Book Talk

Hello friends! 

Since some of you renjoyed the previous post about books I've recently read, I figured I'd continue this, and turn it into a regular thing. 

Small disclaimer upfront: My favourite genres are literary fiction and magic realism, and I love stories that are set in East Asia. I don't exclusively read these things, but they're what I enjoy most at the moment and they might make up a good chunk of the books that I mention. 

Ok, let's go! These are the books that I read recently:

BOOKS I LOVED

• Shoko's Smile: Stories by Choi Eunyoung. My favourite book I read recently. This is such a beautiful short-story collection. I loved every single one and I can't wait to read more from this author!
• Crying in H Mart by Michelle Zauner. A memoir about loss and grief, and how food connects you to your heritage and family. Loved it.
• Know my Name by Chanel Miller. TRIGGER WARNING: Sexual assault. It's a powerful and beautifully written memoir about surviving sexual assault, and how things get distorted in the media.

BOOKS I LIKED

• 1984 by George Orwell. This one needs no introduction, I just hadn't read it yet. It's gripping, deeply disturbing, and I come back thinking about it all the time. This would be in my "books I loved" category, if it weren't for that massive manifesto info-dump 2/3 into the book. 
• Cursed Bunny by Bora Chung. A weird, weird short-story collection. Some of them I loved (The Head, Cursed Bunny, Home Sweet Home), but some of them I didn't care about (mainly the ones that were more fable-like). 
• After the Quake by Haruki Murakami. Another short story collection. Each story is loosely connected to the Kobe earthquake of 1995. I've read so many of Murakami's books, and this is very classic Murakami, but more grounded and not as far-out as some of his other work. 

BOOKS THAT WEREN'T MY THING

• The Stranger by Albert Camus. What a strange little book this was. The main character commits murder but seems to detached and indifferent to everything and everyone in his life. It's exactly what readers might find fascinating about this book, but it was just puzzling to me. 
• The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd. It's a coming-of-age story set in the American South in the 1960s. It's about racism and belonging, and finding a home for yourself. I liked the beginning, but then it just dragged on and felt a bit directionless. It just wasn't for me. 
• Before the Coffee Gets Cold by Toshikazu Kawaguchi. Ugh, I wanted to like this book. It's about a magical café where you can travel back in time. Sounds great! But the writing was just so poor that I couldn't look past it. This might be due to the translation to some degree, but the author is following his own writing rule "tell, don't show", and that made the characters feel one-dimensional at best. The woman in the first story was decribed to be highly intelligent, but acts like an idiot. Also, that last story was just a big no no no for me. 

That's it! At the moment, I'm reading The Travelling Cat Chronicles by Hiro Arikawa and The Secret History by Donna Tartt. Stay tuned. :)