The Wind Up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Murakami

Whoa, what a long and strange trip this book was. In a nutshell, the novel is about Toru Okada's (an "Everyman" kind of character) journey to find his wife who left him suddenly and mysteriously. But really, this book is way more than that - along the way, Okada encounters a bunch of very eccentric and weird characters. What results is an intensely surreal, bizarre and disturbing story. I like how Amazon puts it - Haruki Murakami is a master of subtly disturbing prose. Mundane events throb with menace, while the bizarre is accepted without comment.

Murakami is very popular in Japan, but for some reason, never made it into the American mainstream, which is a shame.

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"A Banquet of Consequences" by Elizabeth George

Elizabeth George's Inspector Lynley mystery series is probably one of my favourites in the style of English detective stories. It's the series that I keep returning to, when I slip into a reading rut and can't focus on reading something new, particularly to the first book in the series A Great Deliverance. While there are lots of decent mystery series circulating now, the first book in George's Lynley stories has a certain grim insistence about it that keeps drawing me back to it. And in her latest contribution to the series, George has written a story that in many aspects parallels her first--however, these parallels did not become immediately apparent until the climax of the story. One of the things that I like best about Elizabeth George's writing is that she realises that a lot of times, the supporting characters can have better story potential than the main title character. She uses this to her advantage in almost all of the Lynley seri...

The Reader by Bernhard Schlink

A short but very moving tale about a man who uncovers the awful truth about a former lover. Michael is 15 when he first meets Hanna, who is 36. Despite the creepy age difference, the two become lovers, though Michael is far more captivated by the mysterious and distant Hanna than she is to him. Their affair is all too brief and one day, Hanna just disappears. Years later, Michael unintentionally sees Hanna as the defendant when he is observing a court case for law school. As Michael slowly learns about Hanna's horrible past, he must struggle to accept the question - if he loves (or loved) a monster, what does that make him? There is redemption in the end, but it's very bittersweet. And of course, they made a movie out of this one. If the weather is decent, perhaps I'll go see it this weekend - Kate Winslet is supposed to be fabulous.

"Proof: the Science of Booze" by Adam Rogers

Proof: the Science of Booze caught my eye when I was looking for something new to read in the science section--specifically in the topic of chemistry. Adam Rogers presents a book that is a comprehensive look at the science behind alcohol and the mystery of why it has the effect that it does...all leading the reader to the grand conclusion of: "we still don't know." Serious examination and studies all lead to the same result of "we know what it does but we don't know why." So why would anyone be interested in a book that takes eight chapters and almost 250 pages to tell you that much about alcohol? Well, for starters there's a ton of information that is just downright cool to learn about; like the physiological effects of what is happening to your body during a hangover, a molecular explanation about what yeast is doing to the sugars and why it is vital to the final product, or a history of prohibition that you wouldn...

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