in the stacks | what i talk about when i talk about running

Synopsis
Renowned Japanese novelist Haruki Murakami focuses his narrative inwards in a non-fiction, memoir-esque book of essays about his life as a runner and a writer. He says himself that he doesn't quite know what this book is other than a way to simply talk to his audience and fans about what it is that crosses his mind when he crosses the finish line at marathons, triathlons, and even an ultra-marathon.

Quotes
"So the fact that I’m me and no one else is one of my greatest assets. Emotional hurt is the price a person has to pay in order to be independent."

"I've always done whatever I felt like doing in life. People may try to stop me, and convince me I'm wrong, but I won't change."

"I'm often asked what I think about as I run. Usually the people who ask this have never run long distances themselves. I always ponder the question. What exactly do I think about when I'm running? I don't have a clue."

My thoughts... 
Melanie got me What I Talk About When I Talk About Running for my birthday this year, and what a great gift and how very thoughtful - it's about writing and running by a Japanese author, and those are three things that mean something to me. I'm ashamed to say that this is the first of Murakami's books I've read, but I can promise that it won't be the last. Murakami is a bit of a loner, humble, and also very confident. His essays seem flowing and uneventful, even, and then when I finished one, I found myself inspired to create routines that build on my talents, to utilize my time in ways that make better sense for my productivity, and to look at writing as a marathon instead of a sprint. I write in bursts, and Murakami says bluntly - that's not how to sustain writing talent. Talent he says, must be divvied out slowly and steadily, must be nourished every single day. He says, too, that the well of talent in many writers dries up, and when that happens, if they don't have discipline to fall back on, they're left with blank pages. On running, too, Murakami does it easier than I ever will, but I left the book inspired to be my own runner, whether that means running at my own pace, setting goals, or even ditching goals and doing it just because I am capable. Reading Murakami almost feels like he's lending an ear to listen to me, instead of the other way around. 

in the stacks | wwII germany & communist north korea

The Book Thief 
Markus Zusak

Summary 
Nine-year-old Liesel Memminger watches her brother die on a train heading to Mulching, Germany before the start of World War II. At his funeral, she steals a book even though she can't read. Her mother is taken by Nazi's, and she's raised by her foster parents, Hans and Rosa Hubermann. She meets a poor neighborhood boy named Rudy Steiner in her first days in Molching, and the two quickly become best friends, stealing fruit to have enough to eat, playing soccer, and negotiating their way through a war that threatens to tear them, their families, and their town apart. The book is narrated by Death, who grows fascinated with Liesel on his many encounters with her while carrying off the souls of those she loves.

Quote(s)
"I wanted to tell the book thief many things, about beauty and brutality. But what could I tell her about those things that she didn't already know? I wanted to explain that I am constantly overestimating and underestimating the human race-that rarely do I ever simply estimate it. I wanted to ask her how the same thing could be so ugly and so glorious, and its words and stories so damning and brilliant."

My thoughts 
Markus Zusak has written a compelling, entrancing work of experimental fiction. It took me 50 pages or so to get into it and to understand the unique format - words are bolded, Death dedicates pages to definitions, inserts commentary about Liesel's life, and spoils parts of the ending. Death as a narrator offers an interesting paradigm shift - an opportunity to see humanity from 'the other side' so to speak. Liesel is a shy, quiet girl by most measures, but she has a ferocity and tenacity that builds throughout the novel and culminates in her being one of the truest heroines of modern literature. Zusak is a poet, too - there were entire passages I read and re-read to soak in them. Every character is developed with careful consideration, and I cried for Liesel, for Rudy, for Hans and Rosa, and for everyone I got to know and would miss when I closed the last page of this beautiful novel.

The Orphan Master's Son  
Adam Johnson

Summary 
Pak Jun Do swears he's not an orphan - a member of North Korean's lowest class. He believes his mother is a famous singer kidnapped to Pyongyang, the nation's capital, and his father runs the orphan camp in which he works as a child. He's later sent to work in underground tunnels, clearing pathways to the DMZ, and endures pain resistance training. The state regime detects his loyalty and picks him to rise in the ranks. He's sent to Japan as a kidnapper, taught English and sent to spy on American ships in international waters, and eventually picked to accompany a team of diplomats to Texas to recapture an item "stolen" from the Dear Leader, Kim Jong Il. Upon his return, he must decide what he's willing to do in order to stay alive and to save the woman he loves - Sun Moon, including challenging the Dear Leader himself.

Quote 
"I wonder of what you must daily endure in America, having no government to protect you, no one to tell you what to do. Is it true you're given no ration card, that you must find food for yourself? Is it true that you labor for no higher purpose than paper money? What is California, this place you come from? I have never seen a picture. What plays over the American loudspeakers, when is your curfew, what is taught at your child-rearing collectives? Where does a woman go with her children on Sunday afternoons, and if a woman loses her husband, how does she know the government will assign her a good replacement? With whom would she curry favor to ensure her children got the best Youth Troop leader?"

My thoughts
Adam Johnson visited North Korea as research for a short story he intended to write. He envisioned a fantastical, satirical account of a story that could be told over mandatory loudspeakers in homes across North Korea. As the original conception turned into a novel, he kept the short story, interspersing it throughout: the novel tells the protagonist's version, and the story told to citizens is North Korea's account of it. It's a powerful novel that shines light on the gross human rights violations in a country for which so little factual information is available. What's fiction and what's real, about the country itself, can only be imagined; Johnson admits that even after visiting, it's impossible to know what daily life is like for North Koreans outside of the areas of Pyongyang that the government allows visitors to see. While there are some fantastical elements to the novel that give it a lightness I didn't often feel it needed, it's a moving, captivating, engrossing read that I thoroughly enjoyed. It won the 2013 Pulitzer Price for fiction for a reason; it's that damn good. 

tgif | highlights

I, even now, persist in believing that these black marks on white paper bear the greatest significance, that if I keep writing I might be able to catch the rainbow of consciousness in a jar. 

jeffrey eugenides, middlesex

previously on travel, hike, eat. repeat... 

you're never alone when you travel - my first solo trip was to mozambique
a recipe for chocolate chip banana bread

early next week, i have a post about a new local business in d.c., complete with a discount code. i hope you're as excited to read it as i am to post it.

have an incredible mlk/inauguration weekend. i hope it's long for you. it is for me. tgif!

in the stacks | The Last Werewolf & Talulah Rising

Full moons make me want to do a few things: read in an over-sized chair, or under covers against mounds of pillows on my bed; hike with only the moon as my light; and fear my transition into a werewolf.

Well, that last one hasn't happened. Yet. But it could, and if it did, I know that it will be painful. Jake, the werewolf, taught me that.

Several months ago - I guess we're talking 6 or 8, I read Glen Duncan's novel, The Last Werewolf, on recommendation of a close friend with a great literary palette. I scrunched up my face when she suggested it. Why would I read a werewolf novel? I (1) curl up in the fetal position, plug my ears and hum if someone so much as jumps out of an unexposed place in a movie, and (2) am as interested in science fiction as I am physics. Which is to say, only when I'm watching The Big Bang Theory.

But Mel, my friend, said, "Trust me," and I did. And holy crap, werewolves are AWESOME. At least in Glen Duncan's world.

The Last Werewolf tells the story of Jake, a philanthropic man of considerable wealth with a proclivity for eating humans when the full moon strikes. He never intended to become a werewolf. He found himself in need of shelter in the 1700s and stumbled into a small cottage. An attractive woman took care of him, and in the process, turned him.

The novel opens with Jake knowing that he is the last known live werewolf. An evil clan wants to exterminate all werewolves and comes after him. He flees, and takes the reader with him on his adventure. The great twist of the novel comes when he meets the love of his life, Talullah, a female werewolf that no one, not even Jake, knew existed. They negotiate their love against the moral qualm of killing and the physical necessity of it. Their dialogue, action sequences and love story take the reader to a place I never expected - belief. I believed their story, and I fell into it as hard as they fell in love with each other. When I closed the last page of the novel, I wanted more.

Thankfully, Glen Duncan is giving us more in his new sequel, Tallulah Rising.

I've ordered the novel, but I haven't read it yet. In fact, I had almost forgotten about Jake and Tallulah and the controversial sub-genre in which they live, until I stole out of my apartment one evening last week, a bottle of wine in hand, and got caught in the gaze of a full moon.

I could almost hear Jake's notoriously long-winded thoughts and 19th century speech and demeanor coming through his words, and Tallulah's laughter bringing him down from a philosophical wandering. I suddenly couldn't wait to get my hands on my copy of Tallulah Rising and find out what happens next in this dark tale of moon-crossed lovers.

I'll report on that one just as soon as I - (page turn).