The Best American Nonrequired Reading 2006 (The Best American Series) (Paperback)

by Dave Eggers (Editor), Art Spiegelman (Illustrator), Matt Groening (Introduction)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. The Best American Nonrequired Reading Series marks its fifth year by expanding the scope of the collection, to include shorter pieces, fragments of stories, transcripts, screenplays, and lists. Brilliantly, Eggers opens with a Best American roundup of notable words and sentences, including "Best American Fake Headlines" from The Onion, "Best American Excerpt from a Military Blog," and "Best American First Sentences of Novels of 2005" (from Bret Easton Ellis's semi-autobiographical Lunar Park: "You do an awfully good impression of yourself"). Contributors of more substantial pieces include Judy Budnitz, Joe Sacco, Cat Bohannon, Kurt Vonnegut, Julia Sweeney and Haruki Murakami, to name a few, and draw from such wide-ranging sources as The Georgia Review, The Washington Post, This American Life and GQ. The result is a collection that's both uproarious and illuminating. In the introduction, comic strip artist and The Simpsons creator Groening provides a list of books that "will keep you up late at night when you're supposed to be sleeping or making love." This is one such book.
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Review
Starred Review. The Best American Nonrequired Reading Series marks its fifth year by expanding the scope of the collection, to include shorter pieces, fragments of stories, transcripts, screenplays, and lists. Brilliantly, Eggers opens with a Best American roundup of notable words and sentences, including "Best American Fake Headlines" from The Onion, "Best American Excerpt from a Military Blog," and "Best American First Sentences of Novels of 2005" (from Bret Easton Ellis's semi-autobiographical Lunar Park: "You do an awfully good impression of yourself"). Contributors of more substantial pieces include Judy Budnitz, Joe Sacco, Cat Bohannon, Kurt Vonnegut, Julia Sweeney and Haruki Murakami, to name a few, and draw from such wide-ranging sources as The Georgia Review, The Washington Post, This American Life and GQ. The result is a collection that's both uproarious and illuminating. In the introduction, comic strip artist and The Simpsons creator Groening provides a list of books that "will keep you up late at night when you're supposed to be sleeping or making love." This is one such book.
  (Publishers Weekly )

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Product Details

• Paperback: 400 pages
• Publisher: Mariner Books; 1st edition (October 11, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0618570519
• ISBN-13: 978-0618570515
• Product Dimensions: 8.1 x 5.5 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #62,792 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

53 of 53 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars 2006 Is Best Edition So Far, October 1, 2006

By	M. JEFFREY MCMAHON "herculodge" (Torrance, CA USA) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

Not resting on their laurels, the BANR editors have devised a more creative approach for 2006 including sections "Best American Headlines" (from The Onion); "Best American Daily Show Exchange on the Anniversary of Watergate" (from Jon Stewart discussion with Stephen Colbert); Best American Answers to the Question "What Do You Believe Is True Even Though You Cannot Prove It?" (scientists and philosophers reveal their beliefs); "Best American First Sentences of Novels of 2005"; "Best American New Words and Phrases." You can see from these titles that BANR is going beyond its usual stories and essays. Other highlights include:

Cat Bohannon. Shipwreck. A short story about a death cult that preserves corpses and draws huge art crowds, a meditation on our inability to deal with our mortality.

Judy Bunitz. Nadia. A short story about a man who orders a mail order bride.

A Soldier's Thoughts. An American soldier blogs about the despair of being trapped in the quagmire of the Iraq war.

Tom Downey. The Insurgent's Tale. A profile of an insurgent who begans to have scruples about the bloodshed he is causing against the Iraqi people, a great complement to "A Soldier's Thoughts."

George Saunders. The New Mecca. A diary style account of Saunders' trip to Dubai where he witnesses the excess of an opulent dystopia built on the backs of slave labor. The excess grotesqueries complement David Foster Wallace's famous boat cruise essay "A Supposedly Fun Thing I Would Never Do Again."

Julia Sweeney. Letting Go of God? Saturday Night Live performer's famous critique of religion.

Sam Shaw. Peg. A short story about a husband and wife who, having nothing to live for but materialism, retreat into an insane world.

Haruki Murakami. The Kidney-Shaped Stone That Moves Every Day. Another fabulous fable by Murakami about the elusiveness of relationships.

Kurt Vonnegut. Here Is A Lesson in Creative Writing. A satire about the lame formulas for teaching the writing of fiction.

14 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Best American Non-Required Reading on the Middle East?, March 2, 2007

By	SORE EYES (Boulder/Wellington) - See all my reviews

I have read two of the other books in this series and loved them. Unfortunately, the 2006 edition does not include the diverse range of subject matter that the other editions have included. For reasons which are not explained in the introduction by Matt Groening, 80 percent of the material in the 2006 edition is from writers trying to make a simplistic point about the Middle East. There are soldier blogs, reviews of luxury hotels in Dubai, stories about terrorists-all with the theme that "we're all the same" in the "we-just-want-to-love-our-family-make-a-living" kind of way. It's a message that any sensitive, well-read person who isn't spending their summers at Jesus Camp would know. And if you aren't a sensitive and well-read person, you aren't going to be picking up this book. The editors are guilty of preaching to the converted.

A lot of the writing here is mediocre. The pieces have been chosen because they fit a theme, not because they are original or well written. I would have preferred one or two pieces regarding Dave Eggers and Matt Groening's point on humanity and then some other pieces which were capable of provoking OTHER types of thought. George Saunders brings us a story about the "New Mecca"- Dubai. He writes about the thousands of workers from India and Vietnam who have been imported to this new paradise. But do I want to read a story about oppressed workers from the point of view of a writer who describes himself and his wife as having a "hobby of maxing out all credit cards in sight"? Or a writer who is interested in Dubai because his editors are willing to pay $1500 a night for him to experience "heaven" at the Durj Al Arab hotel? Ummm, NO!

There are a FEW other subjects in this book, but again-the stories seem to be emphasizing a point to the people that already believe it. I was really disappointed to find I had already read many of the stories and pieces in this edition. Eggers and Groening didn't go far in their attempt to bring me unique reading.

Still, I look forward to the 2007 edition.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Some of it is more nonrequired than you may think, August 5, 2007

By	Andrew Mckim "man on the scene" (Chicago) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This is a good enough read mostly for the fact that you can skip whatever you don't care enough about and read only what peaks your interest. It's even better if you did like me and got it from the library.

The first section is good with all the Onion articles and Daily Show transcript. Then I also enjoyed Julia Sweeney's essay about letting go of God like he was almost an imaginary friend. Also, The Innocents and one or two of the other comics were good. False Cognate as well, was superbly done. And Kurt Vonnegut, c'mon, the man could find something interesting to say about parting your hair, let alone creative writing, which he did know quite a bit about. The best was the diagram of Kafka.

Too many of the stories unfortunately deal with Iraq and the Middle East in general, however, and this is the part I meant when you are able to skip over uninteresting parts. This is no doubtdue to the selection committee is mostly high school area kids from the Bay Area. You take that impressionable age group and you throw in a democratic selection process so everyone gets a say, you're going to wind up with a message along the lines of "Uh, this is like real important to us, man. Cuz". Yeah, you kiddies mean well, but teenagers, if you're going to attempt vague hippie-esque techniques, don't forget the dope, guns, and f'ing in the streets.