2 from the Far East for #WITMonth – Japan & Korea

Sympathy Tower Tokyo by Rie Qudan Translated by Jesse Kirkwood That little phrase on the rather gorgeous front cover of this book, ‘Winner of the Akutagawa Prize’ caught my eye, instantly meaning that this novella wouldn’t be following the current trend for twee, that prize being Japan’s premier literature award. It didn’t disappoint! In fact, Read More

Book Group Report: ‘White’

The Devil in the White City by Erik Larson While a spirited pitch for Hari Kunzru’s White Tears was made when we selected our ‘white’ book, we went to a draw and this book from 2003 came out of the hat. Subtitled ‘Murder, Magic and Madness at the Fair That Changed America’, Larson’s book is Read More

Duncan Jones’s Bowie Book Club #1

After David Bowie died, (was it really over two years ago? it feels like yesterday), I added my own ‘Bowie Book Club‘ page to my blog with his 100 favourite books. I had no plans to read them systematically, but hoped to read or re-read at least a few of them, and read about some Read More