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Re: What are you reading?

Posted: Fri Jan 04, 2019 1:05 pm
by coldbrightsunlight
I've started reading (and will finish tonight because it's very short) The Last Children of Tokyo by Yoko Tawada. Lovely christmas present!! It's an unusual and quite beautiful book.

Re: What are you reading?

Posted: Fri Jan 04, 2019 5:52 pm
by popvulture
Just finished the Jeff Tweedy book not too long ago, as well as The Handmaid's Tale (the former was pretty good, second was both fantastic and terrifyingly relevant, as I'm sure has been said a billion times by now).

Currently working on CivilWarLand in Bad Decline by George Saunders (wonderful so far), rereading Ubik, and gonna start the audiobook of the Beastie Boys Book sometime soon.

Wanna read more Murakami this year. My life is always better when I do that.

Re: What are you reading?

Posted: Fri Jan 04, 2019 6:46 pm
by dubkitty
i think that once i'm through my current reads i'm going to do an ILL for The Torture Garden by Octave Mirbeau, an avant French novel i discovered via a quote that appears on the cover of The Holy Bible by Manic Street Preachers.


“You’re obliged to pretend respect for people and institutions you think absurd. You live attached in a cowardly fashion to moral and social conventions you despise, condemn and know lack all foundation. It is that permanent contradiction between your ideas and desires and all the dead formalities and vain pretences of your civilization, which makes you sad, troubled and unbalanced. In that intolerable conflict you lose all joy of life and all feeling of personality, because at every moment they suppress and restrain and check the free play of your powers. That’s the poisoned and mortal wound of the civilized world.”

Re: What are you reading?

Posted: Sat Jan 05, 2019 4:39 am
by coldbrightsunlight
popvulture wrote: Wanna read more Murakami this year. My life is always better when I do that.
I read Norwegian Wood recently, first one of his I've read. I definitely plan to read more of his books this year.

Re: What are you reading?

Posted: Sat Jan 05, 2019 7:56 pm
by odontophobia
coldbrightsunlight wrote:
popvulture wrote: Wanna read more Murakami this year. My life is always better when I do that.
I read Norwegian Wood recently, first one of his I've read. I definitely plan to read more of his books this year.
Love Murakami. Just bought his latest for Christmas for my wife.

Re: What are you reading?

Posted: Sun Jan 13, 2019 7:36 am
by UglyCasanova
Kafka on the Beach is best Murakami. Fight me.

Currently reading All The Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr. About halfway through. It's very beautifully written and has some really heartwarming moments of love during war that don't feel forced but really highlights the tragedy of their situation. I'm looking forward to finishing it.

Re: What are you reading?

Posted: Sun Jan 13, 2019 8:02 am
by D.o.S.
Recovery Reading so far is a stack of:

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:!!!: :!!!: :!!!:

Re: What are you reading?

Posted: Sun Jan 13, 2019 8:31 am
by coldbrightsunlight
UglyCasanova wrote:Kafka on the Beach is best Murakami. Fight me.

Currently reading All The Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr. About halfway through. It's very beautifully written and has some really heartwarming moments of love during war that don't feel forced but really highlights the tragedy of their situation. I'm looking forward to finishing it.
I will have to read all of his books and then fight you. Or not.

That book sounds interesting, I'll check it out! Need to pick up a few ebooks for easy travel reading for my upcoming holiday so it's on the list :thumb: .

Re: What are you reading?

Posted: Sun Jan 13, 2019 8:58 am
by UglyCasanova
I haven't read all of Murakami either, I just really like that book. Only read half of 1Q84. It just never caught my attention much for some reason. Haven't read the one he dropped in 2017 either (name slips my mind).

Re: What are you reading?

Posted: Sun Jan 13, 2019 9:55 am
by odontophobia
UglyCasanova wrote:I haven't read all of Murakami either, I just really like that book. Only read half of 1Q84. It just never caught my attention much for some reason. Haven't read the one he dropped in 2017 either (name slips my mind).
I prefer Wind Up Bird Chronicles but enjoy all Murakami.

Re: What are you reading?

Posted: Sun Jan 13, 2019 12:00 pm
by dubkitty
speaking of Kafka, are there any good modern translations available? when i read Kafka back in the 70s i found it kind of flat and confusing, and rather suspect that this was the fault of the translator. i always wanted DarkAxel to have a go since he's native Czech speaker with an excellent grasp of English, and it's likely that someone starting from Czech would be better at it. FWIW this is also true of Hermann Hesse.

Re: What are you reading?

Posted: Sun Jan 13, 2019 3:17 pm
by Paul_C
"all Murukami"

single man, not too old, not too young, likes to cook, earns enough money "from somewhere" that he can afford to eat and travel a bit, ends up somewhere a bit weird but it all seems to work out in the end despite nothing much having happened.

sometimes there's a cat.

;)

Re: What are you reading?

Posted: Sun Jan 13, 2019 5:52 pm
by adamajah

Re: What are you reading?

Posted: Sun Jan 13, 2019 6:51 pm
by popvulture
coldbrightsunlight wrote:
UglyCasanova wrote:Kafka on the Beach is best Murakami. Fight me.

Currently reading All The Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr. About halfway through. It's very beautifully written and has some really heartwarming moments of love during war that don't feel forced but really highlights the tragedy of their situation. I'm looking forward to finishing it.
I will have to read all of his books and then fight you. Or not.

That book sounds interesting, I'll check it out! Need to pick up a few ebooks for easy travel reading for my upcoming holiday so it's on the list :thumb: .
All the Light We Cannot See is a beautiful book, thoroughly enjoyed and recommend it.

Haven't read Kafka on the Beach yet, but I loved Hard Boiled Wonderland, Wild Sheep Chase, and Norwegian Wood. Something about that guy's stuff just ticks all my boxes, and:
Paul_C wrote:"all Murukami"

single man, not too old, not too young, likes to cook, earns enough money "from somewhere" that he can afford to eat and travel a bit, ends up somewhere a bit weird but it all seems to work out in the end despite nothing much having happened.

sometimes there's a cat.

;)
Pretty much 100% right there. Maybe that's what I want my life to be like? Wouldn't be bad :p

Re: What are you reading?

Posted: Sun Jan 13, 2019 8:36 pm
by Paul_C
*whispers*

It's Kafka on the Shore, not Beach - or at least, it is in the english translation, there's a cat in this one.



p.s. another really good Murukami book is number9dream by David Mitchell (no cats as far as I can recall).