Finished The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle [11/17/2008]

I am now thoroughly impressed with Murakami. This book had all of the suspense and mystery of Kafka on the Shore but without the foreshadowing. This world where the bizarre is commonplace is scary but also compelling.

The contrast between Toru's unwaivering determination to bring Kumiko back to him, and his complete fatalism with regard to everything else that happens to him is strange.

Ultimately, I think this is a tale of a shamanic journey by a novice without the help of a guide. It's a frightening concept and I'm still surprised Toru made it out alive. I think maybe I'll write a longer paper about this at some point because it's pretty interesting to me.

I am excited to read the rest of Murakami's works but, I think I need a break until the next one because they are so consuming and difficult to read in the same way as Castaneda.

Finished Jhegaala [11/05/2008]

I've finally finished all of the Vlad series. This last one was a bit disappointing, it just wasn't as fun as some of the other books. It seems like Vlad usually heals pretty quick, I don't understand why it would take him 2 whole years to recover from this ordeal (even without the help of sorcery). I think he must have been doing some other things during that time in Fenario. I wonder what?

70's Fantasy Illustration by Boris [11/05/2008]

I found a copy of "The Boy Who Saved the Stars". It has some awesome illustrations by Boris Vallejo. Here's a sampling:

pumpkins [11/02/2008]

Finished Dragon [11/01/2008]

Wow, I had no idea how much Aliera owes Vlad. He's done so much for her, it's really pretty crazy. The descriptions of the war made me feel like Vlad was there for weeks or maybe even months. Finding out it was only a couple of days was sort of surreal. It was nice to finally know how Aliera ended up with Pathfinder. But, I have to admit the whole thing was a little disappointing. There were no twists or mysteries revealed, it was so straight forward.