I have been doing a lot more reading lately. Much of the time, I feel as though I simply don’t have the time to read—or should be doing something ‘more productive’ instead, but, in the last few weeks, reading has felt like a necessary activity.

So, here are some of the books I have been giving my time to as of late:

First, the books I have finished reading:
The Art of Asking—Amanda Palmer (Grand Central Publishing)
Dancing With Myself—Billy Idol (Touchstone)
Anger Is An Energy: My Life Uncensored—John Lydon (Simon & Schuster UK)
Man’s Search for Meaning—Viktor E. Frankl (Washington Square Press)

The books I am reading, or are in the queue:
Mr. Mike: The Life and Work of Michael O’Donoghue—Dennis Perrin (Avon Books)
Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking—Susan Cain (Crown Publishers)
Revolution—Russell Brand (Ballantine Books)

I actually bought the Russell Brand book first, but had to start on the John Lydon book as soon as it arrived. God bless John Lydon; if he did not already exist, nobody would be able to invent him. I wish I had his determination, his ability to be blunt and outspoken, and his ability to surprise. Here is a man who does not take any bullshit—but neither does he have any illusions about himself; he actually strikes me as quite a humble man, in his own way.

I bought the Amanda Palmer book last Monday (11/17), and finished it in less than a day. Whether or not you have heard of Amanda Palmer—and whether or not you even like Amanda Palmer (I like her for the most part, but do sometimes find her annoying)—there is really no arguing that she has a lot to say about the importance of human connection and the increasing lack of it in our society at this point in time. It is impossible to read this book and not be moved at some point along the way. The Art of Asking is an essential read, if you ask me.

Billy Idol’s memoir is all the more impressive because (like Amanda Palmer’s book) he actually wrote it himself. No ghostwriter, or ‘with’ or ‘as told’ to credit—just Billy Idol. Similar to John Lydon, Idol does not appear to have any illusions about himself—and the book is an entertaining/interesting read.

The Viktor E. Frankl book I read in preparation for a CreativeLive course and its accompanying exercises. Whether or not you can get past the account of his life in WWII concentration camps, it is worth reading. The logotherapy approach to overcoming problems surprised me, as it wasn’t something I had thought of before. In some ways, it is very much of its time (the original German edition was published in 1946)—but it still has insights that can be applied to the present.

Mr. Mike will be familiar to those folks who at least remember the early days of Saturday Night Live or Mr. Mike’s Mondo Video. There was a certain cynical, twisted aspect of Michael O’Donoghue’s comedy that is sadly missing today. For me, it is probably most apparent in the 1988 movie Scrooged, which he co-wrote. The TV spots for the Xmas specials (The Night the Reindeer Died, starring Lee Majors; Father Loves Beaver; Bob Goulet’s Cajun Christmas, starring Robert Goulet; and the live broadcast of Scrooged—Dickens’ A Christmas Carol—with John Houseman, Buddy Hackett, Mary Lou Retton, and the Solid Gold Dancers) in particular are prime Mr. Mike. The first couple of the chapters of the book are kind of dull, really—but I expect it to get more interesting as it gets into his involvement with National Lampoon and Saturday Night Live.

Okay! Back to my soup. Rock on, y’all…

(23 November 2014)