what else have i been reading is a short intro to the books i’ve read since this. it does not include tokyo on foot and houses and gardens in kyoto though.
it does include two books i’ve already reviewed: a geek in korea here and a geek in japan here.
hard boiled wonderland and the end of the world by haruki murakami. i still haven’t finished it yet but i can tell you one thing. you will like it if you enjoy murakami’s style: the fantasy element is there to twist the japanese world described in a western manner.
gone girl by gillian flynn. i picked it up in the airport hoping to get lost in it. it does keep you interested until the end but the plot twists are unnatural and the characters hard to believe. i was, of course, tricked by the hype surrounding the related film directed by david fincher and soundtracked by personal favourite trent reznor and his collaborator atticus ross. i have just seen the film and i want my 2 hours+ back! the actors deliver their lines as mere cues for the person in front of them, the characters are unrelatable and the way the puzzle works is impossible. the only believable character was tyler perry… anyhow, getting back to the book: what i consider to be its real unique selling point is the parallel story telling. the story is told by both spouses at the same time which lends an interesting dynamic to the whole thing. none of the above mentioned flaws prevented the book from becoming a huge best seller so perhaps you’ll like it more than i did.
delta of venus erotica by anais nin. i picked it up from a second hand pile on a valencian street. it is a series of short stories commissioned by a collector willing to pay one dollar per page. it’s interesting up to a point. for instance, you can easily notice how the rules of politically correctness were more lax. on the other hand, imagine sex liaisons of all kinds, shapes and sizes. i gave it up at 80% because i came back from my trip and i realized that nothing new was going to happen anyway. all in all, well worth the 1 euro i paid for it.
murderabilia by alvaro ortiz. it’s an interesting comic book i picked up in caixa forum in barcelona. they had such a great selection of books i had a hard time to limit myself to just two: this and the one below. murderabilia has just been published in castellano in november 2014. its author is currently in a tour of spain promoting it. i’ll try to contact him for a short interview as soon as he’ll finish the tour. the book is dark and funny: i liked it!
els capullus no regalen flors by moderna del pueblo. a super funny comic book written by raquel corcoles. i enjoyed my struggle with this catalan version. imagine fairy tales with hipster characters, fashion must haves and hangovers. very entertaining!
valencia by jaime millas covas. after my second trip to valencia i decided to get properly introduced. the book is full of beautiful pictures as well as relevant bits of history and culture. short and sweet: 10 euros well spent!
mal di pietre by milena agus. a book that was passed on to me and that i have passed on since. it’s a moving story of a woman living in sardinia during and after the second world war. beside the story, the insertions in the sardinian language were a nice surprise. i made a mental note to visit the island sometime!
the japanese mind roger j. davies and osamu ikeno. it is a collection of essays each tackling a different japanese concept. i will be back with a full review very soon.
and you? what have you been reading? and what do you recommend that i should read?
photo credits: little aesthete
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JANUARY FINDS 2015 - little aesthete's blog says:
Feb 2, 2015
[…] find the rest of my recent reads here. […]