and technology pushing me to study that from a sociological standpoint.  I didn’t last too long in grad school.  In fact, It was because I fell in love with the freedom to pursue any whim that my intellectual curiousity took me on – I felt shuttered in with my studies.  I’m probably lucky that my funding fell through and that I ended up becoming a graduate school drop out.

From there, I entered the world of business and found a new love.  With this new love, however, my energy to devote to new endeavors started to dry up.  Working hard all day and trying to maintain a social life became top priorities over trying to learn new things.  Not that my intellectual curiosity started to wane – but I started to simply focus it more on tasks that were easier to accomplish – reading the NY Times every day, staying informed on new music, subscribing to interesting feeds in Google Reader.  But books were nowhere to be found.  Every once in a while, a new book would surface and engage me (Tipping Point, Freakonomics, Blink, etc) but, despite a penchant to running up a tab at Amazon and Barnes and Noble – I no longer was reading anything that pushed my brain.

So today – I’ve already finished one book:  Tribes by Seth Godin.  It took me an hour – and, for the most part, didn’t satisfy my intellectual cravings.  I’m now onto my second and, this blog post aside, have been flying through it without any distraction.  It’s “The New Influencers” by Paul Gillin.  I like this one a bit more than Godin’s – but it’s too early to really review.  And, I’m not reading to write a review.  I’m reading to learn something.  Even just one thing – and it’s worth it.

This intellectual hunger probably stems from my new job:  Social Media Specialist.  While I consider myself pretty knowledgable in the subject, I figured a little reading wouldn’t hurt.  Plus, my personal goals are pretty ambitious for this.  I want to do something new with the medium.  I want to create something to be copied and written about.  Will I be successful?  Perhaps – but right now, I just need to satisfy this hunger and hopefully get there in the process…

The book I’ve become enamored with is “Naked Conversations” by Robert Scoble and Shel Isreal. A book on corporate blogging, it’s been the perfect reference for everything that has been occurring in my career. I have a few more books coming my way on the subject, and I’m excited to take something new from each one.

The next book I’m reading is “Catcher in the Rye” by Salinger. I obviously read this when I was in high school, and a few times in college, but rereading it now is a very interesting experience. It’s one of those books that changes as you change – the ethereal feelings it once conjured up no longer exist – instead replaced with subtle hints of judgment. I would imagine this to be a sign of growing “old.” The last time I felt this type of change is when I reread “On the Road” by Kerouac.

I haven’t started reading anything else, but I’m sure I’ll pass along an update as I dive into them. With sunlight fading earlier and earlier each day, I have a feeling that I’ll be reading a lot to avoid the cold harsh winter winds.

Irene is the city visible when you lean out from the edge of the plateau at the hour when the lights come on, and in the limpid air, the pink of the settlement can be discerned spreadout in the distance below: where the windows are more concentrated, where it thins out in dimly lighted alleys, where it collects the shadows of gardens, where it raises towers with signal fires; and if the evening is misty, a hazy glow swells like a milky sponge at the food of the gulleys.

Travelers on the plateau, shepherds shifting their flocks, bird catchers watching their nets, hermits gathering greens: all look down and speak of Irene. At times, the wind brings a music of bass drums and trumpets, the bang of firecrackers in the light-display of a festival; at times the rattle of guns, the explosion of a powder magazine in the sky yellow with the fires of Civil War. Those that look down from the heights conjecture about what is happening in the city; they wonder if it would be pleasant or unpleasant to be in Irene that evening. Not that they have any intention of going there (in any case, the roads winding down to the valley are bad) but Irene is a magnet for the eys and thoughts of those who stay up above.

At this point, Kublai Khan expects Marco to speak of Irene as it is seen from within. But Marco cannot do this: he has not succeeded in discovering which is the city that those on the plateau call Irene. For that matter, it is of slight importance: if you saw it, standing in its midst, it would be a different city; Irene is a name for the city in the distance, and if you approach, it changes.

For those who pass it without entering, the city is one thing; it is another for those who are trapped by it and never leave. There is a city where you arrive for the first time and there is another city which you leave never to return. Each deserves a different name; perhaps I have already spoken of Irene under other names; perhaps I have spoken only of Irene.

Invisible Cities by Italo Calvino

I can’t wait to read it.

Buying In: The secret dialogue between what we buy and who we are
By Rob Walker

After reading the book, I wonder if I’ll find some connection between the brands I love and my personality. Probably. The brands I love include (but aren’t limited to): Apple, RIM (Blackberry), Google, Moleskine, Starbucks – and those are just the things I use on an every day basis.