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No, that's not the headline atop the Bulletin's "click picks" list online. It's the title of a collection of post-Katrina columns from Chris Rose of the New Orleans Times-Picayune.

I picked up a copy at Beckham's Bookshop while visiting the City That Care Forgot, having heard good things. I dipped in, liked what I read and bought it. By the time I'd left for home I'd read about half, finishing the back half a few days ago.

Excellent stuff. Rose became a voice for the Crescent City, chronicling the community's collective despair, helplessness and triumph. He defends Mardi Gras, cheers for the Saints and finds a strange sense of excitement when the first stoplight is turned back on. There's also the story of Miss Ellen, his shut-in neighbor who whiled away her time after the hurricane by painting pictures on blown-off roof shingles.

By the end of 2006, where the book ends, Rose was recovering from a near-breakdown, much like his city.

He's rarely angry in his columns but usually direct, empathetic and often very funny.

So, for anyone interested in a ground-level view of New Orleans' recovery, as well as in reading a real columnist for a change (ahem), "1 Dead in Attic" is recommended.

My column on “Moby-Dick” prompted an invitation to the rare book room of Scripps College’s Denison Library, where librarian Judy Harvey Sahak, who tendered the invite, brought out a special edition of Melville’s classic for me to peruse.

It was my first visit to the rare book room, and the place is impressive, with scads of old and limited edition tomes, including an enormous Medieval choirbook from the early 1500s.

My copy of "Moby-Dick" was purchased at a Starbucks, of all places, where it was sold amidst mugs and bags of coffee. The novel's first mate is named Starbuck, the apparent connection.

This version, as Harvey Sahak had suspected from comments in my column, is a paperback reprint of the deluxe edition published by Andrew Hoyem, a Pomona College alumnus and much-lauded printer, in 1979. Photographs of each page were taken for the paperback to reproduce the way-cool type and the woodcut illustrations.

Well, Harvey Sahak showed me Hoyem’s hardcover original.

Only 265 copies were printed. The paper is heavy and bluish-gray, like the sea, and was handmade in England. Consequently, the book is six inches thick. Its dimensions are roughly 18 inches by 30 inches. Original cost: $1,000. It's a thing of beauty.

We rested the book on a table — oof! — and I read a few favorite passages. Quite a novel, and quite an edition, and it was very nice of Harvey Sahak to invite me over.

Bang for the buck, though, I’m content with my $25 “Moby-Dick.” Especially since it was discounted to $10, which represents 1 percent of the original hardcover price.

Call me practical, as well as Ishmael.

I'm overdue telling you this: I finished "Moby-Dick"!

I wrapped it up on Easter weekend. Sorry for the delay; "Hal Linker" got in the way.

The final three chapters follow the last three days of the hunt for the white whale. Read the first on that Saturday, then the final two on that Sunday at Coffee Bean -- fitting, since I'd read so much of the novel there. Except it was so hot I got an iced drink to cool down, not my usual, a hot drink to warm up.

A little sobering to note that between when I started the book (Jan. 1) and when I finished (March 23), the seasons had turned.

For the record, the ending did nothing to dissuade me from my opinion that "Moby-Dick" is awesome. In fact it reinforced that feeling.

My plan is to write a column about "Moby" in the near future. In the meantime, let the heavens ring with the news that I've completed my quest, a bit more happily than Ahab did.

When last I wrote about "Moby-Dick," on Feb. 6, I was at Chapter 54 and page 248.

Since then I've read 47 chapters and 209 pages and still am not done, although I'm getting there, inch by inch. As of Monday I'm up to Chapter 102 (out of 135) and page 457 (out of 577), reading at least four pages every single day since Jan. 1, and sometimes more. Sunday I read 32 pages, which took an hour of concentration at Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf, where I've read big chunks of the book. (I know I should read at Starbucks, since Starbuck is Ahad's first mate, but I like Coffee Bean better.)

Also since Feb. 6, the Claremont Insider blog devoted a post to my quest for the White Whale. Strange to think that the big news in Claremont that morning was that a Claremont resident was reading "Moby-Dick," but just when I was coming to grips with that, they quickly went back to deriding the Claremont elite and all was right in the world. I did appreciate the attention on myself and the book.

So here's where I am: The Pequod is still on the open ocean and, despite Ahab asking passing ships "Hast thou seen the White Whale?" two or three times already, we've yet to see him.

Do I feel cheated? Not at all. It's an amazing book, full of poetry and philosophy and humor. The anticipation and buildup is part of what makes "Moby-Dick" a classic.

The book is full of digressions about whales and whaling. Entire chapters are devoted to the parts of the whale, such as the skin ("The Blanket"), the forehead ("The Prairie"), the spout ("The Fountain"), the brain ("The Nut"), the head ("The Battering-Ram") and the tail ("The Tail"). An editor could pull all the digressions out and leave a book half the size that would have thrust and momentum. However, at that point you would have a nice whaling tale for boys. It's the digressions, in my opinion, that make the book.

The whale -- Leviathan, as Melville often calls it -- was in his day, and ours, the most incredible mammal in existence, and yet still somewhat mysterious and unknowable, at least at that time. The way he explores and ruminates upon each aspect of the whale, and details how each bit was mined and used by man, can try one's patience at times, but I find those chapters among my favorite, and the most lyrical. They make the whale loom even larger in our imagination.

At any rate, I've got 120 pages to go, or about four hours of reading; two minutes per page is as fast as I can go with Melville, as he takes a lot of concentration. I should finish by the middle of March.

Hopefully the whale shows up by then.

You may recall that my New Year's goal was to read "Moby-Dick."

Well, at the one-month point, a progress report: I'm at page 248, out of 577, or Chapter 54 of 135. At this rate I'll finish by the end of March, which isn't bad; I initially thought it could take me to the end of April.

Did you know Barack Obama cites "Moby-Dick," and also "Beloved," as his favorite books? When I read that, I suddenly became an Obama fan.

"Moby-Dick" is an amazing book -- there's a reason classics are classics -- although it's not what you would call a quick read, owing to long sentences filled with semi-colons that sometimes require a second or third reading to decipher. Some of the language is jaw-droppingly lyrical, though. My schedule is such that it's rare I can find even a half-hour a day to read it, further limiting my progress.

Still, I've managed to read a little bit every single day since Jan. 1, usually six or eight pages. It's not much individually, but nibbling at it daily does make a difference.

Call me Incrementalist.

I've just read "Muscatel at Noon," a 1951 collection of essays by Matt Weinstock, a columnist for the old L.A. Daily News. Bought it a few months ago, I think at Magic Door Books in Pomona, and it's a fun read. (Still gotta read "My L.A.," his earlier, and sole other, book, which I know I bought at Magic Door.) Weinstock was the spiritual father of Jack Smith, the Times columnist who came along a bit later, and he penned witty, self-effacing, character-rich pieces in the days before L.A. became a metropolis.

You'll see why I like him with this excerpt from the back jacket: "Mr. Weinstock says the nicest thing he can say about himself is that he is a working newsman -- despite the fact that he writes a column. Incidentally, his only formula is to try to get around to as many places as possible. He doesn't try to prove things, merely to report, reflect and have a little fun."

There's plenty of great writing inside. One favorite piece begins: "When old timers get together and cry in their beer over the days that used to be in Los Angeles they invariably think of Morris Schlocker, though many of them don't know him by name. Morris Schlocker painted no picture, designed no bridge, founded no memorial. He was, in fact, only a street sweeper. But in his way, he was an artist."

This next bit is sort of an inside-baseball thing but may prove illuminating. Weinstock at one point mentions that his newspaper publishes six editions a day. Imagine, six editions! These days, even big-city newspapers typically publish only one. But it struck me that in a way, newspapers are returning to the multiple-edition concept.

At dailybulletin.com, our online elves stealthily post stories throughout the day and night as they're finished. The idea from the higher-ups is that we're now a 24-hour newsroom. Well, not exactly: There are no news reporters on duty for about 10 of those hours, between roughly 9 p.m. and 7 a.m. But rather than wait until dawn, when the newspaper lands in your gardenias, you can log on at various points in the day or night and find fresh content.

Wonder what Weinstock would think of all this? He'd probably be curious and amused, as he was by so much else.

Skipping out on both dinner and the Pomona City Council on Monday night, I instead left work and headed directly to Pasadena to see novelist Janet Fitch read from and sign her second novel, "Paint It Black," at Vroman's Bookstore.

I interviewed Fitch in 2001 for a Bulletin feature story when she taught creative writing for a semester at Pomona College. She was a good interview subject and nice about everything. "White Oleander" was a bit flowery for my tastes but she's clearly a good writer, and I wanted to do a good job on the story.

Of course it's excruciating to write a story about a writer because you know the writer will read it, and the writer is always, always, going to be a much better writer than you.

When you write about a writer, let me tell you, you worry over each sentence, as much as deadline allows. You do your best to write grammatically, to eliminate awkwardness and to not be trite. You show off a little with what you imagine is a literary turn of phrase here and there, but even that little is probably too much. No doubt the writer is reading you with an indulgent smile, interrupted by an occasional wince.

But enough about my problems. Fitch said my story was fine and signed a very nice inscription in my copy of "White Oleander," as well as drawing a sketch of an oleander, which is a poisonous plant, and writing next to it: "Don't pick the oleander."

Her second novel got lavish praise -- "Janet Fitch is an artist of the very highest order," declared the L.A. Times, between drags on a French cigarette -- so I forsook our noble Pomona leaders to see her closest local appearance and pick up a copy.

"Paint It Black" is set in L.A. at the end of 1980, after the suicide of Germs singer Darby Crash and the death two days later of ex-Beatle John Lennon. The main character is an artists' model at the Otis Art Institute, when it was near MacArthur Park, Fitch explained.

At a previous event, "someone said, 'Oh, it's a historical novel,' " Fitch recounted, to laughter. "Well, I guess to some people it is."

Of her dark themes, such as the aftermath of suicide, she said: "My writing is all about how people internalize difficult experiences ... I'm interested in the times of life when people are pushed to the extreme."

When it comes to others' writing, she most enjoys reading, and listening to, poetry; its musicality teaches her to write her own sentences with what seem like the right number of syllables and beats.

(Naturally we do this in the Bulletin newsroom, everyone reading his or her work aloud on deadline: "A man was stabbed at a party in Fontana," "City leaders in Rancho Cucamonga are mulling a smoking ban," "After deliberating three days, a jury reached a verdict.")

Afterward I got in line to have my book signed. Fitch volunteered that she had kept looking at me knowing she knew me from somewhere but unable to place me. Well, it's been six years, so she gets points for even semi-remembering me. She wrote something nice in my book and thanked me for making the drive.

At this point I thought I could catch the last part of the Pomona meeting, so, dedicated Pomona-ite that I am, I didn't linger at Vroman's. When I got to Pomona I lucked out, sailing along down Garey, every light either green or turning green as I approached. But at City Hall, even though it was only 8:55, there was only one car in the parking lot. Must have been a short meeting by Pomona standards. Sometimes by 8:55 they're still arguing over the consent agenda.

Too bad. I could have hung around Pasadena some more. Maybe even had some dinner.

I've written in my column about the NEA-affiliated Big Read drives in Pomona and Rancho Cucamonga and the independent On the Same Page drive in Claremont, in which residents were urged to read "Bless Me, Ultima," "To Kill a Mockingbird" and "Cannery Row," respectively.

I finished "Mockingbird" on my lunch break Thursday, completing the trifecta.

(My favorite line is the first sentence of Chapter 10, the daughter saying of her father: "Atticus was feeble: he was nearly fifty.")

Tuesday I heard Steinbeck scholar Robert Morsberger speak at the Claremont Library, the final event in the "Cannery Row" series. Morsberger named "The Grapes of Wrath," "Cannery Row" and "In Dubious Battle" as his Steinbeck favorites. "'Cannery Row' is the book I most enjoy rereading," he said, describing it as funny and poetic. A friend, he added, says Doc is one of her favorite characters in literature.

Thursday I heard Mary Badham speak at Rancho Cucamonga's Celebration Hall about her role as Scout in the movie version of "Mockingbird." Badham, the sister of director John Badham, said she got the part in an audition in her native Alabama. She was honest enough to admit she was too young during filming to remember a whole lot other than Gregory Peck's kindness and the boy actors fighting with her.

She was a real-life tomboy, so the part fit her. But she wasn't especially interested in acting, she said, and thus didn't do much after "Mockingbird," although, among other things, she was in the very last "Twilight Zone" episode. As a first-timer without an agent, she didn't get paid much for playing Scout. "I think the last residual check I got was for 89 cents," she added. No wonder she was charging $20 for her autograph after the talk.

I already wrote about seeing Gustavo Arellano speak in Pomona about "Ultima," which meant I went to at least one book event in each of the three cities.

But only Rancho Cucamonga put me on a poster.

Orhan Pamuk, the 2006 Nobel laureate for literature, spoke Thursday night at Claremont McKenna College, and it was yet another count-your-lucky-stars moments, to get to hear a world-class thinker and writer expound so close to home, and free of charge.

Pamuk read excerpts from two of his essays, one describing Istanbul, the other constituting a monologue from his daughter's point of view on all the reasons she didn't want to go to school. (Among them: "The teacher gives me a nasty look, and she doesn't look too good to begin with.") He talked about why he writes, listing a series of explanations: he "can't do normal work," he likes to be alone, he likes the attention, he likes the smell of paper and ink and he wants to read books like his. He also spoke of representing Turkey to the world through his work.

Pamuk, as you may know, faced prison for speaking openly about the Armenian genocide, which his government refuses to acknowledge. After an international outcry, he was instead accused of "insulting Turkishness," a charge that was quietly dropped. He didn't talk about that directly on Thursday, nor did he say anything about the faltering move in Congress to press Turkey on the genocide issue.

"If your country is troubled, as mine is, those troubles find their way back to me in journalists' questions, and then I cannot shut up my mouth," Pamuk said. Other than that remark, he did a good job of shutting up his mouth.

Afterward he signed books. "Snow," his most popular novel, sold out right before I got to the sales table. Instead, I picked up "The Black Book," a novel whose back cover notes that one of the characters is "a popular newspaper columnist." Maybe I can pick up some pointers.

Gustavo Arellano, who writes the "Ask a Mexican" column for the OC Weekly, came to Pomona Saturday afternoon to talk about "Bless Me, Ultima," the Rudolfo Anaya novel that everyone in Pomona is asked to read as part of an NEA-funded program, the Pomona Big Read.

Calling it "an amazing book," Arellano told an audience of 50 in the Cal Poly Pomona Downtown Center that he first encountered it in English class in Anaheim and was won over -- first by its profanity ("That was the first time I had ever seen curse words in a book") and then by its power. He said the novel, about an immigrant boy growing up in New Mexico during World War II and torn between his mother's desire that he become a priest and his father's that he become a laborer, is "as American a novel as you'll find."

During the Q&A, nobody asked about "Ultima." Instead, they wanted to know about his column. He said he gets 50 to 60 questions a week and has a backlog of several hundred, enough to keep him going six years if no one ever again asked one.

"People are just fascinated by Mexicans," he said with a smile. Aren't we, though?

I hope to write about the various city-reads efforts (Pomona, Claremont and Rancho Cucamonga) in print this week or next. Meanwhile, I've gotta get back to "Ultima."

I'm a bit late in noting this, but Kem Nunn's 1992 novel "Pomona Queen" has been optioned for a movie. According to a Variety article forwarded by Derek Deason, Shoreline Entertainment has hired Jeremiah Chechik to direct the film, with Christopher Doyle as cinematographer and with shooting to begin before the end of the year.

As Variety summarizes the plot: "The book revolves around Earl Dean. He is a broken-hearted door-to-door vacuum cleaner salesman who happens to knock on the wrong door. Before he knows what happened, he is embroiled in a stranger's manic quest to avenge the death of a brother. The story takes place over the course of one night."

It also takes place in -- where else? -- Pomona, with mentions of such local spots as the Midway bar, Golden Ox hamburgers and Buffum's department store. After I recommended the book in print a few years ago, readers were divided on its merits, with its grittiness turning off some and delighting others. For my money it's an entertaining way to learn the darker side of our local history.

Nunn, a former Pomona Library page, has gone on to write several well-regarded "surf noir" novels and he created HBO's recent "John From Cincinnati" series.

Incidentally, the Pomona Queen of the title was a real-life orange crate label. Now it's the name of a local brew by Dale Brothers. That probably means something, but I'm not sure what.

Gore Vidal, that is. The novelist, playwright and essayist spoke Tuesday evening at the Claremont McKenna College Athenaeum to impressionable college students, town graybeards and journalists (me).

At this point the literary lion doesn't roar, he merely speaks in a sepulchral purr. To summarize his key points, America has been in deep decline for five decades, the world hates us, things are unlikely to improve and most of us are too dumb to know it, to know our own history, or to care.

Moderator: "So I'm not hearing a lot of hope."

Vidal, poker-faced: "I bubble with it."

On what passed for the bright side, Vidal said in response to a question about 9/11: "Bush didn't do it. He's too incompetent."

If you hear reports of a mass suicide in Claremont, you'll know what triggered it.