Ripped through Matched last week and relished it. Don’t let the inevitable comparisons to Hunger Games influence you. While the similarities are obvious, the tone of Matched is quite different.
The two cent summary follows: Matched takes place in the dystopian future where virtually everyone conforms to rules of the Society. Couples are matched by the government. Food, art, clothing, and everything else is provided and restricted by Big Brother in the form of Officials. Every citizen carries three pills or risks an infraction, or worse – reclassification as an Aberration or Anomaly. Cassia is our protagonist, and she can be pretty infuriating at times, but that’s what makes this story unpredictable.
Matched is one of three. The wait for number two, Crossed, due November 2011 already feels interminable.
Left and right this month stores are pleading with you to buy this and buy that. It’s fucking exhausting, and difficult to separate the worthy from unworthy. As you know, the recommendations here at Demeter Clarc are 100% commercially unbiased. I don’t get free shit and then tell you how great it is. Free shit is always great. Anyway, I digress. 
A couple years ago, I received a fantastic gift I didn’t even know I wanted. When the Kindle first came out, like many folks, I dismissed it for a variety of reasons. A book lover and collector, I mistakenly believed the Kindle would rob me of the tactile romance with the bound page. Furthermore, the last thing anyone wants to do nowadays is stare at another screen.
Thankfully, the purchaser only listens to about 50% of what I say and bought a Kindle as a birthday gift (despite my vocal knee-jerk skepticism). Without further historical narrative, the reasons the Kindle rules. 
You will read more for less money. New releases are typically $9.99 – $14.99. 
The screen isn’t like a computer screen, so stop tripping. It’s not reflective. The type is dark, clear, and easy on the eyes. A favorite feature is the ability to increase font size to avoid eye strain. 
Purchasing a physical book, when an electronic version is available, is arguably a waste of the earth’s resources. On a more personal level, think about your own environment. Do you need more clutter? (Paging A&E, we have a Hoarder.) Even worse, please don’t be that pretentious asshole that compulsively displays every book he or she has read (and several they haven’t) in an obvious effort to appear intellectual. 
Obviously, for travel, the Kindle is essential. Instead of hauling a bunch of books on the plane, all you need is your little buddy. Upon finishing one book, start another; no need to plug into a computer. The Kindle is a self-contained mechanism. The battery life is long and apparently keeps getting longer with each new and improved version. An early-adopter and heavy user, I still have the dinosaur prototype version. Other than a crack running through the keyboard, it works well in almost every capacity. J’adore my Kindle ya’ll.
While you may think you know the story of Lolita, if you have not read Nabokov’s literary masterpiece, you are missing out on one of the most brilliant, touching, perverse, and entertaining books of the last hundred years.
A meditation on youth, loss, trauma, and sexual manipulation, Nabokov employs wry humor and presents his characters without judgment. This subject matter could have easily drowned in the obvious cultural taboo of pedophilia, but Nabokov accesses an emotional purity that artfully bypasses such cliches. Woven into the story are little winks and nods which keep it from suffering under the weight of itself.
Nabokov wrote the screenplay for Kubrick’s 1962 film adaptation, and there is also a 1997 version with Dominique Swain, Jeremy Irons, and a memorable Melanie Griffith. In this case, the book is better than the movies. Lolita is well worth your time and deserves a space on your bookshelf. 
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