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...
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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.

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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.
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The shortest so far from the 5 other Sandman volumes that i've read. This volume is a collection of four stand alone stories that explains some aspects about the Endless namely Dream and Death. Although not a continuation of the Sandman storyline, still it offers readers a lot in regards to the over all scope of this monumental Sandman series.

Calliope - a short story about a struggling one hit writer Ric Madoc and his obsession to reach top form again, doing so he receives a present from cult filmmaker Erasmus Fry, in the form of a muse, whom he abuses and rapes after drawing inspiration from her and writing bestsellers, directing movies and unto the peak of success. Until Dream, who is the muse's former flame, escapes from his captor and decided to free up his muse and gives Madoc a lesson or two about not having any ideas at all.

A Dream of a Thousand Cats - an imaginative tale that shows a gathering of cats and their dream of a world where cats are the masters and human as its servants, a frightening possibility that one feline speaks of, if only all the cats in the world will believe that it is the case ever since the beginning of time.

A Midsummer Night's Dream - won the World Fantasy award for best short story, tells the story of William Shakespeare and his wandering theater troupe and it's performance in front of an audience that looks like not any audiences they have played for in the past.

Facade - is a short story related to another Sandman volume, the Kindly Ones. Former superhero known as the Fury, Lyta Hall now lives in almost seclusion. In the end with the help of "Death" her powers becomes the solution to how she will be freed.

Although i really want to read this volume because i was so curious about Midsummer Night's Dream, although it turned out quite well, i can say my favorite is "Dream a Thousand Cats", the artwork is creepy, the theme so dark and the message frighteningly chilling.

While Calliope reminds me of people who would sell their soul, in exchange for a burst of creativity, makes me wonder who among us right now has a muse somewhere hidden in their bedroom whom they keep imprisoned and abused. Yes another creepy tale.

Plus the inclusion of the sample script by Neil Gaiman will teach you a thing or two about how to write and imagine a story that is ought to be written as a comic book.

All the more makes this a must read for everybody.
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William S. Burroughs' first novel "Junky" (originally titled "Junk") is a fictional narrative, but was heavily based on facts of Burroughs' real life experiences with junk addiction, junk being (opium or any derivatives of opium, morphine, heroin, marijuana etc.).

One can say "Junky" follows the path of the normal "autobiographical fiction that characterized the Beat Generation writing". But unlike Jack Kerouac's "On the Road" , "The Town and the City" and "The Dharma Bums", Burroughs' "Junky" narratives was concentrated heavily on one aspect of his life, which was his own drug addiction.

It's not really what you can call autobiographical, but sort of early day "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas" i can imagine Hunter S. Thompson having "Junky" in his mind while writing his legendary book with regards to the effects of Drugs into having hallucinatory dreams.

"Almost worse than the sickness is the depression that goes with it. One afternoon, i closed my eyes and saw New York in ruins. Huge centipedes and scorpions crawled in and out of empty bars and cafeterias and drugstores on 42nd street. Weeds were growing up through cracks and holes in the pavement. There was no one in sight".

It's a book about a particular phase in William Burroughs' life, an accurate portrayal of the junk world and all the characters that got involved in it, the most candid, eye popping account of an underworld that is a taboo to Americans back then, it is an honest assessment of a man's relationship with Junk as Allen Ginsberg wrote in the afterword.

"no attempt at self-exculpation but the most candid, no romaticization of the circumstances, the dreariness, the horror, the mechanical beatness and evil of the junk life as lived".

*****
Junky opens with the first person narrative of William Lee ( Lee being Burroughs' mother's maiden name ) of the very first time that he got introduced to junk just about the latter part of the war ( 1944 or 1945 ). It then goes on with the usual telling of getting used to injecting junk in his system, meeting underworld characters like drug peddlers, hustlers, thieves, pimps and other form of "lowlifes".

To his experiences as a drug peddler himself, in this way Lee get to earn money to support his junk addiction, hustling drunks on trains ( which they refer to as "lush" ) where they will sit beside a sleeping lush target with Lee reading a newspaper and his cohort Roy would put his hand behind Lee's back and reach for the pocket of the "sleeping lush".

"The car was almost empty and there we were wedged up against the mooch with twenty feet of empty seats available"

To summarize it all up it was as Ginsberg wrote "a systematic history of the events of a habit, the cravings, the jailings, the night errands, the day boredoms"...

From hustling croakers ( term for doctors ) to write scripts ( drug prescription ) for morphines, picking lush pockets along different avenues and train stations of New York, William Lee's junky phase will take him to Texas, New Orleans and eventualy running away from the law unto Mexico.

It's more of a window to the persona and soul of a person with a drug habit,
Burroughs at the same time insists that Drugs is not a habit forming drugs, that virgin drug users will take at least 4 months to develop withdrawal symptoms, nonetheless all the characters he wrote tells us that Junk is Junk, it either leaves you lifeless and lost forever depending on substance and chemicals to bring life to your tormented cells.

******
I enjoyed reading this book, the book gives me an accurate portrayal of a person deeply hooked in drugs, it has a serious overtone especially its about someone who wasn't born to be a loser, Burroughs' background is superb, he went to Harvard, studied and lived in Europe and came from a decent family, it shows how vices or drug dependency can hit almost anyone. And William Lee's narratives gives us with all honesty and a brutal characterization of what life is about when you put yourself in such seemingly un-escapable situation.

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This is my first Chuck Klosterman book, I've read it a few months ago and I'm just making the review right now. Don't know what to write whether I enjoyed it or what. It definitely shows some promises and I heard "Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs: A Low Culture Manifesto" is the book to read if you really want to discover Chuck's writing talent.

nyway here's a bit of the rundown about his book "Killing Yourself to Live: 85% of a True Story".

It was conceived as a sort of documentary book about death with emphasis on the deaths of rock and roll icons. With this path Chuck Klosterman embarks on a road trip across the United States visiting the places of famous death sites of rock and roll stars. Suffice to say he at least visited some sites particularly the NY hotel where Sid Vicious stabbed and killed Nancy Spungen and Sid Himself died, the highway where Duane Allman died in a motorcycle crash, the site where the plane carrying members of Lynard Skynard crashes, Kurt Cobain's Seattle home, the lake where Jeff Buckley drowned, the club that burned killing a hundred people at a Great White show and of course Graceland where the King died.

Apart from tackling what he perceives as death being more advantageous to these figures, thus citing Jeff Buckley's death made his debut album "Grace" from average to something of a "must have" album. Buckley's drowning made him a rock icon from an ordinary good musician.

But the twist if ever there's one is when Chuck Klosterman becomes sort of Charlie Kauffman in "Adaptation" wherein he incorporated himself to the book, the supposed to be death documentary now becomes a sort of memoir of Chuck's experiences with his present and ex-girlfriends. A development that gets annoying sometimes but to his credit he wrote at the first part of the book

"“Well, the larger thesis is somewhat underdeveloped” and by the end, I had my co-worker telling me, “Please don’t write a book about women you used to be in love with,” and when I asks why not, she replies by saying, “Because that’s exploitative. And narcissistic. And a bit desperate.”

Which is what the book became...Chuck Kloster man at his narcissistic stage, can be very well be humorous at a number of occasions and I think that is the only thing why this book belongs on my shelf. I admire his sense of humor and his writing style is something to envy about.

But still, Klosterman wasted a great opportunity here, I mean road trip, death sites of famous rock and roll stars...too bad all of this ended up in the background as Klosterman ended up writing about himself.
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After an injury that he suffered while cutting trees in Boston. Sebastian Junger, a journalist in profession thought about writing a book about the different dangerous occupations in the United States. Living in a nearby fishing community of Gloucester, Massachusetts writing a non fiction book about the events that transpired during the great storm that hit North America in 1991 become the obvious choice.

And the result is "The Perfect Storm: A True Story of Men Against the Sea". A narrative account about the preceding moments and the days that followed after the doomed sword fishing boat "Andrea Gail" set out on its fishing journey.

With veteran fishermen who spends more than 10 months on the high seas each year, coming home only to unwind at the local favorite watering destination the Crow's Nest. Junger introduces us to the characters led by Billy Tyne, the captain of the Andrea Gail along with the ship's five other crew members who would suffer a mysterious fate at the very eye of the Hurricane Grace.

Sebastian Junger captured every details about what is life as a fisherman, the rich maritime history of the industry in Gloucester, thematics about fishing and sailing and even the last thoughts that crowds the head of a person about to die by drowning.

Readers will learn to care for the doomed characters to the point that you'll hope for their eventual safety even though its common knowledge that the Andrea Gail was never found and presumed to be swallowed by the sea.

A feeling of abruptness comes while Junger is narrating the events after the Andrea Gail's last radio message, the possibilities of what happened makes it more poignant as it leaves the readers a mystery of the unknown only the real life crew of the Andrea Gail have experienced minutes before their impending death.

The way Sebastian Junger wrote and researched for his material is well applauded, by countless interviews with family members and friends of the crew of the Andrea Gail, he was able to clearly write a narrative that describes each character's life previous to the tragic event and each motivation in risking their life for such a voyage towards the end of the fishing season.

The book also details other close brush with death of other ships and carriers in the region where the Perfect Storm hit. Which involves a heroic cost guard's successful rescue of three crew members from a sailboat.

Over-all, The Perfect Storm is a story that grips the readers about the real life horrors that fishermen encounters each day on their job. The characters are well portrayed without exploiting or sensationalizing each motives and memories of what transpired.

With this book, Sebastian Junger was hailed as the new coming of a writer in the molds of a Hemingway and help usher in a zest for a genre called the "macho non fiction".
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