BookBlast® presents our curated monthly top 10 reads, a little late because of taking time out in New York and Rhode Island.
Sex, Drugs, Rock’n’Roll
Trouble Boys: The True Story of the Replacements by Bob Mehr (Da Capo, Boston) buy here
The definitive biography of one of the last great rock ‘n’ roll bands of the twentieth century. Though they hated punk bands that is how they were on and off stage.
Reclusive singer-songwriter Paul Westerberg, bassist Tommy Stinson, and the family of late guitarist Bob Stinson opened up to Bob Mehr. Described by Alfred Soto in The Chicago Reader as being “A roaring rock ‘n’ roll adventure, a heartrending family drama, and a cautionary showbiz tale,” the book features new interview material and 72 rare photos.
Teen Rebellion
How To Set A Fire And Why by Jesse Ball (Text Publishing Company, Melbourne) buy here
Sixteen-year-old Lucia Stanton’s father is dead, her mother is catatonic in a mental institute, and she lives in an unheated garage with her elderly impoverished aunt. She’s all in black and angry at our materialistic, capitalist society. Expelled from school for pencil-stabbing a boy who invaded her space, she is intelligent, interesting and impossible to be with, which comes clear as she relates the events of her life in a series of diary entries. To Lucia, arson is a form of class warfare. “I . . . thought about the fire. I know it was just an abandoned building but I felt like something had happened, a real thing for once. My aunt’s stroke had felt pretty real too. I guess real things happen all at once, and then you go back to the false parade of garbage that characterizes modern life.”
These first two books are recommended by a bookseller&lover working at one of the best bookstores in NYC: The Strand, 828 Broadway (& 12th Street), NY 10003. Continue reading BookBlasts® | Top 10 Reads for Independent Minds | August 2017
