literature
Geek literature from the New York Times or the recesses of online. Our favorite stories showcase geeks.
Book Review: "Back When We Were Grown-Ups" by Anne Tyler
I spent a lot of time on my MA Degree reading Anne Tyler because of the fact she was like a comfort read. But since then, for some reason I have not read much and only got back into her with her new book "The Redhead By the Side of the Road". To pick up on her stuff, I have tried to get back into her writing style. However, I have found that one thing has since become true: my reading tastes have altered slightly. I am finding it more difficult to become lost in her novels instead, I analyse the characters and scrutinise the structure of them. I blame my degrees for this and yet, I still do have a fascination with Anne Tyler since she has this vision of the faults of modern life that normal people simply do not have - it is like she has some sort of higher consciousness that we are not privy too.
By Annie Kapur5 years ago in Geeks
Book Review: "The Book of Tokyo: A City in Fiction" by Michael Emmerich, Jim Hinks and Minashi Matsuie
I love reading Japanese Literature. It holds some of the best modernist and post-modernist literature in the world. Authors such as Yoko Ogawa, Haruki Murakami, Banana Yoshimoto, Yasunari Kawabata, Yukio Mishima and Junichiro Tanazaki are among just some of my favourites. There is something about the Japanese literary culture which makes it stand out amongst the rest. The sense of 'othering' and 'otherness' is something that has been frequently explored in different ways. For example: the 'othering' of the protagonist's parents in Yoko Ogawa's best-selling masterpiece: "The Memory Police" and the otherness of Yukiko in Junichiro Tanazaki's "The Makioka Sisters". From cats and darkness, the artificial intelligence, monsters and murder - Japanese literature has managed to perfect the modern and post-modern novels and short stories with its truly brilliant originality. This book here is no exception.
By Annie Kapur5 years ago in Geeks
Three women and a fruit store
The history of 'Season of peaches', the winning work of the III Valencia Graphic Novel Prize, begins in 2006. Its screenwriter, the Murcian Ángel Abellán (1988), starts from a personal experience to put together a story in which desires, emotions converge, frustration, and effort in an environment colored with ocher and gray by another Murcian, illustrator Alba Flores (1991). Both are the authors of this title that has just been released by the publisher Andana after obtaining, last summer, the Valencia Graphic Novel award, a prize endowed with 8,000 euros granted by this Valencian label and which also includes the publication of the work.
By Harsh Mehta5 years ago in Geeks
Book Review: "Karachi Vice" by Samira Shackle
Apart from authors such as Mohsin Hamid and Kamila Shamsie, I do not think I have gotten to experience much of what Pakistani Literature has to offer. My aim this year is to change that. Lately, I have wanted to pick up on my international literature knowledge especially when it comes to the modern day. The piece of Pakistani Literature I decided to pick up was this one by Samira Shackle - "Karachi Vice". As a piece of creative nonfiction, I have seen this as like a window into the Karachi culture and also a window into the real way of life for the local and native people without the romanticisation of the travel narrative. It is a brilliant book of homecoming, activism and the difference between the east and the west. I believe that not only could this book become a classic, but it could also be hailed as one of the prime works of Pakistani creative writing in the many years to come.
By Annie Kapur5 years ago in Geeks
Staircase
Staircase By Samuel de Koning 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16. He had counted them a million times, but it gave him comfort to count every morning nonetheless. Every time he got to 16 he would let out a deep breath of air almost as if he was glad nothing ever changed. Change was something he was scared of. If his world changed would it be for better or for worse? Six months, a year, two years, he didn’t know how long he had been there but he was sure it was more than a few months. Just sitting around, up and down, down and up. Time was irrelevant, the sun he used to see every morning was now gone, he would sleep when he was tired and get up when he wasn’t. He had a vague guess of when “night” and “day” were supposed to take place even though the entire world was all the same boring light grey. It’s funny how people take the simplest things for granted, the sun, the taste of food, the voice of another human, even color itself. He was neither hungry nor full, yet he would probably eat just about anything because it would remind him a little of the life he once knew A voice, that’s what he wanted, just one word. He would give anything to her his mum call his name. Even though he couldn’t remember what she sounded like he knew she had a beautiful voice. A single world from another human would make this grey world light up into a billion different colors. He never talked. He used to, but not anymore.
By WhiteSpace_075 years ago in Geeks
Book Review: "Klara and the Sun" by Kazuo Ishiguro
From start to finish, Kazuo Ishiguro's books tend to draw you in with this fascination for difference and the capacity for love. In his book "Remains of the Day" Ishiguro gives us a heartwarming story that has since been not only turned into a film, but read widely in many different languages. But, I believe one of his most well-known books of our own times is the dystopian "Never Let Me Go". Turned into a film starring Keira Knightley and Carrie Mulligan, this book is about children who are raised for other purposes. In the world of social class and reputation, there are certain things required of these orphans and they need to give them up. Ishiguro is very good at asking the difficult questions about the requirement for suffering and in this book "Klara and the Sun" - he does just that once again. Is it possible for these machines to feel love and be loved? Is it possible for them to feel pain and suffer? The extended metaphor underlying the book is both disturbing and incredibly crafted.
By Annie Kapur5 years ago in Geeks
Book Review: "Small Pleasures" by Clare Chambers
If you know me, you know that I love a good drama. I love reading about these twisted familial problems and the people who are involved with them. When I first saw "Small Pleasures" by Clare Chambers, I admit I was not too keen to read it seeing as it was not just shorter than I would expect but also a bit pricey. But, again, if you know me you would also know that I bought it anyway and read it anyway because due to reading the description, I was captivated. There are not a lot of books out there like this and certainly not ones written in the 21st century.
By Annie Kapur5 years ago in Geeks
Book Review: "Luckenbooth" by Jenni Fagan
Normally when I see a dark fantasy book, it does one of two things. The first thing it does is it takes me back to my school days when I would read “The Vampire Chronicles” and other gothic masterpieces until my life became nothing but a walking shadow. The second thing it could do is annoy the living daylights out of me because it is written so incredibly cliché. I was quite surprised to see that this book - “Luckenbooth” by Jenni Fagan, has managed to do both at the same time and honestly, as much as I would like to say that I enjoyed every bit of it, as I moved through the book, there were definitely things that I found either problematic, jarring or rather badly written. The concept itself though, is pretty incredible and some of the language is brilliant, magical and often at times, uncomfortable. I am clearly in two minds about this book but, as I have read other reviews on it - I see that I am not alone in my inability to make up my mind over whether this book is actually any good.
By Annie Kapur5 years ago in Geeks
Book Review: "Deacon King Kong" by James McBride
The 60s were one of the most diverse decades in all of literature. With the amount of literature about everything from the Vietnam War to the Civil Rights' Movement, the death of the Kennedy Brothers all the way through to the emergence of Bob Dylan and Joan Baez, the 1960s hardly ran out of cultural topics both at the time and in hindsight. Topics such as classic rock, Malcolm X, the 1968 riots and Stonewall never, ever cease to amaze me with just how much some people can recall those powerful times. In "Deacon King Kong" by James McBride, we are taken to 1969 in which we are placed somewhere unfamiliar to ourselves - a church. We are shown a religious man - a deacon. And we are given a strange storyline - a shooting and a man on the run.
By Annie Kapur5 years ago in Geeks
"Harry Potter" Fan Theories: Voldemort, Dumbledore or Harry - Who Is The True Master of Death?
Our final Harry Potter fan theory in this three-article series will dissect who is considered the true Master of Death. Voldemort? Dumbledore? Harry? Has anyone in the Harry Potter universe truly earned the title?
By The Nerd Habit5 years ago in Geeks
