Brooklyn: A Personal Memoir (Capote) -- Summer Reading Challenge

Brooklyn: A Personal Memoir, With the Lost Photographs of David Attie, Truman Capote (2015)

With an afterword by Eli Attie.

The 800s shelf: Literature, which includes plays, poems and essays. I saw that it was about Brooklyn and then I flipped through and saw the pictures, and I had to check this one out.

First off, I've never read anything by Truman Capote, nor was anything ever assigned to be read. I remember a copy of In Cold Blood sitting on my bookshelf when I was a kid, but I didn't pick it up.

Second, the Afterword was actually the most fascinating part of the book. If you pick up this book, you might want to read it first. Or you can save it for last, and it will change your opinion of the entire book.

From the Introduction, I learned when this essay was originally written and where it was published. From Attie's addendum, I discovered that this Memoir was published as a book in 2002 without the photos. The photography of David Attie, someone you've probably never heard of, were still "lost" at that time.

Eli Attie is David's son and was researching the work his father had done. It turned out that Capote could be credited with launching the elder Attie's career. David even found photos of Capote along with many taken in a walk around Brooklyn Heights in the late 50s (1958, according to the text).

The collected photos (I'll let you read the story) were set to be a book on their own, but as these things go, the set was combined with a second edition of Brooklyn. Both works benefit from this.

Capote had a flair for writing (I guess I'm speaking the obvious to many) which I guess fits what I know of his personality from TV and movie appearances (not to mention impressions by people like Rich Little). However, anyone who walks around Brooklyn Heights and the area down by the Brooklyn Bridge will recognize some of the buildings and streets and structures in these photos. And if you were around there back in, say, the 70s or 80s, you might recognize even more. It's a walk down memory lane to see these places along with the people.

Library reading challenge. Catalogue number 813 C

The Luck Archive (Menjivar) -- Summer Reading Challenge

The Luck Archive: Exploring Belief, Superstition, and Tradition, Mark Menjivar (2015)

The 300s shelf: Social Sciences, which I already did, but I saw another book that looked interesting.

In brief, the author was interested in stories about things, objects, and rituals that people believe are lucky or will bring luck. He even visited stores that had some kind of luck in the title. Many of those stories, along with pictures, are gathered in this one volume. He doesn't try to validate the stories, nor disparage them. More of a simple celebration of the things people do to make luck go their way. (Or to make bad luck just go away.)

A quick little read. I saw it on the shelf, and I thought it might be interesting. It was, but not overly memorable. Nothing much to make a note of.

For fun, here are some of the other options I had, which seemed to have a lot to do with Vampires and Zombies. The English Folk Tales book is one I might revisit later. There was also a book on "Social Q's" as well as a wedding planner (could you imagine me reading that on a train?), as well as some on topics I didn't care to read entire books about.

Library reading challenge. Catalogue number 398.41 M