Life of Pi

Piscine Molitor Patel doesn't like his name so he changes it to Pi.  Pi doesn't like what really happened in the 227 days he spent stranded in the Pacific, so he changes it too.  It's about story telling and story telling at its best.

I first heard of the title from a friend from way back when blog was the thing and Ang Lee hasn't directed yet another tiger movie.  I haven't forgotten the book. I once borrowed the e-book from the library.  Reading from a tiny screen isn't really my thing and I wasn't able to finish it before the god damned DRM kicked in on the expiration date. One day I shopped at BJ (not having one), like any domesticated male does, and picked up a copy there for $9.99.  I remember the e-book from the library doesn't even have different fonts denoting different voices like in the book does.  Even the book I bought is a low grade trade paperback (remember BJ), but still I found it infinitely much readable than the screen.  I doubt a bigger screen would make any difference.  This copy has the picture still from Ang Lee's movie adaptation as cover.  I am OKAY with that.  I haven't seen the film except the trailer or teaser out there.

The author or Yann Martel says "the story will make you believe in god."  It's a tall order and personally I don't think the book has much to do with religions or even preachy.  It makes some interesting points and say them in an interesting way, to wit: how he compares Christianity's God sending his Son to die for the sinners to the young protagonist's father sending him to the lions.  For the most part I read it like a young adult's adventure book and I guess to a large extent it is.  But like what infomercials say, "Wait, there's more!"  The story definitely takes on a progressively darker tone when it reaches the end.  Is Pi a reliable storyteller?  Does Richard Parker, the Bengal tiger even exist? And for that matter, the zebra, the orangutan and the hyena?  Or does it even matter?  I think the story is decidedly ambiguous ... or not, in a good way (not the sucky kind like Lost).  It actually makes me think and question what I just read.  Overall a pleasant good read.

Endnote:  a word for young readers:  it has some gruesome scenes about cannibalism.

Fifty Shades of Grey

Unless you live under a rock or out of this world, you probably have heard of this so called mommy porn, Fifty Shades of Grey, E L James' fan fiction based on the tremendously successful Twilight series by Stephenie Meyer, which is a best seller in its own right and not so surprisingly soon to be a motion picture near you.  Of all the unbelievable stuff in the book, I found the bit that the protagonist Anastasia Steele doesn't have her own computer the most unbelievable.  And mind you the story is set in the very near past like 2010 or something and Steele is a college student major in English literature.  The book says she uses the computer at school or from work or share one with her housemate.  Wow.  I can't comment on all the mommy porn stuff as I am out of my depth in that department (OKAY, they are salacious, hot and funny).  I read the e-book version on my sucky htc EVO 4G from the library.  The whole process is not exactly intuitive and actually quite annoying, I got it work but don't ask me how.  The book is supposed to self destruct when expired so nothing to return.  The good thing about e-reading is nobody knows you are reading Fifty Shades of Grey.  Not that there is anything wrong with it.

Unbelievable

Of all the unbelievable stuff I read from Fifty Shades of Grey, I found this one the most unbelievable:  Anastasia Steele, a college student, or a recently graduated student, doesn't own a computer, not desktop nor a notebook.  She has to use her roomate's or one from her part-time job or at school.  Wow!  She has an iPod though.

Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy

The latest movie adaption was released some time December 2011 with the nutty Gary Oldman playing George Smiley, the fatty, shorty and mouldy super spy whose lethal specialty is to bore his enemies to death, and the readers or audience as collateral along the way.  In John le Carre's meticulously constructed spy world, Smiley is like the Kate Moss of super spy, he is kind of old, kind of short, kind of retired but he's nevertheless proven to be the best that is out there and hence always in demand.  OKAY, not exactly Kate Moss but neither is Gary Oldman as far as physical resemblance is concerned.  The film is a reinterpretation and reimagination of the book, as such  I can easily over look any physical difference between the character in the book and in the film.  Unfortunately I overlooked way too much, I slept through the entire movie save for the very beginning and the end while being a captive audience on board of a Cathay flight over the Pacific.  I had no idea how good or bad the film was.  More importantly, the chance of better understanding the book via the movie was totally squashed.  So it was with utter disgust and dismay, I proceeded to read TTSS one more time, back to back in immediate succession.  Am I a masochist or what?  The book is a perpetual dread with confusing characters that have multiple worknames to compound the confusing factor, complicated plot lines with many tangled knots, and a timeline that goes forward, backward and sideways.  To understand the story, one must be exceptionally lucid because the story is anything but.  One is easy to get lost in le Carre's spy world in the best sense and worst sense of the word "lost."  The story, in a nutshell, is a simple one rather: Smiley is brought out of retirement because he is good, remember Kate Moss good, to hunt down a mole in the Circus.  And of course the devil is in the detail, and there are plenty of them.  In the end, the mole Gerald or Tailor as codenamed by Control the head of Circus, is caught and bored to death by George Smiley by his accusatory and lethal silence treatment.  Tailor is such a colorfully complex character personally (a bisexual painter who was born to inherit the Earth!) and professionally (a double agent, duh!) that it's impossible to know when and why (the decline of England as a world power and the hatred of America, really?) exactly he became a double agent for Smiley's nemesis Karla, the Russian spy master whom Smiley met when he was caught and jailed (boo boo boo ...) and probably felt some kind of kinship towards his archenemy--he let the man have his monogrammed lighter, a gift from his unfaithful wife Ann, the illusion of the illusionless man, Smiley.  Perhaps Karla gained Smiley's admiration because he never wavers his adherence to Moscow Centre even when returning to Moscow means death (Karla survived).  Gerald, on the other hand, chooses to betray his country, friends and lovers.  But the sin of all sins for Gerald, being a double agent is,(no, not screwing Ann, his cousin and Smiley's wife) he couldn't simply let his friend/lover die after he betrayed and "orphaned" him, which ultimately brings upon his own demise.  Fool.  In the end, the story is as much about espionage as it's about a yearning to connect, to make sense, to not to be lonely and to be loved--just like any other books or the movie The Avengers.

追揸沽 (To Seek, Hold and Let Go)

This dead tree publication is a compilation of various online posts from the same name Chinese (Cantonese) blog by famed blogger Charcoal who is a self-proclaimed nihilist with the good look of Daniel Wu. Charcoal, when not blogging, runs a small business in Jordan, arguably the biggest cesspool in Hong Kong. Of course, the above can all be prefaced with the word "alleged," as I can neither verify nor debunk those claims except "famed blogger" which is my own assessment that I believe most people share. Charcoal has been pretty successful not to reveal his identity. Most if not all bloggers do not know his real world identity, myself included. But that's not important. What's important is his blog identity, that is, what and how he writes. Why he blogs is the least interesting part. He did say he uses blogging to alleviate tension from work. Or whatever. It boils down to because the guy can and do it much better than most people. About seven months ago, Sina did a similar compilation from Sina's own bloggers and gave the book a title "Why We Blog?" or "Why Weblog?" Anyway, I never bother to check it out, as I am least interested in why when it comes to writings. I am much interested in what people write and even more importantly how people write. Or I am simply turned off by the title. What Charcoal writes Charcoal knows. He writes about his work, his team of staff past or present, his life, his musings on things happened around him. In short, everyday stuff that in lesser hands, can and will become extremely pedestrian and boring. I am not sure if he is a nihilist, but from his posts, I can sense he is an humanitarian. All his characters, real or imagined are ordinary people. Ordinary as in people can be found in nightclubs, in small offices, on the streets, the mentally challenged, unprivileged and underprivileged in the urban jungle that is known as Hong Kong. Charcoal, through his writings, give ordinary people a voice, a character in an otherwise mundane if not totally cruel and meaningless life. Charcoal reveals and praises humanity in his most ordinary characters. Some of his more distinguished blog posts are actually novellas written yet in another voice, like a Beer Girl or an Office Assistant. Charcoal is a blogger-cum-novelist. Personally I think how is more important than what one writes. Charcoal, like I said earlier, writes everyday life. But he always manages to find an angle, a voice, an opinion, a connection that he can make his own and makes things interesting. Now that is what I call talent or past hard work manifested as talent. As to the dead tree publication, the comments are gone, so commenters don't expect to find your witty comments on the book. Like I said, the book is a compilation of blog posts from the past, so you can find all the contents online except for the book preface. The preface is typical Charcoal, well written, self deprecating, gives credits to people and fellow bloggers who have either inspired or helped him along the way. And finally he gracefully apologizes to Charlie Cho Cha-Lei for appropriating his picture as his online avatar and praises Mr. Cho's contribution to the Hong Kong cinema. "To Seek, Hold and Let Go", like Charcoal's online avatar Cho is decidedly lowbrow in the best sense of the word, very assessable and enjoyable. If you are to read between the lines or bytes, you can definitely appreciate the humanity and dignity of his characters that are shared among human kinds in an otherwise meaningless and sometimes cruel existence. "To Seek, Hold and Let Go" is the most important publication of this summer because I say so. Bottom line: You don't have to get the book if you are already an avid reader of his blog. But then again, if you read his blog regularly and religiously you would like to get a hardcopy so you can read it anytime and anywhere online or offline. If you have been living under a rock or don't believe in blogging (I am truly surprised you are reading this then) you owe yourself to get copy of this exemplary Cantonese writing at its very best. Disclosure: Yours truly got a signed copy with an accompanying note waiting for me when I checked in my hotel in the mildly dangerous and pleasantly decadent Jordan neighborhood, the same can be said about Mr. Charcoal's blog, mildly dangerous and pleasantly decadent. 7/25/2007

The whole post with proper hyperlink is right here.

Bag Of Bones

I bought Bag of Bones from a library sale for one dollar many moons ago and the bag of bones has been on the shelf ever since.  Finally I feel like there is simply no better way to end the year 2011 than reading Bag of Bones, a horror story by the one and only King.

The hardcover is more than five hundred pages long and about two inches thick.  It feels substantial and overwhelming.

Mike Noonan, a recently widowed second tier romance/suspense writer had a four-year writer's block and finally decided to set out to his vacation home hoping to unclog the block or at least to relax.  He got more than he bargained for.  He uncovered deep rooted town secret from many generations back, met some unsavory characters, human and otherwise and even linked his wife's untimely death back to their vacation home Sara Laughs.  The plot twists and characters are interesting, far fetched and have enough going on to keep the story forward and in the end everything is logical and explained, that is, if you were to accept the premise (I am fairly disappointed the plastic owls don't play a more important role than led up to be).  Of course, it's more than just a ghost story, it's about love, justice and peace too.  King proves to be king.  The book may seem daunting but it's an easy read.

Steve Jobs

I was somewhat intimidated by the thickness of the book and spooked by Jobs' infamous death stare and enigmatic Mona Lisa-like smile.  The cover portrait, by Albert Watson who is kind of blind and bears an uncanny resemblance to his subject, was taken using an analog large format camera of which Jobs was duly impressed.  I took the dust cover off before started reading.

The authorized biography by the renowned Walter Isaacson clocks in more than 600 pages with never seen before obligatory pictures of Jobs and families in the middle and notes in the end.  I thought it would take me some time to finish it but no, it only took me more than a week even though I had been extremely busy between eating my meals and using the bathrooms.

The book chronicles Jobs' personal and professional life, warts and all, through and through with vivid recollections from Jobs himself as well as from others and often time interspersed with Isaacson's own take on the events.  The Book of Jobs certainly confirms Jobs as an enigmatic dichotomy.  He couldn't code like Gates, not a brilliant engineer like Wozniak, but what he lacked he more than made up for with his intuition, his belief in himself being special and his relentless drive demanded from himself and others for perfection.  And of course being exceptionally intelligent helped too.  Isaacson is even handed and sometimes even goes overboard to expose Jobs' dark side or quirks.  He insinuates that Jobs was too busy to flush toilets in addition to his more well-known infractions: Job soaked his feet in the toilet bowl to unwind, cheated Wozniak, abandoned his own child, had no qualms took others' ideas as his and totally lacked social grace.  Despite or perhaps even because of all his faults, it makes Jobs even more fascinating or human--apparently Jobs reality distortion field is at work here, death or alive.  In the end, Isaacson sheds his biographer role and let Jobs have the last words, which are intelligent and thoughtful as always but also uncharacteristically graceful: summing up who he is, what he wants to do and what drives him, all directly from the horse's mouth.   The book is compelling and easy to read, because number one Jobs was a compelling person on so many levels, with spectacular successes and failures, and you will have to make an effort if you were to try to make him less compelling and number two Isaacson's chronological recounting of events is easy to follow and not get in the way of the flow of the story.  It's not easy to sum up anybody's life in a book especially one as fascinating as Jobs' but I believe Isaacson's "Steve Jobs" has done it.

The Pale King

What surprises me is The Pale King actually is intended to have a plot as enumerated in the end notes that are included in the unfinished novel by the late David Foster Wallace.  From my reading, which sadly was mostly done on my commute, I couldn't find a plot, something remotely resembles a plot maybe but not in the traditional sense that I understand it.  In fact it's more like a collection of short stories, those that have no beginning or end at all.  I find it difficult if not impossible to make any sense out of the characters, who come from and go nowhere, in the grand scheme of things such as the story of the novel.  But once I accepted the novel was probably written by a mad man who happened to be smart, articulate, pedantic and very good at moving words around then I kind of came to the conclusion that I could enjoy or even admire it, all these were of course done without me realizing it--the novel is so hypnotic that it either puts me to sleep or totally engrosses me during my daily commute to and from work.  His use of footnote is somewhat annoying to say the least.  I am in the opinion that if you cannot incorporate your thoughts in the body of a sentence or a paragraph then you should leave it out otherwise just write it in, that is, unless you are writing a research paper or you are DFW who tends to write extensive footnotes whenever he feels like it (of course being a wordsmith he can absolutely write anything in a sentence or paragraph, it's just that he makes a conscious literary choice not to and instead happily writes footnotes in the length of a chapter or a section).  There are a few chapters or rather pages (out of more than 500 pages) that I particularly enjoy and am duly impressed.  One being how an agent got an epiphany and turns himself from being a wastoid at college to an accountant; the other being how a father got killed in a busy subway platform.  I personally think the detail and the psychological landscape presented are pretty out of this world.  And above anything else (and despite his fixation on footnotes or rather my own fixation and displeasure on his writing footnotes), I find his writing touching and deeply sincere, which turns out to be the real surprise for me.

American Pastoral

Whenever I feel like I need to pretend to be some kind of intellectual I pick up a Philip Roth. And they never disappoint. I started reading American Pastoral in 2010 and couldn't finish it until 2011, mostly done on the train. I'm just glad I got it done. And I guess in 2011 I will spend less time reading crazy shit like that and begin reading like more pragmatic stuff. Adieu.

The Big Short - Michael Lewis

The 2008 Wall Street implosion was so bad that even the few, most notably Steve Eisman and Mike Burry, that were right in predicting the Armageddon and made boatloads of money off this clusterfuck weren't exactly elated when it actually happened.  That's how bad it was.
I almost failed to finish Lewis' book, primarily because I kept going back to read what I didn't understand when I was commuting to and from work between sleeping and standing on the train.  In the end, I just gave up understanding because you know the big time CEO's and all bold faced regulators didn't understand credit default swaps or CDO's either.  I am just ignorant if not fabulously and murderously so like the Wall Street type.  I read it as a work of fiction and for its entertainment value.  I enjoy the prose and the narrative because they are witty, wise and vulgar.  What I perhaps don't enjoy is even I've known it prior to reading the book, there aren't exactly any losers on Wall Street.  The CEO's and traders who lost billions and ran their firms to bankruptcy still got to reap millions in compensation very much at the expense of shareholders and tax payers money.  They really got a lot of something for nothing.

The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest

The is the last installment of Larsson's enormously popular so called Millennium Trilogy.  It was so popular that in my lunch break at Bryant's Park yesterday I saw two other people reading his first and second book within a radius of fifteen feet.  Being in the US and not ready to buy any imported paperback at grossly inflated price, I got my brand spanking new hardcover from eBay, which is a few dollars cheaper than Amazon but just as good if not better.  It arrived at lightning speed with tracking so there is no complaint but praise.  The book is more than 500 pages thick and if anything I think my biceps just got better toned after holding it on the train for a week or so.

The first "Dragon Tattoo" is about serial killings, the second "Played with Fire" is about revenge and this third one  "The Hornet's Nest" is about government conspiracy so big and so horrendous that you just can't believe it, especially of all places, in Sweden where people are just nice and beautiful.  Anyway, the three books all carry a common theme: excessive coffee consumption.  Before reading this trilogy, my feeble mind thought only Americans would be so crude as to drink coffee all the time.  Well I know we have company now.

"The Hornet's Nest," being the last installment brings closure and certain sadness to the trilogy knowing full well that if there is any more sequel or spin-off it won't be from Larsson himself because he passed away before the books were published.  However, there are talks or rumors that there does exist an almost finished novel in his laptop or something to that extent according to an article I read in The New York Times magazine not too long ago--that is if I remember it correctly.  This final installment does tie all the loose ends and gives a very traditional and satisfying ending: the protagonists live while the bad guys either got killed or busted.  Justice is served.  The End.  The only loose end, if there is one, is though there are mentions of Lisbeth's twin sister starting in the second book but she is even more elusive than Lisbeth as a character, till the very end, she is only mentioned but not present.  Perhaps she is meant to appear in subsequent Millennium stories.  Alas, that would never happen, not from the original creator anyway.

The Girl who Played With Fire

This is the second installment of the late Stieg Larsson's widely successful Millennium Trilogy. 

This time the story gets very personal.  We got to know more, way more, of our female protagonist, Lisbeth Salander, which is of course a welcome diversion from the middle aged journalist Blomkvist who always got lucky with the ladies and is the main focus of the first installment.  We found out her past and her family and hence why she is what she is--such a certifiable and justifiable nutcase.  Salander might be strange with a capital S but at the same time she is just like every other girl we know.  When she got tons of money, what does she do?  She goes on a year-long vacation, buys an exquisite apartment and yes gets a boob job done by the best surgeon available in Genoa, Italy.  I am sure the girls can relate.  Larsson does most of the narratives in his own voice and there aren't that many dialogs, especially of Salander's because you know she is such an antisocial weirdo.  But sometimes we got lucky, didn't we?  On page 584 of the mass market paperback, we got to hear undistilled and unfiltered words pouring from her mouth, which are rare and at the same time exemplary of what she is.

"I've had a fucking miserable week and I'm in a fucking bad mood,"  she said.  "You know what the worst thing is?  Every time I turn around there's some fucking pile of shit with a beer belly in my way acting tough.  Now I'd like to leave.  So move your ass."

If there were ever a subtitle it could have been called "The Girl Who Hate Men Who Hate Women."

The book is more than 700 pages thick and Larsson, a master of story telling and suspense, just keeps his readers guessing and wanting for more.  It certainly is on par with the first one and it bests the first one especially if you are a bit tired of the whole serial killer genre and more into something like sex trafficking.  The book has an abrupt ending which only makes one want to read the third installment even more.

The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo

The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo is the first of a three part so called Millennium series by the late Stieg Larsson who died shortly after he submitted the manuscript of what has now become an international bestseller.

The story is mostly about a middle-aged journalist, Blomkvist who has plenty of luck with women and a grown woman Salander who is stuck in a body of a thirteen-year-old and seems to have misguided sartorial taste on Goth, body piercings and tattoos. Together they discover dark family secrets, find missing persons, catch serial killers, expose financial gangsters and what have you. They share a passion for Apple products, hers a Powerbook (she likes it so much so that she gives a blowjob in exchange for money to buy one) and his an iBook (no blowjob mentioned), in between all these activities, they have sex and drink a lot of coffee.

The paperback is almost 600-page thick and the story is well paced, organized and plotted. Every little thing is explained (Remember the TV series Lost? Anybody? Where nothing is really explained and people have so low an expectation that they actually don't expect the finale answers every stupid convoluted clues left before. Ha?). Overall I like the story except I always have some prejudice against translated works. I keep thinking what's missing in the translated English version. Too bad, I don't read Sweden. Salander is supposed to be a world class hacker yet I don't really see her do any actual hacking. I expect the book to print verbatim what commands and source codes she uses to hack. Alas, there is none and I just have to take Larsson's word for it.

Homer & Langley

Homer & Langley is E. L. Doctorow's re-imagining of a true New York story that spans several decades beginning in the thirties.  Homer is blind while Langley is insane and together the brothers are just insanely blind.  The story, interspersed with historical references and cultural shifts, is narrated by Homer, the younger of the two, who though blind as a bat is acutely perceptive to tell in details their slow descend from riches to rags voluntarily and inevitably after the passing of their well-to-do parents.  The narrative is exceedingly dignified and beautifully poignant, in the end one is left with no choice but to sympathize with the brothers even they were to die in their own filth tragic comedically.


Notes:
p. 139.  "I will not here detail the ... "  It seems like the editor is asleep.
p. 116  "It's no different than always, said Massimo."  Massimo is the son of a gangster so he may not be speaking grammatically "correct" English.  As such he doesn't say "different from" so it may be intentional and not a mistake after all.  Still, I can't get over it.

Random Musing: Little Reunion

Chang says with ominous accuracy that "only people who don't have a life are interested in others' private matters." It's with this voyeur's mentality that I proceed to read Chang's posthumous Little Reunion.

Little Reunion is Chang's catharsis to bring closure to part of her tumultuous life. In so doing, it's almost impossible to distinguish whether Chang is writing herself or writing a fictional character, Shing Gau Lei, who is by and large, in Chang's agent and confidant Stephen Soong's words, "unconventional" and "unsympathetic," just like Chang herself. Fiction is all about human experiences. Chang documents her life in every minute detail possible: from infant to a ghastly abortion with the fetus ended up flushing down the toilet. And in between, some wild sex that includes "carpet munching" and vigorous thrusts that are cervix crushing.

When she was an infant, she prefers to be fed with a china spoon to a steel spoon that inexplicably leaves certain fishy metallic aftertaste which doesn't sit well with her fine palate. This is a quiet harbinger to her impeccable taste and at times irritating sensibility which can easily guarantee her a lifetime of unhappiness. In the course of reading her loveless lonely upbringing in the big family, I can't help but see certain parallel in Chang's description to that of the Dream of Red Chamber: the impending collapse of the old, the decay of the filthy rich, the incestuous relationships within the family, right down to the wet dream of his own brother. Chang saves the most harshest revelation to herself. Gau Lei or herself is amoral when it comes to love. Often time, she sounds like she prefers the war never ends, placing her own interest above that of her own countrymen (she sees herself an outsider no matter where she is). Knowing her first love and probably the only love of her life, Shiu Chi Yung (Hu Lancheng in real life) is married doesn't stop her from beginning the relationship. Nor the fact that he works for the Japanese during the Sino-Japanese War. And not even when she discovers Shiu is a serial womanizer who seems to have an insatiable and uncontrollable appetite for women and sex even or especially in dire times. Many years after their relationship ended, Chang can no longer think of Hu's name but still knows the feeling--her innards are like boiling, her whole body is like on fire, the waves of pain only recedes after a few rushing up the body; the lady may be just experiencing hot flashes during menopause and yet she romanticizes it and attributes it to Hu. Her relationship with Hu may not be what the readers like but this is how she honestly feels about Hu and this is how she lives as a human being and she as a writer likes to share her private matters in all their glory with all those who are willing to learn about life.

I like the non linear narrative of the book. Life is fragmented and so is memory. The structure of the novel just reflects that. Chang picks up pieces of her life bit by bit, and fastidiously arranges them for the world to see. Right on the very first page, Chang is telling us how it's going to be done: the narrative is present, then fast forward to the future then back to the present. And in the end, Chang brings everything full circle, ending the story where it all begins, echoing the exact same sentences. It sends chills down on my spine when I read the very last page.

Random Musing: Little Reunion

This my musing on Little Reunion. There are many like it but this one is mine.

This can be called Memoir Of A Writer As The Last Chinese Aristocrat. But of course, the name Little Reunion is so much better. In the end, there is no reunion not even a little one. Irony is still alive and so well preserved in Chang's work. This is a no-holds-barred autobiography of her life from childhood to her late twenties. And I have to say this is the bomb. And I can't help but think how could Ang Lee be so prescient when he directed Si Jie which was based on Chang's same name short story, with added explicit sex scenes that couldn't be found in the original work? Apparently Lee was way ahead of us, seeing what we couldn't see in Chang. My hunch of all the explicit sex scenes in both Chang and Lee's works are a way of a clear fuck-you and liberation arising from the protagonist's indignation toward her life and time in general. And to a certain extent, humans are just animals without furs.

Book Review

Lame-O Book Review where you find book reviews at their lamest.  Presented by yours truly with warts and all.

Animal Farm:  I read it when I was in junior high school perhaps.  I couldn't remember half of it.  So I felt like I need to read it again.  I think Molly is an interesting character, all she cares about is her ribbon and sugar.  Who cares about revolution if it takes away my ribbon and sugar.  Molly is the every man.

1984.  Since I read Animal Farm, might as well read 1984.  The middle got a bit long winded when Orwell talked about Oceania and the wars and what Newspeak is.  It's bit complicated but overall I really like how he puts things together.  The story is depressing with a capital D and very intelligent and cerebral.

The Road.  You think there is something going on on the next page, no there isn't.  It's page after page after page of despairs and hungers.  This is just post-apocalyptic at its very worse.  If you've already felt like to kill yourself then don't read it.

The White Tiger

Can you keep a white tiger in a rooster coop? No. Not according to first time author Aravind Adiga, who won the 2008 Booker Prize award with his debut novel The White Tiger.

The story is about one man's revolution against his world, as told through a series of letters written within a week, addressed from Balram Halwai, the protagonist, the once poor honest country-mouse, the chauffeur, the social entrepreneur and ultimately the rich business entrepreneur, to the Chinese Premier, Wen Jiabao who is embarking on a business trip to visit India. Adiga, in searing indignation and raging dark humor, through the narrative of Balram, exploits and magnifies all the ills he finds in present day India. In the end, one is left without a choice but to sympathize and empathize with Balram even when he does the unthinkable; a revolution is not a dinner party as Mao once eloquently put it and somebody has to sacrifice, and when that sacrifice happens it's better him than me or so must Balram thinks.

Some have criticized his characters are caricatures of the Indian society and his lack of in-depth understanding of India renders his social commentary shallow and superficial. But in his defense, I don't think this is meant to be an account of true events and I actually appreciate the heightened reality of his characters and its feverish kaleidoscopic characterization of India, they go well with the author's pizazz and his wry sense of humor.

It is entertainment with some thought-provoking message. What more can you ask for?

Further readings from real reviews from both sides of the Atlantic.

If I Can't Improve Blogging . . .

Maybe blogging can improve me.

Because of blogging, I got to meet some bloggers and learned a thing or two from them. And since I am easily influenced by somebody I like and admire, I have been reading books more often than I used to be thanks to those bloggers who shall remain nameless for not to be associated with a low life like me (OKAY, it's readandeat and snowdrops). Certain books I wouldn't have read if not because of them.

"Pull over and ask for direction"--this is my lame translation of a Chinese three-part novel 停車暫借問 by then 18-year old literati prodigy Zhong. I have not been reading any Chinese books for a long time so it took me some time to warm up to her brand of writing which is not exactly easy for a semi-illiterate like me. I am quite at awe to know that the three-part novel, with the book's title taken from the second part, was written by a 18-year old, especially the story has a strong historical background and spans a few decades. This just shows there are really early bloomers who really can make the never bloomers like myself want to kill themselves. The book is full of imagery and beautifully written. The only thing I don't quite understand is the first part of the story seems separate from the rest of the book and doesn't relate except for the lead female character. It seems like a totally different story. On the whole, it was a sappy story about unrequited love with a few male loser characters bobbing in between. And you always wonder why and how a beautiful girl would fall for some losers but hey it happens and it happens every day. As a man, you always hope you are one of their mistakes.

"Falling Leaves: The Memoir of an Unwanted Chinese Daughter"--An auto-biography written by Tianjin born Chinese American Adeline Yen-Mah who is a physician turned writer. I guess she writes because she can of course but also because she understands the power of writing--how Mah witnesses the power of writing early on when her childhood classmate cries over being made a villain in her early literary creation. More importantly, this book is perhaps a therapeutic way of getting back at or getting over her own unloving family. The story of Mah begins in the late 30's in Tianjin, China and spans across continents and decades until the late 90's, chronicling how she overcomes adversities imposed upon her by her own unloving family mainly orchestrated by her beautifully devilish cruel and unusual French-Chinese stepmother, Niang and other inevitabilities like wars and her own race and gender. It is a story well told and along the way I also got a glimpse of modern Chinese history as an added bonus in addition to the sometimes sappy but always inspiring storyline. The moral of the story, if you were born to an absolutely unloving family, make sure it's at least rich enough to send you to England to get a medical degree.

About Books

Culled from the comments I have written . . . .

Never buy a book you don't intend to or can't finish. It's a waste of natural resources, a waste of your living space and in the end a reminder of how pathetic you are.

Borrow from the library.

Owning books don't make you an intellectual, reading them may.

From the hopelessly illiterate.

Usually I don't have the above problem or what I perceive as a problem, as I don't buy books for decor reason. I just bought some lately for reading, probably inspired by other bloggers I come to aspire to.

On my recent book buying experience . . . .

I don’t even trust myself, usually what people say and what people do are different if not totally opposite. Let me tell you how and under what circumstances I bought my most recent books . . . .
I was on my way to McDonald’s having my dietary equivalent of a slow suicide and I passed the street vendor who usually sell books there. The man is in his 50s with questionable personal hygiene selling mostly popular titles. Regarding the source of his books, we share the Clinton military gay policy–Don’t Ask Don’t Tell. I decided to have some adventure and totally judged books by their covers and titles. I bought “Indignation” and “The Last Lecture,” totally on the strength of its title and cover. I didn’t even know “The Last Lecture” was on the best seller list and the fact that the backstory of the story is bigger than the story itself. The first one turns out to be an excellent short story at least in my mind. The Last Lecture is a book that can make a manly man like yours truly wells up in the train, more than once. Usually I avoid reading any self-help and preaching book at all cost because no manly man can tolerate people telling him what to do with his life, but The “Last Lecture” turns out to be a very fine read. There is nothing like an intelligent dead man talking to you.
Then I bought Ansel Adams’ “The Picture” from a library booksale, it cost $3. It was almost like an insult to the master, because we are talking about greatest American photographer Ansel Adams here. But I guess we shouldn’t judge a book by how much it was sold, Jane Austin was like 3 for $1, so there you have it. I also picked up “Bag of Bones” by the King, $1, just, it’s hardcover and an inch and a half thick, it looks tremendous and substantial.
If you still don’t know whether I would buy or read your book, don’t despair, I don’t either.
With warmest wishes and best of luck.
. . .
Jane Austen was once spelled like Jane Austin in the 1800s, basically Austen and Austin are interchangeable or so many people say. . . . Never mind.

My blog really sinks to a new new low, in parallel with the latest stock market trend, as I have to resort to recycling my own stuff. No amount of verbiage can deflect my own deficiency for lack of imagination. But it is what it is hope you enjoy it in the early morning.