This is my first Tom Robbins' novel, fellow multiplier Karl and Aimee has been recommending him forever. I now know why.

"Half Asleep in Frog Pajamas" as the title would suggest is filled with humor and hilarious situations and most of all extra terrestrials without becoming a science fiction novel.

The heroine, Filipina stockbroker Gwen Mati ( her father being a Filipino, mother an Irish ) thought she just had the worst day of her young career, as stocks crashed and she tries to cover her ass while awaiting the resumption of the trading over the course of a long weekend she encounters strange happenings around her.

First, her boyfriend's jewel stealing monkey but presumed to be a born again monkey went missing, offering her help in trying to locate the damned monkey her bestfriend Q-Jo a 300 pound psychic went missing too after meeting with a fellow who later turned out to be Larry Diamond, a former stockbroker turned financial renegade who just spent a long time of soul searching or should i say searching for the origin of mankind in a far away place called as Timbuktu.

Over the course of the next few days, Gwen Mati will jerk around from one revelation to another (most seemingly crazy) brought on by the eccentric Larry Diamond ranging from the origins of frogs, mysterious African rituals to outer space sexuality.


There isn't much of an in depth character study that most novels had, some will prove great while others tend to bore you. I think it's Tom Robbins' style to write stories like this, with plots twisting and turning until it becomes a real mystery with killer lines and quotes that will make one ran out of highlighter ink.

For the more serious readers who lack a sense of humor they might find Tom Robbins a disappointment, but knowing what i know now, why most of his books have weird titles and the plot are outrageous to say the least, well at least it gives me joy and enriches my imagination with the things he writes and most of the times he writes it real good.

As for me, there are still two Tom Robbins book waiting on my shelf to be read and I'm sure hell looking forward to reading those books and scoring more Tom Robbins novels...

Love him or hate him, i'm talking about Chuck Palahniuk.

In my case, i have nothing but love for his work.

Probably America's most nihilistic writer, Chuck Palahniuk once again has tip toed in the world of madness, the grotesque, human sufferings all that plus salt sprayed with endless dark humor.

As one critic would put it "If you're looking for comparisons, I'd say Palahniuk is like a cross between Tim Powers on acid and Kurt Vonnegut gone postal."

Diary takes form as a journal written by Misty Wilmot, a former art student with a once promising future but now reduced to waiting tables at a seafront hotel in an island called Waytansea.

To rub salt to the wound, her husband Peter is in a state of a coma after a seemingly failed suicide attempt. Soon Misty finds herself besieged with phone calls from angry customers, regarding house renovation jobs that Peter did in the past, seems like Peter has a fondness for leaving vile and disturbing messages painted on each of the houses' walls and plastering off whole rooms.

After the intervention of her mother in law, Grace. Misty, in a sudden burst of creativity goes back to painting. After finishing about a hundred paintings, believing her daughter Tabbi is dead, befriending a "handwriting expert", a cop assigned to the nations 'hate crime division' showing up to ask some questions, harboring a connection to painters from the past Maura Kincaid and Constance Baron, Carl Jung theories, Jain Buddhists and a conspiracy that threatens the lives of hundreds, Misty's world is rapidly turned into one frenetic chase for sanity amidst all cynical and unusual twists that only Chuck Palahniuk can deliver.

*****
Most critics take against Chuck Palahniuk was that all of his characters are almost the same, shocking, mad, anger prone, a walking "fuck you" sign all that plus his sick humor.

Which i don't get, why take it against the man whose style is synonymous to spookily imaginative and superbly grim, well in this case in Diary, gone are the Tyler Durden charisma, but for the second time since "invisible monster" it takes form at a female point of view, a girly character although not the usual chick on the block.

Misty Wilmot is the closest you'll ever get to the Tyler Durden type bullshit-philosopher character, in "Diary" Chuck Palahniuk laid out an "in your face" narratives with cool repetition phrases such as "Just for the record, the weather today is calm and sunny, but the air is full of bullshit", "bermuda triangulated" when falling short of an explanation.

I can understand the short cuts that Palahniuk makes in his novel, in his own admission he is a minimalist, no need to go into the depths of a scenario, i mean who cares, as long as the character is, as i said before an "in your face" who don't give a fuck about his/her surroundings.

Bottomline: This novel is most of the times hilarious, expectedly disturbing, frightening and poignant at the same time ( thus the association with Douglas Coupland everytime i think Chuck Palahnik ) -- but it's always clever and well-written. Not a book to be missed.

The novel in which French Novelist and moralist Albert Camus explored what he termed as "the nakedness of man faced with the absurd".

Meursault ( his surname ), narrates the last part of his life, from the opening line of "Maman died today" ( Maman being a child's term for mother ) , Meursault tells with all honesty the events that followed.

Upon returning to Algiers after burying his mother he crossed paths with an old officemate Marie, whom he develops an intimate relationship, life for him is going to work everyday, being loyal to his firm, waiting for each Saturday to spend the day with Marie, dealing with his neighbors in a friendly manner, Salamano and his dog, restaurant owner Celeste and a self described "warehouse guard" Raymond.

Problem arises when Raymond got in trouble with a group of Arabs.

During a trip to an Algier beach side, Raymond, Masson ( Raymond's friend ) and Meursault got in a fight with the Arabs who followed them, Raymond was cut by a knife in the arm and side of the mouth.

Afterwards for no reason, Meursault went back to the beach, at the same spot where he found the Arab in the sun drenched Algiers Beach, in what he narrates as

"I knew i had shattered the harmony of the day, the exceptional silence of a beach where i'd been happy. Then i fired four more times at the motionless body where the bullets lodged without leaving a trace. And it was like knocking four quick times on the door of unhappiness".

Meursault, an ordinary man now unwittingly gets drawn into a senseless murder.

Meursault then narrates the investigation that follows, the trial and the sentencing all with cunning and honest description of his feelings, the freedom, the life that he lost and the eventual acceptance of his fate.

******
Originally written in French, translated into English countless times, the new English version by Matthew Ward is called as the most truest Camus English rendition ever.

"Mother died today" was aptly replaced by "Maman died today" as one of the example of being true to Camus' version.

Albert Camus is considered as a moralist, a philosopher among being a great novelist, among his works are the non-fiction philosophical essay "the Rebel" and fiction like "the Plague", "the Fall" and "exile in the kingdom" all dealing with Man's inner senses and nature, with the Plague being a parable of Man's moral resonance.

In the Stranger, Camus writes in a fast faced manner, short in details of the surroundings, more cut to the chase with regards to the Narrator's feelings of himself and those who are around him.

"I explained to him, however, that my nature was such physical needs got often in the way of my feelings, the day i buried Maman, i was very tired and sleepy"

In explaining to his lawyer the reason for his seemingly "insensitivity" during his mother's funeral.

It was a book that lets readers an inside spot in the mind of a person as Camus stated "faced with the absurd", dealing with his actions, getting use to life with no freedom and eventually accepting the fate that awaits him.

"When i was first imprisoned, the hardest thing was that my thoughts were still those of a free man, for example i would suddenly have the urge to be on a beach and to walk down to the water...all of a sudden i would feel just how closed in i was by the walls of my cell...but those lasted a few months...afterwards my only thoughts were those of a prisoner"

****
It was a short read like a long essay, 123 pages in all, it will just take up an hour of your life, but i tell you its one hour you would never ever regret losing.