Good Reading 2022
1. Joe Meno, Book of Extraordinary Tragedies
2. Jan Fridegard, Land of Wooden Gods
3. Hans Keilson, The Death of the Adversary
4. Simon Kuper, Soccer Against the Enemy
5. Bill Jackson, Kid Show: My World of Imagination
6. George Ade, The Old-Time Saloon: Not Wet, Not Dry, Just History
7. Lynd Ward, God's Man: A Novel in Woodcuts
8. John Dos Passos, The Big Money
9. Mike Royko, Dr. Kookie, You're Right!
10. Mark O'Brien, What's Our Name? Everton!
Honorable Mention: Sherwood Anderson, The Egg and Other Stories; George Ade, Pink Marsh; Terry Edwards, Madness' One Step Beyond
Re-Readings: Aleksandar Hemon, Nowhere Man; George Ade, Artie; Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol; Mike Royko, Boss: Richard J. Daley of Chicago; Mike Royko, Slats Grobnik and Some Other Friends; Mike Royko, Sez Who? Sez Me; Mike Royko, Like I Was Sayin'; Mike Royko, Up Against It; Mike Royko, I May Be Wrong, But I Doubt It
Thoughts: Joe Meno is an old favorite of mine, and Book of Extraordinary Tragedies is staggeringly good: funny, heartbreaking, hopeful, and despondent all at once, and his best book yet...I read Land of Wooden Gods in its original Swedish (very, very slowly) during a Scandinavian language class in college, and acquired it a few years ago in English translation; it's a riveting story of Viking life, told from the perspective of a slave...Bill Jackson is a childhood hero of mine, the creator of The B.J. and Dirty Dragon Show, Gigglesnort Hotel, and Cartoon Town; this memoir tells all of the ups and downs of his career, and fortunately for anyone who grew up in the Chicago area during the 1970s, most of his career was ups...Asterisk on The Big Money: it's a long book and I'm far from finished with it, but I'm more than halfway through, so I'll count it as a 2022 read...This was, by design, my Year of Royko: I read all seven of his books that were published during his lifetime, consisting of six collections of his newspaper columns and his brilliant profile of Mayor Daley; Dr. Kookie was the only one that I hadn't read previously.