WWW.WEDNESDAY

WWW. WEDNESDAY asks three questions to prompt you to speak bookishly. To participate, and to see how other book lovers responded, click here. 

PS I no longer participate in WWW.WEDNESDAY via that link because her blog won't accept Blogger comments. I mention this only to save you the frustration I experienced trying to link up

1. What are you currently reading? Deck the Hounds by David Rosenfelt. Bruce Springsteen's memoir (below) was so intense, brimming with passion and dysfunction and ambition and rock and roll, that I wanted something simpler and more straightforward. And Christmas-y. Christmas-y would be nice. So I picked up this Andy Carpenter mystery.

 

I love Andy. An independently wealthy, super-talented defense attorney who is constitutionally unable to shut up, he's one of my favorite "cozy mystery" protagonists. This time around, Andy finds himself going into the Christmas season by walking it like he talks it and helping a homeless man. A homeless man who, of course, has a dog. Every Andy Carpenter mystery begins with a dog. 

  

2. What did you recently finish reading? Born to Run by Bruce Springsteen. When it comes to music, my personal airwaves are rules by THE THREE B's: The Beatles, Babs and Bruce. I could probably go the rest of my life without listening to anyone else and still be pretty happy. 

 

Last year I read Barbra Streisand's memoir and was fascinated. Often annoyed, never bored. Which is something when you're talking about a memoir of 900+ pages. So when I picked up Bruce's 500-page autobiography, I expected to zip through it with a similar reaction.

 

I didn't. I am shocked to report that, at times, I was bored by Bruce. The man who has held me entranced onstage for up to four hours, the Boss who led the soul-shaking, earth-quaking, heart-stopping, pants-dropping E Street Band bored me at times! His book is, objectively speaking, better written than Streisand's. But he just didn't have her audacity and indefatigable need to be understood. Really, at times in her book, I felt like Streisand was gripping me by the collar and yelling, "HEAR ME!" With Born to Run, I felt like the very literate Professor Springsteen was trying to impart his hard-earned wisdom. And I got bored! (Not often, mind you. But the fact that it happened at all surprised me.)

 

But I'm glad I stuck with it. Bruce is surprisingly candid about his own shortcomings as he takes us from boy to man, from musician to celebrity, from loner to family man. It's a journey that includes many bouts of depression and hour upon hour of therapy. I admire his courage and his honesty about needing and getting help. It's hard to imagine a more male American specimen than the Boss. I think he may be able to destigmatize mental health issues for men with his memoir and the bio-pic Deliver Me from Nowhere.

 

I also loved hearing how some of my all-time favorite songs came to be. I can't thank Bruce enough for the music that moves my soul. I now know "Bobby Jean" is not about a lover but a friend, Steve Van Zandt. As one whose most solid relationships have been with my friends, it adds a new and poignant dimension to a song I always loved.

Now let's see if Sir Paul writes his life story. Somehow I'm not holding my breath. The Cute Beatle has always been more opaque, played it closer to the vest, than either Babs or Bruce. 

3. What will you read next?  I don't know.