the score: 2013

2nd week of Dec (already!); currently in the middle (more or less) of 3 books (The Wheel of Ice, Stephen Baxter; Where Europe Begins, Yoko Tawada; The Wild Boys, William S. Burroughs), but at the rate i'm going not sure i'll be seeing the back end of any of 'em by the end of the year, so i think i'm ready to call it: slow year for reading. just 16 books (not including false starts/nonfinishers, but in any case less than half of last year's (!!!)) - 15 if you don't count Simon's amazing, amazing The Jardin des Plantes w/c crossed over from the end of 2012 - on the list, w/ the peak, coincidentally enough, on my birthmonth: July had the most number of books read in a month as well as my fave reads of the year (Carson's Red books, as well as this year's 'annual' reread - possibly the last - of Nightwood, not to mention (& to mention anyway) the finally-getting-through-&-putting-down of IJ). but, y'know, slow doesn't necessarily = bad; i mean, i didn't love all these books, but almost all of 'em blew me away someway somehow.

here's this year's list, presented w/o further comment

1. The Jardin des Plantes, Claude Simon (tr. Jordan Stump; 23 Dec 2012 - 9 Jan 2013)

2. Summer in Baden-Baden, Leonid Tsypkin (tr. Roger & Angela Keys; 10 Jan - 25 Jan 2013)

3. Against the Day, Thomas Pynchon (25 Jan - 18 May 2013)

4. Last Year at Marienbad, Alain Robbe-Grillet (tr. Richard Howard; 18 May - 23 May 2013)

5. Speedboat, Renata Adler (23 May - 31 May 2013)

6. Infinite Jest, David Foster Wallace (31 May - 12 July (11:58pm) 2013)

7. Empire of the Senseless, Kathy Acker (13 July - 17 July 2013)

8. The Autobiography of Red, Anne Carson (17 July - 21 July 2013$

9. Red Doc>, Anne Carson (21 July - 23 July (11:27pm) 2013)

10. Nightwood, Djuna Barnes (3rd reading; 24 July - 29 July 2013)

11. Azorno, Inger Christensen (tr. Denise Newman; 30 July - 1 Aug 2013)

12. Dhalgren, Samuel R. Delany (1 Aug - 30 Aug 2013)

13. Ulysses (1922 text), James Joyce  (31 Aug - 15 Oct 2013)

14. Bleeding Edge, Thomas Pynchon (15 Oct - 5 Nov 2013)

15. Seven American Deaths and Disasters, Kenneth Goldsmith ( - 13 Nov 2013)

16. Annihilation, Jeff VanderMeer (15 Nov - 22 Nov 2013; 2nd read 27 Dec 2013 - 1 Jan 2014)
17. Appleseed, John Clute (13 Dec - 25 Dec 2013)