Rainbirds

First of all, can we just acknowledge how beautiful the cover is? The title says "Rainbirds" but you get goldfish on the cover. I love it!

I sense a lot of Murakami's style in this debut novel; the quietness, weird people, weird dreams, the moon, jazz (!), and pasta (!). Oh my God, it's like she really pushed herself to be Murakami's minion! I was waiting for a talking cat to make an appearance to complete the Murakami's pattern, but thank God it didn't happen.

I also feel that some of the scenes are simply incoherent, the flow is just wonky there.

I gave 2 stars for this. In a nutshell, don't bother spending time with this book. Read a Murakami instead and you'll get a better experience.

I feel bad because the author is Indonesian-born Singaporean and I'm supposed to cheer for her. I hope that she finds her own style in her second book. Please just leave Murakami in his own world - there are many other concepts to explore.

At Mrs Lippincote's

Elizabeth Taylor is Jennifer's favorite author and she recommended her to me. I've never read any of her works, so I decided to check it out and start with her first novel. At Mrs Lippincote's is a story set in 1945. We follow the Davenant family - Roddy, his wife Julia, son Oliver, and cousin Eleanor settling in this rented house.

It took me a while to get used to her style. I felt that it reads more like scenes than a novel. However, I loved Taylor's sharp and witty delivery, and all the references to literature works. She brought the characters to life that they are so relatable even to the current era.

My favorite character is the 7-year old Oliver. He is a bookworm as described here:
Oliver Davenant did not merely read books. He snuffed them up, took breaths of them into his lungs, filled his eyes with the sight of the print and his head with the sound of words. Some emanation from the book itself poured into his bones, as if he were absorbing steady sunshine. The pages had personality.

Catch-22

It took me 2 months to finish this book. Heller was an amazing writer; he came up with the story and then broke them into tiny jigsaw puzzles, messed them up, and linked the pieces together into this amazing book!

I am glad that I stayed on. The first part was a struggle as he introduced so many characters with no background, and then I realized that the background came later... and slowly I could see the big picture. The humor helps, too!

The Eighth Day

A lady kidnapped her lover's baby, joined a cult, and was always on the run until one day she had nowhere to run anymore. The victim naturally grew up as a troubled young lady searching for her identity.

I like how the author presented us with the both sides of the story; all the aches, longings, and struggles to understand why their lives ended up this way.

Mitsuyo Kakuta is popular among the ladies in Japan, but not well-known outside the country. I really appreciate how she tackled women and family issues in 80s Japan in this book.

This One Summer

It's a typical teenager story.

You have one reliable good friend, problems at home, a guy whom you have a possible crush on; mix all the issues together, and it's a walk down the memory lane 😅It's a light read for a hot summer day!

Not a big fan of the artworks, though.

I love the depiction of summer in Awago beach 💖This book triggered the itch to book a trip to Bali right away!

What Happened

I came to the office at 6.30AM on Election Day to guard my trading positions in case the polling went crazy. I was so confident that HRC would win, as confident as I was in Jun’16 that Brexit wouldn’t happen! 😅I lost my faith in humanity after the Brexit mess so I was really hoping that America had the common sense not to swing and elect Trump, which I think could be a disaster in the long-term. 

I remember thinking “Gosh I don’t know how it feels to be HRC now!” 😞 She is such a strong woman! I don't know how to pick myself up if I were in her position. So I think she needed a closure and writing about it helped her to move on. If you were following the news during the election, there is nothing new in this book. 


Whenever I'm feeling down and unsure about the future, I just say to myself "If Hillary could do it, so can you!" She may not be perfect but she is one amazing bionic woman; she has the mentality of a steel!

Convenience Store Woman

What is normal? We are formed almost completely of the people around us, and the society is quick to punish anything outside the boundaries. 

Keiko Furukara has never fit in, and she is most comfortable as a convenience store woman. Are you in your most comfortable skin despite society judging you?

The True Deceiver

I finished this book last night, and I am left here ruminating in my bookcoma. It’s a story about two women - a Big Bad Wolf and a Flowery Rabbit - one is deceitful, another is gullible. When the two characters meet, they force change onto themselves, and they become the persons that they despise.

Jansson’s delivery is compact and masterful; such complex character study in just 180 pages of controlled prose. I call this nothing but perfection!

Here's a passage that I like the most:

"I remember the dog at home, when I was a girl; the one that killed chickens. They tied a dead hen around his neck and he carried it around with him all day until he just lay there unmoving with his eyes shut in a morass of shame. It was cruel. There's nothing so hideously easy as giving someone a bad conscience..."

WOW! 😍😍😍

Force of Nature

Aaron Falk #2

From Kiewarra, we are now at Giralang Range where a team-bonding activity went wrong. A group of 5 women went for hiking and they got lost. When tensions are high, people start snapping at each other and old wounds reappears... and that's when things get even worse.

I like the story line of Harper's second book, but she uses the same tricks as The Dry - same twists, same baits - and I got bored with the style.

I hope she finds a new and exciting way to deliver her stories. How to survive a series if you only have one trick in the bag?

The Dry

Jane Harper's debut novel, and my first Australian crime fiction. I loved reading this book; it's so atmospheric you can actually feel the heat of Australian summer.

The story is set in Kiewarra, a rural area about 5 hours from Melbourne. The small community has so much old grudges among themselves, and one day Luke Hadler's family was found dead with only the youngest daughter as the sole survivor. Everyone assumed that Luke killed his wife and son before he killed himself. Easy to assume, but what's the story behind?

So came Aaron Falk, the hero of the story and also Luke's childhood friend. I like how Harper scattered hints as the story is progressing. The twists came close to the end, and not just one but two crimes were solved. Hurrah!

I checked Goodreads and found out that there's Aaron Falk #2. Yay! This could be my next crime fiction series. I used to be a big fan of Kay Scarpetta until Cornwell changed to 3rd party POV and she lost it. Sue Grafton passed away last year, so there's no more Kinsey Millhone and that makes me really sad.