[Note: Movable Snipe is a week-long feature wherein two writers read and evaluate five blogs, sending each other one letter a day. This week's Snipers are Michael Helke and Fiona Maazel. Michael's first letter can be accessed here; Fiona's response to it, here. Day Two: Michael.]

The -Ist Factor: Late 90's novels end with the same insufferable suffix

Hey, Michael. I did just read that anonymous response to my letter. But since I’m so vapid and adolescent, I can’t muster the emotional wherewithal to care.

Gerry Adams: PW called A Farther Shore “suspenseful, biased, subversive, blunt and often funny.” The NYTBR said of Before the Dawn, “There are frequent flashes of good writing.” Some guy said of Cage Eleven, “I don't believe a terrorist, with a hatred of all things British will give a honest account of the UK justice system.” Adams has written nine books. Is this funny about, uh, Sin and Cessation? Yes. Yes, it is. Dear Anonymous: for more enlightening news about what goes on in the world of literature, do visit The Elegant Variation.

I’m pretty interested in this stuff about the good childhood, too. Crooked Timber is plugging a symposium on the topic, which seems just interesting enough to excuse the soporific and, I guess, pointedly derivative title of the event. The good soldier, the good daughter, I guess such titles are in vogue, sort of like the ubiquity of the “ist” suffix in novel titles of the late nineties. The Archivist, The Intuitionist, et al. Just read Sally Schrag’s 2-page précis, which you can download off the site. It’s compelling. Is a good childhood middle-class? Is that what the phrase means? Hey, Michael, did you have a middle-class childhood? Was it good? Mine was not so middle-class, not at all, and—oh, wait, I am being pithy again. Alas.

Here’s the thing I can’t handle about 3 Quarks Daily: it makes me feel stupid. Dear Anonymous: You’re right, I am stupid. Certainly unversed in a lot of what 3 Quarks thinks I should know, or rather, presumes I should know. This bit about Philip Rieff is apropos what, exactly? And who the hell is Philip Rieff? And why are none of these book titles in italics? I’m supposed to know Philipic (sic) Fellow Teachers is a book? And why is this post lifted from this month’s Book Forum with no attribution? I am totally confused.

So much so that I have no energy left to talk N. Korea except to say that Drezner is appropriately skeptical about today’s agreement with N. Korea. Kim Jong-Il is, I think, quite mad. I am simply waiting for him and Ahmadinejad to join forces and effect Holocaust. Oh, Anonymous, I almost forgot! For a more sober and conservative—and considerably less frivolous—discussion about Korea’s nonproliferation agreement, see Drezner.

Michael, I have to split. Will save delights arrayed by Nerve for later.

Cheers,

Fiona