http://www.goodreads.com/review/list_rss/73783 en-US Fri, 25 Jul 2008 06:59:14 -0700 60 http://www.goodreads.com/ 200 41 http://www.goodreads.com/images/layout/gr_logo.gif 28249646 Fri, 25 Jul 2008 06:59:14 -0700
author: Homer
name: Taka
average rating: 3.86
book published: 600
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 07/25/08
shelves: classics
review:

]]> 28248790 Fri, 25 Jul 2008 06:49:35 -0700
author: Alexander S. Pushkin
name: Taka
average rating: 4.62
book published: 1968
rating: 4
read at: 03/05
date added: 07/25/08
shelves: russian_lit
review:

]]> 28233182 Thu, 24 Jul 2008 22:24:56 -0700
author: Jerry Cleaver
name: Taka
average rating: 4.36
book published: 2004
rating: 0
read at: 12/06
date added: 07/24/08
shelves: reference
review:

]]> 27378711 Fri, 18 Jul 2008 18:43:52 -0700
It's a short book, clocking in at 170 pages in big print. The story is simple, but not really engaging. The leitmotifs of the book - pederasty, living the moment, hedonism - have already been done before and done better, by such authors as Oscar Wilde and Nietzsche. The book actually read like a story done by an amateur who is still clumsily putting together a story and unfortunately fails to deliver something engaging.

Certain passages stood out amidst mediocre descriptive writing and were pretty cool and definitely quotable, but the overall story was quite monotonic and repetitive and disappointing. I wasn't affected by Merceline's death, for example, because I didn't feel like I knew her at all.

From a story-telling POV, there really were NO scenes and it was mostly composed of telling (and not showing). And again, I'd have no problem with that if the author pulls it off. This is another unfortunate case in which the author fails to cut the mustard. Throughout, my engagement level was about 5 out of 10, which is JUST enough to not make me fall asleep and put it down forever, and I read every page with the half-boredom of someone who is weary of the subject that's been exploited and explored by countless others but expects the author to make something new out of it (which Gide really didn't).

And the translation. There were some really clunky passages with misplaced punctuation that stanched the flow of the sentences. When I see more than one instance of stupid mistakes like that, it's a complete deal-breaker for me, and so I must say I have no respect for the translator since the translator's job is to convey the overall feel of a literary masterpiece done in a foreign language, butchering and smearing and desecrating it by these fundamental (albeit minor) errors is simply UNacceptable.

So there was nothing new or refreshing or much engaging in it, but there were some cool passages and it was a quick read = it was OK]]>
author: André Gide
name: Taka
average rating: 3.62
book published: 1902
rating: 2
read at: 07/08
date added: 07/18/08
shelves: french_lit, japan_jul07-present
review:
It's OK--

It's a short book, clocking in at 170 pages in big print. The story is simple, but not really engaging. The leitmotifs of the book - pederasty, living the moment, hedonism - have already been done before and done better, by such authors as Oscar Wilde and Nietzsche. The book actually read like a story done by an amateur who is still clumsily putting together a story and unfortunately fails to deliver something engaging.

Certain passages stood out amidst mediocre descriptive writing and were pretty cool and definitely quotable, but the overall story was quite monotonic and repetitive and disappointing. I wasn't affected by Merceline's death, for example, because I didn't feel like I knew her at all.

From a story-telling POV, there really were NO scenes and it was mostly composed of telling (and not showing). And again, I'd have no problem with that if the author pulls it off. This is another unfortunate case in which the author fails to cut the mustard. Throughout, my engagement level was about 5 out of 10, which is JUST enough to not make me fall asleep and put it down forever, and I read every page with the half-boredom of someone who is weary of the subject that's been exploited and explored by countless others but expects the author to make something new out of it (which Gide really didn't).

And the translation. There were some really clunky passages with misplaced punctuation that stanched the flow of the sentences. When I see more than one instance of stupid mistakes like that, it's a complete deal-breaker for me, and so I must say I have no respect for the translator since the translator's job is to convey the overall feel of a literary masterpiece done in a foreign language, butchering and smearing and desecrating it by these fundamental (albeit minor) errors is simply UNacceptable.

So there was nothing new or refreshing or much engaging in it, but there were some cool passages and it was a quick read = it was OK
]]> 5207383 Tue, 15 Jul 2008 19:23:58 -0700
No, I didn't read ALL of it. I read his "Sonnets and Songs," "Elegies and Heroical Epistle," and "Holy Sonnets." I also took a look at his famous "No man is an island entirely of itself" meditation (Meditation XVII), and tried to tackle his "Death's Duel," but gave up due to a sheer lack of interest in the subject.

Reading poetry is difficult. I liked some of his sonnets, but I don't think I understood most of his poetry. I had to keep re-reading the lines and sometimes the whole sonnet multiple times to understand what he's trying to say. I'd like to think that it was worth my time just to find some poems I liked.

What kept me from NOT reading all of his poetry and prose (and thereby violating my categorical imperative) is that I'm just not interested in what he has to say, because I'm not religious and found most of his concerns irrelevant.

I believe that reading is a process of self-discovery. You read and read and read to find what you like, what you can identify with, what resonates with your self, at the same time to expand your horizon. And if a book is not engaging your mind, maybe you're wasting your time. After all, you can get through only so many books in your life, and there are just SO many of them out there. Sometimes you need to be courageous and wise enough to put down a book that might be preventing you from reading some book you will really love and would regret if you didn't read it.

I'm not saying John Donne is a waste of time for everyone. No, that would be just dumb. What I'm saying is that FOR ME, at least at this stage in my life, his works are worthless because they don't interest me, inspire me, or enrich me. Maybe I've picked it up at the wrong time. Maybe I'll find it much more engaging, inspiring, and enriching when I read it when I'm older.

But for now, I'm glad to have found some sonnets I like, and with them fermenting in my mind, I'm putting the rest of it down to continue my adventure.


]]>
author: John Donne
name: Taka
average rating: 4.44
book published: 2001
rating: 2
read at: 07/08
date added: 07/15/08
shelves: english_lit, japan_jul07-present
review:
Batter my heart, religious Donne--

No, I didn't read ALL of it. I read his "Sonnets and Songs," "Elegies and Heroical Epistle," and "Holy Sonnets." I also took a look at his famous "No man is an island entirely of itself" meditation (Meditation XVII), and tried to tackle his "Death's Duel," but gave up due to a sheer lack of interest in the subject.

Reading poetry is difficult. I liked some of his sonnets, but I don't think I understood most of his poetry. I had to keep re-reading the lines and sometimes the whole sonnet multiple times to understand what he's trying to say. I'd like to think that it was worth my time just to find some poems I liked.

What kept me from NOT reading all of his poetry and prose (and thereby violating my categorical imperative) is that I'm just not interested in what he has to say, because I'm not religious and found most of his concerns irrelevant.

I believe that reading is a process of self-discovery. You read and read and read to find what you like, what you can identify with, what resonates with your self, at the same time to expand your horizon. And if a book is not engaging your mind, maybe you're wasting your time. After all, you can get through only so many books in your life, and there are just SO many of them out there. Sometimes you need to be courageous and wise enough to put down a book that might be preventing you from reading some book you will really love and would regret if you didn't read it.

I'm not saying John Donne is a waste of time for everyone. No, that would be just dumb. What I'm saying is that FOR ME, at least at this stage in my life, his works are worthless because they don't interest me, inspire me, or enrich me. Maybe I've picked it up at the wrong time. Maybe I'll find it much more engaging, inspiring, and enriching when I read it when I'm older.

But for now, I'm glad to have found some sonnets I like, and with them fermenting in my mind, I'm putting the rest of it down to continue my adventure.



]]> 26814421 Fri, 11 Jul 2008 20:19:09 -0700
I don't know how she does it. From page 1 to the last page, I was absorbed in the world she created in a style reminiscent of Chekhov, portraying the subtle emotions and sad moments of ordinary people. Although I'm not a fan of anthologies and short stories because they tend to be uneven and not very engaging, this anthology actually blew me away with its sustained narrative that is at once engaging, simple, and direct, revealing the inner struggles of the characters and making it possible to understand and identify with them immediately.

There really is not much to say but that Lahiri is an awesome story-teller with a wonderful knack for capturing subtle human emotions and creating lively characters.

Some people might dismiss her as banal and lightweight, but there's no denying that she is a great story-teller. Just because she doesn't display an esoteric knowledge on the physics and mechanics V-2 rockets or have numerous long and hilarious footnotes or a mind-blowing labyrinthine layout, it doesn't mean that she is catering to mainstream taste or that she is not "literary" enough. Check out Chekhov. He thought that the best description of an ocean was: "It is large." Like him, Lahiri writes about ordinary people struggling on their own. Like him, she writes in simple, yet eloquent and revealing prose. Like him, she writes without judging them, leaving it to the reader to decide.

Though I tend to like the convoluted and reader-unfriendly postermodern literature, I liked Interpreter of Maladies for its sheer story-telling power and simple & direct language.

Much respect & a great read]]>
author: Jhumpa Lahiri
name: Taka
average rating: 4.11
book published: 1999
rating: 4
read at: 07/08
date added: 07/11/08
shelves: contemporary, japan_jul07-present
review:
Simple and eloquent--

I don't know how she does it. From page 1 to the last page, I was absorbed in the world she created in a style reminiscent of Chekhov, portraying the subtle emotions and sad moments of ordinary people. Although I'm not a fan of anthologies and short stories because they tend to be uneven and not very engaging, this anthology actually blew me away with its sustained narrative that is at once engaging, simple, and direct, revealing the inner struggles of the characters and making it possible to understand and identify with them immediately.

There really is not much to say but that Lahiri is an awesome story-teller with a wonderful knack for capturing subtle human emotions and creating lively characters.

Some people might dismiss her as banal and lightweight, but there's no denying that she is a great story-teller. Just because she doesn't display an esoteric knowledge on the physics and mechanics V-2 rockets or have numerous long and hilarious footnotes or a mind-blowing labyrinthine layout, it doesn't mean that she is catering to mainstream taste or that she is not "literary" enough. Check out Chekhov. He thought that the best description of an ocean was: "It is large." Like him, Lahiri writes about ordinary people struggling on their own. Like him, she writes in simple, yet eloquent and revealing prose. Like him, she writes without judging them, leaving it to the reader to decide.

Though I tend to like the convoluted and reader-unfriendly postermodern literature, I liked Interpreter of Maladies for its sheer story-telling power and simple & direct language.

Much respect & a great read
]]> 26179056 Wed, 09 Jul 2008 19:38:39 -0700
There is no sustained, overarching story. The book is very much episodic and repetitive with all the 41 chapters loosely strung together in a kind of haphazard way. In fact, many of the chapters tell the same events without any sense of direction or purpose. I'm not opposed to artistic and unconventional writing to make some larger point about the world as long as every - or almost every - bit of it counts and is enjoyable, which is to say, if the author can pull it off right. The risk of doing that, though, is that it may make the story not as engaging as it could be (e.g. Beckett's trilogy).

And in my humble opinion, Heller doesn't pull it off right. I think much of Catch-22 is unnecessary and can be cut without undermining the integrity of the book. I really thought Heller didn't need all 453 pages to make his point about the ridiculousness of war and bureaucracy. In fact, I got it in the first 100 pages. Though I really enjoyed reading about the rise of Milo's international syndicate, I had a hard time focusing and kept falling asleep at places.

The characters are all pretty flimsy - as so often happens with comedies -but that's OK because as long as there is a good story, it really doesn't matter. But there is no story either! Hmph.

I hear it took the author 10 years to finish the novel. 10 years! It makes perfect sense, then, that there is no overarching story. I could see the author keep writing and writing and got lost in that 10 years and had no clue what he was writing about and ended up producing this hodgepodge of random, redundant, unnecessarily long book without any unifying story to string all the chapters together in a satisfying way.

And the writing. The first half reminds me of Kurt Vonnegut - simple, sometimes even simplistic, with short sentences (and I'm not a fan of Vonnegut)- and the second half reminds me of Neal Stephenson (who is one of my favorites), with a lot of idioms and slang interspersed with obscure words (exophthalmic, amyotrophic, acrimonious, etc.). I know Heller came before Vonnegut and Stephenson and Pynchon and all the major postmodern authors. But I just wasn't impressed with his prose.

So, some funny moments, easy to read, but no unifying story, no characters you can identify with, random episodes most of which are mediocre, and unnecessarily long.

2 = it was OK]]>
author: Joseph Heller
name: Taka
average rating: 4.10
book published: 1961
rating: 2
read at: 07/08
date added: 07/09/08
shelves: american_lit, japan_jul07-present
review:
Hard to say--

There is no sustained, overarching story. The book is very much episodic and repetitive with all the 41 chapters loosely strung together in a kind of haphazard way. In fact, many of the chapters tell the same events without any sense of direction or purpose. I'm not opposed to artistic and unconventional writing to make some larger point about the world as long as every - or almost every - bit of it counts and is enjoyable, which is to say, if the author can pull it off right. The risk of doing that, though, is that it may make the story not as engaging as it could be (e.g. Beckett's trilogy).

And in my humble opinion, Heller doesn't pull it off right. I think much of Catch-22 is unnecessary and can be cut without undermining the integrity of the book. I really thought Heller didn't need all 453 pages to make his point about the ridiculousness of war and bureaucracy. In fact, I got it in the first 100 pages. Though I really enjoyed reading about the rise of Milo's international syndicate, I had a hard time focusing and kept falling asleep at places.

The characters are all pretty flimsy - as so often happens with comedies -but that's OK because as long as there is a good story, it really doesn't matter. But there is no story either! Hmph.

I hear it took the author 10 years to finish the novel. 10 years! It makes perfect sense, then, that there is no overarching story. I could see the author keep writing and writing and got lost in that 10 years and had no clue what he was writing about and ended up producing this hodgepodge of random, redundant, unnecessarily long book without any unifying story to string all the chapters together in a satisfying way.

And the writing. The first half reminds me of Kurt Vonnegut - simple, sometimes even simplistic, with short sentences (and I'm not a fan of Vonnegut)- and the second half reminds me of Neal Stephenson (who is one of my favorites), with a lot of idioms and slang interspersed with obscure words (exophthalmic, amyotrophic, acrimonious, etc.). I know Heller came before Vonnegut and Stephenson and Pynchon and all the major postmodern authors. But I just wasn't impressed with his prose.

So, some funny moments, easy to read, but no unifying story, no characters you can identify with, random episodes most of which are mediocre, and unnecessarily long.

2 = it was OK
]]> 1366096 Wed, 02 Jul 2008 20:19:25 -0700
Having read three major works by Faulkner, I never thought Faulkner's prose to be THAT long and convoluted until I read this one. The sentences go on and on, sometimes for half a page, sometimes for an entire page, strung together with clause after clause, requiring the reader to really focus and remember what the subject of the enormous sentence is, though retaining and figuring out what all the clauses are referring to is often times hard to determine as you get lost in that meandering prose that keeps burgeoning like this, sometimes ignoring grammar altogether, sometimes even omitting commas when listing euphuistic obscure poetic little adjectives, punctuated with long parenthetical asides (kind of like this, making it hard to follow the gist of the sentence and causing momentary amnesia whereby the subject of the sentence you tried so hard to retain throughout the long serpentine sentences is almost completely obliterated, sometimes made more complex by an insertion of another parenthetical aside inside of it (like this, you see?) compelling you to go ALL THE WAY back to the beginning and skip the asides altogether and re-read the entire damn thing again to wholly understand what the hell it's saying), the inexplicable semi-colon followed by a dash -- the dash long and imposing, confusing and unnecessary, enclosing more clause after clause in this fashion, severing the subject from everything else that is relevant and instrumental in understanding the sentence as a whole;-- the dash further elongating and compounding the sentence, and all those "not only...but" constructions that are sometimes embedded in or juxtaposed with a negative clause, making it outright ANNOYING (here it is, just CHECK this out) not because they are unpoetic (it can be at times) or stylistically uninteresting (because sometimes - just sometimes - it is) but not only because they are unnecessary and time-consuming to read but because they are just damn confusing!

So if you made it this far in my review and took the time to understand what I said above, you should be able to handle Absalom, Absalom!. Or maybe not. Though there are ups and downs, the entire book is written in this convoluted style. So know what you're getting yourself into before tackling this difficult work.

The story, on the other hand, is interesting. Though 90% of it is really telling and not showing at all, it's generally interesting enough to impel you through the dense, clattered prose and understand the story of a mysterious and impeccable man bent on building a dynasty of his own. In a nutshell, it's a good Shakespearian tragedy (the son destroying the dynasty) with a good Southern twist (in particular, racism).

Overall, despite my parody of his style, I did enjoy the unique experience of reading Faulkner at his most convoluted. An interesting (yet hard) read.]]>
author: William Faulkner
name: Taka
average rating: 4.03
book published: 1991
rating: 3
read at: 07/08
date added: 07/02/08
shelves: american_lit, japan_jul07-present, modernist_lit
review:
A Tough Read--

Having read three major works by Faulkner, I never thought Faulkner's prose to be THAT long and convoluted until I read this one. The sentences go on and on, sometimes for half a page, sometimes for an entire page, strung together with clause after clause, requiring the reader to really focus and remember what the subject of the enormous sentence is, though retaining and figuring out what all the clauses are referring to is often times hard to determine as you get lost in that meandering prose that keeps burgeoning like this, sometimes ignoring grammar altogether, sometimes even omitting commas when listing euphuistic obscure poetic little adjectives, punctuated with long parenthetical asides (kind of like this, making it hard to follow the gist of the sentence and causing momentary amnesia whereby the subject of the sentence you tried so hard to retain throughout the long serpentine sentences is almost completely obliterated, sometimes made more complex by an insertion of another parenthetical aside inside of it (like this, you see?) compelling you to go ALL THE WAY back to the beginning and skip the asides altogether and re-read the entire damn thing again to wholly understand what the hell it's saying), the inexplicable semi-colon followed by a dash -- the dash long and imposing, confusing and unnecessary, enclosing more clause after clause in this fashion, severing the subject from everything else that is relevant and instrumental in understanding the sentence as a whole;-- the dash further elongating and compounding the sentence, and all those "not only...but" constructions that are sometimes embedded in or juxtaposed with a negative clause, making it outright ANNOYING (here it is, just CHECK this out) not because they are unpoetic (it can be at times) or stylistically uninteresting (because sometimes - just sometimes - it is) but not only because they are unnecessary and time-consuming to read but because they are just damn confusing!

So if you made it this far in my review and took the time to understand what I said above, you should be able to handle Absalom, Absalom!. Or maybe not. Though there are ups and downs, the entire book is written in this convoluted style. So know what you're getting yourself into before tackling this difficult work.

The story, on the other hand, is interesting. Though 90% of it is really telling and not showing at all, it's generally interesting enough to impel you through the dense, clattered prose and understand the story of a mysterious and impeccable man bent on building a dynasty of his own. In a nutshell, it's a good Shakespearian tragedy (the son destroying the dynasty) with a good Southern twist (in particular, racism).

Overall, despite my parody of his style, I did enjoy the unique experience of reading Faulkner at his most convoluted. An interesting (yet hard) read.
]]> 1366085 Wed, 25 Jun 2008 05:20:50 -0700
This is probably my favorite Faulkner by far.

The longest yet the easiest to read of the three Faulkner books chosen by Oprah for her book club, Light in August is more of a traditional novel with an engaging plot that is both rich and complex, and multidimensional characters who are incredibly alive and real. Unlike in As I Lay Dying and The Sound and the Fury, however, Faulkner uses a minimum of stream of consciousness, making it much easier to read and understand what's going on. And like other two novels, it's got multiple POVs that reveal without causing any confusion the characters themselves and the unfolding of the main story.

And GOSH he can write. Granted, his prose is serpentine and elaborate; but MY HE CAN WRITE. At many places I was simply dazzled not only by the sheer lyricism of it but by the mastery with which he portrayed the tense scenes and the myriad characters - even and especially the minor ones. That is something only true masters can pull off. Hats off to the Nobel laureate!

Very much recommended.]]>
author: William Faulkner
name: Taka
average rating: 4.01
book published: 1932
rating: 4
read at: 06/08
date added: 06/25/08
shelves: american_lit, japan_jul07-present, modernist_lit
review:
Pretty Darn Good--

This is probably my favorite Faulkner by far.

The longest yet the easiest to read of the three Faulkner books chosen by Oprah for her book club, Light in August is more of a traditional novel with an engaging plot that is both rich and complex, and multidimensional characters who are incredibly alive and real. Unlike in As I Lay Dying and The Sound and the Fury, however, Faulkner uses a minimum of stream of consciousness, making it much easier to read and understand what's going on. And like other two novels, it's got multiple POVs that reveal without causing any confusion the characters themselves and the unfolding of the main story.

And GOSH he can write. Granted, his prose is serpentine and elaborate; but MY HE CAN WRITE. At many places I was simply dazzled not only by the sheer lyricism of it but by the mastery with which he portrayed the tense scenes and the myriad characters - even and especially the minor ones. That is something only true masters can pull off. Hats off to the Nobel laureate!

Very much recommended.
]]> 1366067 Wed, 18 Jun 2008 22:35:07 -0700
My second Faulkner did not disappoint me or bore me out of my mind.

The story, at first utterly perplexing and inscrutable, gets clearer and clearer as it progresses. The first section tells the story from the mentally impaired Benjy, and is WILDLY experimental in portraying a mind living in constant impressions and associations as the scene switches back and forth between present and past, sometimes without warning. Once you get the hang of how Faulkner shifts time, the section becomes quite readable.

The second section narrated by Quentin has striking similarities with Joyce's A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man in representing a young, intellectual mind filled with tortured thoughts and indelible memories of the past wandering around and going through a rather ordinary day.

The last two sections are really easy to read and clarify a lot of things that went unsaid but implied in the first two sections.

Here, let me just add that Jason Compson - satisfyingly evil, refreshingly active, and almost beyond-good-and-evil - is one of those villains that you come to like and admire as a villain, belonging to the same class of awesome and fascinating villains as Barabas, Shylock, and Iago. And why is this? In direct contrast to his tortured Hamlet of a brother, he is the only person in the family that does ANYTHING and gets things done. In fact, his section is PACKED with actions. He's always doing something, running around getting things done, and to accomplish what he sets out to do, he does not scrupulously choose his means. His obsession with money goes beyond petty morality, and he gets what he wants. For that, you can't stop admiring him. Definitely an excellent villain. Love it!

The great thing about this novel is that you get to know all those characters intimately and identify with them. Maybe I'm in the minority to like Jason Compson the Awesome Villain who is inexplicably (and satisfyingly) cruel but who actually gets things done, and hate his effeminate and overly intellectual brother Quentin for his cowardice and grousing and inability to do jackshit. The point is that though the book is hard to get through especially in the beginning, it's a book that gets you acquainted with its diverse array of characters like they are actually alive.

Good stuff]]>
author: William Faulkner
name: Taka
average rating: 4.04
book published: 1929
rating: 3
read at: 06/08
date added: 06/18/08
shelves: american_lit, japan_jul07-present, modernist_lit
review:
Good (w/ my favorite new villain!)--

My second Faulkner did not disappoint me or bore me out of my mind.

The story, at first utterly perplexing and inscrutable, gets clearer and clearer as it progresses. The first section tells the story from the mentally impaired Benjy, and is WILDLY experimental in portraying a mind living in constant impressions and associations as the scene switches back and forth between present and past, sometimes without warning. Once you get the hang of how Faulkner shifts time, the section becomes quite readable.

The second section narrated by Quentin has striking similarities with Joyce's A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man in representing a young, intellectual mind filled with tortured thoughts and indelible memories of the past wandering around and going through a rather ordinary day.

The last two sections are really easy to read and clarify a lot of things that went unsaid but implied in the first two sections.

Here, let me just add that Jason Compson - satisfyingly evil, refreshingly active, and almost beyond-good-and-evil - is one of those villains that you come to like and admire as a villain, belonging to the same class of awesome and fascinating villains as Barabas, Shylock, and Iago. And why is this? In direct contrast to his tortured Hamlet of a brother, he is the only person in the family that does ANYTHING and gets things done. In fact, his section is PACKED with actions. He's always doing something, running around getting things done, and to accomplish what he sets out to do, he does not scrupulously choose his means. His obsession with money goes beyond petty morality, and he gets what he wants. For that, you can't stop admiring him. Definitely an excellent villain. Love it!

The great thing about this novel is that you get to know all those characters intimately and identify with them. Maybe I'm in the minority to like Jason Compson the Awesome Villain who is inexplicably (and satisfyingly) cruel but who actually gets things done, and hate his effeminate and overly intellectual brother Quentin for his cowardice and grousing and inability to do jackshit. The point is that though the book is hard to get through especially in the beginning, it's a book that gets you acquainted with its diverse array of characters like they are actually alive.

Good stuff
]]> 1366077 Sun, 15 Jun 2008 18:20:56 -0700
In this slim volume (260 pages), Faulkner packs 15 POVs to tell a rather simple story of a pretty fucked-up family journeying to a faraway town to bury the mother. The story is simple, but the kaleidoscopic telling makes it a toil to read through it. It's one of those books that makes you work and commands a second read.

I'm glad I finally read Faulkner because his prose, especially in Darl's chapters, is beautiful, almost enigmatic. Some of his descriptions, too, are poetic, unique, and fascinating.

Although there were some slow parts I had difficulty plowing through, As I Lay Dying in its narrative techniques, character portrayal, and menagerie of the tragic, the comic, the grotesque, and the absurd, is definitely worth the read.


]]>
author: William Faulkner
name: Taka
average rating: 3.87
book published: 1930
rating: 3
read at: 06/08
date added: 06/15/08
shelves: american_lit, japan_jul07-present, modernist_lit
review:
My first Faulkner (difficult, but good)--

In this slim volume (260 pages), Faulkner packs 15 POVs to tell a rather simple story of a pretty fucked-up family journeying to a faraway town to bury the mother. The story is simple, but the kaleidoscopic telling makes it a toil to read through it. It's one of those books that makes you work and commands a second read.

I'm glad I finally read Faulkner because his prose, especially in Darl's chapters, is beautiful, almost enigmatic. Some of his descriptions, too, are poetic, unique, and fascinating.

Although there were some slow parts I had difficulty plowing through, As I Lay Dying in its narrative techniques, character portrayal, and menagerie of the tragic, the comic, the grotesque, and the absurd, is definitely worth the read.



]]> 23829819 Wed, 11 Jun 2008 08:51:25 -0700
Murderously boring, maddeningly pointless, and unnecessarily long, the book was a torture. Because it's my categorical imperative to read every book I start, I could not, to keep my integrity and autonomy in tact, put the book down forever to wither away in the basement. And boy was I happy - no, ecstatic - to be finally done with it. Though not as bad and boring as Beckett's trilogy (which I hated with the utmost passion I could muster), Operation Shylock is a waste of time. I could not care less about the protagonist (rather hated him), didn't think the postmodern gimmick added ANYTHING at all to the story (when unnecessary, CUT it!), and at least about 100 pages were painfully and meaninglessly irrelevant and unnecessary. The story was also stale. Things DID happen, but there was just too much irrelevant shit peppered everywhere that it made it one hell of a slog to read it through. And as for the main plot, just listen to the blurb on the back cover: "Philip Roth meets a man who may or may not be Philip Roth..." I mean, WHO CARES?!

There are two things that he had it going for in this book: humor and prose. There were a few places that were mildly funny (really reminiscent of Beckett's trilogy...), and some of his passages - clearly the product of a mature master - were gorgeous. But that's it. My kudos stops here, giving it just enough toehold to keep myself from physically tearing it apart and stomping on it and screaming at the top of my lungs.

I will, however, forge ahead against my instinct and read his other two supposed masterpieces - American Pastoral and The Human Stain - but I'm understandably reluctant.

Incidentally and conveniently, my review can be summarized by the words of the author himself: "It is, I thought: exactly nothing. There is no meaning here at all. That's the meaning. I can stop there. I could have started there. Nothing could look more like it meant something than this, and nothing could mean less" (p.202)

I just can't BELIEVE this book won the PEN/Faulkner Fiction Award for 1993. No, I can't BELIEVE it won ANYTHING. And all those praises! "Fiendishly imaginative book"? "[E]xcruciating suspense"? "[N]ervously exuding a kind of delirious brilliance"? WTF?!?! Excuse me, but they are the most trumped-up and exaggerated bullshit I have ever heard. Philip Roth at some point in the book says everything is a lie. The book is a lie. But it took me a while to figure out that the praises, too, were a lie!

Don't waste your time and money on this book... it's not worth it.]]>
author: Philip Roth
name: Taka
average rating: 3.69
book published: 1994
rating: 1
read at: 06/08
date added: 06/11/08
shelves: japan_jul07-present, post-modern_lit
review:
I hated it. I usually LIKE books because I feel like I can learn from every book. So I usually don't have a strong dislike for books. But this book was an exception. It was so bad. Not only did I not like it but HATED IT with a vehemence I didn't think I was capable of.

Murderously boring, maddeningly pointless, and unnecessarily long, the book was a torture. Because it's my categorical imperative to read every book I start, I could not, to keep my integrity and autonomy in tact, put the book down forever to wither away in the basement. And boy was I happy - no, ecstatic - to be finally done with it. Though not as bad and boring as Beckett's trilogy (which I hated with the utmost passion I could muster), Operation Shylock is a waste of time. I could not care less about the protagonist (rather hated him), didn't think the postmodern gimmick added ANYTHING at all to the story (when unnecessary, CUT it!), and at least about 100 pages were painfully and meaninglessly irrelevant and unnecessary. The story was also stale. Things DID happen, but there was just too much irrelevant shit peppered everywhere that it made it one hell of a slog to read it through. And as for the main plot, just listen to the blurb on the back cover: "Philip Roth meets a man who may or may not be Philip Roth..." I mean, WHO CARES?!

There are two things that he had it going for in this book: humor and prose. There were a few places that were mildly funny (really reminiscent of Beckett's trilogy...), and some of his passages - clearly the product of a mature master - were gorgeous. But that's it. My kudos stops here, giving it just enough toehold to keep myself from physically tearing it apart and stomping on it and screaming at the top of my lungs.

I will, however, forge ahead against my instinct and read his other two supposed masterpieces - American Pastoral and The Human Stain - but I'm understandably reluctant.

Incidentally and conveniently, my review can be summarized by the words of the author himself: "It is, I thought: exactly nothing. There is no meaning here at all. That's the meaning. I can stop there. I could have started there. Nothing could look more like it meant something than this, and nothing could mean less" (p.202)

I just can't BELIEVE this book won the PEN/Faulkner Fiction Award for 1993. No, I can't BELIEVE it won ANYTHING. And all those praises! "Fiendishly imaginative book"? "[E]xcruciating suspense"? "[N]ervously exuding a kind of delirious brilliance"? WTF?!?! Excuse me, but they are the most trumped-up and exaggerated bullshit I have ever heard. Philip Roth at some point in the book says everything is a lie. The book is a lie. But it took me a while to figure out that the praises, too, were a lie!

Don't waste your time and money on this book... it's not worth it.
]]> 4246225 Thu, 05 Jun 2008 18:03:01 -0700
The book is long (562 pages) and dense as you can see when you flip through it that every page seems to be JAMMED with prose without any sort of indentation for dialogue (there is, but Styron has this queer habit of not starting a new line when writing dialogues).

And the prose. At first I thought it was turgid and overwrought, but it's one of those styles that grows on you. My opinion of it now is that it's a pretty prose with a unique lilt that once you get used to it makes it pleasant to read every sentence. It's pretty because there is nothing wrong with it, because it's often adorned with obscure, cool words (e.g. marmoreal, vocable, spatulate), and because it can sometimes be poetic, depending on your taste.

The story is actually quite engaging. It takes a bit to get to the juicier parts of the story and the beginning is a little bit weak with some unnecessary and irrelevant stuff that, though funny in parts, should've better been CUT from the story altogether. But once Stingo meets Sophie and Nathan, it becomes a good literary thriller and despite some slow parts here and there, it generally keeps up the pace till the very end.

Some people said they prefer actual Holocaust survivors' accounts, but I think these complaints miss the point. There are two things I need to say on this.

First, I thought the story was still pretty damn good for someone who didn't experience the horror firsthand. In fact, I thought he did a superb job titillatingly and tantalizingly revealing Sophie's past and secrets one by one and creating a compelling story out of secondhand sources. In other words, his storytelling and meticulous research more than compensates for his lack of firsthand experience.

Second, Stryon didn't set out to depict Holocaust in order to tell the public the sheer horror and evil of it. Rather, he was more interested in - I felt - the human drama, sexuality, types of time, and other myriad concepts that hovered around Holocaust. By the end of the story, I really did sympathize and identify with Sophie whose tragic past is told in a detailed account that penetrates to the depths of her psyche. In other words, I felt like I knew the main characters really well, even almost personally. So for people looking to learn about Holocaust, this book might not be the best book (though there are tons of historical research behind it), but for those who like to read a good story with serious human drama that sucks you right into it, this is it.

So, good prose and good story = 3.5]]>
author: William Styron
name: Taka
average rating: 4.23
book published: 1992
rating: 3
read at: 06/08
date added: 06/05/08
shelves: american_lit, japan_jul07-present
review:
Pretty good (3.5)--

The book is long (562 pages) and dense as you can see when you flip through it that every page seems to be JAMMED with prose without any sort of indentation for dialogue (there is, but Styron has this queer habit of not starting a new line when writing dialogues).

And the prose. At first I thought it was turgid and overwrought, but it's one of those styles that grows on you. My opinion of it now is that it's a pretty prose with a unique lilt that once you get used to it makes it pleasant to read every sentence. It's pretty because there is nothing wrong with it, because it's often adorned with obscure, cool words (e.g. marmoreal, vocable, spatulate), and because it can sometimes be poetic, depending on your taste.

The story is actually quite engaging. It takes a bit to get to the juicier parts of the story and the beginning is a little bit weak with some unnecessary and irrelevant stuff that, though funny in parts, should've better been CUT from the story altogether. But once Stingo meets Sophie and Nathan, it becomes a good literary thriller and despite some slow parts here and there, it generally keeps up the pace till the very end.

Some people said they prefer actual Holocaust survivors' accounts, but I think these complaints miss the point. There are two things I need to say on this.

First, I thought the story was still pretty damn good for someone who didn't experience the horror firsthand. In fact, I thought he did a superb job titillatingly and tantalizingly revealing Sophie's past and secrets one by one and creating a compelling story out of secondhand sources. In other words, his storytelling and meticulous research more than compensates for his lack of firsthand experience.

Second, Stryon didn't set out to depict Holocaust in order to tell the public the sheer horror and evil of it. Rather, he was more interested in - I felt - the human drama, sexuality, types of time, and other myriad concepts that hovered around Holocaust. By the end of the story, I really did sympathize and identify with Sophie whose tragic past is told in a detailed account that penetrates to the depths of her psyche. In other words, I felt like I knew the main characters really well, even almost personally. So for people looking to learn about Holocaust, this book might not be the best book (though there are tons of historical research behind it), but for those who like to read a good story with serious human drama that sucks you right into it, this is it.

So, good prose and good story = 3.5
]]> 965938 Tue, 27 May 2008 08:40:56 -0700
Hearing and reading only good things about this book, I had really high expectations for it, thinking it would be better than Dan Brown's The Da Vinci Code. But alas, it simply wasn't. Sure, Eco's book has more obscure occult arcana and esoterica, but the story, I think, is shit. Dan Brown at least knew how to tell a story - I really couldn't put the book down the whole time. Sure, it's not serious literature, but Dan Brown's story was FAR superior to Umberto Eco's. Aside from its encyclopedic display of knowledge and conceptually interesting theses, Foucault's Pendulum is overwrought, uneven, and just too long (reminds me of Borge's quip that an idea should be expressed succinctly in fiction).

Let me explain.

The part about Colonel Ardenti is very interesting. But then Eco seems to just abandon the leitmotif, i.e., "the Plan" and spends the next 200 pages, from p.150 to p.350, on uninteresting, irrelevant, random snippets and vignettes that have NOTHING to do with the Plan. I kept asking myself, "Why am I reading this?" Then after the torturous 200 pages, he seems to have remembered about "the Plan" and so finally gets back down to business and begins to spin an interesting yarn, although at times Eco seems to forget all sense of academic restraint and overwhelms you with historical dates and facts and esoterica, the upshot of which is a confusing narrative about the Plan teeming with too much information. Interspersed in the central narrative are conceptually interesting but actually excruciatingly boring journal entries written in gross purple prose by one of the characters, Belbo, and I wished with all my heart that some editor out there were smart enough to force Eco to CUT THAT SHIT altogether. Hasta. Just like that for the substantial betterment of his novel and the advancement of the readers' general happiness worldwide.

The ending is also quite unsatisfying, though the main point of the book (that there is no secret) is clearly presented and ruminated on. I, too, like the Diabolicals, wanted the grand revelation, only to be let down thoroughly at the end (the difference between the reader and the Diabolicals is that the former stops searching while the latter don't).

So, the book offers a very weak, uneven story that suffers from too much information, too many irrelevant narrative lines, and an unsatisfying ending. Conceptually, the ideas about inventing a story, mixing truth with falsehood, and the absence of secret as the most fascinating secret are, I think, VERY interesting, but I think the book could have articulated them just as well in half the pages. Again, Eco could have benefitted TREMENDOUSLY from following an astute editor's advice.

A few good things about the book: the story thread about the Plan is awesome (but not the end); most of the esoterica (at least to me) were interesting; and it was surprisingly a quick read.

I heard The Name of the Rose is much better, so I'll give it a shot sometime soon, but as far as this book is concerned, I'm sad to conclude that it was an unfortunate let-down :(]]>
author: Umberto Eco
name: Taka
average rating: 3.92
book published: 1989
rating: 2
read at: 05/08
date added: 05/27/08
shelves: japan_jul07-present, post-modern_lit
review:
Quite disappointing--

Hearing and reading only good things about this book, I had really high expectations for it, thinking it would be better than Dan Brown's The Da Vinci Code. But alas, it simply wasn't. Sure, Eco's book has more obscure occult arcana and esoterica, but the story, I think, is shit. Dan Brown at least knew how to tell a story - I really couldn't put the book down the whole time. Sure, it's not serious literature, but Dan Brown's story was FAR superior to Umberto Eco's. Aside from its encyclopedic display of knowledge and conceptually interesting theses, Foucault's Pendulum is overwrought, uneven, and just too long (reminds me of Borge's quip that an idea should be expressed succinctly in fiction).

Let me explain.

The part about Colonel Ardenti is very interesting. But then Eco seems to just abandon the leitmotif, i.e., "the Plan" and spends the next 200 pages, from p.150 to p.350, on uninteresting, irrelevant, random snippets and vignettes that have NOTHING to do with the Plan. I kept asking myself, "Why am I reading this?" Then after the torturous 200 pages, he seems to have remembered about "the Plan" and so finally gets back down to business and begins to spin an interesting yarn, although at times Eco seems to forget all sense of academic restraint and overwhelms you with historical dates and facts and esoterica, the upshot of which is a confusing narrative about the Plan teeming with too much information. Interspersed in the central narrative are conceptually interesting but actually excruciatingly boring journal entries written in gross purple prose by one of the characters, Belbo, and I wished with all my heart that some editor out there were smart enough to force Eco to CUT THAT SHIT altogether. Hasta. Just like that for the substantial betterment of his novel and the advancement of the readers' general happiness worldwide.

The ending is also quite unsatisfying, though the main point of the book (that there is no secret) is clearly presented and ruminated on. I, too, like the Diabolicals, wanted the grand revelation, only to be let down thoroughly at the end (the difference between the reader and the Diabolicals is that the former stops searching while the latter don't).

So, the book offers a very weak, uneven story that suffers from too much information, too many irrelevant narrative lines, and an unsatisfying ending. Conceptually, the ideas about inventing a story, mixing truth with falsehood, and the absence of secret as the most fascinating secret are, I think, VERY interesting, but I think the book could have articulated them just as well in half the pages. Again, Eco could have benefitted TREMENDOUSLY from following an astute editor's advice.

A few good things about the book: the story thread about the Plan is awesome (but not the end); most of the esoterica (at least to me) were interesting; and it was surprisingly a quick read.

I heard The Name of the Rose is much better, so I'll give it a shot sometime soon, but as far as this book is concerned, I'm sad to conclude that it was an unfortunate let-down :(
]]> 22113036 Tue, 20 May 2008 21:17:41 -0700
Once in a while out of the blue, someone comes up with a work of art incredibly original and mind-blowing, and one can only pray that he or she is lucky enough to encounter it. Well, here it is. A book devilishly conceived and beautifully crafted, written in its own polyphonous and cacophonous language, telling a captivating horror story about a strange house. The unusual layout of the book makes a portion of it a real labyrinth, making your eyes wander over those pages in search of the right footnote to a footnote to a footnote. In other words, MZD realizes for the first time Ts'ui Pen's labyrinth in Borge's "The Garden of Forking Path," something I thought was an impossibility.

Though Johnny Truant's penchant for interminable run-on sentences and some of the stuff in the appendices (esp. Pelican Poems) irked me at times, the writing is gorgeous and the story is masterfully told. The layout, or what some people may call 'a mere gimmick,' is not only strange and cool and beautiful, but has a point (!). I'm a proponent of Modernism and experimental fiction insofar as the bizarre, non-conventional aspects of the novel have some kind of purpose. Here, they do, and I'm quite impressed by MZD's knack of bringing together all those different styles and unusual layouts into one coherent and captivating piece.

Unlike other postmodern writers (e.g. DFW, Nabokov, Chabon), MZD won't avalanche you with obscure words. There are some here and there, but it's definitely not a postmodern vocab avalanche. It's eminently readable and HIGHLY engaging. I think in House of Leaves, you find the rare mix of story-telling, postmodern playfulness, and modernistic innovations.

Although the book looks long and intimidating, it actually isn't. Flipping through the pages at random, you'll notice that many pages have only a few sentences or even no word at all. In fact, it took me less than a week to finish it.

Some reviewers have pretty strong sentiments about this book, calling it, to quote one such reviewer, "bullshit" and giving vent on the book's unusual layout where one has to turn the book around to read the sentences. The reviewer goes on to add, rather cryptically, that s/he is not stupid and hence calling it bullshit. I simply do not get it. The layout, if it was without meaning or purpose, is "masturbation" or just "bullshit" where the author tries hard to impress or be artsy for the sake of being artsy. I don't think he's trying to be pretentious at all (rather, I think he's being overly pretentious to make fun of literary criticism). Nor do I think that he's being artsy for the sake of being artsy because I think the artsiness has a purpose: to visually represent the experience of the characters. Whether he does it successfully in all instances is up for debate; the important point is rather that it's a means to an end. The age-old maxim still applies here: if it doesn't contribute to the story, cut it. But because the whole artsy layout does contribute to the story, stet - let it stay. Don't hate the book just because it's not normal and tries to do something new.

Overall, it's got everything you'd expect in a great book. It's funny, sad, perplexing, surreal, playful, beautiful, and fun. Recommended for anyone who wants to experience a work of genius.

Inspiring.

]]>
author: Mark Z. Danielewski
name: Taka
average rating: 4.14
book published: 2000
rating: 5
read at: 05/08
date added: 05/20/08
shelves: japan_jul07-present, post-modern_lit
review:
Amazing--

Once in a while out of the blue, someone comes up with a work of art incredibly original and mind-blowing, and one can only pray that he or she is lucky enough to encounter it. Well, here it is. A book devilishly conceived and beautifully crafted, written in its own polyphonous and cacophonous language, telling a captivating horror story about a strange house. The unusual layout of the book makes a portion of it a real labyrinth, making your eyes wander over those pages in search of the right footnote to a footnote to a footnote. In other words, MZD realizes for the first time Ts'ui Pen's labyrinth in Borge's "The Garden of Forking Path," something I thought was an impossibility.

Though Johnny Truant's penchant for interminable run-on sentences and some of the stuff in the appendices (esp. Pelican Poems) irked me at times, the writing is gorgeous and the story is masterfully told. The layout, or what some people may call 'a mere gimmick,' is not only strange and cool and beautiful, but has a point (!). I'm a proponent of Modernism and experimental fiction insofar as the bizarre, non-conventional aspects of the novel have some kind of purpose. Here, they do, and I'm quite impressed by MZD's knack of bringing together all those different styles and unusual layouts into one coherent and captivating piece.

Unlike other postmodern writers (e.g. DFW, Nabokov, Chabon), MZD won't avalanche you with obscure words. There are some here and there, but it's definitely not a postmodern vocab avalanche. It's eminently readable and HIGHLY engaging. I think in House of Leaves, you find the rare mix of story-telling, postmodern playfulness, and modernistic innovations.

Although the book looks long and intimidating, it actually isn't. Flipping through the pages at random, you'll notice that many pages have only a few sentences or even no word at all. In fact, it took me less than a week to finish it.

Some reviewers have pretty strong sentiments about this book, calling it, to quote one such reviewer, "bullshit" and giving vent on the book's unusual layout where one has to turn the book around to read the sentences. The reviewer goes on to add, rather cryptically, that s/he is not stupid and hence calling it bullshit. I simply do not get it. The layout, if it was without meaning or purpose, is "masturbation" or just "bullshit" where the author tries hard to impress or be artsy for the sake of being artsy. I don't think he's trying to be pretentious at all (rather, I think he's being overly pretentious to make fun of literary criticism). Nor do I think that he's being artsy for the sake of being artsy because I think the artsiness has a purpose: to visually represent the experience of the characters. Whether he does it successfully in all instances is up for debate; the important point is rather that it's a means to an end. The age-old maxim still applies here: if it doesn't contribute to the story, cut it. But because the whole artsy layout does contribute to the story, stet - let it stay. Don't hate the book just because it's not normal and tries to do something new.

Overall, it's got everything you'd expect in a great book. It's funny, sad, perplexing, surreal, playful, beautiful, and fun. Recommended for anyone who wants to experience a work of genius.

Inspiring.


]]> 21772960 Mon, 12 May 2008 05:47:48 -0700
This is definitely an entertaining read that sucks you right in as things are set in motion. I loved how the author manipulates multiple perspectives and create different characters that are alive and interesting. Hats off to how skillfully she does this without making identification difficult for the reader. The plot moves at breakneck speed and keeps the reader engaged; there really wasn't any dull moments except in the very beginning where the author sets it up.

There were two things I thought were the book's weaknesses: 1) Yayoi's murder of her husband wasn't convincing; and 2) the near-mad character of Satake was not believable. Other than that, though, it's a great, well-assembled thriller that goes beyond the scope of an ordinary crime thriller as it tells much about Japanese society.

Good stuff.]]>
author: Natsuo Kirino
name: Taka
average rating: 3.84
book published: 1997
rating: 3
read at: 05/08
date added: 05/12/08
shelves: japanese_lit, japan_jul07-present
review:
Good! (3.5)

This is definitely an entertaining read that sucks you right in as things are set in motion. I loved how the author manipulates multiple perspectives and create different characters that are alive and interesting. Hats off to how skillfully she does this without making identification difficult for the reader. The plot moves at breakneck speed and keeps the reader engaged; there really wasn't any dull moments except in the very beginning where the author sets it up.

There were two things I thought were the book's weaknesses: 1) Yayoi's murder of her husband wasn't convincing; and 2) the near-mad character of Satake was not believable. Other than that, though, it's a great, well-assembled thriller that goes beyond the scope of an ordinary crime thriller as it tells much about Japanese society.

Good stuff.
]]> 21131417 Tue, 06 May 2008 20:03:47 -0700
Chabon is now one of my three favorite contemporary writers (others are David Foster Wallace and Neal Stephenson) with his graceful, elegant prose, extensive vocabulary, and entertaining plot. While the book was not "fall-on-the-floor-funny" as one reviewer says, it certainly was entertaining and beautifully written. I really was floored by many of his metaphors.

Many reviewers complain of Chabon's narration that does a lot more telling than showing, which makes it more difficult for the reader to identify with the characters. But I think he pulled it off fairly well and I did sympathize with the characters (though I could've sympathized more if he had done more showing than telling), and his descriptions, I thought, were not at all boring but poetic and didn't bother me at all.

The novel reminded me of Gabriel Garcia Marquez's One Hundred Years of Solitude where he does masterfully narrate one hundred years of history by more telling than showing. Also, the golem coming back at the end of the story reminded me of Melquiades's secret parchment that appears in the beginning and re-emerges to be deciphered at the very end.

The only minor complaint I have of this amazingly well-put-together novel- well yes, other than that he could've done a little more showing and less flashbacks at crucial moments - is that it seemed like it dragged on toward the end. The beginning is perfect, and had he kept the pitch throughout, it would've been the perfect novel because that's where I laughed, was dazzled by the beauty of his prose, and fascinated by the plot, the golems and the art of escape and all the cool things that were being brewed together. But somewhere along the line, the excitement dwindled, the cool, esoteric knowledge dropped away, and the plot became haphazard and sprawling.

Still, it's a great novel and I highly recommend it.


]]>
author: Michael Chabon
name: Taka
average rating: 4.23
book published: 2000
rating: 4
read at: 05/08
date added: 05/06/08
shelves: contemporary, japan_jul07-present, post-modern_lit
review:
Awesome (4.5)--

Chabon is now one of my three favorite contemporary writers (others are David Foster Wallace and Neal Stephenson) with his graceful, elegant prose, extensive vocabulary, and entertaining plot. While the book was not "fall-on-the-floor-funny" as one reviewer says, it certainly was entertaining and beautifully written. I really was floored by many of his metaphors.

Many reviewers complain of Chabon's narration that does a lot more telling than showing, which makes it more difficult for the reader to identify with the characters. But I think he pulled it off fairly well and I did sympathize with the characters (though I could've sympathized more if he had done more showing than telling), and his descriptions, I thought, were not at all boring but poetic and didn't bother me at all.

The novel reminded me of Gabriel Garcia Marquez's One Hundred Years of Solitude where he does masterfully narrate one hundred years of history by more telling than showing. Also, the golem coming back at the end of the story reminded me of Melquiades's secret parchment that appears in the beginning and re-emerges to be deciphered at the very end.

The only minor complaint I have of this amazingly well-put-together novel- well yes, other than that he could've done a little more showing and less flashbacks at crucial moments - is that it seemed like it dragged on toward the end. The beginning is perfect, and had he kept the pitch throughout, it would've been the perfect novel because that's where I laughed, was dazzled by the beauty of his prose, and fascinated by the plot, the golems and the art of escape and all the cool things that were being brewed together. But somewhere along the line, the excitement dwindled, the cool, esoteric knowledge dropped away, and the plot became haphazard and sprawling.

Still, it's a great novel and I highly recommend it.



]]> 20765848 Sun, 27 Apr 2008 06:06:15 -0700
Dave Eggers has a unique, experimental style in the spirit of modernism cast in simple, colloquial language quite reminiscent of David Foster Wallace. There are definitely very funny parts, and some of the scenes and episodes are interesting and beautiful, but overall, I felt it to be, as the author admits on the first page, "kind of uneven." I really didn't care all that much for many of the episodes (esp. the Real World interview part), and didn't know what to make of them because most of them are disconnected and lack cohesion. While it was interesting, easy to read, funny and ridiculous at times, I wouldn't say, as The New York Times Book Review has it, "Exhilarating ... Profoundly moving." As a matter of fact, I wasn't really affected, much less profoundly moved, by the narrator's plight.

A reviewer says that this criticism about the unevenness of the book is already included in the book and yet he still manages to make it interesting. But just as a smoker who is aware of the risk s/he is taking by sticking to the habit doesn't make the risk go away, the self-awareness of one's own work's shortcomings does not blot them out, much less compensate for them. Sure, it's uneven and interesting, peppered with some hilarious bits. Sure the author openly admits it. But the fact remains that I didn't get sucked into it, by its story or style

So I'm led to the conclusion that the hype over this book is overblown and if you wanna see for yourself how it is, it's better to go into it without the highest expectations stoked by such reviews you find on its back cover.

To sum: It's OK (2) + some good laughs (0.5) = 2.5



]]>
author: Dave Eggers
name: Taka
average rating: 3.59
book published: 2000
rating: 2
read at: 04/08
date added: 04/27/08
shelves: japan_jul07-present, post-modern_lit
review:
More like 2.5--

Dave Eggers has a unique, experimental style in the spirit of modernism cast in simple, colloquial language quite reminiscent of David Foster Wallace. There are definitely very funny parts, and some of the scenes and episodes are interesting and beautiful, but overall, I felt it to be, as the author admits on the first page, "kind of uneven." I really didn't care all that much for many of the episodes (esp. the Real World interview part), and didn't know what to make of them because most of them are disconnected and lack cohesion. While it was interesting, easy to read, funny and ridiculous at times, I wouldn't say, as The New York Times Book Review has it, "Exhilarating ... Profoundly moving." As a matter of fact, I wasn't really affected, much less profoundly moved, by the narrator's plight.

A reviewer says that this criticism about the unevenness of the book is already included in the book and yet he still manages to make it interesting. But just as a smoker who is aware of the risk s/he is taking by sticking to the habit doesn't make the risk go away, the self-awareness of one's own work's shortcomings does not blot them out, much less compensate for them. Sure, it's uneven and interesting, peppered with some hilarious bits. Sure the author openly admits it. But the fact remains that I didn't get sucked into it, by its story or style

So I'm led to the conclusion that the hype over this book is overblown and if you wanna see for yourself how it is, it's better to go into it without the highest expectations stoked by such reviews you find on its back cover.

To sum: It's OK (2) + some good laughs (0.5) = 2.5




]]> 5207641 Thu, 24 Apr 2008 04:40:59 -0700

As I expected, there were a TON of pronouns - or more precisely, around 300 (no, I didn't count them, thanks) - in a mere 30 pages of the text, which was followed by a rather random and rambling work of equal length called Works and Days. There were maybe four parts in Theogony that I found was of historical, literary, and mythological significance: the naming of the Muses (which is minimal, since Hesiod doesn't assign their specific functions), Cronos's castration of his father, Zeus's birth, and the gods' war with the Titans. In the second work, the only interesting parts were the story about Prometheus and the division of human history into not three but five stages (gold, silver, bronze, "demigods and heroes," and finally iron). If it weren't for its sheer shortness, I wouldn't bother to spend time on it. I think a quick reading of a summary on Wikipedia or other sources would suffice for gleaning the "important" elements in the work.

Hence the two stars (= it was ok).]]>
author: Hesiod
name: Taka
average rating: 3.78
book published: 1999
rating: 2
read at: 10/07
date added: 04/24/08
shelves: classics, japan_jul07-present
review:
May not be that important--


As I expected, there were a TON of pronouns - or more precisely, around 300 (no, I didn't count them, thanks) - in a mere 30 pages of the text, which was followed by a rather random and rambling work of equal length called Works and Days. There were maybe four parts in Theogony that I found was of historical, literary, and mythological significance: the naming of the Muses (which is minimal, since Hesiod doesn't assign their specific functions), Cronos's castration of his father, Zeus's birth, and the gods' war with the Titans. In the second work, the only interesting parts were the story about Prometheus and the division of human history into not three but five stages (gold, silver, bronze, "demigods and heroes," and finally iron). If it weren't for its sheer shortness, I wouldn't bother to spend time on it. I think a quick reading of a summary on Wikipedia or other sources would suffice for gleaning the "important" elements in the work.

Hence the two stars (= it was ok).
]]> 20502276 Tue, 22 Apr 2008 21:09:02 -0700
Thought not the best of the stories I've read (literary-autobiography-wise, nothing I've read surpasses Bruno Schulz's The Street of Crocodiles), this charming, rather haphazardly collated collection of Nabokov's autobiographical episodes is certainly worth reading for its breathtaking prose, unique and incisive ruminations on various subjects, and revealing, behind-the-scenes vignettes and thoughts of one of the most fascinating writers of the 20th century.

The only major misgiving I had was the bland, woolgathering reveries I had to trudge through. But then there are these passages that soar into the Unreal and leave me gasping for breath. From the very first sentence ( "The cradle rocks above an abyss, and common sense tells us that our existence is but a brief crack of light between two eternities of darkness"), Nabokov proves himself again and again to be the master prose stylist that he was. Just read this description of the moon:

So there it comes, steering out of a flock of small dappled clouds, which it tinges with a vague iridescence; and, as it sails higher, it glazes the runner tracks left on the road, where every sparkling lump of snow is emphasized by a swollen shadow (p.99).

In these instances, I simply must surrender, prostrate, to Nabokov with my humble hat off. I was also pleasantly surprised to find myself laughing over some of the vignettes (esp. in Chapter 6). Take, for example, this one:

One summer afternoon, in 1911, Mademoiselle [my favorite along with Nabokov's father] came into my room, book in hand, started to say she wanted to show me how wittily Rousseau denounced zoology (in favor of botany), and by then was too far gone in the gravitational process of lowering her bulk into an armchair to be stopped by my howl of anguish: on that seat I had happened to leave a glass-lidded cabinet tray with long, lovely series of the Large White. Her first reaction was one of stung vanity: her weight, surely, could not be accused of damaging what in fact it had demolished; her second was to console me: Allons donc, ce ne sont que des papillons de potager! - which only made matters worse. (127)

Funny, incisive, and lyrical, the book is a great read especially if you're a writer. Like some reviewer has written, "time with Nabokov is invariably time well spent." And it is true. He shows us the secret passageways and hidden nooks of the English language that other writers have completely overlooked. It is simply delightful to follow his prose, stumble over obscure charming words, and be surprised, accompanied by that guttural groan of awe and satisfaction at witnessing the magician of words at work.


]]>
author: Vladimir Nabokov
name: Taka
average rating: 4.09
book published: 1989
rating: 3
read at: 04/08
date added: 04/22/08
shelves: american_lit, japan_jul07-present
review:
Memory well spoken (3.5)--

Thought not the best of the stories I've read (literary-autobiography-wise, nothing I've read surpasses Bruno Schulz's The Street of Crocodiles), this charming, rather haphazardly collated collection of Nabokov's autobiographical episodes is certainly worth reading for its breathtaking prose, unique and incisive ruminations on various subjects, and revealing, behind-the-scenes vignettes and thoughts of one of the most fascinating writers of the 20th century.

The only major misgiving I had was the bland, woolgathering reveries I had to trudge through. But then there are these passages that soar into the Unreal and leave me gasping for breath. From the very first sentence ( "The cradle rocks above an abyss, and common sense tells us that our existence is but a brief crack of light between two eternities of darkness"), Nabokov proves himself again and again to be the master prose stylist that he was. Just read this description of the moon:

So there it comes, steering out of a flock of small dappled clouds, which it tinges with a vague iridescence; and, as it sails higher, it glazes the runner tracks left on the road, where every sparkling lump of snow is emphasized by a swollen shadow (p.99).

In these instances, I simply must surrender, prostrate, to Nabokov with my humble hat off. I was also pleasantly surprised to find myself laughing over some of the vignettes (esp. in Chapter 6). Take, for example, this one:

One summer afternoon, in 1911, Mademoiselle [my favorite along with Nabokov's father] came into my room, book in hand, started to say she wanted to show me how wittily Rousseau denounced zoology (in favor of botany), and by then was too far gone in the gravitational process of lowering her bulk into an armchair to be stopped by my howl of anguish: on that seat I had happened to leave a glass-lidded cabinet tray with long, lovely series of the Large White. Her first reaction was one of stung vanity: her weight, surely, could not be accused of damaging what in fact it had demolished; her second was to console me: Allons donc, ce ne sont que des papillons de potager! - which only made matters worse. (127)

Funny, incisive, and lyrical, the book is a great read especially if you're a writer. Like some reviewer has written, "time with Nabokov is invariably time well spent." And it is true. He shows us the secret passageways and hidden nooks of the English language that other writers have completely overlooked. It is simply delightful to follow his prose, stumble over obscure charming words, and be surprised, accompanied by that guttural groan of awe and satisfaction at witnessing the magician of words at work.



]]> 20114765 Fri, 18 Apr 2008 19:41:16 -0700
A surprisingly readable book, what with all the gore and plotless rambling of a madman. I can see how some people think it's a total waste of time to read it because, after all, there is no moral, no plot, no meaning in all of it. Most of the book consists of Patrick Bateman inventorying what he and other people are wearing and eating, and recounting what he does to the homeless, prostitutes, and other victims of his demented desire. Threading through all the episodes is the leitmotif quoted above: "no one is safe, nothing is redeemed." No one is safe from senseless violence that people like Patrick Bateman commits. And what is truly scary is that, as Bateman himself says toward the end, appearance can be deceiving (yet that's the only thing people seem to care). The book presents a scathing satire of a society that cares so much about appearance and really ignores what's inside. The ultimate result of such a society is Patrick Bateman, who has a difficult time trying to understand himself. This, and nothing else, holds the book together and it's remarkable how such a rambling book about nothing can interest me enough to keep me reading it till the end.

Some episodes, however, were truly meaningless and frustrating to read (viz., a detailed five-page description of what Patrick Bateman does every morning, and an excruciatingly irrelevant 8-pager on the history of Huey Lewis and the News and why they are one of the best bands of the '80s).

As a writer, I did learn much about clothes, brands, and dishes - details that might have been a bit lacking in my own writing - so I'm grateful for their abundance in the book. Some of the gore scenes were quite unnerving and disgusting, but at the same time strangely fascinating for their very violence.

The first half of the book is definitely slow and weak, and it gets better and we get to know Patrick Bateman a little more deeply (if that's possible) in the last 50 pages of the book when he starts raving about appearance and humanity and some of the raving is quite interesting, e.g.:

"Nothing ws affirmative, the term 'generosity of spirit' applied to nothing, was a cliché, was some kind of bad joke. Sex is mathematics. Individuality no longer an issue. What does intelligence signify? Define reason. Desire--meaningless. Intellect is not a cure. Justice is dead. Fear, recrimination, innocence, sympathy, guilt, waste, failure, grief, were things, emotions,, that no one really felt anymore. Reflection is useless, the world is senseless. Evil is its only permanence. God is not alive. Love cannot be trusted. Surface, surface, surface was all that anyone found meaning in ... this was civilization as I saw it, colossal and jagged" (375)

Bam. That's the nutshell of the criticism that the book levels at the society we live in. Certainly, there are definite streaks of this obsession with appearance at the cost of the content of individuality. As a satire, the book does take what it criticizes to its extreme and presents it to us in its ugliest form. And some of the episodes are actually FUNNY because they are over the top and just plain ridiculous. So, as a satire, I think it does a great job, but as a story, I have to give it what I gave because it lacks in a lot of elements I appreciate in a novel.

All in all, the book does cut deeper than what a lot of people think (e.g. one reviewer claimed to sum up the book as the author saying "I was a yuppie and I hated it" - but jeez, it's a fucking SATIRE, don't you see it?), and as a satire of a society we still live in, I think it's an important book and should be read AS A SATIRE (people who accuse the author of nihilism and other nasty epithets JUST DON'T GET IT).

]]>
author: Bret Easton Ellis
name: Taka
average rating: 3.78
book published: 1991
rating: 3
read at: 04/08
date added: 04/18/08
shelves: japan_jul07-present, post-modern_lit
review:
"[N]o one is safe, nothing is redeemed." -- a solid satire (3.5)

A surprisingly readable book, what with all the gore and plotless rambling of a madman. I can see how some people think it's a total waste of time to read it because, after all, there is no moral, no plot, no meaning in all of it. Most of the book consists of Patrick Bateman inventorying what he and other people are wearing and eating, and recounting what he does to the homeless, prostitutes, and other victims of his demented desire. Threading through all the episodes is the leitmotif quoted above: "no one is safe, nothing is redeemed." No one is safe from senseless violence that people like Patrick Bateman commits. And what is truly scary is that, as Bateman himself says toward the end, appearance can be deceiving (yet that's the only thing people seem to care). The book presents a scathing satire of a society that cares so much about appearance and really ignores what's inside. The ultimate result of such a society is Patrick Bateman, who has a difficult time trying to understand himself. This, and nothing else, holds the book together and it's remarkable how such a rambling book about nothing can interest me enough to keep me reading it till the end.

Some episodes, however, were truly meaningless and frustrating to read (viz., a detailed five-page description of what Patrick Bateman does every morning, and an excruciatingly irrelevant 8-pager on the history of Huey Lewis and the News and why they are one of the best bands of the '80s).

As a writer, I did learn much about clothes, brands, and dishes - details that might have been a bit lacking in my own writing - so I'm grateful for their abundance in the book. Some of the gore scenes were quite unnerving and disgusting, but at the same time strangely fascinating for their very violence.

The first half of the book is definitely slow and weak, and it gets better and we get to know Patrick Bateman a little more deeply (if that's possible) in the last 50 pages of the book when he starts raving about appearance and humanity and some of the raving is quite interesting, e.g.:

"Nothing ws affirmative, the term 'generosity of spirit' applied to nothing, was a cliché, was some kind of bad joke. Sex is mathematics. Individuality no longer an issue. What does intelligence signify? Define reason. Desire--meaningless. Intellect is not a cure. Justice is dead. Fear, recrimination, innocence, sympathy, guilt, waste, failure, grief, were things, emotions,, that no one really felt anymore. Reflection is useless, the world is senseless. Evil is its only permanence. God is not alive. Love cannot be trusted. Surface, surface, surface was all that anyone found meaning in ... this was civilization as I saw it, colossal and jagged" (375)

Bam. That's the nutshell of the criticism that the book levels at the society we live in. Certainly, there are definite streaks of this obsession with appearance at the cost of the content of individuality. As a satire, the book does take what it criticizes to its extreme and presents it to us in its ugliest form. And some of the episodes are actually FUNNY because they are over the top and just plain ridiculous. So, as a satire, I think it does a great job, but as a story, I have to give it what I gave because it lacks in a lot of elements I appreciate in a novel.

All in all, the book does cut deeper than what a lot of people think (e.g. one reviewer claimed to sum up the book as the author saying "I was a yuppie and I hated it" - but jeez, it's a fucking SATIRE, don't you see it?), and as a satire of a society we still live in, I think it's an important book and should be read AS A SATIRE (people who accuse the author of nihilism and other nasty epithets JUST DON'T GET IT).


]]> 19839592 Mon, 14 Apr 2008 05:21:03 -0700
Krakauer doubtlessly is a great story-teller who can keep you engrossed in every detail he delivers at each turn of the story. My only complaint is that he sprinkles difficult vocabulary not only without any added effect, but clunkily, making certain words stand out from the rest of his prose. Take, for example, the following sentence:

"Now, four days later, Nukita warned us that a similarly predacious swarm of print and television reporters lay in wait for us..." (280, emphasis added)

Um... why not just "predatory"? Is it just me, or is the word "predacious" as common a word as "predatory"?

Or take another sentence:

"But such moments were tempered by the long penumbra cast by Everest..." (282, emphasis added)

Again, why not infinitely more understandable and easy-to-imagine "SHADOW"? Why "PENUMBRA"? Why go so poetic and abstract all of a sudden? I was literally thrown off balance when I came across the word in midsentence because it's so out of place. Besides, it hazards leaving the reader wondering what the word means rather than sympathizing with the author's plight. My complaint is based on the fairly commonsensical belief that when a word is not adding anything - whether it be impact, image, style, etc. - it should be ruthlessly cut and/or replaced with another. PENUMBRA seems to fall pat into this sort of instance. Unfortunately, I didn't keep detailed note of every instance in which the author slipped in flashy words tragically to the detriment of his own otherwise lucid prose, I can't say for certain how often he did it, but as far as i remember, there were numerous similar occasions where I thought the word he chose was definitely working against his writing.

But my quibbling cavil ends here and I only have kudos for the book. It's an awesome adventure story about people with astounding willpower under the worst and extremest of environmental conditions imaginable. Highly recommended.

]]>
author: Jon Krakauer
name: Taka
average rating: 4.10
book published: 2004
rating: 4
read at: 04/08
date added: 04/14/08
shelves: contemporary, japan_jul07-present
review:
Great!

Krakauer doubtlessly is a great story-teller who can keep you engrossed in every detail he delivers at each turn of the story. My only complaint is that he sprinkles difficult vocabulary not only without any added effect, but clunkily, making certain words stand out from the rest of his prose. Take, for example, the following sentence:

"Now, four days later, Nukita warned us that a similarly predacious swarm of print and television reporters lay in wait for us..." (280, emphasis added)

Um... why not just "predatory"? Is it just me, or is the word "predacious" as common a word as "predatory"?

Or take another sentence:

"But such moments were tempered by the long penumbra cast by Everest..." (282, emphasis added)

Again, why not infinitely more understandable and easy-to-imagine "SHADOW"? Why "PENUMBRA"? Why go so poetic and abstract all of a sudden? I was literally thrown off balance when I came across the word in midsentence because it's so out of place. Besides, it hazards leaving the reader wondering what the word means rather than sympathizing with the author's plight. My complaint is based on the fairly commonsensical belief that when a word is not adding anything - whether it be impact, image, style, etc. - it should be ruthlessly cut and/or replaced with another. PENUMBRA seems to fall pat into this sort of instance. Unfortunately, I didn't keep detailed note of every instance in which the author slipped in flashy words tragically to the detriment of his own otherwise lucid prose, I can't say for certain how often he did it, but as far as i remember, there were numerous similar occasions where I thought the word he chose was definitely working against his writing.

But my quibbling cavil ends here and I only have kudos for the book. It's an awesome adventure story about people with astounding willpower under the worst and extremest of environmental conditions imaginable. Highly recommended.


]]> 19704699 Wed, 09 Apr 2008 20:01:07 -0700