Media update
Ah, there's nothing like handing in an assignment to discover later in the day that you've done it All Wrong. Luckily, I am in a mood of utter indifference right now. I'll wait and freak out when I get it back *g*
Crazy Rich Asians (Kevin Kwan) - This book... was not what I thought it was going to be. I don't know why, but I was expecting a fast and hard takedown of the Asian super-elite, perhaps because there's so much material there, and it was anything but! It was light and engaging, in a Jackie Collins-meets-Merlion kind of way, but it's as much celebration as satire. (The Merlion is one of the national symbols of Singapore - it's half lion, half fish, and let's just think about that for a moment *g*) It's all fast cars, private jets, huge houses, family-owned resorts, servants, and a tangled web of relationships, only with (primarily) Singaporeans instead of Americans.
The book centres around Rachel Chu, an American Born Chinese, whose boyfriend Nick takes her back to Singapore to attend his best friend's wedding and introduce her to his family. What he hasn't mentioned to her in all their time together is that his family is hideously, filthy, stinking rich. As are his friends. So she becomes the "plebeian" observer to this world of "crazy rich" Asians (as opposed to crazy Rich Asians, although there's a bit of that as well). Nick's friends accept her - mostly - but his mum is appalled, since Rachel is a nobody, her mum is a single parent and even worse, from China! Horrors! (Yes, there is a pecking order.) The book name drops designer labels constantly, as well as jet-setting around America, Singapore, Australia, etc. So basically a lot of gawking at how the other half lives entertainment. One thing that did irritate me was the constant footnoting of Hokkien, Cantonese, Malay and Singlish expressions which was very distracting. I think they could probably have been inferred well enough from the text or handled in a glossary. Even more annoying was his tendency to include authorial comments or his life history in such footnotes which just threw me completely out of the book. So, I didn't like that aspect so much, but the rest of the book was forgettably fun. The ending wasn't properly resolved, but I didn't care enough for that to bother me. Library book.
Cluetopia (David Astle) - A year by year stroll through 100 years of crossword puzzles. Entertaining, but at a couple of pages per year it felt a bit flimsy. The best story I remember is this British teacher who was investigated during one of the World Wars because coded names of military operations kept showing up magically in his crossword puzzles. Investigation of his background turned up nothing, and yet the names kept appearing. It turned out that he made his (high school) students create interlocked word grids in class to keep them busy, and then he based some of his published crosswords on their work. One of the popular student haunts was right next to a military base, and they kind of 'absorbed' the coded conversation of the soldiers, which then made its way into their grids. Also, Chinese crosswords actually exist, but are based on character strings rather than letters, as you'd expect I suppose. There are even crosswords in Klingon. Of course there are. Christmas present.
People Who Eat Darkness (Richard Lloyd Parry) - It's not often I read a book and marvel at the journalism as much as the subject, but the sheer depth of research was pretty impressive. It's the (true) story of Lucy Blackman, a young, blonde British woman who goes off to Tokyo with her best friend, seeking a little bit of adventure. She takes up work illegally as a "hostess", a job which basically involves making conversation and drinking with (mostly) Japanese men. The exploration of that world alone - its rules, its rivalries - was fascinating. One day, she calls her best friend to say she's going off with a man she's just met, to have dinner - not all that odd in that world - and she'll be back soon, not to worry. She never comes back. This is followed some days later by a phone call from a Japanese man with heavily accented English saying that Lucy's joined a 'cult', and won't be coming home after all. Somehow her friends and family don't find this reassuring or convincing. After a great deal of pushing from relatives, friends, and some lucky political timing, her remains are eventually discovered in a small cave near a beach resort. When her killer is eventually found, he turns out to have made a habit of drugging and filming women while he sexually assaulted them. It's creepy as hell, but rivetingly well told, going deeply into Lucy's diarised hopes and dreams, her feuding relatives, the East meets West clash of cultures, the Japanese legal system, and all the red herrings and false hopes along the way. Library book.
The Life to Come (E. M. Forster) - GUYS THIS BOOK. I WANTS IT. Okay, so the book that first got me into Forster was Maurice, no surprises there. I read the other novels, and enjoyed them, but none of them came close to the simplicity and let's face it, the appealing themes of Maurice. The Life to Come is a book of Forster's short stories (posthumously published), most of which contain explicitly gay themes as well as some not-very-gentle digs at convention and religion and I LOVED it.
Not every story, but there are some gems. I was actually sporfling in horrified glee at some of them - so elegantly told, yet incredibly wicked. For example, the titular story features a proud missionary who's given the task of converting a tribe of notoriously recalcitrant "natives" (there's a decidedly colonialist feel about a few of the stories, as well as recurring class themes, but to be fair, Forster is also noticeably unsparing of his own class). Anyway, the flaxen-haired missionary charges in full of determination, but no, the tribe are no more interested in hearing from him than anyone else. He accepts defeat, but it's getting dark and it's too far to go home, so he takes shelter in a little hut near the village. In the middle of the night, the lovely young chief comes to him and asks the missionary to show him Christ's love... which ends up becoming rather literal, if you know what I mean. The next morning, the missionary flees in horror from the sin he's committed, returning humbled to his brethren, but then, lo! A messenger arrives - the entire tribe is converting to Christianity because of his influence! The chief has decreed it! Oh, dear. So now the missionary is heaped with praise and glory at this astonishing mass conversion, but warns the chief he must never mention what they did. The chief keeps wanting to be shown the love of Christ again, and the missionary says one day he will, but he can't just now, the chief must be patient and wait. Despite how hilariously ironic the beginning is, it devolves into a tragedy as everything falls apart.
There are quite a few brilliant stories in the collection (The Obelisk is possibly my favourite), and as I've said, at times I could not believe how evil the man was, and all in such beautiful, beautiful prose. I swear one of the stories in essence says: "And then he committed incest and bestiality and they all lived happily ever after. The end." And I'm sitting here like, "DID I REALLY JUST READ THAT?" I adored it so much. I haven't bought a single book this year (apart from a compulsory text) but this is first on my list for when I start up again. Library book.
I also went to see Henson's Alternative Puppet Up! - Uncensored which was much better than I'd expected. I didn't realise until after I'd bought tickets that it was really an improv-style show, which usually doesn't appeal to me. So it's kind of The Muppets meet Theatresports - with the additional oddity that the people with puppets are on stage, while the "TV version" showing just the puppet(s) plays on monitors to either side. It involved a cast of six puppeteers and a host who invited audience suggestions for various "scenes" that the puppeteers then played out. For example, there was a James Bond song-sketch based on the title suggestion "Kill Me One More Time" featuring the supervillain "Abbott" (as in Tony, not "and Costello", although I grant you it's a fine distinction). There was also something to do with six hotdogs and a porn movie. Don't ask. It was all amusing enough, if a bit hit and miss, but the highlights were the rehearsed set pieces. Two were based on the technique of video looping, which I'd never seen done before. A puppet announced he and his 'brothers' were going to do a dance together, based on an audience suggestion ("bubble and squeak"). He sang about bubble and squeak while dancing in front of the monitor. Then what he'd just done replayed immediately on the monitor while the puppeteer set himself up in a different position, and went through again, so now two identical puppets were on screen dancing with each other. He repeated the process until there were the five 'brothers' all doing a routine together in different positions. At the end the entire ensemble used this technique with about twenty different puppets - looping through time after time until the monitor was crammed full of puppets all with their own complementary singing and movement routines. Hard to explain but brilliant to watch.
My favourite things, though, were just the live recreations of two original Henson skits - "I've Grown Accustomed to Your Face" where a girl puppet sings to a pink cloth-thing that ends up turning evil on her, and "Java" which is kind of... the rivalry between two pink and orange Slinkies. If you've seen it, you'll know it! All in all, a good time.
Tried to watch True Detective, but only managed half an episode. I know it's supposed to be brilliant. It's just not registering on my care-o-meter. Hannibal, on the other hand - wow, this week's was the creepiest one yet. But that's possibly because I really loathe Alana. Sorry ;P
Crazy Rich Asians (Kevin Kwan) - This book... was not what I thought it was going to be. I don't know why, but I was expecting a fast and hard takedown of the Asian super-elite, perhaps because there's so much material there, and it was anything but! It was light and engaging, in a Jackie Collins-meets-Merlion kind of way, but it's as much celebration as satire. (The Merlion is one of the national symbols of Singapore - it's half lion, half fish, and let's just think about that for a moment *g*) It's all fast cars, private jets, huge houses, family-owned resorts, servants, and a tangled web of relationships, only with (primarily) Singaporeans instead of Americans.
The book centres around Rachel Chu, an American Born Chinese, whose boyfriend Nick takes her back to Singapore to attend his best friend's wedding and introduce her to his family. What he hasn't mentioned to her in all their time together is that his family is hideously, filthy, stinking rich. As are his friends. So she becomes the "plebeian" observer to this world of "crazy rich" Asians (as opposed to crazy Rich Asians, although there's a bit of that as well). Nick's friends accept her - mostly - but his mum is appalled, since Rachel is a nobody, her mum is a single parent and even worse, from China! Horrors! (Yes, there is a pecking order.) The book name drops designer labels constantly, as well as jet-setting around America, Singapore, Australia, etc. So basically a lot of gawking at how the other half lives entertainment. One thing that did irritate me was the constant footnoting of Hokkien, Cantonese, Malay and Singlish expressions which was very distracting. I think they could probably have been inferred well enough from the text or handled in a glossary. Even more annoying was his tendency to include authorial comments or his life history in such footnotes which just threw me completely out of the book. So, I didn't like that aspect so much, but the rest of the book was forgettably fun. The ending wasn't properly resolved, but I didn't care enough for that to bother me. Library book.
Cluetopia (David Astle) - A year by year stroll through 100 years of crossword puzzles. Entertaining, but at a couple of pages per year it felt a bit flimsy. The best story I remember is this British teacher who was investigated during one of the World Wars because coded names of military operations kept showing up magically in his crossword puzzles. Investigation of his background turned up nothing, and yet the names kept appearing. It turned out that he made his (high school) students create interlocked word grids in class to keep them busy, and then he based some of his published crosswords on their work. One of the popular student haunts was right next to a military base, and they kind of 'absorbed' the coded conversation of the soldiers, which then made its way into their grids. Also, Chinese crosswords actually exist, but are based on character strings rather than letters, as you'd expect I suppose. There are even crosswords in Klingon. Of course there are. Christmas present.
People Who Eat Darkness (Richard Lloyd Parry) - It's not often I read a book and marvel at the journalism as much as the subject, but the sheer depth of research was pretty impressive. It's the (true) story of Lucy Blackman, a young, blonde British woman who goes off to Tokyo with her best friend, seeking a little bit of adventure. She takes up work illegally as a "hostess", a job which basically involves making conversation and drinking with (mostly) Japanese men. The exploration of that world alone - its rules, its rivalries - was fascinating. One day, she calls her best friend to say she's going off with a man she's just met, to have dinner - not all that odd in that world - and she'll be back soon, not to worry. She never comes back. This is followed some days later by a phone call from a Japanese man with heavily accented English saying that Lucy's joined a 'cult', and won't be coming home after all. Somehow her friends and family don't find this reassuring or convincing. After a great deal of pushing from relatives, friends, and some lucky political timing, her remains are eventually discovered in a small cave near a beach resort. When her killer is eventually found, he turns out to have made a habit of drugging and filming women while he sexually assaulted them. It's creepy as hell, but rivetingly well told, going deeply into Lucy's diarised hopes and dreams, her feuding relatives, the East meets West clash of cultures, the Japanese legal system, and all the red herrings and false hopes along the way. Library book.
The Life to Come (E. M. Forster) - GUYS THIS BOOK. I WANTS IT. Okay, so the book that first got me into Forster was Maurice, no surprises there. I read the other novels, and enjoyed them, but none of them came close to the simplicity and let's face it, the appealing themes of Maurice. The Life to Come is a book of Forster's short stories (posthumously published), most of which contain explicitly gay themes as well as some not-very-gentle digs at convention and religion and I LOVED it.
Not every story, but there are some gems. I was actually sporfling in horrified glee at some of them - so elegantly told, yet incredibly wicked. For example, the titular story features a proud missionary who's given the task of converting a tribe of notoriously recalcitrant "natives" (there's a decidedly colonialist feel about a few of the stories, as well as recurring class themes, but to be fair, Forster is also noticeably unsparing of his own class). Anyway, the flaxen-haired missionary charges in full of determination, but no, the tribe are no more interested in hearing from him than anyone else. He accepts defeat, but it's getting dark and it's too far to go home, so he takes shelter in a little hut near the village. In the middle of the night, the lovely young chief comes to him and asks the missionary to show him Christ's love... which ends up becoming rather literal, if you know what I mean. The next morning, the missionary flees in horror from the sin he's committed, returning humbled to his brethren, but then, lo! A messenger arrives - the entire tribe is converting to Christianity because of his influence! The chief has decreed it! Oh, dear. So now the missionary is heaped with praise and glory at this astonishing mass conversion, but warns the chief he must never mention what they did. The chief keeps wanting to be shown the love of Christ again, and the missionary says one day he will, but he can't just now, the chief must be patient and wait. Despite how hilariously ironic the beginning is, it devolves into a tragedy as everything falls apart.
There are quite a few brilliant stories in the collection (The Obelisk is possibly my favourite), and as I've said, at times I could not believe how evil the man was, and all in such beautiful, beautiful prose. I swear one of the stories in essence says: "And then he committed incest and bestiality and they all lived happily ever after. The end." And I'm sitting here like, "DID I REALLY JUST READ THAT?" I adored it so much. I haven't bought a single book this year (apart from a compulsory text) but this is first on my list for when I start up again. Library book.
I also went to see Henson's Alternative Puppet Up! - Uncensored which was much better than I'd expected. I didn't realise until after I'd bought tickets that it was really an improv-style show, which usually doesn't appeal to me. So it's kind of The Muppets meet Theatresports - with the additional oddity that the people with puppets are on stage, while the "TV version" showing just the puppet(s) plays on monitors to either side. It involved a cast of six puppeteers and a host who invited audience suggestions for various "scenes" that the puppeteers then played out. For example, there was a James Bond song-sketch based on the title suggestion "Kill Me One More Time" featuring the supervillain "Abbott" (as in Tony, not "and Costello", although I grant you it's a fine distinction). There was also something to do with six hotdogs and a porn movie. Don't ask. It was all amusing enough, if a bit hit and miss, but the highlights were the rehearsed set pieces. Two were based on the technique of video looping, which I'd never seen done before. A puppet announced he and his 'brothers' were going to do a dance together, based on an audience suggestion ("bubble and squeak"). He sang about bubble and squeak while dancing in front of the monitor. Then what he'd just done replayed immediately on the monitor while the puppeteer set himself up in a different position, and went through again, so now two identical puppets were on screen dancing with each other. He repeated the process until there were the five 'brothers' all doing a routine together in different positions. At the end the entire ensemble used this technique with about twenty different puppets - looping through time after time until the monitor was crammed full of puppets all with their own complementary singing and movement routines. Hard to explain but brilliant to watch.
My favourite things, though, were just the live recreations of two original Henson skits - "I've Grown Accustomed to Your Face" where a girl puppet sings to a pink cloth-thing that ends up turning evil on her, and "Java" which is kind of... the rivalry between two pink and orange Slinkies. If you've seen it, you'll know it! All in all, a good time.
Tried to watch True Detective, but only managed half an episode. I know it's supposed to be brilliant. It's just not registering on my care-o-meter. Hannibal, on the other hand - wow, this week's was the creepiest one yet. But that's possibly because I really loathe Alana. Sorry ;P