Sorry for the delay, kids. Life happens sometimes.
But the set-back allowed me to see this link on the burgeoning brew scene in Duhloot. Combined with the awesomeness that is the Northern Waters Smokehaus, and Duluth suddenly is a destination city.
Back to the book biz. This month's selection, Ambitious Brew: The Story of American Beer by Maureen Ogle, is after my own heart. I received this book as a holiday gift from my kids, love them.
Ogle entertainingly chronicles the personalities and travails of America's founding beer dynasties -- the Bests, Buschs, Millers, Schlitzs and so forth, through the heady expansion years of the late antebellum and throughout the postbellum period, the culture wars that led to Prohibition, the triumphant return and then consolidation of the industry in the decades after repeal, and finally the giddy resurrection of craft brewing in the late 1970s through today. It was fun to read her descriptions of the origins of the Best family's brewing operation in 1840s Milwaukee, interlaced with a smidge of malting and brewing chemistry.
This is not great history on a par with The Roommate or Robert Caro or Robert K. Massie, despite the occasional pretension. Some of the treatment of the economics, politics and social aspects, particularly early in the book, is rather amateurish. Her treatment of the consolidation in the industry during the 1950s and 1960s is pretty limited. For example, while she devotes a few lines to the adoption of "accelerated batch fermentation" in her depiction of the fall of Schlitz, I think she underplays the importance of technological innovations as well as the growing use of rice and corn adjuncts in place of malted barley as paving stones on the road to beer hell.
The beer market stagnated in the 1950s and 1960s, thanks to watered-down quality, but also several other factors that Ogle identifies -- a demographic lull in prime beer-drinking aged consumers, a tremendous rebound in consumption of hard liquor, and the rise of the diet industry (infamously culminating in the insidious triumph of Light/Lite "beer").
Some of her prose and analysis left me wanting to drink. E.g., "But beer also fell victim to a national palate that, since the 1920s, had gravitated toward the sugary and the bland, both of which can be seen as hallmarks of a modernizing society" (p.227). Ugh. She then goes on to tie those trends to "a more casual attitude toward sex, to name one example" of "modern" attitudes. Double ugh.
Ogle is at her best mining correspondence, press coverage and other contemporary accounts to tell the personal stories of intrigue and competition between the beer baron families, and, later, sketching the lives of modern pioneers, such as Anchor Steam's founder, Fritz Maytag, Sierra Nevada's founder, Ken Grossman, and Boston Brewing Co.'s Jim Koch. This is entertaining reading.
When she stays away from Deep Thoughts, this is a fun book, worthy of the beach or late-night bedtime reading. You'll come away with a much deeper appreciation for the place of the brewing industry in American history, and some great anecdotes.
What are you reading?
I thought "Man, it's really late to be posting," forgetting that I'm now +7 from Central time.
I've been making slow (but steady) progress on Catch 22. I'm finally into the parts I've not already read, which is nice.
On the plane I re-read David Foster Wallace's "Federer as Religious Experience" from the NY Times. To me, this is one of, if not the, best sports writing I've encountered. Wallace's footnote tangents serve the work very well here, as opposed some of his other stuff where it is distracting, at best. Combined with his obvious tennis knowledge, the whole piece is superb.
It IS really late to be posting a First Monday, seeing as how it is Wednesday.
...serve the work very well here...
I see what you did there.
Ugh, reading is difficult with an infant around. I renewed A Crown of Swords too many times and had to give it back to the library. But I checked it out again as well as Path of Daggers and plan to get to reading it on my trip to 'Bama (ugh) next week.
I'm halfway through The Reckoning by David Halberstam about the crisis faced by the auto industry in the 80s. Pretty enlightening to read after the industry's subsequent crisis a few years ago.
I read that soon after it came out (pre-grad school, when I still read that kind of stuff for "pleasure reading"). Typical Halberstam -- lots of great material, buried in waaaay too much text. His books are hot chicks encased in fat suits.
L.A. confidential: i normally don’t like to read books that i’ve already seen the movie of. thankfully, the book had almost nothing to do with it (i was also unaware that this was a continuation from a previous book). this was my first experience with ellroy, and he definitely has a style of his own. it kind of reminded of the wire in that he doesn’t really stop to explain the background or the jargon he uses. personally, i wasn’t a big fan of his staccato writing style when it came to the action scenes. i did get the feeling that things were happening *snap* *snap* *snap*, but it was very choppy to try and follow. still, i enjoyed it and will probably read something else by him eventually (perhaps the next in the series?).
the girl with the dragon tattoo: i pretty feel the same way about this that everyone else around here did. good, not great. i’ll get to the next two eventually.
the hunger games: i got this from someone at work as i bookless. i was a little apprehensive as the person i got this from and i definitely don’t have anywhere close to the same tastes. that said, it was a good, quick read. the idea’s been done (several times), but it was still pretty good. i think the book could have been much better if the main target wasn’t young adults, but still, i guess i’d recommend it.
norwegian wood: murakami’s “coming of age” book. or something. besides that claptrap, this was a fabulous book. i’d only read the wind-up bird chronicle before this, but in reading about this book, i see this was his attempt at a “straight story”. strangely, the best comparison to this book off the top of my head would be women by
hank chinaskicharles bukowski (though not nearly as depraved). i really wish i could read murakami in the original japanese…I finished the other two Millenium books (Girl Who Played with Fire, Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest) and they were entertaining but a bit disappointing. The third book isn't really more than part II of the second book, fyi.
i've heard pretty much the same thing, so i'm not in a rush.
Damnit. I left duluth about a decade too early.
I'm reading Hunger Games. Entertaining quick kids book. I agree with HJ.
I'm halfway through Four Fingers of Death by Rick Moody. It's a bit of an eye-roller. Pulp sci-fi meets introspective intellectualism. They go together like peanut butter and foie gras.
I can hardly wait to be done with it so I can start ripping into 1Q84.
Yeah, I never got a handle on Four Fingers of Death. The best thing of Moody's that I've read (and I haven't read much) is the short story/novella "The Albertine Notes", recommended to me by my current boss.
This is the first time I've read Moody, but I've heard that The Ice Storm is his best work. It sounds interesting, and I'd like to think that I will give it a shot, but given the slog that Four Fingers has become... I dunno. I think I really picked the wrong book of his to start with.
I'm going classics right now before I get to a bunch of non-fiction on the bedstand. I finished For Whom the Bell Tolls by Hemingway. The first 2/3 was slooooowwwwww. Then the last third was a taut, thrilling page turner. So not sure if I can recommend or not. Now just about to start Kerouac's On The Road. Of course I've read it at least 5 times. But this version is the "original scroll." There are no paragraphs, no chapters, barely any periods. Should be an interesting read.
Glad you were delayed until Wednesday evening since it allowed me to finish a second book.
First, I finished Judas Unchained. Since the previous book, Pandora's Star was all development, at most 100 pages involved any plot set up. Which made the entire second half quite gripping. But, while exciting, the plot was very straightforward and had zero surprises. The Starflyer's identity wasn't unexpected and I guessed the final agent (50% chance anyway).
After that, I moved on to the sequel-ish Void trilogy and just finished The Dreaming Void. I get the feeling the trilogy will be similar to the "saga" that predates it in that the first book will be primarily setting up the characters and the final two books everything crashes together.
I hadn't head about it until just now, but British sci-fi writer John Christopher passed away last week. I really enjoyed his books when I encountered them as a twelve year old.
I wrote John Christopher a letter soon after reading his Tripod series back in, oh, about 3rd grade (so, circa 1971). I think I still have his very nice response, which came by Airmail, which was cool.
Tales of the South Pacific by James Michener. This thing won a Pulitzer in 1947 and I can see why - I couldn't put it down. Each short story feels distinct but connected. The descriptions of life (and death) in the South Pacific during WWII were intricately drawn and I felt like I really got to know the men and women he introduced. This isn’t your typical storm-the-beach-hero-worship book about the war. It was written when the horror and poignancy of that conflict was still fresh in everyone’s mind and it shows. Mr. Michener really cared about his characters and - in the end - so did I.
Four Fish by Paul Greenberg. A history lesson and review of the use, biology and current status of the four fish most likely to be found on the plate; Greenberg does a really nice job of exploring questions about the management of human expectations and demands (cultural, political, culinary, industry, etc.) with regards to these animals. Along the way, he paints a pretty sad picture of the mismanagement and outright destruction of the various fisheries. He also attempts to offer solutions and insight on possible future practices for practical stewardship and improved management of these fisheries. All this while posing some challenging questions regarding various ethical considerations associated with the consumption of fish without coming across as self-righteous or preachy. A much longer review can be found here.
I've finished reading Paul Auster's Leviathan, and have to say that this one wasn't nearly as good as the NY trilogy. By the end I was just slogging through to finish what I had started without caring about any of the characters. It's too bad because the book had promise in the beginning.
I'm in the middle of Ghosts of Belfast by Stuart Neville. Despite the prose being a wee bit clumsy, I'm enjoying this book so far. Maybe, just maybe, I miss Belfast and Northern Ireland.
Up next is the The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, and Play It As It Lays.