#damned
Private sessions be like
Dear Universe,
Show me the way!
Sincerely,
A lost one
Do what you feel in your heart to be right- for you’ll be criticized anyway. You’ll be damned if you do, and damned if you don’t.
-Eleanor Roosevelt
LATEST BOOK HAUL.
The anatomy of my bookshop trips used to consist of (1) a new novel tucked in my arm, (2) my wallet a few bills lighter, and (3) a wee whisper in my ear that urges me to start reading the book in my commute home. Now that I have towers of to-be-reads that may or may not be collecting dust bunnies at home, I make it a point to stop…hoarding…for a while and start ticking off the Unreads List.
BUT when you have an annual event like the Manila International Book Fair or MIBF, it’s hard not to splurge. Everything on the shelves is discounted and your money felt more and more like a transient thing in your pocket every passing minute—and you don’t care. There’s no way to tame a bookworm’s inner junkie in a place like that.
That’s But 01. But 02 is: when you feel a bit under the weather and you need something to cheer you up.
Because to tell you the truth, I only bought a handful of books from MIBF. The rest are either given to me as a gift or bought on occasions when I’m feeling a tad sad. Yeah, I roll like that. Anyhoo, without further ado, here are a few information about each novel:
- The White Tiger by Aravind Diga. Set in a raw and unromanticized India, The White Tiger—the first-person confession of a murderer—is as compelling for its subject matter as it is for the voice of its narrator: amoral, cynical, unrepentant, yet deeply endearing.
- Damned by Chuck Palahniuk. Follows the story of Madison, a thirteen-year-old girl who finds herself in Hell, unsure of why she will be there for all eternity, but tries to make the best of it.
- Invisible Monsters: Remix by Chuck Palahniuk. Injected with new material and special design elements, this book fulfills Palahniuk’s original vision for his 1999 novel, turning a daring satire on beauty and the fashion industry into an even more wildly unique reading experience. NOTE: I’m done reading this and I love it! Full review to follow!
- The Girl Who Fell Beneath Fairyland and Led the Revels There by Catherynne M. Valente. September returns to Fairyland where she learns that its inhabitants have been losing their shadows—and their magic—to the world of Fairyland Below. Sequel to The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making.
- Unnatural Creatures edited by Neil Gaiman. A collection of short stories about the fantastical things that exist only in our minds—collected and introduced by beloved New York Times bestselling author Neil Gaiman.
- The History of Love by Nicole Krauss. Leo Gursky taps his radiator each evening to let his upstairs neighbor know he’s still alive. But it wasn t always like this: in the Polish village of his youth, he fell in love and wrote a book. Sixty years later and half a world away, fourteen-year-old Alma, who was named after a character in that book, undertakes an adventure to find her namesake and save her family.
- Naked Lunch by William S. Burroughs. Follows junkie William Lee, who takes on various aliases, from the US to Mexico, eventually to Tangier and the dreamlike Interzone. The vignettes are drawn from Burroughs’ own experience in these places, and his addiction to drugs.
- Under My Hat: Tales from the Cauldron edited by Jonathan Strahan. Collection of “witch” stories from the biggest names in fantasy and young adult literature, including Neil Gaiman, Holly Black, Diana Peterfreund, Margo Lanagan, Peter S. Beagle, and Garth Nix.
- All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr. Deftly interweaving the lives of the blind Marie-Laure and German orphan Werner set during WWII, Doerr illuminates the ways, against all odds, people try to be good to one another.
- Landline by Rainbow Rowell. A tale about a disintegrating marriage and a phone call from the past—and not just from anyone’s past, it’s from the past self of the Georgie’s—the protagonist’s—husband. It’s not time travel, not exactly, but Georgie feels like she’s been given an opportunity to fix her marriage before it starts. (Thanks for the gift, Mamu Kit!)
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Mon, 03 Jan 2022 20:18:43
AlternateCall Me By Your Name poster I whipped up for the fun of it. Reference drawn for the two figures from the same statue of David by Bernini.
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