Buku Time

"The most delicious, depraved, inventive, macabre and hilarious literary debut I can think of... More , I want more!" Stephen Fry

"Redolent of soft leather chairs in fine gentlemen's establishments, and the cracking of whips in the basements beneath them. Perniciously addictive." Guardian

"It is easy to imagine Oscar Wilde, on a chaise longue smoking an absurdly expensive cigarette, reading The Vesuvius Club and laughing out loud at its playful decadence and wit. There can surely be no higher praise." Times Literary Supplement 

Now, with blurbs like these, who wouldn't be tempted to rush a purchase and speed home to savour it?  I did, but it look me two long years before I could actually finish it.

I plunged into the book almost immediately upon buying it in December 2009. For some reasons, I just couldn't get past the first chapter. Something felt missing between the pages.

After a few tries, I gave up and abandoned the book altogether, consigning it to the upper shelf, where it languished until I spied upon it once again a fortnight ago. 

Determined to give it another try, I took it down, dusted it and began again. Strangely enough, there was renewed zest as I settled into the storyline. 

It was such a refreshing departure from my usual true-life crime & mystery, murder & mayhem staple. I'm glad I did what I did. A great read The Vesuvius Club turned out to be. ..  

Went to Borders at The Curve last week to check out new offerings from Stephen King and Jonathan Kellerman, and found these two.

I'm long done with "Mystery". Loved the many twists and turns. Pak Abu, who reads only at bedtime, is still plodding along with "Full Dark, No Stars"..

A month ago, found this one nestled amongst my Haruki Murakamis. Don't know whose book it is and how it got there; I know for sure it's not mine. if I were to hazard a guess, it could be son Naj's (have yet to ask him), for that's his kind of read.

Not one to pass up a chance of reading a feebie, I settled into the book, which recounted the motorbike travels of two good friends, actor Ewan McGregor (Obi-Wan Kenobi of Star Wars fame) and fellow actor Charley Boorman. 

It's a fascinating and entertaining travel book about two bikers chasing their shadows through Europe, Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Mongolia, Russia, across the Pacific to Alaska, then down through Canada and America.  

Two middle-class Brits roughing it out on the Steppes and in Siberia, being offered boiled sheep head in a Mongolian yurt (as honoured guests they had to dig out the eyes and eat them, a delicacy as it were)... Commendable read..
  

Books waiting to be read... hope it's not going to be a two-year wait like The Vesuvius Club.... :-)