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kerryvaughan's reviews
173 reviews
Outer Dark by Cormac McCarthy
challenging
dark
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
4.5
“I’ve seen the meanness of humans till I don’t know why God ain’t put out the sun and gone away.”
^^ Heard. ^^
Cormac’s a vibe, no doubt about it. If you want to see fictional suffering flayed and splayed in stark vivid prose, read this. No surprise that McCarthy is relentlessly bleak but some surprise, at least for me, at just how far into the “outer dark” he goes here. And how funny he can be. Maybe that’s just me. I find comedy in the deepest blackest holes.
John, thanks for the recommendation; this ink in the water (blood in the breast milk, as Cormac would have it) hit the spot.
PS: I separated art from artist here and pretended I read this before learning Cormac was apparently a rank dog.
^^ Heard. ^^
Cormac’s a vibe, no doubt about it. If you want to see fictional suffering flayed and splayed in stark vivid prose, read this. No surprise that McCarthy is relentlessly bleak but some surprise, at least for me, at just how far into the “outer dark” he goes here. And how funny he can be. Maybe that’s just me. I find comedy in the deepest blackest holes.
John, thanks for the recommendation; this ink in the water (blood in the breast milk, as Cormac would have it) hit the spot.
PS: I separated art from artist here and pretended I read this before learning Cormac was apparently a rank dog.
Journal of a Novel: The East of Eden Letters by John Steinbeck
dark
emotional
funny
informative
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
5.0
5. Journal Of A Novel: The East of Eden Letters by John Steinbeck. If you love Eden or Steinbeck, you must read this.
Fate put this book in a Jackson, TN Goodwill last weekend for me to find while I was reading East of Eden. Could not have been better timing and could not have been a better epilogue to a book I was not ready to be done with. I am very lucky to have found it.
Steinbeck wrote Eden in a giant notebook given to him by his friend and editor Pascal Covici. Each day, he’d write a letter to Pat on the left pages and write Eden on the right. The result is this collection of real-time insights into writing Eden and into the Hamiltons, minutia of Steinbeck’s life (“today I did many things, redesigned a toilet and rebuilt it, fixed my fish bowl”), bonus: the story of Steinbeck carving the actual box presented to Pat at the beginning of Eden, and darkly intimate (sometimes hilarious) insecurity, doubt and self-deprecation. Oddly comforting to know the mountainous Steinbeck was after all as human as the rest of us pebbles. #2025books
Fate put this book in a Jackson, TN Goodwill last weekend for me to find while I was reading East of Eden. Could not have been better timing and could not have been a better epilogue to a book I was not ready to be done with. I am very lucky to have found it.
Steinbeck wrote Eden in a giant notebook given to him by his friend and editor Pascal Covici. Each day, he’d write a letter to Pat on the left pages and write Eden on the right. The result is this collection of real-time insights into writing Eden and into the Hamiltons, minutia of Steinbeck’s life (“today I did many things, redesigned a toilet and rebuilt it, fixed my fish bowl”), bonus: the story of Steinbeck carving the actual box presented to Pat at the beginning of Eden, and darkly intimate (sometimes hilarious) insecurity, doubt and self-deprecation. Oddly comforting to know the mountainous Steinbeck was after all as human as the rest of us pebbles. #2025books
East of Eden by John Steinbeck
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
4. East of Eden by John Steinbeck
“Tom got into a book, crawled and groveled between the covers, tunneled like a mole among the thoughts, and came up with the book all over his face and hands.”
When the book is this good? Me too, Tom, me too. 12/10. No notes. Steinbeck never misses.
I was already a bit of a Steinbeck stan/betch (call me ol’ John Stanbetch up in here) and finally got to this masterpiece (thanks Josh) and realize that between this and Runaway Soul (also thanks Josh), #2025books is starting out to be a take-no-prisoners reading year. What a thrill.
“Now you are people and you have joined the fraternity and you have the right to be damned.”
“And I feel that I am a man. And I feel that a man is a very important thing - maybe more important than a star. This is not theology. I have no bent toward gods. But I have a new love for that glittering instrument, the human soul. It is a lovely and unique thing in the universe. It is always attacked and never destroyed - because ‘Thou mayest.’”
“Don’t be sad,” said Cal. “I’m going to let you use my rifle.”
Aron’s head jerked around. “You haven’t got a rifle.”
“Haven’t I?” Cal said. “Haven’t I though?”
“Tom got into a book, crawled and groveled between the covers, tunneled like a mole among the thoughts, and came up with the book all over his face and hands.”
When the book is this good? Me too, Tom, me too. 12/10. No notes. Steinbeck never misses.
I was already a bit of a Steinbeck stan/betch (call me ol’ John Stanbetch up in here) and finally got to this masterpiece (thanks Josh) and realize that between this and Runaway Soul (also thanks Josh), #2025books is starting out to be a take-no-prisoners reading year. What a thrill.
“Now you are people and you have joined the fraternity and you have the right to be damned.”
“And I feel that I am a man. And I feel that a man is a very important thing - maybe more important than a star. This is not theology. I have no bent toward gods. But I have a new love for that glittering instrument, the human soul. It is a lovely and unique thing in the universe. It is always attacked and never destroyed - because ‘Thou mayest.’”
“Don’t be sad,” said Cal. “I’m going to let you use my rifle.”
Aron’s head jerked around. “You haven’t got a rifle.”
“Haven’t I?” Cal said. “Haven’t I though?”
The Runaway Soul by Harold Brodkey
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
reflective
sad
tense
slow-paced
4.0
3. The Runaway Soul by Harold Brodkey.
This is the longest, thickest and meatiest book I’ve had in years. I think Brodkey would want to know that.
It’s the story-non-story-anti-story of Wiley Silenowicz’s early life, various parts of it, filtered through Wiley, various parts of him. Well, mostly just two parts. The brain and the other brain.
Physical, mental, sensual and intellectual experiences smashed through the strainer of memory, ground through the mill of writing it down, then relived and digested again. It’s Wiley’s ouroboros of self. It is visceral and horny and sad and very, very male. It’s a 100 page sex scene that is barely about sex. It’s an introspection on family, connections and cruelty. It’s a confession and a boast.
If I’d read my own review before I read this book, I wouldn’t have read this book. But I’m glad I did, because through it all, it is *good.* Brodkey’s got some absolutely laughable dialogue, and I nearly threw chairs when four-year-old genius Wiley *taught himself to read*…*in half an hour*, but there is also some absolutely stunning prose here, and the end result is a family that will never leave my brain. 4/5 but I may rate higher after I’ve come down from it. #2025books
This is the longest, thickest and meatiest book I’ve had in years. I think Brodkey would want to know that.
It’s the story-non-story-anti-story of Wiley Silenowicz’s early life, various parts of it, filtered through Wiley, various parts of him. Well, mostly just two parts. The brain and the other brain.
Physical, mental, sensual and intellectual experiences smashed through the strainer of memory, ground through the mill of writing it down, then relived and digested again. It’s Wiley’s ouroboros of self. It is visceral and horny and sad and very, very male. It’s a 100 page sex scene that is barely about sex. It’s an introspection on family, connections and cruelty. It’s a confession and a boast.
If I’d read my own review before I read this book, I wouldn’t have read this book. But I’m glad I did, because through it all, it is *good.* Brodkey’s got some absolutely laughable dialogue, and I nearly threw chairs when four-year-old genius Wiley *taught himself to read*…*in half an hour*, but there is also some absolutely stunning prose here, and the end result is a family that will never leave my brain. 4/5 but I may rate higher after I’ve come down from it. #2025books
I Don't Care by Ágota Kristóf
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
reflective
sad
tense
fast-paced
4.25
2. I Don’t Care: Stories by Agota Kristof
Translated by Chris Andrews
Best hour and half of reading I’ve done in a while. This collection is a stunning quiver of 25 very short arrows, sharp and slicing right into your heart, your gut, your brain. Thematically they circle around loss, exile and searching for home whatever and whoever home means. Some stories are darkly funny, others are heartbreaking. Together they perforated me.
Favorite story: “The Streets” but ask me tomorrow and it might be “My Father” and the third day it might be “A Northbound Train.” #2025books
Translated by Chris Andrews
Best hour and half of reading I’ve done in a while. This collection is a stunning quiver of 25 very short arrows, sharp and slicing right into your heart, your gut, your brain. Thematically they circle around loss, exile and searching for home whatever and whoever home means. Some stories are darkly funny, others are heartbreaking. Together they perforated me.
Favorite story: “The Streets” but ask me tomorrow and it might be “My Father” and the third day it might be “A Northbound Train.” #2025books
Satantango by László Krasznahorkai
challenging
dark
funny
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
3.0
1. Satantango by Laszlo Krasznahorkai
First book of the year, finally done. It shouldn’t have taken a week to read this fairly short book. But it did. Because I didn’t connect with it like I wanted to. Everything about it is something I love on paper. It’s bleak? It’s funny? It’s “profoundly unsettling”? It’s about a possible devil coming to town and screwing everyone over? A *checks notes* tango?? With Satan?? Say less bro
But I must have expected *more* bleakness and profound unsettlement. Or maybe I had too much distraction going on in real life. That’s the only reason I can think of for not vibing with this like I thought I would or wanted to. Even when I think about it, I rationally think “this book’s rad” but I emotionally think “….meh.”
I learned after reading this that there’s a six or seven hour long classic movie of this. Have you watched it? Is it worth it? That’s a long time to be dragged by the nose through the mud by Irimias, which perhaps is the exact point of the movie’s length.
I’ll still read all the other Lasz Kraz on my TBR but maybe won’t rush out to get them. I have so many other valued books to read, already in my grubby little hands, unless Irimias talks me into giving them all to him. #2025books
First book of the year, finally done. It shouldn’t have taken a week to read this fairly short book. But it did. Because I didn’t connect with it like I wanted to. Everything about it is something I love on paper. It’s bleak? It’s funny? It’s “profoundly unsettling”? It’s about a possible devil coming to town and screwing everyone over? A *checks notes* tango?? With Satan?? Say less bro
But I must have expected *more* bleakness and profound unsettlement. Or maybe I had too much distraction going on in real life. That’s the only reason I can think of for not vibing with this like I thought I would or wanted to. Even when I think about it, I rationally think “this book’s rad” but I emotionally think “….meh.”
I learned after reading this that there’s a six or seven hour long classic movie of this. Have you watched it? Is it worth it? That’s a long time to be dragged by the nose through the mud by Irimias, which perhaps is the exact point of the movie’s length.
I’ll still read all the other Lasz Kraz on my TBR but maybe won’t rush out to get them. I have so many other valued books to read, already in my grubby little hands, unless Irimias talks me into giving them all to him. #2025books
The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh Nguyen
109. The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh Nguyen
….meh. Tree of Smoke was so much better.
This isn’t a bad book. It’s probably even a good one. But I expected more (perhaps wrongly) from a Pulitzer winner. And instead of liking any of these people, I longed for Denis Johnson’s characters the whole time. And, kick the poor Sympathizer while he’s down, but I also just read The Disinherited, which also pitted the lure and peril of Communism against each other but in a gnarlier, more heartbreaking way. And well, even a nice sailboat sucks when you’ve just been on yachts.
Confession: I finished this on Jan 1 but I’m counting it as my last 2024 book bc I didn’t want to get stuck looking at it as the first book in the 2025 IG highlight. 🫠 #2024books
….meh. Tree of Smoke was so much better.
This isn’t a bad book. It’s probably even a good one. But I expected more (perhaps wrongly) from a Pulitzer winner. And instead of liking any of these people, I longed for Denis Johnson’s characters the whole time. And, kick the poor Sympathizer while he’s down, but I also just read The Disinherited, which also pitted the lure and peril of Communism against each other but in a gnarlier, more heartbreaking way. And well, even a nice sailboat sucks when you’ve just been on yachts.
Confession: I finished this on Jan 1 but I’m counting it as my last 2024 book bc I didn’t want to get stuck looking at it as the first book in the 2025 IG highlight. 🫠 #2024books
Day of the Oprichnik by Vladimir Sorokin
adventurous
challenging
dark
funny
tense
medium-paced
4.0
🐛🐛🐛🐛
Although I try to not deep-dive too hard on one author at a time, one thing led to another and I read all four of the Sorokin books I own in quick bear-succession. I tried to write near-succession and my phone autocorrected to bear-succession (because it can see the bear on the cover??), proving yet again that AI is scary both in how right it can think it is and in how wrong it can actually be.
Anyway, thinking you’re right when you’re dangerously wrong is fitting for this review, since it’s how I figure Sorokin means us to see main character Komiaga and his murderous, treacherous, pious actions done as an oprichnik, a brutal enforcer in the service of Russia’s government. Komiaga loves his country and believes his drugs, rape, murder and pillage to be done in “faith” to His Majesty. All in a day’s work!
Men behaving badly in the name of service to God, country or king is nothing new. But this is Sorokin so you know it’s gonna get weird. And although this doesn’t go as buck crazy as some of his other work, it has its obscene horrendous moments. And some funny moments. And the best moments which are funny AND obscene AND horrendous. 🐛
(I really hope someone knows why this emoji is here)
#2024books
Although I try to not deep-dive too hard on one author at a time, one thing led to another and I read all four of the Sorokin books I own in quick bear-succession. I tried to write near-succession and my phone autocorrected to bear-succession (because it can see the bear on the cover??), proving yet again that AI is scary both in how right it can think it is and in how wrong it can actually be.
Anyway, thinking you’re right when you’re dangerously wrong is fitting for this review, since it’s how I figure Sorokin means us to see main character Komiaga and his murderous, treacherous, pious actions done as an oprichnik, a brutal enforcer in the service of Russia’s government. Komiaga loves his country and believes his drugs, rape, murder and pillage to be done in “faith” to His Majesty. All in a day’s work!
Men behaving badly in the name of service to God, country or king is nothing new. But this is Sorokin so you know it’s gonna get weird. And although this doesn’t go as buck crazy as some of his other work, it has its obscene horrendous moments. And some funny moments. And the best moments which are funny AND obscene AND horrendous. 🐛
(I really hope someone knows why this emoji is here)
#2024books
Omon Ra by Victor Pelevin
Main character Omon and his best friend want to go to space. They enroll in military school and get chosen for the cosmonaut program. Things turn weird.
It’s alright. Prose (maybe the translation, maybe the source material) is thin and story is predictable, at least for me they were. You ever watch/read/listen to something and some out-of-place detail wrecks your suspension of disbelief, slapping you out of the world the creator(s) established? Like figuring out you’re in a dream because you know your next door neighbor isn’t a conjoined twin with your boss? There’s a name for this occurrence, isn’t there? Anyway, it happened here. A particular moment (which I won’t mention for spoiler reasons) and all was lost.
All that said, it’s not a *bad* book. And if I hadn’t lately been knee deep in much meatier Russian literature, I may not have found this watery. But today? Right now? Meh. It just made me want to go back to Sorokin, which I promptly did. #2024books
It’s alright. Prose (maybe the translation, maybe the source material) is thin and story is predictable, at least for me they were. You ever watch/read/listen to something and some out-of-place detail wrecks your suspension of disbelief, slapping you out of the world the creator(s) established? Like figuring out you’re in a dream because you know your next door neighbor isn’t a conjoined twin with your boss? There’s a name for this occurrence, isn’t there? Anyway, it happened here. A particular moment (which I won’t mention for spoiler reasons) and all was lost.
All that said, it’s not a *bad* book. And if I hadn’t lately been knee deep in much meatier Russian literature, I may not have found this watery. But today? Right now? Meh. It just made me want to go back to Sorokin, which I promptly did. #2024books
Blue Lard by Vladimir Sorokin
adventurous
challenging
dark
funny
tense
5.0
Whaaaaaaat a book. Oh Vlad, you so bad.
Blue Lard by Vladimir Sorokin, translated by Max Lawton. I hesitate to say I loved it because it feels like saying I love murder scenes staged by the criminally insane into red art installations. But I kinda do love those. So I think I loved this. Yeah. I loved it. Is it too cutesy to call it a murder scene staged by the criminally insane into a read art installation?
ITo steal the blurb, it’s “an act of desecration. Blue Lard is what’s left after the towering masterpieces of Russian literature have been blown to smithereens, the most graphic, shocking, controversial, and celebrated book to be published in Russia since the end of Communism.”
That’s a hefty description but it’s probably accurate. This book is an unhinged fever dream. Per Max’s “extroduction,” Sorokin himself can’t explain it all. Going in, I only knew what the blurb said: there’s a futuristic lab where clones of famous Russian authors write under duress and secrete “blue lard,” a scientifically unique substance harvested to power reactors on the moon. The blue lard is stolen by a figuratively and literally underground cult who sends it back in time to an alternate reality where Stalin and Hitler are best buds and Hitler shoots electricity out of his hands.
Despite this, uh, memorable synopsis I’d gotten so distracted by the obscenities and beauty of the first 50 pages (“as he was a coffee table, so has he remained.”) that I forgot all about the plot until I stumbled onto it mid-page. And then I lost the plot again in the caves, disoriented by the layers and distracted by some truly crystalline writing. Because that’s how this book operates. Oh and it can be funny as hell. AAA, I’m looking at you.
Maybe not worth saying it this late in the post but I would 100% not recommend this book to many people. It’s hard to read for 100 reasons. But if you’re into the grotesque and surreal and witty, you’d be into this. #2024books
Blue Lard by Vladimir Sorokin, translated by Max Lawton. I hesitate to say I loved it because it feels like saying I love murder scenes staged by the criminally insane into red art installations. But I kinda do love those. So I think I loved this. Yeah. I loved it. Is it too cutesy to call it a murder scene staged by the criminally insane into a read art installation?
ITo steal the blurb, it’s “an act of desecration. Blue Lard is what’s left after the towering masterpieces of Russian literature have been blown to smithereens, the most graphic, shocking, controversial, and celebrated book to be published in Russia since the end of Communism.”
That’s a hefty description but it’s probably accurate. This book is an unhinged fever dream. Per Max’s “extroduction,” Sorokin himself can’t explain it all. Going in, I only knew what the blurb said: there’s a futuristic lab where clones of famous Russian authors write under duress and secrete “blue lard,” a scientifically unique substance harvested to power reactors on the moon. The blue lard is stolen by a figuratively and literally underground cult who sends it back in time to an alternate reality where Stalin and Hitler are best buds and Hitler shoots electricity out of his hands.
Despite this, uh, memorable synopsis I’d gotten so distracted by the obscenities and beauty of the first 50 pages (“as he was a coffee table, so has he remained.”) that I forgot all about the plot until I stumbled onto it mid-page. And then I lost the plot again in the caves, disoriented by the layers and distracted by some truly crystalline writing. Because that’s how this book operates. Oh and it can be funny as hell. AAA, I’m looking at you.
Maybe not worth saying it this late in the post but I would 100% not recommend this book to many people. It’s hard to read for 100 reasons. But if you’re into the grotesque and surreal and witty, you’d be into this. #2024books