Archive for the ‘Book Reviews’ Category
This is version two of the blog, which currently contains 110 published posts. To some extent, this blog represents the creative excesses of a design enthusiast who is somewhere in the process of applying to grad school, working at a law firm and resides in the Financial District of New York City.
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So, I haven’t been posting a lot recently, mostly because my computer is broken (the screen freezes unless I bend it at an angle — weird, I know) and HP has told me that it would cost $400+taxes+parts to fix. Obviously, I’m not going to spend what could likely be over 500 dollars to fix a three-year-old computer that cost less than a thousand dollars to begin with. Assuming a five-year rate of depreciation, $500 would be well over it’s current value. It’s a bit of a racket seeing as how Hewlett-Packard also has the highest hardware failure rate of the leading notebook manufacturers. It was relatively cheaper, but given that my last HP laptop also had similar problems and the screen died out shortly after it hit its 3rd year, I don’t think I would get another HP notebook.
In fact, HP has a 3-year manufacturing failure rate (as opposed to accidental damage) of just over 25% compared to Asus, Toshiba and Sony which each have failure rates hoving just above or below 16% over the course of the same three-year period. You can see the results of that study here (PDF file), though, it’s coming from a vendor of warranty protection plans, so take it with a grain of salt.
But aside from discussions of the book value of my laptop and manufacturing failure rates, I have, however, as a result of its shitty hardware, been reading more instead. Here are some of the recent ones.
Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood. Loved this. I’ve never been a huge fan of dystopian novels, mostly because anything taken to an extreme is bad, I think, but this world is so carefully constructed and her writing is so readable that it was hard to be such a cynic about it. I think my favorite part was the relationship between Oryx and Sandman. It’s an alternate reality; if you’re into that you should definitely read this (and probably already have). Otherwise, just read it anyway cause it’s good.
Girl’s Poker Night by Jill Davis. Eh. My sister gave this to me a while back. It was better than the average chick lit but not by a lot and not really worth reading unless you particularly are in the mood for that stuff.
My Name is Red by Orhan Pamuk. Huh. I liked this book in theory. I liked that it was almost a philosophical (regarding art) mystery. It’s a story about a murder among a group of miniaturists (read: artists), set in the Ottoman Empire (it’s translated from Turkish). The idea is that they are working on book of illustrations that reflects a style that is considered to be sacrilegious in that it is considered idolatry, detracting from the glorification of God, etc. There’s more to the plot line than just this, but the main character, Black, investigates by speaking to the suspects regarding their views on various aspects of art, and at the same time the unidentified murderer discusses his thoughts as well. Theoretically, you should be trying to figure out who is the murderer based on these discussions of art philosophy. It was good in terms of writing, pacing, etc., but I think my appreciation of this book is largely on an academic level. If you think you’d enjoy theoretical discourses on art, for example considering what “is” art and whether things like personal style detracts from art and the representation of “truth,” then you’d probably love this book.
The Mysterious Affair at Styles by Agatha Christie. Always good. I think this was the first Hercule Poirot novel ever. I thought I would be over my Agatha Christie phase by now, but I guess not.
Bel Canto by Ann Patchett. Very Oprah. Obviously unrealistic. But entirely enjoyable. A group of rich important people get kidnapped by terrorists who are good people at heart.
The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Schafer. I liked reading this, minus the romance. Its seems like a solid novel who had an editor who forced in some contrived romantic plot line so there would be was more of a plot arc, but it was just distracting. It’s about the German occupation of Guernsey (not fictional), as told through a conversation in letters (entirely fictional). It begins when a writer receives a letter from someone from the island and ends up conversing with various people to find out about their experiences during the occupation. It’s Hallmark-y in it’s way, but interesting from a historical perspective.
Baby Proof by Emily Giffen. This was sitting on my self for, like two years. It’s chick-lit, but I liked the premise of this book, mostly because I liked the idea of exploring the trade-off between decisions about kids and someone you’re into. Oddly enough, it was something I recently had a conversation with someone about so I finally picked it up and went ahead and read it. Overall, it was pretty good as far as this genre goes, but the ending was such a disappointment and waaay cheesy.
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I promised, like three years ago, to Jessie that I would read something by Barbara Kingsolver, who she says is one of her favorite writers. So, true to my (procrastinating) word, I finally got around to and finished The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver earlier today.
I’ve been trying to mix it up in my reading repertoire terms of genres. The Poisonwood Bible was more on the serious side of drama. For the most part it’s set in the Congo during its short-lived bid for independence from Belgium. However, the story actually spans three decades and is told through the wife and four daughters of a zealous preacher, Nathan Price, who move to a small village there, Kilanga, to do missionary work. As one expects with these sorts of fish-out-of-water-type premises, it changes them more than they change it. However, it’s well written and thought-provoking in other ways, though it is clearly bent on challenging certain Westernized, I guess, attitudes for lack of a better word (the author doesn’t use such terminology, thank goodness) and on criticizing the U.S. and other foreign involvement in the economic and political affairs in the Congo.
While most of the story focuses on the difficulties of the Price family, the political/social message comes through in bits and pieces and finally comes to light more fully as they are forced to flee. In short, Belgium colonized the place and essentially handicapped the country (by not allowing non-whites to get an education, not building infrastructure, etc.). After the people rose up and demanded their independence, President Eisenhower, in cahoots with other foreign leaders, gave orders to have the elected leader of Congo assassinated because these leaders of white men were unhappy with the negotiations regarding the sale of the country’s natural resources (diamonds, in particular). They fixed the following election to have him replaced with a puppet figure instead and corruption ensued (the U.S. began building a power system in Congo they knew would fail in order to saddle the country with billions in debt, ensuring that the flow of resources would be unhindered in the future). There are also non-politically geared messages in the book as well — about people, human nature, etc.
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So yeah, I apologize to the 3 visitors to my blog about the porn banners that took over for a while. Apparently the permissions on my files were set incorrectly, which (gasp!) left my mySQL tables unprotected! And then I neglected to fix it for some time, haha.
At any rate, I’ve started applying to law schools now. The basics of my applications are finished, my personal statement and resume, etc. so I’m glad to finally have my life back to some extent.
In fact, I finally finished Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke, which I really enjoyed. It’s about two magicians, set in England during the Napoleonic Wars. When the story begins, magicians are almost an anachronistic remnant of Britain’s past (according to the story, magic once abounded but has since disappeared). Instead, there are only theoretical magicians, as opposed to practical magicians, who study magic in an academic manner. However, two “practical magicians” appear on the scene and attempt to rediscover magic, piecing things together.
All in all, it’s long, but it’s funny (a sort of dry, British humor) and very enjoyable. Plot-driven and well-conceived, IMHO. To quote Wikipedia: “It has been described as a fantasy novel, an alternate history, and an historical novel.” I’m not much for fantasy (with the exception of the Harry Potter series, obviously), but I liked this take on magic. Recommended. A solid 4 stars.
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I started this book a year ago and finally got around to finishing it last week. I know it’s very pop-lit-y, but that actually doesn’t bother me. If it gets people to actually read books, I’m happy. In fact, I think elementary schools should encourage kids to read more stuff that’s just fun to read (the same way that gateway drugs work — leads to more serious stuff later) if they want them to grow up to be better readers and better writers, but whatever, that’s not what this post is about. I think I actually commented about this book before in a different post, but whatever.
So yeah, the book is this woman’s memoir about her travels to Italy, India and Indonesia following her divorce. Obviously, it’s not for guys (or intellectuals), but I laughed out loud many times, especially in the beginning (i.e. Italy), which is always a big plus for me. Her spiritual discourse — this is the India part — is actually interesting though it clearly is barely skimming the surface (but I suppose her editor probably wouldn’t have allowed it any other way). I thought the most interesting parts re:cultural differences were in the Indonesia section.
All in all, the book is sort of a mixed bag — kind of like a 3-for-1 deal cause each section is so different. Honestly, there’s not many people that I know that I think I’d recommend this book to, but I think most people could find something to like about it. This probably isn’t the best review I’ve ever written, but oh well. 3 and 3/4 stars.
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I finished A Conspiracy of Paper by David Liss a while ago and still haven’t been able to decide whether or not I liked it. It’s basically about the prelude to the first financial bubble in London, which is where the stock markets first began to develop back in the early 18th century.
As a novel, the book is part historical mystery and part Intro to Financial Markets for Morons (Wait!! You mean when you tell people the stock is going to go up they start to buy?!? Like that.) with a little romance thrown in for good measure. And while it doesn’t manage to present a particularly compelling mystery nor does it serve to educate at any level that would be useful (the romance is so poorly done, it’s not even worth mentioning again), a quick pace and eventful plot keeps the book from becoming mired in its (numerous) shortcomings. My instinct was to dislike the book, but somehow it managed to keep my interest and wasn’t unenjoyable.
So, yeah, the writing isn’t anything special. And no, the characters herein would never finangle their way into any Literary Hall of Fame. And yeah, you have to really strech reality to believe that this bumbling bully would ever really manage to unravel any sort of mystery without getting himself killed (the villians in the book just hand him information). But hey — it’s a good subway read and divides up neatly into 20-minute chunks. Three (maybe two-and-a-half if I’d had a bad morning) stars.
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Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. Sigh. I was so sure I would like this. Not to come off as some sort of ardent feminist, but I think Marquez grossly oversimplifies women (they’re either Madonnas or complete flat-out whores — some literally — who basically serve to service men), and it seems more like a parody of love than anything resembling an actual courtship (it’s possible this sentiment is more of a reflection of my lack of life experience — I’m just putting it out there). But I think the biggest thing is that bothered me that it seemed to show a lack of understanding about people (their desires, motives, etc.) and human nature so that the characters in it, especially the female ones, come off as difficult to relate to. They just didn’t seem very real — maybe it’s just me, I don’t know.
Basically, the book is summed up as: boy meets girl. Girl marries someone else. Boy waits for her husband to die and has a lot of sex. Over half a century later, boy and girl hook up.
I’ve always felt like I should like Gabriel Garcia Marquez more because he’s supposed to be so wonderful, but it was pretty painstaking to get through this novel. I have to admit I found the first few chapters engrossing, but as the story line played out and the characters developed…eh. And I disliked Chronicle of a Death Foretold even more (summed up: blindly following traditions is bad). I read Chronicle for school, however, so I always assumed that I disliked it mostly due to my associating that book with classwork. Guess not.
Baring some use of symbolism that maybe some English majors would appreciate more than I do (symbolism tends to not enhance the value of books by much for me because it serves neither to educate or entertain), I failed to find anything particularly notable in this book. Also, it provides some insights into the aging process I guess, but I think just I’m not in a position to fully appreciate it at this point in life. I get that Marquez can string together a pretty sentence, obviously, but I just didn’t enjoy this book. I’d give it three-and-a-half stars, but a personal rating of two-and-a-half.
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Thing I did during break:
I did a little bit of the things I said I would do – LSATs, sleep, getting together with people, etc. I didn’t make as much progress on the LSATs as I hoped. I still think I could do better on the logic games if I studied some more — it just takes me too long to chart out those problems right now. I want to get to the point where charting them out is second nature. I think I’m okay on the rest.
I’m surprised how many people I ended up seeing over break. It seems Marie, Sid and Nita (who I did not see) are all planning on law school as well. A bunch of people are doing i-banking or finance-related jobs: Hemal, Bo, etc. Lots of med-schoolers. Also, I finally, finally saw all the Yalies, who have been alluding all of us for the past few years. We had an awkward New Years’ party at Khang’s house — we ended up washing champagne glasses as it hit midnight because they were too dusty to toast with, haha. Also, for future reference, twist-off champagne bottles don’t “pop,” regardless of what the warning on the bottle may say.
We also managed to get in some ice skating, even if Jules, Kasey and Bo were two hours late. Yeah, thanks. Seven minutes my butt, Jules. Haha. Howie and Karen came, too. Ann and Aaron showed up together (but not “together”), but Aaron was unwilling to skate because he is a scaredy-cat. You may tell him I said that because I never got invited to that LAN party to play Diablo 2. I’m very upset. I also had a weird night out with the boys — I attempted to get into the wrong person’s car (v. awkward) and we went to a place that played explicit music videos from the late 80′s and early 90′s. Very weird, but I met Sid’s cousin. Cool.
What else…I ended up going to three movies over break. First, Enchanted with Marie, where I missed the first hour because I went to the wrong movie theater, proving, unequivocally, that I am indeed a genius. Second, Enchanted (again!) with Tina, Amy and Jeanne, wherein I finally got to see the full movie. Finally, I saw Charlie Wilson’s War with Daniel and Aaron. I would say both movies were slightly better than mediocre, but whatever.
Recently Read Stuff:
Pillars of the Earth, by Ken Follet; I actually really liked this book. I’ve been in a historical fiction and mystery phase recently. (Obviously, this falls in the first category.) It was probably the lengthiest book that I’ve read continuously. Usually, I get bored at some points in more “epic” novels. It got a little overwrought with drama at some points, but I guess that’s to be expected from a former writer of horror/thrillers. Oh, it’s about building a cathedral.
The Dante Club, by Matthew Pearl; I have a feeling (however potentially unfounded) that things that are described to be facts in this book give way to much more entertaining fictions, but it’s about a group of Dante translators who discover that a murderer is going around killing off sinners in a Dantesque fashion. However, this is set at a time when Dante is relatively unknown and still only in Italian so the murder must be among their ranks. Drama ensues.
Freddy and Fredericka, by Mark Helprin; I enjoyed this, but I honestly can’t think of a single person I’d recommend it to. It’s about a royal couple who – for various reasons – get sent, penniless and with only one another, to make their own way in America. It’s a little more bizarre than I’d expected, but if you’re willing to suspend reality, you’ll probably find yourself rooting for the two main characters. One caveat, it’s a little condescending when it comes to making assumptions about the perceptions of the “common people” but whatever.
The Murder of Roger Ackroyd by Agatha Christie; Good. Someone gets stabbed in the back. House full of people — whodunit?
The Clocks by Agatha Christie; Also good. A a stranger finds a dead body in house surrounded by clocks set to the wrong time. Hercule Poirot comes to the rescue.
Shopaholic & Baby by Sophie Kinsella; Actually pretty entertaining. I thought her previous Shopaholic book (the & Sister one) kind of … was not great. Anyway, this one was more like the previous ones, thank goodness. Basically, our Becky has a baby, but suspects that Luke is stepping out with her doctor. It’s good, clean fun.
Other Stuff:
I booked tickets to London! Whoo hoo!
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I’m trying to read Veronika Decide Morir (trans: Veronika Decides to Die) in Spanish right now. It’s quite difficult because I haven’t practiced my Spanish in almost three years. I’m a little less than a hundred pages into it, but it’s taken me almost 4 hours of reading and looking up words.
Anyway, in the book he tells a story about a king of a kingdom and the sorcerer who attempts to ruin him. The sorcerer poisons the water source in the kingdom to drive people to madness. The king, on the other hand, drinks from a private water source. Things go according to plan and the people go crazy. The king, trying to stop the madness, tries to take security measures, but everyone thinks he’s the crazy one. In the end, in order to rule, he ends up drinking from the poisoned water source himself. Once he is like everyone else, they believe he has regained his sanity. And, in this secluded kingdom, the crazy king and all the crazy people lived happily ever after.
I liked this story. It leads me to believe Paulo Coelho knows what it’s like to do group projects.
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I’ve been meaning to read Slaughterhouse-Five since the dawn of time. Seriously, I think I’ve had the book for about five years now. I’ve read Timequake, Welcome to the Monkey House, Bagombo Snuff Box, God Bless You, Dr. Kevorkian, Man without a Country, etc., etc. – loved all these books, but for some reason had never been able to get myself to read his most well-known work.
Until now, of course, and it was wonderful. Oddly enough, he cites a quote in two instances which happens to be one of my favorite quotes. I won’t recite it here – it seems cheesy when taken out of an appropriate context.
I think my delay in reading it might be because I knew I loved Vonnegut so much that I was worried I’d read it and be disappointed – with most of the writers I’ve loved the most, one day I pick up a book I thought I really loved and find that it’s not what I thought it was. I suppose maybe it’s cause I read a lot of stuff when I was young and gave more credit them than they deserved. But who knows.
At any rate, knowing that I wanted to concentrate on reading the new Harry Potter tome, I went ahead and tried to tie up some loose strings by finally finishing the book. I ended up having to start over since it was so long since I’d read the beginning, but it was well worth it. The whole time, I kept thinking about how it hit me when I found out Kurt Vonnegut was dead. It was on the Georgetown bus in Washington D.C. on our way to the business strategy case competition, day of. It was on the left column on the front page of the Post, and it made our little competition seem very insignificant.
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Alright, last post about the past month in New York. It was originally supposed to be about my activities outside of work, but since all we seem to ever do is eat at various restaurants, this has essentially become a restaurant log. There’s also a bunch of places we’ve been to that I never caught the name of. Shame. But anyway, here goes:
Weekends (a.k.a. the Restaurant Log)
The downside of working a lot is that it’s hard to do things during the week. I basically have no time whatsoever from Monday through Friday. I actually didn’t do laundry for the first time until this past weekend – I just kept buying more clothes and underwear, no joke. Right afterwards, I went online and bought more stuff from Victoria’s Secret so I could toss the crap I’d purchased from Duane Reade. Yuck.
Instead, I keep most of my social engagements on the weekends so that I don’t end up canceling on people all over the place and feeling like a jerk. Luckily, people have been in and out of New York every weekend so it’s been pretty fun with sooo much good, delicious, savory, flavorful food. For example, Heartland Brewery has really good mini-burgers.
My first weekend after starting work, I spent most of the time with Rita shopping in Soho and checking out little boutiques. At some point, we went out to a little restaurant called the Barking Dog, where we ate outside in this stone fountain area thing. Quite lovely with pretty good food, depending on what you order. Later we went to Cafe Zaiya because they have really great cream puffs. I also got together with Bo and Chen, who are both also working in the city, but we basically walked around, ate at Monster Sushi and ended up going to the Mac store for some reason. Whatever.
Second weekend, Kasey and Jules strolled into town – yay! So, all us IB kids got together again and went to some very, very random Chinese restaurant in (where else) Chi-town and got gelato afterwards in Little Italy. Also, there was this French restaurant later where Bo tried to hit on the waitress. The great thing about hanging out with other Asian people is that we can do family-style food which is always fun. Chen brought some friends and gave me a sew-it-yourself Monster doll — I’m waiting for a time to do it when I can give it the full attention it deserves.
Oh, when I met up with Rita and her friend Chelsea, we went to this really cute restaurant painted in blue that I need to remember to get the name of. We had a really overzealous waitress who listed off specials for at least a couple minutes. It was a little weird. That, and the crepe place (called Crepe Creations) we went to afterwards that had no food. Seriously. We tired to order stuff and each time they said they didn’t have chocolate, or didnt’ have “fluff” whatever that is but it’s in half their menu or whatever else. When they finally had the stuff, they ran out of apples in Rita’s apple crepe and they ran out of whipped creme and substituted powdered sugar on mine. I know the guy was no Mario Batali, but come on – whipped cream and powdered sugar are so not the same thing.
The weekend after that was busy, to say the least. My sister was in town, so we got together with two of her friends, Monica and Theresa, both people from Plano. Also, Rita came in again, but with James and Ben, so of course we have to get together. At the same time, both Brown and Beam – Emory people – were in town, too, and they managed to run into Suhas in the subways on the one day she came into town. My sister and I ended up hanging out with her friends during the day and my friends at night, basically. It’s not worth detailing out everything that went down, but it essentially was a really fun weekend. I also went to, like, five really good restaurants that weekend and got really fat.
RESTAURANTS INCLUDED:
Havana with the Asian crew, New Yeah Shanghi Deluxe as well as Sala with Monica and Geg, Smorgas Chef and Choux Factory thanks to Theresa (and Geg), and finally I think the Emory kids went to Tigerland but I’m not sure. It was good.
My sister managed to miss her flight out three times in a row (okay, twice it was because she was standby, but still.) The last night she was here, we went to a Japanese restaurant near my place, and for dessert, we ordered some banana sushi concoction out of curiosity. After some slight confusion regarding complementary green tea ice cream (I wanted to know where the bananas were) – it was actually really good.
Finally, this past weekend, my fourth weekend in New York, marking my first full month to be in the big city, was Rita’s birthday! Her not-quite-surprise party was held at Gyu-Kaku, and I met a ton of her friends from high school. Justin showed up because he was in town visiting Stephanie, as well as James and Jimmy-James. Justin ditched us to go to a ballet. Uncool, man. Uncool. Chaussie was also in town for Rita’s 21st, so we all hung out afterwards (Halal on 53rd and 6th, Dylan’s Candy Bar and the ever-reliable Jamba Juice), as Rita went out and got crunk with her high school people.
Anyway, that’s my story up until this point. I have half and hour before work starts, so off to breakfast. Ciao!
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