Blowhard, Esq. writes:

Everyone else is doing end-of-the-year recaps, so I thought I’d join the chorus of noise and share mine. I included all of the Teaching Company stuff I listened to even though they’re not technically books because hey, it’s my list and I’ll do what I want.

• Fourteen Western Stories by Lloyd Fonvielle. Sir Barken reviewed it here.
• Classic Dining: Discovering America’s Finest Mid-Century Restaurants by Peter Moruzzi
• The Bannings by Ray Sawhill and Polly Frost. Fabrizio raved about Sawhill’s and Frost’s Sex Scenes here.
• Flashman by George MacDonald Fraser. I wrote about it here.
• A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan
• The Sisters Brothers by Patrick DeWitt
• The Big Book of Legs edited by Dian Hanson
• Sailor Twain by Mark Siegel. I mentioned it here.
• Can Job by Kirsten Mortensen. Fabrizio reviewed it here.
• Look Homeward, America by Bill Kauffman. Paleo Retiree interviewed Kauffman about his movie Copperhead here.
• The Vikings by Kenneth Harl
• Big History by David Christian
• Beowulf translated by Seamus Heaney. I quoted it here and here.
• Poster Art of the Disney Parks by Daniel Handke and Vanessa Hunt
• Ask the Dust by John Fante. I talked about the movie here.
• I Was Looking for a Street by Charles Willeford. I quoted it here and talked about it here.
• I is for Indecent edited by Alison Tyler
• Lady Chatterley’s Lover by D.H. Lawrence
• Art Adrift: Crisis of Painting, 1920 to 1940 and Beyond by Donald Pittenger. Check out Pittenger’s blog.
• Missouri Green by Lloyd Fonvielle
• Miami Blues by Charles Willeford. I quoted it here.
• Pauline Kael: A Life in the Dark by Brian Kellow. Sawhill and Frost interviewed the late, great Kael here.
• BJs on the Roof by Kirsten Mortensen
• Ava Gardner: The Secret Conversations by Peter Green. I quoted it here.
• Somebody Owes Me Money by Donald E. Westlake
• From Bauhaus to Our House by Tom Wolfe
• Los Angeles in the 1930s: The WPA Guide to the City of Angels by the Federal Writers Project
• Religions of the Axial Age by Mark Muesse
• Then Again by Diane Keaton
• Circus by Lloyd Fonvielle
• The High Middle Ages by Philip Daileader
• Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë. I reviewed it here.
• The Late Middle Ages by Philip Daileader
• The Moon and Sixpence by W. Somerset Maugham
• Sir Gawain and the Green Knight translated by W. S. Merwin
• The Early Middle Ages by Philip Daileader
• L.A. ’56: A Devil in the City of Angels by Joel Engel
• Tao Te Ching by Lao Tzu, translated by Victor Mair. I quoted it here.
• Las Vegas: An Unconventional History by Michelle Ferrari and Stephen Ives
• Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys
• Alexander the Great and the Hellenistic Age by Jeremy McInerney
• Casino by Nicholas Pillegi
• When the Mob Ran Vegas: Stories of Money, Mayhem and Murder by Steve Fischer
• Inside Las Vegas by Mario Puzo
• The Complete Pin-Ups by Gil Elvgren
• History of the English Language by Seth Lerer
• In Cold Blood by Truman Capote
• American Religious History by Patrick Allitt
• True Crime Detective Magazines edited by Eric Godtland and Dian Hanson
• How the Crusades Changed History by Philip Daileader. I talked about it here.
• Legacies of Great Economists by Timothy Taylor
• The First American Cookbook: A Facsimile of “American Cookery,” 1796 by Amelia Simmons. I shared a recipe from it here.
• The Shining by Stephen King. More on this in a future post.
• The Americans by Robert Frank
• The Fall of the Pagans the Origins of Medieval Christianity by Kenneth Harl
• The Fantastic Engravings of Wendel Dietterlin
• The Birth of the Modern Mind: The Intellectual History of the 17th and 18th Centuries by Alan Charles Kors
• Pin-Up (Taschen 365: A Year in Pictures Day by Day) edited by Dian Hanson
• Victorian Britain by Patrick Allitt
• Christmas in the West by Lloyd Fonvielle

Books I’m currently reading that I should finish by the end of the year:

• Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë
• The Power of Glamour: Longing and the Art of Visual Persuasion by Virginia Postrel

Books I’m currently taking my time with:

• My Secret Life by “Walter”. I quoted it here.
• The Romance of Lust by Anonymous

What did you enjoy this year? What would you recommend? Also, I’d love to see Fabrizio’s and Sax’s movie lists but I don’t know if WordPress has sufficient storage space for either.