Arukiyomi

Context: Started this off at a friend’s house in Studley Green in the rolling Chiltern hills.

REVIEW
Another book given to me on my last birthday which I thought I should finish by my next. In fact, I even had two months’ start on this one as the lady who kindly gave me it thought my birthday was in March when it’s in May. I’m glad I waited actually because a large part of the story takes place in Haiti. It wouldn’t have been the same had I not been aware of it since the earthquake.
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Context: Finished this off as we stayed with friends in Flackwell Heath.

REVIEW
Got this for my last birthday and thoughtI’d better finish it before my next birthday comes round! I started this after finishing Think and, appropriately, it pretty much picked up where that left off: mathematics and questions of life the universe and everything. It wasn’t as hard going as Think thankfully, in fact, some bits of it were very interesting.
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Context: listened to this while I took the car to get its MOT. It failed, then, after some new front brake hoses and a tyre, it passed.

REVIEW
A loooooong time ago, a very good friend of mine and I decided that we’d read a book together. He was in the US, I was in South Korea at the time. He said he’d found me a copy of this in a second-hand bookshop and he’d sent it over. It never arrived. We never did read it together. Now that I’ve just finished listening to it though, I know why he wanted me to read it.
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Context: while I was reading this, the guy who owns the house we’re living in broke his ankle.

REVIEW
My wife’s aunt gave me this one for Christmas…. (ahem) Christmas 2008. Thought it was about time I got round to it. I was definitely intersested to read it as I’ve always wanted to know more about philosophy. If you do, Simon Blackburn, Prof of Philosophy at Cambridge University is your man. Thing is, having read the book, I’m not sure I do still want to know more…
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Context: While reading this I started wearing reading glasses and… boy!… they really took some getting used to!

REVIEW
Battles, rivalry, espionage, subterfuge, love, filial honour, tradition, strategies, mysticism, kingdoms, suicide, plots, intrigue, betrayal, loyalty, cunning, wisdom, wealth, corruption, conquest, weaponry, tactics, plots, debauchery, virtue, memorials, poetry… if any of these are what you’re looking for in a novel then The Romance of the Three Kingdoms might interest you.
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Context: finished this off as we made a long and very snowy drive back from up north to Cambridge.

REVIEW
Influential in terms of its contribution to the sci-fi fantasy adventure genre, controversial in terms of its portrayal of sexuality, I’d not heard much of this novel before listening to it via librivox.org. I’ve read a large number of these Victorian adventure sagas and I don’t on the whole like them much. This explored moral themes a lot more than Wells and Verne do I thought, but, for that, it wasn’t as engaging as their work.
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Context: 2009 became 2010 while I was reading this.

REVIEW
I don’t read thrillers as a rule so, when I unwrapped this book on Christmas day, I was intrigued to see if it would break the rules. I was inspired to read on the front cover that this was the winner of the British Book Awards Crime Trhiller of the Year last year and that, according to no less than Philip Pullman, it was supposed to be “Several cuts above most thrillers.” In fact, right at the end of the book, I came across a page that stated that this book was “destined to be regarded as amongst the best crime novels ever written.”

Er… hang on. Let’s not get carried away with our omniscience shall we? So, now I’ve read it, what did I think?
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Context: read while I was suffering from the worst cold I’ve had in years.

REVIEW
It begins with the discovery, by young Michele, of something horrific which is all his own secret. But he’s mistaken and what he thinks is horrific is much, much worse. To cap it all, it’s not a secret at all.
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Context: Night fell on my day in bed while I finished this off – the fourth book in a day. Felt much better afterwards.

REVIEW
Not only has Hamid got a good idea for a book here, he’s chosen the perfect vehicle for it. The novel is told entirely in monologue by the reluctant fundamentalist. It is told to a USAnian who wanders into a market in downtown Lahore. This nameless, faceless, voicless USAnian is a great character and the way Hamid uses him in the book is a superb compliment to the monologue. I read this in one sitting and greatly appreciated it all the way through.
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Context: Read this while feeling grim in bed in my grandmother’s old bedroom with her crucifix above me.

REVIEW
A friend (the same one who lent me the superb Knowing Me, Knowing You) lent me this just yesterday. It seemed an easy read and so I decided to polish it off this morning. It came with strong recommendations, but, I’m afraid, it didn’t really deliver as I had hoped.
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Context: One of four books I finished in a day in bed in Stockton. Not feeling great.

REVIEW
This is a disturbing book. Of that, there is no doubt. Quite what it contributes to humanity I’m not sure. What Bataille was attempting to do, I’m not sure either. Was it worth reading? I didn’t think so. For a book that disturbs so deeply, it’s incredibly short. My version was barely 70 pages long. But in those few pages, Bataille draws the reader into arenas of sex and violence that are shocking in their brutality and pointlessness.
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Context: The first book I finished on my new Sony Reader. Read while the snow melted on the new housing estate foundations they’re building over the road. Thi

REVIEW
This is a novella that, if you’re a fan of Edith Wharton, would really appeal to you. In fact, it was this story that probably inspired her to begin her writing streak and take Chopin’s ideas a lot further. The title tells it all. In fact, it’s somewhat prophetic; it marks an awakening not just in the life of Edna Pontellier, the protagonist, but in the lives of women throughout the western world.
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Context: Got this for my niece for Christmas… when, unusually, I got a stocking from the mother-in-law.

REVIEW
This is one of the few books on the list which a 7 year old could read. In fact, it may be the only one. I didn’t think I’d ever read a copy of it. I don’t have kids and, although I do buy books for my sister’s children, I’d never seen a copy of this anywhere. The other day though, I was online and saw a copy of this trilogy. I was able to read it before giving it to my niece.
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Context: As I was reading this, it started snowing in the UK… and it went on an on for days. First white Christmas we’ve had for years.

REVIEW
This is a very interesting book written halfway between a novel and non-fiction and cram full of reflections on life and writing. I liked the life bits but got a bit bored with the literary end of things. I’m not that familiar with literary history at all, you see; much more familiar with life. Still, I did thoroughly enjoy large parts of this small book and thought the whole very clever, if at times a little too much so.
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Context: Finished this off while I was attending the first workshop of the Oral Literature Project at Cambridge University.

REVIEW
Another tale of woe from Wharton. I can forgive anyone who spends their life writing about one theme when they do it well. This wasn’t her best but it was certainly entertaining. Lily Bart isn’t Bovary or Karenina but she flirts with becoming one. If you’re familiar with Wharton you’ll feel very at home in this novel. If not, prepare yourself for an individual’s conflict between desire and society. As usual with her, society comes off worst.
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Context: Mrs Arukiyomi made some great flower decorations for her parents’ anniversary while I was reading this.

REVIEW
Wow wow wow wow. What an amaaaaazing book. It’s in fact the fourth Woolf that I’ve read but it blows everything she’s done before completely out of the water. There are hints of what is to come in the middle section of her previous novel To the Lighthouse but to pull off a 200 page novel of such astounding prose is nothing short of genius. Why did this woman never win the Nobel Prize for Literature?
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Context: got back to a passtime that I last did nearly 20 years ago while reading this: sketching.

REVIEW
In the form of an email to the premier of China, Balram writes his memoirs from the self-made luxury of Bangalore. His start in life couldn’t have been more removed and how he got from there to where the book opens is a mystery until the very end.

Adiga won the Booker with this in 2008 and, quite frankly, he got lucky; it must have been a particularly weak year. The Times calls this a masterpiece. I can’t see it myself. Sure, it’s a fun read and there’s some great insight in there. But it’s not Midnight’s Children by a very, very long way.
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Context: started working out with some weights while reading this.

REVIEW
This book has been a real milestone for me in understanding not just why I like to behave the way I do, but also in understanding others and, in particular, Mrs Arukiyomi. Last year, we both got into Myers Briggs Type Indicators. MBTI is a way of identifying traits which you prefer over ones you really find uncomfortable. Basically, I’m an INTJ (Introvert, iNtuitive, Thinking, Judging) while my wife is an ESFP (Extavert, Sensing, Feeling, Perceiver) which is the polar opposite. I’m sure we’re not unique in being the only people who married opposites, but it really helps to know that it’s okay to be who you are when you live with someone who sees the world completely differently from you 24 hours a day.
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Context: We got and started opening a chocolate advent calendar while I was finishing this off.

REVIEW
This is one of the strangest books I’ve read in a long time. It’s the story of a man who seems to be a world-famous pianist. So famous, in fact, that he’s pretty much a household name. He arrives in a city a few days before a major concert and that’s about as far as normality goes.

As he settles into his hotel, things start to become very surreal. Time, space, people, his character… all of these things take on very elastic qualities. Even metaphors are flexible. The seemingly significant becomes inane while the ridiculous is raised to the heights of sublimity. At times the narrative takes on farcical proportions and had me laughing out loud. There was nothing really to laugh about, it was just the juxtaposition of objects and events.

This goes on for over 500 pages and, if I’d known this from the outset, I might not have started it. Once I got going though, Ishiguro had wrapped me up in what was effectively a dream.
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