The Nine Cloud Dream is a 17th century Korean novel attributed to Kim Man Jung about a young Buddhist monk from a sacred mountain who falls from grace by obsessing over earthly pleasures. One day, upon returning drunk from the kingdom of the Dragon King, the young monk Hsing-chen meets eight beautiful fairies barring his…
This is the record of the box man. I am beginning this account in a box. A cardboard box that reaches just to my hips when I put it on over my head. That is to say, at this juncture the box man is me. A box man, in his box, is recording the chronicle…
One of the novels included in the 2019 Booker Prize Longlist that caught my eye was Oyinkan Braithwaite’s My Sister, The Serial Killer. The title alone was enough for me to want to read it. The story revolves around Nigerian sisters Korede and Ayoola, who are very different yet similar to each other. Korede, the…
Alienist – /ˈālēənist/ noun. Former term for psychiatrist. The Alienist by Caleb Carr is a historical fiction set in New York City at the turn of the 20th century, which involves a host of fictional and real people. The events that unfold in the novel are fictional, set against a poverty-stricken, corrupt, and expanding city, which…
So, the latest book review I’ve been procrastinating on is Isabel Allende‘s (probably) most well-known novel, The House of the Spirits. I finished this book about a week ago, so I figured it’s time to finally write some kind of passable review about it. The House of the Spirits isn’t hard to read; it’s engaging,…
The Vegetarian (Chaesikju-uija) by Han Kang is a South Korean novel that won the 2016 Man Booker International Prize. It is a short novel about a young woman, Yeong-Hye, who, after a strange dream, suddenly decides to become a vegetarian. The novel is divided into three parts, each focusing on a different character. The first…
The Hyaku-nin-isshu is a collection of 100 poems by 100 different individuals compiled by Fujiwara no Teika during the 11th century. The poems follow the tanka form of 5-7-5-7-7 syllables per line and are mostly about love or nature, written when only members of the nobility were allowed, or known, to write poetry. In fact, several…
Ian McEwan’s novels never fail to engage me, whether they are over 500 pages or under 200. The same can be said about his 2007 novella, On Chesil Beach, which is about the ill-fated wedding night of a young couple, Edward and Florence. Florence is a talented violinist, and Edward is a young historian, and…
What can I say about Leo Tolstoy‘s Anna Karenina that hasn’t already been said by one reader or another? It’s a long, complex, bittersweet novel about the lives of aristocratic families in Russia in the late 1800s, which is summed up nicely in its famous opening lines, “Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family…
I just finished Paul Beatty‘s The Sellout, which was the Man Booker Prize winner of 2016. It’s a short, strange, witty novel that, though seemingly humorous, tackles very serious social and cultural issues. The novel starts with the protagonist, African-American Mr. Me, high on his homegrown marijuana at the Supreme Court of the United States,…
The Misanthropologist 