Street Book - The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera

Found - at the CAN MOCAMP in Kas, Turkey
Picked Up Because - This was a book in English!

This novel written in the mid 80's is told through a interesting point of view. From the start the athor let's the reader know that it is just a story and the people in it just characters. The "story" of these fake people is told around very real historical events that happened in Prague starting with the Russian occupation the spring of 1968. A film of this book was made in 1988 with Daniel Day-Lewis cast as the books womanizer who lives for his work as a surgeon, but falls for a young woman with unstable dreams that he makes his wife. This does not stop the sex he craves with many other woman to fill his intellectual thirst. One of this mans lovers is a strange Artist that has a reason of her own for her over sexed lifestyle. The Arthur has a tendency to take small timeouts from his lovers lives to explain the human mind and how we may see the acts of fate by using philosophy and other rants. Is the world "Light" to some and "Heavy" for others? Is the feeling of lightness a reaction to being free? Or just a symptom of the mind that wants to fit feeling with fact? In this book these are not questions that can have a answer, just ways to help the fake lives of these people seem more real. Some parts of this Novel one will read twice just to let it all soak in and that is what makes this a great book.

Street Book Here is New York E.B White

Found - Houston and 2ND
Picked up because - E. B. White is he American Author of Charlotte's Web

Finding certain books on the street feels like fate. One look down and there could be an adventure at your feet. This small volume by E.B. White has some revealing things to say about New York City. Written in 1948 when the city was different, but was it that different then? The City has always been the City of Dreams, has it not? This book has been called an essay because it kind of teaches more to the reader then one would think. In this White touches on the real New York and how it feels to live in the Big Apple at the height of its glory. He seems to know all the things that ring true for the city and its people. With a turn of phrase and informative rants this book is a must read for all New Yorkers. This Street Book came with a note inside "Here is to finding your New York during your stay. Enjoy the Adventure and embrace serendipity." So if fate steeps in and "Here is New York" is your next read don't feel surprised

Street Books - Madame Bovary Gustave Flaubert

Found - Central Park
Picked up because - Its a classic

In the days of high speed Internet and cable T.V. its hard to realize how monotonous life was back in the 1850's. In France at the time there was a big difference between everyday life and the popular novels. Gustave Flaubert wanted to point out this fact in his first novel "Madame Bovary." In this story a young Doctor marries an older widow his mother picked out. Then he becomes a widow himself, ah such is life. When he meets the young Miss Bovary she marries the Doctor. He moves from one small town to a slightly bigger town in northern France, near Rouen in Normandy to please his new wife. The book is told through his "eyes" till this point. Then the reader gets into Madame Bovary head. She wants luxury and romance, but gets bored with her not so sharp husband. Walk with her down the wrong road of infidelity and debt. This bestseller of the 1850's was put on trial when it came out for "offenses against morality and religion." The story of longing and seduction is considered a masterpiece. Reading it now over a century latter the themes seem to echo forward. After all life might be different but the struggles of love are the same.

Street Books - Valley of the Dolls Jacqueline Susann

Found - Coat check in Atlantic City
Picked up because - Wanted to read again

Vally of the Dolls by Jacqueline Susann was a instant hit. Her tale of three friends brought together by life in 1940's New York City, was a sensation in 1966. Even now one can find it in every book store, or when getting coats from a casino in Atlantic City. This book is worth reading a second time. This is hard because when you lend it out to people it never comes back. That's what happens with really good books, they come in and out of your life. New York.. if you can make it there you can make it anywhere.. hard to say why this rings true. People come to New York to catch a dream. Each of Jacqueline's woman has a dream to achieve, each one has heart to break, and each find help in the "Dolls." Those beautiful little helpers that keep everything on track. This story is set when women were on the verge of liberation. It has all the dangers that have to be over come to make it on your own. Read it and then pass it on, its that good.

Street Books - Inner City Hoodlum Donald Goines

Found - Eastern Parkway and Washington Ave across the street from the Brooklyn Museum of Art
Picked up because - The name of the book "Inner City Hoodlum"

This is a short little fiction that is set in the "Cesspool of Los Angeles." This story is about the streets and from the streets. This is the last book from who is concerted one of the first African American writers of urban fiction Donald Goines. Inner City Hoodlum, which Goines had finished before his death, was published posthumously in 1975. Donald did have a hard life on the streets. He Lived and finally died on the streets when he and his wife were shot to death in Detroit one October night. Goines has been a thief, a pimp, drug dealer and an addict. He has lived the life of his characters. He wrote 16 books in just five years, most in jail or the Penitentiary. Some of his books have become films, such as "Never Die Alone" and "Crime Partners" with Ice-T and Snoop Dogg. Many rappers have praised Goines and his writing like RZA, 2Pac, Nas, Ghostface Killah, Ludacris, and Common. This career criminal with seven prison sentences proved he could also be a writer and could give the "real" story from the ghetto. In this book he has a good story of two friends that get pulled deeper and deeper into the "game." A story that runs into some tight spots that make it that much more exciting. To bad this author was gunned down in the streets and the identity of the killer or killers remains unknown.

Street Books - Present at the Future Ira Flatow

Found- Ludlow and Stanton St. in the LES.

Picked up because - Ira Flatow is on NPR.
Ira Flatow is the heart of NPR's Science Friday. He has come out with a book to help us realize that we live in the future now. This book makes things like Cosmology and Nanotechnology look easy, well easy to explain anyway. He does us a favor by breaking down science principles in such a light hearted way. The first five chapters look inward to the mind. These are kind of a searching exercise for you brain. Then he moves out to space before coming home again to Global Warming. This look at the energy crises does not stop there. No Mr. Flatow dives deep into the types of energy we use and could be using in the future. One of the most eye opening chapters is about technology at its smallest, Nanoscale Science and Engineering. Before it all over he dabbles in the everyday science he likes to point out in a segment he calls "Beauty in the Details." In this book Ira Flatow shows us that the future is now so we are all "Present at the Future."

Street Books - Nicholas Ray An American Journey by Bernard Eisenschitz

Found - Essex St. and Rivington St in the LES .
Picked up because - James Dean on cover.
Nicholas Ray was an under appreciated part of early Hollywood. An highly passionate director that most people don't know by name. Yes everyone knows "Rebel Without a Cause" was a classic, but now after reading this biography by Bernard Eisenschitz, one finds that this director had real life experience with the nitty-gritty of American life through the 30's and 40's. Born in the Midwest he moved to New York during the depression, there he became a part of the theater. Then when President Roosevelt's New Deal gave many artist work throughout the country, Nick went out into the backwoods of this country to help rural areas with local theater activities. These experiences in peoples homes and backyards in the 30's helped Nick set up the feeling of real American hardship in his films. During this time Nick got to work with Charles and Pete Seeger. This started his love of folk and blues (used in most of his films) and Nick's technical skills in sound. Before going back to theater and then moving on to film Nick moved back to New York. Working the sound for many jazz clubs he meet Billy Holiday and other greats. Also he would bring up some of the musicians that worked with him on the radio and lived with him in the country like Leadbelly. Living such a rich life before Nick went west to Hollywood might have been why he seemed so passionate to others in the film industry. In this book Bernard Eisenschitz takes you from movie to movie with an easy flow. Here is where the reader gets the whole story about RKO, and Howard Hughes. Lucky RKO lent Nick out for Bogart's "In a Lonely Place." The title says a lot about how Hollywood could feel for the writer/Director. Even in the western, Johnny Guitar there are hints of how Nick felt about Hollywood with lines like: 'I'm a stranger here myself." The best is how Nick handled the actors and actresses. Mostly with little whispered suggestions, he was said to be able to pull the character out of the actor. Working in a very loose way, sometimes with only part of a script he would encourage improvisation, unheard of with most directors of the time. This book does not glorify Nick, Eisenschitz puts in all the gambling, drinking, and the problems with Nick's wife's. Eventually Nick goes to Europe to make some films, then ends up back in New York as a teacher and lecture. Film direction, Nick told his students, is a "hunt for the truth" This books "hunt for the truth" was more then just a story about Nick Ray, it was about how sometimes we as Americans don't really see who we are. How we need artists like Nicholas Ray to show us our own story before we believe in it.

-Nicholas Ray An American Journey by Bernard Eisenschitz, translated from French by Tom Milne

Street Books - Ghosts of 42ND Street Anthony Bianco

Found - Brooklyn on Gram near Metropolitan
Picked up because - black and white cover looked cool
History is never boring on the forty deuce, from stars to strippers its seen it all. This little corner of New York became the center of the world, "The Great White Way." Then it almost fell into ruin before being lifted up back on high. Yes it's a ruff and tumble story. A great topic for a book, fitting that our first "Street Book" is about a street. This does read easy but also tells specifics. Theater from vaudeville to burlesque, business from real estate to retail, even some police actions. All the cheaters of the streets come out when reading about what went down on 42ND and Broadway. From stables to today what other part of America could make 300 pages seem like a quick read. An exciting twenty four hour, year round street part of what makes New York, New York. Times Square is a destination for the whole world and after reading "Ghost" you know why.