Finding new books is harder than it should be. Independent bookstores are closing shop, and big box stores who only carry whatever bribes their way past the exorbitant stock keeping fees. Databases and libraries become impossible to navigate unless you already know what you're looking for. Even with online resale, you can only search within your own vocabulary. Now rare are the times when one can simply look upon a bookshelf and see some hitherto unknown title.
I know I must not be the only one with this problem. So, I offer a listing of my own shelves, such that anyone may use my listing as reference for their own.
My books get divided into three categories: Fiction, Arts, and Sciences. ... however, what I classify as what depends more on my own idiosyncrasies and opinion of the book than anything else.
I will only list books that I liked, were interesting, or at least not terrible enough to be disowned. Self-authored books are not listed. Multiple copies in different languages are listed only under one entry. Scientific work that risks being quickly outdated are unlisted. Items are listed alphabetically, but not in the order in which I first read them, so inter-related lines of thought between multiple books may be listed in a confusing order.
I take recommendations for others, within reason.
– Jonathan Ball
Poetry in the sense of it being experimental prose, which makes it a bit more accessible to literary types with a hate-love-relationship for pretension. Ball is a fantastic writer, but this collection of poetry falls prey to the usual pitfalls most collections of unrelated poems suffer, even through the loose thematic connections. Plus, the fact that it was a follow-up work to the absolutely perfect Clockfire will make whatever light one views it under naturally unfair.
It contains its gems, though; my favourites being “WOLVES” and “That Most Terrible of Dogs.”