Tenth of December | 
so-so2.5/5 - soft so-so
While I enjoyed some stories, too many left me really not interested. I disliked the lack of world building, and the orality of his writing. My favorites were Victory Lap, The Semplica girls diaries, and Escape from Spiderhead.
pickLike many collections of short stories this one was uneven. The first was the best, and I wished he had developed it into a novel, or at least a novella. Lots of men/boys struggling with feelings of inferiority and trying to hide them in bravado, which got tiring by the end. Soft pick.
I'm teaching "Victory Lap," the first story in Saunders' wonderful collection Tenth of December, in class today.
I'm teaching Saunders' story "The Semplica Girl Diaries" in class tomorrow and am reminded of how brilliant Saunders is.
#BookCoverChallenge
Day 250.
Here I will note 365 books (or as many as I will have before I get tired) that have shaped my taste in literature. No explanations, no reviews. Just the cover of the book.
I do not challenge anyone. You are all welcome to take part.
🎶Remember, remember
The Tenth of December..🎶
#midyearfaves Day 4 This is not my first Saunders. This is not even my favorite Saunders. My favorite is the first short story collection that I read by him, “Pastoralia.“ First love means a lot. Yet, this is an objectively technically stronger book than Pastoralia. I finished this one 3 months ago & there are still pieces that I will think about from time to time. To this day👇
pickThis short story collection was up and down for me. “Escape from Spiderhead,” a sci-fi tale involving prisoners, was TRULY BRILLIANT, but “The Semplica Girl Diaries” I could barely finish. “Al Roosten” showed Saunders humorous side, which I adored. While this is still a pick because I generally enjoyed reading it, I think only Spiderhead will stick with me long term.
pickMy edition of Tenth of December quotes Jennifer Egan as saying, “Subversive, hilarious, and emotionally piercing.“ Two things: I'm not sure if this quote was specific to Tenth of December or was lifted from an earlier Saunders' collection & I don't often quote writers in my reviews bc it feels a bit like plagiarism. Yet, yet...The final two stories in the collection are My Chivalric Fiasco & the title story. In My Chivalric Fiasco a👇
The hazards of eating dinner while reading. This passage made me literally spit out a chip. 😬😂
1) Not very often, but whenever I settle down with a great collection as is the case with the tagged book, I always plan on doing so in the future.
2) I co-host the monthly #NYRBBookClub We're approaching two years now!
@TheSpineView #Two4Tuesday
so-soShort story collection best imbibed slowly. Space them out by a week or a month. I took the book on a long plane ride so read the stories back-to-back. They all started to sound the same after awhile.
There is some substance here. Reader is privy to the narrator's inner monologue so for what seems like random or stupid actions to other characters, we can fill in the “reasoning.“ Characters still seemed shallow, not too smart.
George Saunders is on a virtual book tour! I‘m so jealous of anyone in a closer time zone who can attend 😂
panDid not like. Struggled to finish.
I‘m almost done!
Though this is a five hour audiobook, it‘s taken me several days to get through it. As you can see, I still have an hour to go! Maybe it‘s Saunders monotone voice of reading the text or the subject matter, blasé normal life short stories, but they‘re not holding my attention.
pickGeorge Saunders is steadly making his way to one of my favourite authors. Yes, I'm not a reader of short stories, because I never remember them. But Saunders might be different. His stories are so intense and deep, his pictures that strong, that they might remain.
Day 23 - #NotSoFavoriteAuthor
After reading this book, I must say that satirical fiction is not for me. I found this book very difficult to read. The words did not flow and I really was not interested in what the author was trying to relate. There are a lot of good reviews for this book so some people did benefit from reading it. Not sure if I could honestly recommend it as I wouldn't want to put anyone else through the pain it was for me to read.
pickSaunders is a masterful storyteller & this is an impressive collection of stories. The above quote encapsulates everything you need to know going in—there are moments of grace in dire circumstances but seldom happy endings, moments of courage, redemption, & hope but also futility, desperation, depravity, cruelty, utter ridiculousness. All the best & worst we can be as humans. Love it/hate it, this collection gives you something to think about.
Saunders on good writing and what it does. (This is from his conversation with David Sedaris at the end of the book.)
Took my next book with me on a long walk this morning—have to take advantage of upper 40s and sunny because winter will be here soon enough!
bailedI could not handle this book... I am not a fan of short story collections in the first place and this book is a prime example of why. I couldn‘t even make it page 100! 😞
1. Tenth of December by: George Saunders
2. Cookies and Clairvoyance by: Bailey Cates
3. Warm and sunny
#weekendreads @rachelsbrittain
so-soThis book frustrated me; of the first 4 stories in a 10 story collection, 3 of them were fantastic. “Puppy” was my favorite and I would recommend this collection for that story alone. It is a story that shines a light on family and judgment in a way I think fans of Celeste Ng would love. Even though I read this collection over several weeks, Saunders‘ writing style became tiresome and got in the way of my enjoyment of the rest of this collection.
What better way to celebrate Mother‘s Day or, really, any spring day when it isn‘t raining than with a trip to the bookstore? Came home with the tagged book because Saunders is a master of the short story, See What I Have Done because it sounds good (& has a great cover), Liberty‘s Exiles about American Loyalists & their stories after the American Revolution, & From Here to Eternity which is about death & how various cultures care for the dead.
“Can goodness win? Or do good people always get shafted, evil being more reckless?”
pickSaunders uses his dark and surreal style here to cut right to the heart of American materialism and feelings of inadequacy. He is endlessly creative, but in this collection, that creativity feels sharp and impactful instead of gimmicky.
bailedI'm not a fan of short stories, generally; but this author and collection are highly regarded. I had a completely different (and unpleasant) experience than expected based on blurbs/reviews. Bailed at 30% (about 75 pages).
Eeek, December was a pretty terrible reading month. I am fairly sure “The Bone People” sent me into a slump from which only George could get me out of !
#december18 #decemberwrapup
pick⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 1/2
Given how much I love “Lincoln in the Bardo” this was almost guaranteed to be a hit. It seems I am discovering Saunders work backwards, working my way slowly towards his debut short story collection.
His devilish sense of humour and deftness with language is all here. I can‘t fault this collection every story worked but I particularly enjoyed “Escape from Spiderhead” and “The Semplica Girl Diaries”.
However, more novels please :)
George Saunders writes killer short stories, and Tenth of December might be his most unforgettable collection. I love how he incorporates one or two sci-fi or dystopian elements into an otherwise realistic story.
#WinterWonderland #TenthAvenueFreezout
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=BL-HL3ELvFI
Didn‘t quite make it on the date, but close enough!
A house on the park. He'd seen it a million times. And now was in it. It smelled of man sweat and spaghetti sauce and old books. Like a library where sweaty men went to cook spaghetti. #tenthofdecember #georgesaunders
I got some new books on my kindle - thought this one was appropriate for today! 🤓
I love seeing this in my in-box, even if it isn‘t a personal message like I‘d prefer! 👍🏽
so-soThe halting style of speech is odd, but works. The twisted trains of thought are both familiar and neurotic, with long leaps into tangents and unlikely, but understandable contemplations of consequences. The father‘s lamentations of the impacts on his children are funny while ringing true in their absurdity. The style reminds me somewhat of David Foster Wallace. Short, but enjoyable for a quick read.
“It wasn‘t fair. It happened to everyone supposedly but now it was happening to specifically to him. He‘d kept waiting for special dispensation, but no. Something/someone bigger than him kept refusing. You were told the big something/someone loved you especially but in the end you saw it was otherwise. The bit something/someone was neutral. Unconcerned. When it innocently moved, it crushed people.”
#georgesaunders #tenthofdecember
“To keep him alive she started piling on him various things from life, things smelling of a home—coats, sweaters, a rain of flowers [...]. He was piled high with clothes. He was like the bed at a party on which they pile the coats.”
This is the best goddamn simile I have ever read.
#georgesaunders #tenthofdecember
Afterwards, sometimes there would be tears. Tears in bed? And then they would—Molly pressing her hot wet face against his hot wet face. They were sorry, they were saying with their bodies, they were accepting each other back, and that feeling, that feeling of being accepted back again and again, of someone‘s affection for you expanding to encompass whatever new flawed thing had just manifested in you, that was the deepest, dearest thing he‘d ever—
I started listening to this earlier today, and I‘m already more than halfway through! My god this prose just sparkles. It‘s simply dazzling. And Saunders reads it so well. #nowlistening #nowreading #audiobooks
pickI loved this book. The stories twist and turn to include many characters‘ perspectives. Each story is somehow both brutal and kind, and in the end, an exercise in compassion.
I have a hard time abandoning books because I always want to give them enough chances. Maybe I‘ll like them after the second half or so? But with so many outstanding books, I need to prioritize and only read what I love.
So I‘m saying goodbye to Tenth of December by George Saunders after 50 pages 👋🏽 I‘m not a big fan of short stories anyway, and I have a TBR full of promising reads.
What‘s your take on not finishing books you don‘t love?
@Zelma Thank you so much for my package!!! Lincoln in the Bardo was my favorite book of last year, and I am so excited to read more from Saunders!! And American Housewife sounds fantastic! I can‘t wait to dive into these. The books marks are super cute, I love that your local store puts pics of their pets on them, and I really want to visit now! Thanks again to @CSeydel for setting this up. My first swap and I had a ton of fun! #shortstoryswap
pickI‘m not sure I quite understood the earliest pieces in this collection, but at about 20% in, they definitely clicked for me, with Saunders seeming to enjoy exploring unusual personalities. I liked his novel even more and would definitely read more of his work.
