Best books … chosen by Mark Jude Poirier

Brokeback Mountain by Annie Proulx (Scribner, $10). My good friend called me when I was living in rural Texas and said, “You have to read the story in this week’s New Yorker.” I did. Proulx’s utterly germane and original figurative language never fails to take my breath away—and I’ve read Brokeback Mountain about 20 times since its first publication, in 1997.

Sometimes a Great Notion by Ken Kesey (Penguin, $16). The structure of this novel is beautifully and skillfully tangled; it mirrors the characters and setting perfectly. I like that Amazon.com lists “pot hangover” as one of the most “statistically improbable” phrases that readers will find in its pages.

The Paris Review #171 edited by Brigid Hughes (Paris Review, $12). This issue includes the story “The Fifth Wall” by Malinda McCollum, a disturbingly stunning and sinister tale that rivals Robert Stone’s work in its unflinching look at humanity. And it ends with a mouth full of bees! I’ll be first in line at the bookstore when McCollum publishes a volume of her stories. Until then, I’ll comb the literary magazines.

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The Official Preppy Handbook edited by Lisa Birnbach (Workman, $9). This was my bible in middle school. I didn’t quite understand satire yet, and I’m pretty sure when it came to choosing a college a few years later, I consulted it again. I know it’s pathetic that a novelty book from the ’80s so greatly influenced me, but it’s true.

Breuer Houses by Joachim Driller (Phaidon, $60). Over the last few years, I’ve developed a pathological interest in midcentury modern architecture and design. Marcel Breuer is my favorite of the “Harvard Five,” and this book is like porn for me. My favorite is the “binuclear” Robinson house in Williamstown, Mass. With its butterfly roof, it sits unassumingly in the shadows of the Berkshire Mountains.

Diary of Wimpy Kid I and II by Jeff Kinney (Abrams, $13 each). I saw my 9-year-old nephew Mason speed through these books, so I thought I’d check them out myself. I haven’t laughed so hard in a long time. The humor is pitch-perfect and somewhat subversive, and presumably for kids.