Book : Neil, Elif, Haruki and Riley Fizan.

Post from 2 months back :

I found great books at KL Sentral : 3 books for RM 25, the shop is located at the old Chicken Rice Shop restaurant near Chatime :

1. Purple Cow : Transform your Business by Being Remarkable by Seth Godin. He is a brilliant marketing writer.

2. Make Good Art by Neil Gaiman

I posted the commencement speech given by him in this previous post. I love the speech, I found it inspiring, right straight to the heart. So when I found several of these books at the shop, I bought one for my personal keeping. I wish every creative person own this book, so they can read it every now and then.

3. The Drowned Book : The Book by Bahauddhin, The Father of Rumi, translated by Coleman Barks. I love finding good books in random places. Only one look at the book's spine, I took it out and realized that I found another book translated by Coleman Barks - this time the work of Rumi's father, his teaching. 

The first book I found was 2 years ago at Kinokuniya before I went to my part time work. At that time I was in the beginning of learning about Persian poetry and spiritualism. The book was a bit expensive for me, but I bought it nonetheless thinking that I might enjoy it. I ignored the book after I finished reading it because I found Coleman a bit annoying for my liking. So after a while, finding another book translated by him about a subject non other than another Persian writer is a bit surprising. And I believe in sign. Plus I just recently read The 40 Rules of Love by Elif Shafak that touched about the same subject as well. So it's like a random fate, and I don't mind spending RM 8.90 in a book :D

Siblings ! :

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These days :

Since I work at home doing freelance, I found myself too busy for books. I didn't buy any new books for awhile now. The last book I read 2 months back is Elif Shafak's The Architect's Apprentice, and I'm still in the 1/3 of the book. I'm also re-reading Murakami's Hear the Wind Sing - *the first novella he wrote on and off while having lunch or waiting for Af from work. 

But last weekend, we went back to Raub for the labour's day holiday. I brought back the book I received from Riley Fizan : Bintang Hati Saya last year and determined to finish it during the holiday. I actually got the book for awhile now, but my brother borrowed it and never return it back. I saw the book on his shelves 2 weeks ago and finally took it back. It has been awhile since I last read books written in Bahasa :D

For the little present, I owe you a review, Riley Fizan :)

From the note you wrote to me about the character being born inspired a little by me, I can't stop from making a comparison with myself personally. Things that reminds me of myself : she loves to write, loves astronomy and she's stubborn :D But she's brave and she cares for people, whereas I'm far from that. She's also lazy, always distracted and had difficulties in all her subjects while I was a super nerd who studies all the time when I was a student and I'm workaholic :D 

I also found a nice coincidence : 'Hakimi' was a name I always use in all my cerpen when I grew up. It has always been my favorite name - I think there were 3 of my cerpen with 'Hakimi' as the main character and I never told anyone except for my brother who reads all my writings. 'Adam' is a name I keep in my fiction name-list. 'Harris' was also a family name I used in one of the unfinished cerpen when I was in school. Plus, astronomy was my obsession all through my teenage year, I kept all articles about astronomy and printed images of space and auroras, kept them all in a big file of nerdiness - just so :D

I never thought the story ended that way though. I never saw that coming - that left me quite surprised, I even summarized it all to Af on the way back home from Raub. Kudos for that - *I wouldn't write what happened in the book here, that would be a spoiler to the whole novella kan. Af said the twist was impressive, normally people choose to write cheesy love stories that we can kinda guess the ending, but not this one. I just wish there are more personal thoughts and feelings expressed in the story so I can really get to know the character and relate to each of them :)

Do I want a sequel? I think a prequel to Hakimi's life before meeting Adriyana is quite a nice story. Especially because you left him with so much mysteries :D 

Thanks again, Riley Fizan. 

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Book : The Reader's Voice

I happened to learn about the reader's voice from Cornelia Funke's trilogy : Inkheart. 

Mortimer Folchart or Mo, is a book binder.  He got this ability to bring characters from books to the real world. What I loved about Mo other than having a full-time job to treat books everyday is and his powerful reader's voice. The writer beautifully explained how some people have the ability to let written words alive. So I imagined how Mo's powerful story-telling would be in real life. 

Mo could paint the air with his voice alone.

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Some people do have the reader's voice. It captures your attention, it makes you listen. Some politicians have this ability, some public speakers need to learn this skill. I strongly believe that if your job is to speak to people, you need to know about this. Or else, many people, including me, would not listen to you while you speak. Not as an act of rudeness, we will just choose to avoid any possibilities of having to listen to you.

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Anyhow, in finding people with great reader's voice, I came across the famous celebrity writer : Neil Gaiman. I keep on having a strong feeling that being a celebrity writer makes you less a writer but he keeps on showing me that I am wrong. Not only did he wrote so many books, published novel graphics,  gave such an inspiring commencement speech last year, got a beautiful little library and a very a classic house with such beautiful dogs, and many more things that too good to be true as a writer, he also has a strong reader's voice.

From the speech he gave last year, I found out that he is one of the people with the ability to make people listen to him. You can listen to him reading one of his book : The Graveyard Book, or from his current project with Blackberry : A Calendar of Tales.

Being a writer and a reader both at the same time, that is more than enough. 

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Little Stories 23 : Books

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I am being quite selective when it comes to books nowadays. I no longer have as much time as my student years. So I am being picky. I read books that got good reviews, been recommended, been in my wish list,  written by my favorite authors or random old-time books that I love to reread. This month books :

The Magician fell from the book shelf when I was looking for books by Neil Gaiman. I couldn't find American Gods or even The Graveyard Book and Coraline, so I took the incident as a sign. Few days earlier, I read Paulo's book : The Alchemist, on how human nowadays failed to use their instinct and see signs around them. We forgot that there's energy around us and if we try to listen, we may find some useful information for us. So I bought the book, because it fell on the right moment when I was making a decision. 

PS : My classmate recommended this book to me 3 years ago. She said I should try to find and read this book. 

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I finally found Coraline, special edition illustrated by Chris Riddell. I am trying to ignore the large font size - it is a book for children. I love the illustrations, it reminds me of Diana Wynne's books and Inkheart trilogy when I was young. Books with nice illustrations :D

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Here is a photo of my little book shelves - well, some part of it, it is actually much higher than this.  There are many more books around my room, everywhere. Regret buying book shelves from IKEA , this is Billy series around RM160 each. It is not strong enough for books. I am thinking of installing a proper book shelves to the wall. 

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Neil's little library is one of my inspiration, it is in the basement! 

I told my siblings :

I need to have a library like this! Proper book shelves installed to the wall. It should be high to the ceiling and low to the ground. And a nice sofa, and nice carpet and all. Let me take a picture of this so I will be reminded everyday - I quickly snapped a picture on the screen using my phone.

And my siblings left me with boring looks.
They have heard this so many times before.
:D

Pictures courtesy from Shelfari

Pictures courtesy from Shelfari

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