Reviews #28 and #29: The Chattering Classes
Book Review #28: Conversations with Mr. Prain by Joan Taylor Melville House (June 2006) Book Review #29: The Best of Slate: A 10th Anniversary Anthology Edited by David Plotz, Introduction by Jacob Weisberg, Foreword by Michael Kinsley Atlas Books (June 2006) In typical fashion, I've managed to find a theme in the two totally disparate books I've read most recently: they're both about people who love to talk. In the first, a fictional twosome from opposite sides of the track exemplify talk as battle of wills (and method of foreplay); in the second, members of the digital intelligentsia spout opinions about every issue of the last ten years, making for a lot of conversation for the folks at home. (And for once, both books are actually already available in bookstores.) CONVERSATIONS WITH MR. PRAIN was actually the first book I received through the auspices of Fresh Eyes Now, Robert Gray's project for linking authors with booksellers. His strength is that he knows what we