Burlesk Bangus

❝ Let me tell you this: if you meet a loner, no matter what they tell you, it’s not because they enjoy solitude. It’s because they have tried to blend into the world before, and people continue to disappoint them. ❞

Jodi Picoult, My Sister’s Keeper

Top Five Books I Own with the Best Page Scent

• Brand New Haruki Murakami Books (Vintage UK Edition)

• Books Purchased from Booksale

• Brand New Nicholas Sparks Paperbacks

• Brand New “Si Amapola sa 65 na Kabanata” by Ricky Lee

• Brand New “The Book Thief” by Markus Zusak

Breaking News: I’m down to the last 50 pages of A Wild Sheep Chase, and I think I need a break for Murakami’s books after this one.

A psychotic mother, an alcoholic father, an uncaring psychiatrist, and a pedophile. These are only few of the odd characters in Running with Scissors. Told in the first person narrative, Augusten Burroughs takes the readers along for the ride of his deranged childhood, from the time he was about ten until he was in his late teens. His mother was mentally ill and his father was a dispassionate alcoholic guy. Both of them have nasty, physical fights, and once they get divorced, Augusten’s mother decided to hand over her parental rights to her psychiatrist, Dr. Finch. Augusten moved into the doctor’s despicable home, complete with his dysfunctional children, spaced-out wife who eats dog food, and Neil Bookman, the adopted 34-year-old (?) pedophile son of the doctor who lives in their backyard.

To those who are planning to read this book, keep in mind that you have to be prepared for some graphic homosexual portions. I myself was not prepared for the rather explicit gay sexual content in this book. That aside, I still enjoyed the book and find it very amusing.

What I liked in this book is how Augusten Burroughs told his story even though his version of reality is truly warped and mighty alarming. He even admits to others that he is gay, finds a lover twice his age, and does a lot of drugs which is mostly given to him by the Santa Claus look-alike Dr. Finch. The chapters such as “The Masturbatorium,” “The Joy of Sex,” and “The Seven-and-a-Half Inch Disaster” really emphasized the twisted path of his self-discovery.

All in all, Running with Scissors is an interesting, absurd read.Augusten Burrough’s life story is really fascinating and disturbingly funny. However, some chapters for me are more ‘disturbing’ than ‘funny’, and I feel this book is more of fiction than a memoir.

Rating: ★★★☆☆

Currently reading: A Wild Sheep Chase by Haruki Murakami

His life was like a recurring nightmare: a train to nowhere. But an ordinary life has a way of taking an extraordinary turn. Add a girl whose ears are so exquisite that, when uncovered, they improve sex a thousand-fold, a runaway friend, a right-wing politico, an ovine-obsessed professor and a manic-depressive in a sheep outfit, implicate them in a hunt for a sheep, that may or may not be running the world, and the upshot is another singular masterpiece from Japan’s finest novelist.

Haruki Murakami Book Covers

Currently reading: Running with Scissors by Augusten Burroughs

Running with Scissors is the true story of a boy whose mother (a poet with delusions of Anne Sexton) gave him away to be raised by her unorthodox psychiatrist who bore a striking resemblance to Santa Claus. So at the age of twelve, Burroughs found himself amidst Victorian squalor living with the doctor’s bizarre family, and befriending a pedophile who resided in the backyard shed. The story of an outlaw childhood where rules were unheard of, and the Christmas tree stayed up all year-round, where Valium was consumed like candy, and if things got dull, an electroshock therapy machine could provide entertainment. The funny, harrowing, and bestselling account of an ordinary boy’s survival under the most extraordinary circumstances.

The Elephant Vanishes is a compilation of short stories by Haruki Murakami, some of which appeared in previous international newspapers and magazines. As expected, the collection is full of Murakami’s usual array of lonely men, mysterious women, surreal scenarios, and ordinary events taking on sudden and unexpected meaning.

Prior to reading this, I had read Murakami’s other short story collection, Blind Willow Sleeping Woman, which I personally felt was a slightly stronger collection on the whole. That aside, I enjoyed almost all stories in this book. All of them were excellent reads and at the end, readers will surely have their personal favorites among the 17 stories.

Below are short descriptions of my favorite short stories (watch out for major spoilers!):

• The Second Bakery Attack. A couple is hit by a sudden wave of intense hunger in the middle of the night. The husband thought he was under a curse when he robbed a bakery years ago. The wife suggested that to get out of the curse, he needs to rob another bakery. But they couldn’t find a bakery so they decided to hold up a McDonald’s and steal 30 Big Macs (yum yum!).
• Sleep. Usually, the protagonist in a Murakami fiction is an unnamed male. But here in Sleep, it involves a female lead character. A housewife finds out that she can’t sleep one day and starts to read a lot during the night when everybody is asleep, thus developing an unusual kind of insomnia.
• Lederhosen. Another female protagonist. A woman visits someone in Germany then divorces her husband after imagining him wearing a pair of lederhosen (those hiking pants that Germans wear) requested for a souvenir. She drags a man in off the streets who has the same build as her husband to fit the lederhosen she bought for his husband. Seeing the stranger’s bare skin as he shows off the lederhosen, she suddenly realizes she hated her husband all through their years together.
• Family Affair. The protagonist is in his thirties but still living with his younger sister who is on the verge of marrying a man and he finds his sister’s fiancee boring. The sister tries desperately to get her brother to take an active interest in her fiancee – to meet his family, have dinner with them and the like. Yet the brother remains in his disinterested state, preferring not to get involved with the affairs of others. It was so hilarious especially when the protagonist is joking around his sister’s fiancee.
• TV People. Small men appear in the narrator’s apartment, rearrange the living room, and set up a television that is not receiving any signal. But these mysterious men don’t seem bothered that they aren’t picking up any broadcast. In fact, they act as if the narrator is not existing there.
• The Dancing Dwarf. A man who works in the ear section of an elephant factory (not toy elephants, but real elephants!) has a succession of dreams about a dancing dwarf and makes a dangerous deal to win the heart of a beautiful woman who also works in the elephant factory. For me, this is the strangest, most magical, most disgusting (the maggots!) and most surreal piece within this book.

Other personal opinions:

• Most favorite story: The Second Bakery Attack, Family Affair and The Dancing Dwarf
• Most hilarious story: Family Affair
• Most confusing story: The Kangaroo Communique (I’m sorry but I didn’t understand this one. Huhu)
• Most mouth-watering story: The Second Bakery Attack (because of the Big Mac) and A Window (because of the different kinds of hamburger steak mentioned)

Another interesting fact in this novel is Noboru Watanabe. This kind of name is given to several characters in several short stories, ranging from a missing cat (The Wind-up Bird and Tuesday’s Women) to a sister’s boyfriend (Family Affair) to an elephant keeper (The Elephant Vanishes). Perhaps “Watanabe” is the most common name in Japan.

Overall, Haruki Murakami manages to give all the stories here a unique unity in this one solid body of work. The Elephant Vanishes is definitely a classic Murakami — strange, whimsical, reflective and more than a little confusing. It’s a must-read for all the author’s fans, and could even start as a good point for those who are curious in the work of one of the greatest modern day writers.

Rating: ★★★★★

My most read authors. Pugad Baboy pa rin forever! LOL

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Currently reading: What I Talk About When I Talk About Running by Haruki Murakami

An intimate look at writing, running, and the incredible way they intersect, from the incomparable, bestselling author Haruki Murakami.

While simply training for the New York City Marathon would be enough for most people, Haruki Murakami decided to write about it as well. The result is a beautiful memoir about his intertwined obsessions with running and writing, full of vivid memories and insights, including the eureka moment when he decided to become a writer. By turns funny and sobering, playful and philosophical, What I Talk About When I Talk About Running is rich and revelatory, both for fans of this masterful yet guardedly private writer and for the exploding population of athletes who find similar satisfaction in athletic pursuit.

Haruki Murakami books, Polish Edition (Muza Publishing)

Currently reading: The Last Song by Nicholas Sparks

Seventeen-year-old Veronica “Ronnie” Miller’s life was turned upside down when her parents divorced and her father moved to Wrightsville Beach, North Carolina. Three years later, she remains alienated from her parents, particularly her father… until her mother decides it would be in everyone’s best interest if she and her brother spent the summer with him. Resentful and rebellious, Ronnie rejects her father’s attempts to reach out to her and threatens to return to New York before the summer’s end. But soon Ronnie meets Will, the last person she thought she’d ever be attracted to, and finds herself falling for him, opening herself up to the greatest happiness — and pain — that she has ever known.