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Please tell me this is Tamaru.

Definitely explains the man in the hallway as being Tengo's father's ghost.

The paragraph describing Murray's first sight of the cabin sets such the tone! I will have to quote it in full for the full review. Lush, but clear prose. Beautiful.

I like Judy's chutzpah. She is a surprisingly complex figure for a female character written by a man in the 1920s. I had not expected this.

Now I feel like the jerk. Sartre was a very, very sad little boy. Ouch.

Tengo's father is dead, and I see so many parallels between their story and that of my father dying last Spring. It's not exactly the same, by any means - I had a better relationship with my father than Tengo had with his, for example - but there are a lot of parallels with the whole experience. Hits kind of a tender spot.

Ah, so two moons are not just limited to Tengo and Aomame. Interesting. My original hypothesis about life within the novel seems to hold.

No, really. Sartre was kind of a jerk. A smart jerk, but a jerk nonetheless.

Hmm. Curious if any of this chapter matters, as it's largely a rehash of previous events from a different POV. Filler?

I'm still baffled by the connection between Fuka Eri and Aomame, but it seems that there has to be some connection.

Isn't Komatsu worried that, in telling Tengo about the events with Buzzcut and Ponytail, he might be putting himself in even more danger? Or did they give him the injunction to talk?

Ushikawa: stirred, then shaken. You go, Fuka-Eri! Stare that man down!

Sartre seems like kind of a jerk.

Dreamy.

Yes, I was fairly certain something like this had happened to Komatsu. He wouldn't just go quiet like that all of a sudden.

"My god, Judy, the human eye is a very terrifying thing. It's so inhuman. There's no soul in it. It's a machine. A lot of cloudy, spongy, extremely queer stuff with a sinister black hole. It's expressionless, when you look close. Laughter, kindness, everything that makes people human. seems to disappear. What a strange and terrible thing mind must be . . ."

Sartre's analysis of anti-Semitism as a weird sort of coping mechanism for weak-minded people who are seeking to absolve themselves of responsibility is being born out in the US, UK, and elsewhere right now. People would rather blame and persecute than do the actual work necessary to truly exercise their inherent freedom. Ironic.

I went and saw Seussical for the second time in my life last night. Love the play, but the writers were trying to stuff 10 pounds of Suess into a 5-pound bag. I mean: The Grinch? That had nothing to do with anything, it was just shoehorned in. The play would have been better without any of The Grinch. Much better. Less is more, sometimes!

I still don't know if I really like Ushikawa or really hate him. An intriguing antagonist(???) to say the least.

I might like "The Picture" best of all. A piece of Symbolist art comes at a cost, again and again and again. The ending out O'Henrys O'Henry. A deliciously twisted story that takes the notion of The Monkey's Paw two steps forward and one step back. I have a hard time putting into words what this story does, but it does it sneaky and sinister and leaves you begging at the end. For what? Can't tell. Five stars!

Tengo's comatose ghost was haunting Aomame and Fuka Eri? Cool!

"The Cook's Story" is an excellent little ditty with multiple angles of obfuscation. Definitely one of those tales that leaves you guessing, but gives several possibilities as to what really did happen and what really is happening. I'm not big on stories about the chosen subject matter, to be honest, but this is well done and a wicked little read. Be careful what you eat . . . four stars.

Now I'm wondering if Ushikawa will be the means of bringing Tengo and Aomame together?

I'm also noticing that the listing on goodreads says this book has 925 pages. It actually has 1157. Must be a different edition or something.

So, Kumi is a vessel through which Aomame speaks to Tengo? I think so???

This wins for the out-of-context line of the week:

That was as far as he wanted to go picturing Queen Victoria having menstrual cramps.

So. Much. Detail.

What to make of this immaculate conception?

"The Old Knowledge" is unrevealed until the end, and what an end! A story of barrows and witch bottles and the trickster in the dirt, as it were. This is a grim, yet beautifully capricious story worthy of five bronze or flint stars. This story made me chuckle a wile- pun intended.

Is there a way to set your notifications so that your feed only shows events from your Top Friends? I don't like unfriending people, but I need to narrow my focus a bit. Does anyone know? (Bonus: If you're the one to tell me, you stay on my Top Friends list, if you aren't already there, though you probably are).