It's quarter of a year!
Here's a list of books that I've read for now :
- Pinball, 1973 by Haruki Murakami
- After Dark by Haruki Murakami
- The Silence of the Lambs by Thomas Harris
- Damn Good Advice by George Lois
- Rework by Basecamp
- South of the Border, West of the Sun by Haruki Murakami
- Displacement, Travelogue by Lucy Knisley
- Underground by Haruki Murakami
- Red Dragon by Thomas Harris
- The Museum of Innocence by Orhan Pamuk
- Hard-boiled Wonderland and the End of the World by Haruki Murakami
- Leaving Time by Jodi Picoult
- I'll be Seeing You by Mary-Higgin Clarks
- The Strange Library by Haruki Murakami
My personal favorite are :
- Underground, a non-fiction writing by Haruki Murakami. I wrote about it in this post.
- The Museum of Innocence, a fiction about love obsession by Orhan Pamuk. I post it here.
- Leaving Time by Jodi Picoult.
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For now, I only read 3 non-fictions. When writing a paper for a Coursera's assignment, I realized that I was having a hard time writing an actual formal academic writing. I had to answer in my own usual writing style. While doing peer assessment, I also realized that I was having a hard time understanding other students' essay. I'm not sure whether it was because of the jargons/bombastic words or my incapability to understand academic writing or because they didn't even understand what they were trying to explain : in other word, the-longer-essay-the-better.
In this case, I tried to relate to the real life. If academic writings are written in such way that is hard for normal people to understand, then what's the point? How can people like me, learn stuffs from their findings without feeling intimidated by so many new terms and big words?
But as Neil Gaiman said; to be the next Tolkien, don't read big Tolkienesque fantasies, he didn't read big Tolkieneque fantasies, he read books on Finnish philosophy. Go and read outside your comfort zone, go and learn stuffs.
So, I'm challenging myself to read more non-fictions and academic writings this year.
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I bought almost all Murakami's books and I downloaded several copies of his books (Pinball 1973, After Dark & After the Quake) because those books are too expensive and way too short for the price - less than 400 pages. How can 800 pages and 200+ pages cost the same? It doesn't make any sense at all. I can read that in a one way commute =.=
I feel bad but I still don't want to buy it so I downloaded it from my friend. In a way, it is an illegal softcopy with several spelling errors and annoying format. Didn't read it full-heartedly because it was all crushed in a small screen of my old iPhone instead of an actual physical book. I promised myself to buy Murakami a coffee and lunch if I ever meet him, as a treat - because I didn't pay for those books :F
Current read : After the Quake and Hannibal
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