So, I finished Resolution 1! Queue up the fanfare! HOORAY! But…I didn’t read Life of Pi.
I just couldn’t get into the book, couldn’t find it gripping or engaging…it was certainly cerebral, encouraged a deep thought of sorts, but it just didn’t catch me…I found myself zoning out after reading only a couple pages. And though I knew the goal was to read a whole book by the end of the week, I knew I wasn’t going to make it if I kept trying to struggle through that novel. Sure, I plan to read it eventually…just didn’t read it last week. And I didn’t end up reading Boomtown either…So what did I read?
The classiest book I've ever read. The word "breast" is featured on each cover, so you know it's a hit.
Yes, I own a “smut book” from 1961. It was 50 cents on a March of Dimes fundraiser table at a local K-Mart, and it was worth the 50 cents alone to perform a brief oration while walking with my friends from the K-Mart to a nearby restaurant. But after being jaded by the dreariness of Life of Pi (which I’m sure gets better and definitely will get read by me sometime), I think I just wanted to read something I thought would be fun. Turns out I got a lot more than I expected from this book…it seems that in the early 1960s they demanded actual plot and semi-quality writing in its “adult reading,” and so I found out that Bedroom Alibi was actually a decently-composed mystery novel with plot twists, murder, and, yes, bedrooms.
Turns out that reading this book provided me a pretty awesome view back into the 1960s as only an English major could travel. You can actually see from the cover alone the female subjugation, the male’s fully-dressed gaze of ownership on the naked female body…yeah, it’s a “smut” book, but there’s still plenty for an English major to do here. The characters commonly refer to hired help as the “Mex maid” or “Mex waiter,” terms that could be seen as derogatory in a modern context. Also, there are continual references to women having intellectual weakness, women talking about how they felt they were victims because the criminal knew they would be weak… Then again, there’s also the back cover…
A woman who knew what her tongue, mouth, breasts and thighs could do to a man — make him lie, steal, gamble his life and profession for her. A man, whose maleness (codeword for…uh…male equipment…) made a woman lie, steal, gamble her life and profession–even kill for him!
And the power of the phallus rears its ugly head…maybe that was a poor play on words….
Regardless of whether or not I read something intellectually stimulating, I ended up reading a novel which had all of three sex scenes of about 2 paragraphs a piece, and found out that the rest of the book was a decently composed novel. Resolution 1 served it’s purpose: I made a goal, completed the goal, and learned something I might not have if I hadn’t set the goal. I’m not sure that I ever would have read Bedroom Alibi if I hadn’t cut this particular deal with myself…not to say that my life would have been completely unfulfilled without it, but it would have lacked a little…perspective.
Resolution Score: 1/1.
See you later for Resolution 2!
-Josh
Weekly Resolution 