Babel by R.F. KuangMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
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Thursday, October 26, 2023
Saturday, October 21, 2023
Marion wine bar Melbourne
Melbourne places just seem so much more trendier and hip :D but a lot more expensive but I think Perth has equally good food nowadays.Review: The Vegetarian
The Vegetarian by Han KangMy rating: 3 of 5 stars
I would not recommend this book to anyone who knows or who has an eating disorder. It’s a sombre read. The story is divided into three parts told from the main character Yeong Hye’s husband’s eyes, then her brother in law and finally her sister’s. In the process, we see what kind of repressed, objectified existence Yeong Hye is trying to shed from through her refusal of meat, progressing to what seems to be her refusal of all things of the flesh. Probably more poignant to Japanese and Korean women or Indian women because women’s rights hasn’t progressed to the same degree, nonetheless the book alerts us to the way men see the women as maids, sex objects as opposed to persons with the same need for freedom and expression.
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Review: The Winter Soldier
The Winter Soldier by Daniel MasonMy rating: 3 of 5 stars
Plot driven story about a privileged young man entering into war. A bit of love story as one would expect. Focused on the psychiatric manifest séquelae of war. I didn’t like the end. I don’t think introducing a new character in the very end is a good way to end and I was thinking the story might come full circle to Lucius friend but if I expand on this it would give the end away. Nonetheless a compelling story line and having been to Vienna in recent weeks, I felt connected to❤️
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Tuesday, October 3, 2023
Sunday, August 27, 2023
Sunday, August 13, 2023
Thursday, July 20, 2023
Monday, July 10, 2023
Saturday, June 3, 2023
Friday, May 19, 2023
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Friday, May 12, 2023
Saturday, April 15, 2023
Sunday, February 19, 2023
Sunday, January 1, 2023
Review: The Book of Form and Emptiness
The Book of Form and Emptiness by Ruth OzekiMy rating: 5 of 5 stars
Hearing voices. Sounds like a work day in my office. However, this is such an imaginative voice with heart warming push and pull of the mother son relationship - both mourning over the same person loss. Benny eventually finds friends he feels a belonging to. His mum finds relieve from the ties of objects to the past. It’s interesting that Benny heard the voice of objects and his mum’s hoarding is an equivalent- anthropologising human qualities to objects. It reveals the humanity of those cast aside by society.
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Review: The Low Road
The Low Road by Chris WomersleyMy rating: 3 of 5 stars
It’s a book very full with story. Every page something happens - someone dies or someone kills somebody. It’s not a mystery as there is no crime to solve but it kept me wondering what happened to him or her. The characters’ past are slowly revealed as the story progresses. I learnt about the author from the ABC book shelf podcast. It’s a page turner. But I did feel the last section, the killings and tortures seems unnecessary and doesn’t gives me any better understanding of Lee. It was just a little too many murders and deaths crammed in the last part of the book.
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Review: The Torrent
The Torrent by Dinuka McKenzieMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
Gripping with twist at every turn. It’s a page turner. Each detail is purposeful and has implications. It’s such a well planned plot.
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Review: Bewilderment
Bewilderment by Richard PowersMy rating: 3 of 5 stars
I liked the story overall but I felt it a bit too similar to flowers of algenon - which was also mentioned in the book. I felt Robyn a bit like greta thunberg on the spectrum… there is a sense of doom that runs through the story so the ending isn’t that unexpected although I still thought it would have been nicer to end on a happier note
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Review: The Last White Man
The Last White Man by Mohsin HamidMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
It reminds me of Kafka's metamorphosis and Jose Saramaggo's Blindness - the overnight change of a person into a taboo of society infused with Covid paranoia. I felt the last part of the book, the aftermath of the peak of the disease, a little unnecessary. Nonetheless, the story was gripping and tight. To me, the story mostly spoke about race - racism to engrained that even a dark man despises himself. Whilst even the mother's love of her child can be tainted by these prejudices, the latter part of the book also describes how true love can see beyond the stigma and find the person underneath. Great read though not excellent.
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Review: The Child in Time
The Child in Time by Ian McEwanMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
A twisted story of strange and tragic events, much like the way the story portrays time in a non linear twisted thing. But one idea stuck in my mind- time is a vessel for fulfilment of our desires. Childhood, adulthood, birth and death happen through the medium of time. Time carries pain but it also contains joy and pleasure. With time comes death but it also gives life - like Charles and Kate is followed by birth and new life for Stephen and Julia.
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Review: Sea of Tranquility
Sea of Tranquility by Emily St. John MandelMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
What a book! It must be so well planned - beginning with different characters in different times but the links are revealed in the second part of the book. What does make “life” real? Whatever life is, we are the ones living it. Whether it is 100 years ago or 1000 years from now, life is about experiences, and we have to exist in a time and a world, life is as real as we want to make it.
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Review: Losing Face
Losing Face by George HaddadMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
This is a story of a migrant family. Each member has their own trauma and secrets hiding their weaknesses in order to hold up a face of strength to defend outside forces that tries to break apart the family. I also think the title also recognises the cynicism of this need to maintain a front - it is about pride and saving face. The topic of consent seems timely with the recent discussion over Britney Higgins case. However the themes of fitting in, family secrets, migrant identity are time less issues subtly brought out through the words and story lines
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Review: Home Before Night
Home Before Night by J.P. PomareMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
What a twist?! I could not stop until I finished the story. Every line was vital and an absolute page turner.
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Review: The Swimmers
The Swimmers by Julie OtsukaMy rating: 3 of 5 stars
Perhaps because I’m a swimmer that I didn’t find the beginning half of the book too strange. Although the swimmers’ believes about the crack led me to think perhaps this was going into some sort of fantasy or magical realism story. That it did not. Rather, the second half of the book should have a warning for any elderly person for disturbing content! Whilst I myself frequently go in and out of aged care facilities and I can certainly understand the potential for despair, loneliness in such settings, I felt it exaggerated. It felt like she was describing a dystopian state controlling these old people and manipulating these fragile vulnerable old people for their money. I sometimes I do feel like these facilities are inhumane and money grabbing but I fail to see the point the author wants to make with the story - is it to say that anyone of us ordinary person can develop dementia and die not knowing ourselves anymore??
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Review: The Spare Room
The Spare Room by Helen GarnerMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
In spite of the often light hearted description of the situation of the book, there is a very dark undercurrent of our avoidance of mortality flowing through the book. I love the description of the complex love and hate, demands and compromises we expect of relationships, friendships specifically. Beautiful language. I’d love to have friends like Helen Garner
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Review: Oh William!
Oh William! by Elizabeth StroutMy rating: 3 of 5 stars
I know people have raged about the book - at how well she captured the conflicted emotions of marriage and intimate relationships. However having read Helen Garner’s the Spare Room shortly after, I felt Garner’s description of human relationships and use of language superior to Strout’s. Above average book and an entertaining read.
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Review: How High We Go in the Dark
How High We Go in the Dark by Sequoia NagamatsuMy rating: 3 of 5 stars
Only in the second half of the book did I realise they are short stories in and of them selves but there is a thread of connection between them. I was slightly disappointed when I realised they won’t somehow come together. But it’s a chilling theme and speaks to loneliness. Pandemic or not , we still disconnect and even more lonely after the pandemic. There is no lesson learnt…
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