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Published on January 13, 2008

Reading: “Midnight in the Garden of Good & Evil” by John Berendt and
“The Penguin Guide to Jazz on CD” by Richard Cook & Brian Morton
    Fourteen years after publication, Berendt’s characters still thrill with their eccentricities and vivid personalities. At the heart of this ‘non fiction novel’ is a murder in a grand Savannah mansion. As the electrifying story unfolds, the strange lives of the conservative citizens of this sleepy southern American city intertwine with astonishing effect. It would have been easy for Berendt to go for the sensational. Instead, with restraint and exquisite prose, he weaves a movie for the mind. A true modern classic.  
    “The Penguin Guide to Jazz on CD” by Richard Cook & Brian Morton
Larger and heavier than a brick, thousands of reviews of jazz on CD cover the entire history of this everinventive art. From Albert Ammons to John Zorn, each CD is starred, catalogued and evaluated and all the musicians are listed. This is a book that jazz lovers will continuously dip into rather than read from cover to cover. But if, for example, one reads all the reviews of a single artist such as Miles Davis, the development of his music leaps off the page. The 127 page index, a delirious tour de force, not only leads you to each musician, it also takes the completist to every CD they appear on. The Guide is a towering achievement that will never be bettered.