July 2020 Books

Seasons of Migration to the North (موسم الهجرة إلى الشمال) by Tayeb Salih

This book is amazing. It’s lyrical, emotive and surprising. Salih has crafted a book that is not only intriguing, it’s also educational, and it explores the dark side of colonialism (more and more I’m finding it hard to see any positives) in Sudan and how orientalism and fetishisation of a culture and its people is utterly deplorable. A must-read for anyone wanting to educate themselves on Black Arab culture and the aftermath of white colonialism.

Adèle (Dans le jardin de l'ogre) by Leïla Slimani

Well, this is one disturbing novel. Adèle tells the story of a woman who engages in extramarital affairs and flings with numerous men, some she knows, some her husband knows and others who are complete strangers. Adèle is essentially a sex addict and her life soon descends into chaos as her liaisons become more and more frequent and risky. What makes this novel disturbing is the psychology behind Adèle’s actions and then some things that happen that are quite clearly spoilers so I won’t divulge them to you. But give this a read if you're into thrillers.

The Prophet by Khalil Gibran

This is one wise book. Gibran teaches through poetry in The Prophet and I felt like I had gained some invaluable wisdom by the end of its rather short page count. If you only read one book out of this blog post make it this one as you’ll come out the other side a better person to be around. Guaranteed.

Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 (82년생 김지영) by Cho Nam-joo

While this novel is powerful in its raw and honest offloading of gender inequality in South Korea it isn’t really a good novel. It’s very simply written and feels more like a report at times but I did find it very moving and also quite concerning as I identified (as do most women who read it no doubt) with a lot of what is discussed within it. It is a watershed book for Korea and it caused a massive uproar when published, so perhaps that is all that counts, and maybe the simplicity of it is necessary to get it into as many hands and minds as possible.

Dubliners by James Joyce

It has taken me quite the time to read this collection of short stories, I started them last year as part of my uni course and naturally only read the stories I needed to read for an essay. Seeing as I have recently finished my degree I thought it was high time to actually finish the collection. Some stories I liked, ‘A Painful Case’ being my favourite and the story I actually wrote about. But for the most part, they were well written but ultimately forgettable snapshots of life…I guess maybe that is the point and I will be reading more Joyce as I like his style.

Social Creature by Tara Isabella Burton

I got this book a while back from a book subscription box and I finally decided to pick it up and read it. I mainly read it as I was going through my books and deciding what to keep and what to get rid of (after reading of course!). This book was on the get rid of pile and after reading it I feel no different, it was an average thriller with average characters. Slimani’s Adèle is a much better thriller in my opinion.

The Humans by Matt Haig

This book very much has an agenda…an agenda to make you laugh constantly at the absurdity of human life. Haig has such a brilliant way of capturing all the minutiae of everyday life and turns it into a treatise on how and why life is brilliant and should be celebrated, all through the eyes of an alien as he learns how to be human. If your feeling down then this is a book to read as it will help you recapture your appreciation for life, and it’s also powerful to know that Haig wrote this book after getting through depression and anxiety.

Heroes and Villains by Angela Carter

Every time I read more of Carter’s work I fall a little more in love with her writing, the art of writing and literature overall. She was a master at her craft and every sentence she weaves is brilliant. Heroes and Villians is 164 pages of feral poetry, it's a gothic fairytale set in a post-apocalyptic world that will leave you considering it long after you close the book. I think I just found another new favourite this month.

June Books

This month has basically been a marathon of short fiction, a final trudge through Dune and me discovering a new favourite book and a desire to read classics again. Oh and I read one of the most obscene books ever written!

Dune by Frank Herbert

I wrote a separate review for Dune as I felt like I had a lot to say, and I did. So TL;DR I liked it but I didn’t like it. It’s complicated and it depends on how you read it and from which POV. But if you fancy reading the full review then click here.

At The Sign Of The Cat And Racket (La maison du Chat-qui-pelote) by Honoré de Balzac

This month I decided to start tackling French author Balzac’s The Human Comedy (La Comédie Humaine) a collection of interlinked works which is made up of novels, novellas and essays set in during the Restoration period and July Monarchy. Balzac could be seen as a French Dickens, as both wrote about society and with a focus on realism. This novella follows a few characters who work at a small shop in Paris and the owner marries his daughters off to two very different men. The themes of money, happiness, status, faithfulness, art, and work run throughout. At some point when my French is up to scratch, I’ll probably try reading some of The Human Comedy in French so stay tuned for that (let’s hold me accountable please!)

Also, Balzac’s At The Sign Of The Cat And Racket has forced me to reconsider the genre of realism, and particularly whether I was wrong about Dickens! I have for many years refused to touch a Dickens novel after reading A Christmas Carol at school and finding it veritably boring. I even avoided reading Bleak House for my degree because I thought I knew that I would hate it (ended up reading Walden by Thoreau and despised that instead) but maybe I would have liked it! Maybe I need to reconsider Dickens, and that folks is something I never thought would happen!

Micromegas by Voltaire

More French lit, I think I often coincide my cinematic choices with my book choices as recently I started watching French films again and suddenly all I want to read is classic French Literature. It’s a bit strange but I’ll go with it (I’ll have to because I have ordered so many French Lit second-hand books recently). I read Candide for Uni last year and really enjoyed Voltaire’s wit and seeing that I was miles behind on my 75 books in a year challenge I thought to myself “why not read this tiny little book by a French author that you’ve read before”. So I did. Micromegas is a rather strange little thing, it is essentially Sci-Fi before Sci-Fi was a thing.

The short story follows a giant from a planet called Sirius as he journeys through the solar system, he meets another giant (though much smaller than Micromegas) on Saturn and they soon find themselves on Earth. For these giants, Human life is so small (literally) and they find our behaviour (waging wars) perplexing due to how insignificant we seem, as in comparison, humans are tiny, and live such short lives and have a much inferior intellect to them. Voltaire’s brand of satire is fantastic and I can’t wait to read more of his works.

Record of a Night Too Brief (蛇を踏む) by Hiromi Kawakami

I like abstract stories, I like bizarre and challenging stories. But I did not like any of the short stories in this volume. I also have in the past read Kawakami and enjoyed her prose, but this collection of three stories just didn’t do anything for me. I found them too strange and I was unable to connect with them on any level. All I can say is nevermind, you win some and you lose some. Will I continue to check out Kawakami’s work? Sure, I think she’s an interesting and talented writer, it’s just that these stories didn’t touch me.

A Spy in the House of Love by Anaïs Nin

I have found a new author to consume wholeheartedly. Her prose is deliciously poetic, and the way she writes Sabine is so vivid and relatable but alarming and deplorable at the same time. I loved this novel and I feel like I need to get a physical copy (I read it on Libby) to underline all the moments of poeticism and to read it over and over again.

Femme Fatale by Guy de Maupassant

This Penguin Little Black Classics book contains four short stories set in 19th Century France was nothing particularly fantastic, just ok in my opinion. But for 80p you can’t really go wrong and I might read Maupassant’s most famous work Bel-Ami as a result.

Story of the Eye (Histoire de l'œil) by Georges Bataille

This is a book that will leave an impression on you. It’s interesting to analyse from a psychological angle but my goodness it is utterly depraved and probably the most f***ked up book I have ever read. All I’m prepared to say is that I can probably never look at eyes and eggs the same way again.

My Thoughts on Dune

Frank Herbert’s Dune is heralded as one of the greatest Sci-Fi novels ever written, its influence in the genre is absolutely undeniable, but, is it actually any good? Let’s find out.

Spoilers ahead so proceed with caution if you haven’t read the book!

Dune is a mammoth of a novel and granted there is a lot that happens but I found it to be quite boring in places. I loved the beginning of the novel with the political intrigue, the foreshadowing and the imminent danger that Leto was caught up in. I also enjoyed Yueh’s internal struggle about his betrayal and his role in the assassination of Leto. The Bene Gesserit were fascinating and the litany against fear is something I will take from this book and use in my life, as I feel like the line ‘fear is the mind killer’ can be a powerful mantra for anyone in a time of anxiety or difficulty (Hello 2020 I’m looking at you).

So what was boring? Well the Villain, I didn’t really want to read about him and delve into his thoughts. The Baron was rather one dimensional and his paedophilic obsession with young boys was vomit-inducing. I also found that the novel was just a bit too long, if some of the desert roaming stuff had been condensed then I would have enjoyed the novel a lot more than I actually did. I also found flicking between the story and the glossary to understand all the invented terms rather irritating as it instantly removes you from the narrative and reminds me of reading ye olde classics for English literature at uni!

Another thing is the question of whether Dune is problematic or not. You have a white saviour narrative, the uncanny references to Iraq (I mean the name of the planet is Arrakis, it’s too similar to be a coincidence) and Arabic culture and history. The spice Melange as a metaphor for the oil crisis, the list goes on. What was Herbert doing, as a White American Man, should he have been allowed to play with a whole culture’s history and use it for a novel? On the flipside, Paul can be seen as a villain, if you read the novel as a treatise on the dangers of colonialism and the violence of white supremacy it becomes something else entirely. Maybe this is what Herbert was trying to craft, a politically woke novel. One can hope. And actually, Quinn’s Ideas (go follow him if you’re a Sci-fi nerd his videos are brilliant!) on Youtube makes the perfect case for this:

The novel can also be read from an ecological angle, the world of Arrakis is a delicate and balanced ecosystem. Water is precious and the sandworms are revered as gods. But, a disturbance in this balance would be catastrophic, just like global warming is going to and has already caused immense harm to Earth. There are a few lines that stand out to me on this subject…

"The historical system of mutual pillage and extortion stops here on Arrakis," his father said. "You cannot go on forever stealing what you need without regard to those who come after.”

I feel like this is exactly the sentiment that needs to be adopted by society before it’s too late!

Back to my overall thoughts on Dune, I’m still harbouring mixed feelings but I like how much there is to analyse, and this review is only hitting the surface. I am still excited for Denis Villeneuve’s cinematic adaptation as I know he will take the best of the novel and make it pop on screen, and I’m pretty confident that Timothée Chalamet has the skill to play Paul as a complex and morally ambiguous character. But is Dune the greatest Sci-Fi novel ever written? It depends who you ask…

March Books

March was very strange month for the entire world but reading is one of the best ways to escape this craziness for a few hours. Here are the books I read this March

My Sister the Serial Killer by Oyinkan Braithwaite

I listened to this short book on audible, and I can say that it immersed me so much into the story as the narrator Weruche Opia did such a wonderful job of inhabiting the different characters. It’s an interesting tale of a woman who knows her sister is a serial killer, and just how far you will go for family. If my sister was a serial killer I don’t think I would be as loyal as Korede.

Counting Stars, Like a Chicken on a Folding Screen and The Human Arachnid by Kye Yong-muk

I read 3 of Kye Yong-muk’s short stories this month all of which are available to read for free thanks to the LTI Korea via Buk.io. These short stories were all written during or just after the Japanese occupation of Korea and as such reflect this troublesome time in the countries history, one of upheaval, political disarray and poverty. These short stories are a part of history, a part of world history that is often unknown to most in the west. And it’s rather powerful stuff, especially when you read The Human Arachnid which is full of censorship as it was written in 1929 about the working conditions that many Koreans found themselves under the tyranny of Empirical Japanese rule.

Between the Acts by Virginia Woolf

Woolf is one of the most iconic writers of the modern period, her use of stream of consciousness is absolutely iconic at this point. Between the Acts is rife with comedic social commentary and it is also representative of Woolf’s interest in literary history. It’s an interesting read but you have to pay close attention to fully uncover each carefully crafted layer.

Untold Night and Day by Bae Suah

This book is very dreamlike and bizarre. If you love surrealism and fragmented narratives then give this one a read, Bae Suah never disappoints with her beautiful yet strange prose.

Good Morning, Midnight by Jean Rhys

This is one of the bleakest and darkest books I’ve ever read, it’s so excruciating to read Rhys’s novel of a woman in despair just before the second world war. This is a uni book that I’m glad to have read but can safely that I will never read it again because it just made me feel so deflated and sad.

Photo Shop Murder by Kim Young-ha

I finally managed to get a hold of this collection of two short stories by Kim Young-ha second hand from AbeBooks. The two stories are ‘Photo Shop Murder’ (which easily feels like it could be a Korean movie with its subversion of expectations) and ‘Whatever Happened to the Guy in the Elevator’ a surreal and almost Kafkaesque exploration of one man’s commute to and from work. I love Kim’s writing and this little book didn’t disappoint.

February Books

I read quite a bit more this month and I also have a couple of unfinished books that will roll over into march or beyond as I have a lot of books to read in part or whole for uni right now. But here are all the books I read this month!

Civilization and Its Discontents by Sigmund Freud

Freud is a must-read for any student of English lit, so naturally, I gravitated towards this collection of essays to accompany my unit on modern lit. I have been fascinated by psychology for many years and even considered studying it instead of Eng Lit. This was an interesting read but some points regarding women vexed me slightly but that’s to be expected from a 20th-century text.

The Radleys by Matt Haig

A light-hearted, fun and quick read. The story was a little predictable but I don’t really care about that as it was rather funny and a nice way to pass an evening or two.

Only Dull People Are Brilliant at Breakfast by Oscar Wilde

I thought this was going to be a short story but it was actually just a collection of Wilde’s witticisms, Funny as they are I was a little disappointed.

Colour and Light & Concord 34 by Sally Rooney

I read a couple of Sally Rooney’s short stories to try and get on backtrack with my (totally impossible) 75 books in a year challenge, which I didn’t but I like reading a good short story nonetheless. I like Rooney’s writing and I like how she navigates heavy topics in a sensitive but real way.

Fight Club by Chuck Palahniuk

I like the David Fincher movie so I thought I would check out the source material. I think its a case of the film is better than the book, in the respect of dealing with the whole Tyler Durden revelation and the iconic ending scene has much more power than the cop-out ending of the book.

Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix by J.K. Rowling

I cried. And I can’t believe I only have 2 more books to go before I’ve finished Harry Potter, I only started listening to the audiobooks last year and I’m already nearly finished! Once again I have to commend Stephen Fry on bringing these stories to life with his exceptional narration and I feel like he adds a lot of magic to the stories.