Nightlight News

Summer Breeding is what the mosquitoes are doing right now. They weren't really doing much of anything to speak of, and then Tropical Storm Bernard? Billy? oh - Barry dropped water and I guess he kinda fueled the Summer Breeding.

But what I really meant to write about was summer reading, but "potty" brain insists on being heard first. Summer reading is what they talk about in all the magazines, and radio shows, and apparently we are all supposed to be doing it right now? I don't know, because except for kids on summer vacation and people taking off work (aka on holiday), most of us are still working and living the same schedule as before right? And what about hot weather makes you want to read more? I guess when it gets really muggy and even moving slightly causes one to break out into a ridiculous sweat, perhaps reading is the highest impact activity imaginable. I actually tend to enjoy sweating, although the effects on my axillar odor are somewhat distasteful to those of effete nasal sensibility, like my momma. Nevertheless, a fondness for perspiration would definitely put me in the minority.

I tend to find reading to be difficult. OK - qualify that statement, you say. I can read fine. I find it hard to finish books. I get somewhere past the first thirty pages and then just plain up and lose interest. So the best things for me to read are a) short story collections b) comics c) magazines d) non-fiction and reference books e) internet music reviews f)job boards g)news. I shy away from fiction and storybooks, except on long vacations, like sojourns to Mexico. But nevertheless, in the sheer interests of consistency with the other medias - like the NPR program Day-to-Day "Summer Page-Turners" I now do my best to produce the -

Nightlight Summer Reading Club

It's not really a club in the sense that you can join. And certainly not as influential as Oprah's much lauded but secretly conspiratorial Book Club. That is, I do not conspire, by suggesting these novels, to lift you out of any slump, or help you recover from anything, except maybe boredom. I doubt these books will save your womanhood, or renew your faith in god, but then again, WHO KNOWS!! But I welcome your comments, and please let us know about your favorite summer books, and if you write a review of something (short, like 100 words), I'll post it here. OK? Just email nightlightbooking(at)gmail.com
Ready, set, go!


First on the list is Labyrinths. This paperback is a Borges collection, and as such, it is full of the a-type charklies approved book content - short stories, although there are also essays and other such writings. Borges has an inimitable quality and ability to create works of fiction that are as mind-bogglingly complex as an encyclopedia, very intelligent, interesting, and suggestive. Suggestive of higher disciplines like metaphysics or linguistics, but grounded in a style that mimics the essay while painting a picture of fictional worlds. Often the short stories begin as if picking up from some other spot that was never written about - Borges appeals mainly to my sense of the absurd and my desire for writing that challenges both the vocabulary and the mind of the reader. In this case, many of the writings in Labyrinths encourage we the readers to subvert our casual relationship with natural reality in favor of a creative and morphing concept of the world as an illusion through which we illustrate vastly complicated and yet terribly simplistic ruminations.








Kramer's Ergot, for the unaware, is possibly the coolest and most interesting collection of underground comics going around these days. This is the sixth of the series, and somehow, it falls short of the last two. Maybe it's that there are too many "real-life" style comics, and not enough of the weird and wacked style that held my attention in the past editions (like the Matt Brinkman comic, or Leif Goldberg's). Editor Sammy Harkham has done a great job of putting together some real eye-pleasers, and there are plenty of interesting stories - especially the mind-blowing Popul Vuh High School (21 Jaguar St) - which just about justifies the asking price (see below). For those of you that thought Popol Vuh was just Werner Herzog's house band, relearn - P.V. is the Mayan Book of the Dead, and in this comic, it gets recast as the story of a surreal high school. The hypercolor finale pages are inspiring to say the very least. Kramer's Ergot is a good way for folks who are interested in comic art to throw down a fat wad of dough ($35) in order to recieve a beautiful present to yourself that gives and gives. Souther Salazar's super-cute Ferver and Razzle is a personal fave, and as always, C.F.'s adventure stories are interesting. PaperRad's style is inimitable and always welcome in any comp. Overall, Kramer's Ergot remains the stand-out comics anthology of the day.


Andrew Weil is a totally well-respected scientist who did a bunch of carefully planned and well thought out experiments where he gave stoners and non-stoners regular doses of marijuana back in the late 60s and he came to some very interesting conclusions. This book, in a weird way, is the closest thing on this list to an Oprah Book Club selection because it can really help those of us who have intense relationships with drugs understand why we seek out these moments of altered conciousness, and what we can do to maintain non-self-destructive relationships with drugs. In other words, he has some really good things to say about fucking yourself up, and why you might be more/less inclined to do so. For instance, he helped me understand what it was about alcohol I didn't like (too "noisy" in the head), and what it was about marijuana that was so appealing (puts you in the present, with little regard for immediate future or past, hence the semi-oblivious stoner gaze and attention). The beauty of the book too, for the hard of attention span like yours truly, is that you can pick it up and put it down at will without worrying about losing your place - the chapters stand on their own. That is especially true for the chapter on the drug habits of Amazonia's inhabitants. A good read for anyone with a slightly intellectual attitude towards their own self-destruction or investigation into altered conciousness. Also an excellent argument in favor of meditation.




More books to come? Doubt it, going kinda slow on the above and haven't picked up something new in a while. I say to you - RECOMMEND!! Although, I do religiously read The Nation and Harper's, and got an information packet from ATTRA that has really caught my attention. It's called Building Better Places: Federal Programs for Sustainable Agriculture, Forestry, Entrepreneurship, Conservation, and Community Development . . .