Operation Napoleon by Arnaldur Indridason
I cursed myself to finish every novel I begin. Sometimes, that is easy and thrilling, but over times, it becomes a chore. Operation Napoleon belongs to the latter group. But I finished the novel, and […]
Category Archives: World Literature
Blind Owl by Sadeq Hedayat
During a recent trip to Spokane, I went to Auntie’s Bookstore to buy a novel to read on the train. I searched for a half-hour, or maybe a whole hour, but I ended up buying […]
The Man Who was Thursday by G. K. Chesterton
There are novels to understand, but there are novels to experience. After reading G. K. Chesterton’s The Man Who was Thursday twice—the second time to remind me of the plot—I concluded that it is securely […]
In the Café of Lost Youth by Patrick Modiano
I visited the Lost Young cafe in Paris in 1976. A bunch of us wanted to see a real Parisian nightclub, and our guide agreed to take us. I fear something was lost in translation, […]
Invisible Cities by Italo Calvino
I don’t believe I’ve ever read any book that I have more trouble reviewing than Italo Calvino’s Invisible Cities. Though it’s classified as a novel, it is unlike any novel I had read before. In […]
Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse
Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse tells the story about the titular character and his spiritual quest. Siddhartha is the son of a Brahmin, a Hindu priest, who realizes he wasn’t suited for the traditional path towards […]
Memories of My Melancholy Whores by Gabriel García Márquez
Memories of My Melancholy Whores begins with its protagonist and narrator declaring the objectionable goal of wanting to have sex with a teenaged virgin. It’s the gift he wants to give himself for his ninetieth […]
Book Review: Cinnamon by Samar Yazbek
“Poetry,” one of my literature professors had said long ago in class, “is about mixed emotions.” She was talking about Theodore Roethke’s “My Papa’s Waltz,” a short poem loaded with both positive and negative imagery […]
Book Review: Piercing by Ryu Murakami
Piercing begins with a chilling scene and intensifies from there. It’s an unrelenting, violent novel that refuses to turn a blind eye to its characters’ deranged compulsions. It’s a novel about compulsions, but not the […]
The Sorrows of Young Werther by Johanna Wolfgang von Goethe
According to Wikipedia, when The Sorrows of Young Werther was published in 1774, it became the world’s first best seller. Since book publishing was, at best, only a toddler, since copyright laws were nonexistent, and […]