5 Books that Won’t Impress a Boy

15 06 2012

Bored BoyI figured I would follow up on my last post, 5 Books that Won’t Impress a Girl, with a list of books that won’t impress a boy.

5. Confessions of a Guidette – Nicole "Snooki" Polizzi. Boys are not fans of celebrity memoirs. Besides, Jersey Shore kids are meant to be watched, not read. So let’s just hide that under the stack of Vanity Fairs, where it should be.

4. Eat, Love, Pray – Elizabeth Gilbert. Not only is this book unrealistic – she gets a book advance large enough to fund a year’s worth of travel and introspection – but we have to watch Julia Roberts in the movie adaptation.

3. A Room of One’s Own – Virginia Woolf. Yes, she is making a timely (written in 1928) and important point about women’s place in fiction, as writers, and the public sphere. But does she have to take so long to say it? I would like to see her and Hemmingway together for coffee.

2. Pride and Prejudice – Jane Austen. Girls read this because they all want a Mr. Darcy. Unfortunately, this puts too much pressure on us boys. The reality is: Colin Firth is not really Mr. Darcy, and most men are not good ballroom dancers. So, please stop asking us to take lessons. 

1. Any Play by Shakespeare – Shakespeare. To be perfectly frank: we can barely understand a sonnet, let alone be able to memorize one and recite it to you under the next pale moon.





5 Books That Won’t Impress a Girl

8 06 2012

Recently I read this article on the Paris Review blog: What Books Impress a Girl.

Rather than add to the conversation, I figured I would add my top 5 books that will never impress a girl. In fact, I’ve received more eye-rolling than amorous adulation from girls when they spotted these titles on my bookshelf:

5. The Death and Life of Superman – Roger Stern. Yes, it’s a book. Yes, I bought this in 92, when he actually “died”. I was quite sad when it happened. Despite that, my partner says, “you’re in your thirties, move on!”

4. Moby Dick – Herman Melville.“Have you seen the great white whale?” Boys like tales of the high-seas,  high-adventure, and revenge. Girls… well, they don’t.

3. Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas – Hunter S. Thompson. A story about drugs, excess, and finding the American dream? Blegh. Girls do not go Gonzo for Gonzo Journalism.

2. Tropic of Cancer or Tropic of Capricorn — Henry Miller. Isn’t he a misogynist? And, aren’t his female characters mere fabrications of a thirteen year-old boy’s dream? Yes. And, sigh, yes.

1. The Twilight series — Stephenie Meyer. What are those doing on your shelf, next to the movies? And what’s with the Robert Pattinson action figure… I think we should talk…








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