Philip Roth

Ryan wonders if, from my Nobel odds, I was actually pushing Roth.

Na'ah.

Read a few, that was it. There's a lot of them, though. Maybe it's in the ones I didn't read.

I was simply saying that he's been pushed for so long, and revered for so long, that he's probably the most likely American. He may be too cranky, though. McCarthy seems too self-conscious, if you ask me (and also cranky), but then again, postmodern self-consciousness is the core of Murakami, who I sort of like.

In the end, I'm no judge of literature. I do happen to edit books for a living, but I've long ago gone off reading because my brain is so fried by, well, so much reading. Since the DJ is in the business of popular fiction, that's where I live, and when I get away from it, I tend to read either nonfiction or debate stuff or SFF. Serious fiction? Not often. I can't take it seriously.