Tuesday, February 13, 2007

"What is David Plotz reading?"

David Plotz is Slate's deputy editor and author of The Genius Factory: The Curious History of the Nobel Prize Sperm Bank.

I asked him what he has been reading. His reply:

Mostly I'm reading the Bible, because I have been blogging it for Slate. I'm in the Book of Ezekiel now, which is the humane, stoner portion of the Old Testament (a testament that is more often pretty ruthless).

For kicks I'm reading Absurdistan, which I'm about a year late getting to, but does feel hilariously, creepily current given the craziness of Russia. I actually don't like it as it deserves to be liked--I'm worn out with the genre of post-Soviet absurdism (Jonathan Safran Foer, etc.).

And I'm dipping into Arthur Allen's fantastic new book Vaccine, which is a history of, uh, vaccines, and is more entertaining than any book about shots has a right to be.

Read the results of the Page 69 Test for David's The Genius Factory.

And visit the official Genius Factory website where you can learn more about the book.

Arthur Allen put his book Vaccine to the Page 69 Test; look for more on that subject tomorrow here on the blog.

--Marshal Zeringue