Munjeli Cookbook
Archive for September, 2009
Untouched by Human Hands, by Robert Sheckley
Outrageously original, wickedly funny sci-fi. I was lamenting the quality of recent sci-fi reads to a librarian (Jim, from the Fiction Department of LAPL Central) and he handed me this book. The copy I read was lushly vintage, with spotted pages and an anonymous rebound cover. The real wow is the fact that this collection [...]
A blog without books..
I’ve made myself a new blog. Why? Because I didn’t want to clutter this one with a pile of outgoing links, but I still wanted to document my own travels on the web. I’ve gone far beyond reading the news. With a sophisticated collection of productivity tools and social networking sites, every day I [...]
The Difference Engine, by William Gibson and Bruce Sterling
More actors than a telenovela stumble through a labyrinth of intrigue in this seminal Steampunk tome. There are enough points of view to disorganize a kaleidoscope; flashbacks and flashforwards; invented terms and slang. I still don’t know if I actually liked it. Rather, its a book I’ll recommend to interested parties in esoteric conversations about [...]
White is for Witching, by Helen Oyeyemi
It’s a book about a curse: there is no happy ending. Watching the hapless family swirl down the vortex of historic misdeeds supervised by a sinister domicile, I was reminded of John Wray’s book Canaan’s Tounge. Oyeyemi lacks his uncanny grasp of history, but she writes knowledgeably about how evil survives. Consumption is the vehicle of expression [...]
Dance Night, by Dawn Powell
Dawn Powell wrote a sharp and lively description of small town America, remarkable for its lack of cliché. Particularly, the shamelessness and hypocrisy brought on by isolation and limited opportunity rang true. Even a murder is almost comically downplayed by the townspeople, who would rather sympathize and protect their own than discuss a sordid reality. [...]
The Word Desire, by Rikki Ducornet
It isn’t erotica, quite; few of the stories were explicit. Yet, all of them dealt with sexual expression, repression or suppression. The exotic locales and historical details of some stories refer to the genre, as well. Descriptive and elegant prose made it a compelling read. Longing is a theme, and several of the tales will [...]
Death with Interruptions, by José Saramago
Beautiful vocabulary had me running for the dictionary while I read; no mean feat if you know how I babble. Its hard to say whether its the result of translation though; some obscure language is the penance of portage. I’m not sure what this book is about. My first impression is the dialog between intimacy [...]
The Ends of Our Tethers, by Alasdair Gray
This was the first book I’ve read by Gray. I can’t remember where I stumbled on it, but someone mentioned he was a force in typography. I love it when authors use the medium and play with fonts or layout. The Ends of Our Tethers was mild in graphics, yet tastefully laid out. The stories [...]
The White Tiger, by Aravind Adiga
This is the second book by Aravind Adiga I’ve read; in July I read Between the Assasinations In both books he writes thoughtfully about the mechanics of poverty. The White Tiger is straightforward in plot, told exclusively in the first person as the protagonist writes a letter to a visiting dignitary. The villains of the [...]
Alexandria, by Lindsey Davis
Something different. It has been awhile since I read a mystery, but I have always enjoyed them, working my way through Agatha Christie and Arthur Conan Doyle when I was still a child. I was lured to read the work of Lindsey Davis by a review at Barnes and Noble. Her work is set in [...]
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