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[book-cravings]

“Fifty shades of Grey” & “Grey”

E. L

Fifty shades of Grey, Fifty shades darker, Fifty shades freed, Grey

E. L. James

Vintage Books 2011

English

There we go the controversial book!

It has been called everything from Mummy-porn to revolution to garbbage.

I can’t stand Ana, we clearly don’t have the same personality and it was hard at times to keep on reading but I’m no quitter so I read all 3 books.

Yet I did fell for Mr. Grey and his icy cold character. I’ve always had a soft-spot for arrogant powerful guys. No surprise here.

I think it is extremely interesting to see the image of Prince Charming 2.0 : forgotten are Fitzwilliam Darcy and his contemporaries.

So let’s disequate that shall we? The 21st century Prince Charming is rich, just like he was back then, but hold on to your panties he has an actual job. He is generous, ah this is very important ladies, he has to be sensitive and gentle and very touched by those who didn’t get as lucky as him. He is very exclusive, you’d swear he never saw another chick, like Cinderella’s prince who didn’t care to dance with anyone else that fateful night our dear Mr Grey has only eyes for Ana, an irrealistic trait if you ask me but that clearly shows what women want from a man.

The very difference between Prince Charming and Prince Charming 2.0 is that he does not base his choices on appearance. I used to believe Cinderella was the prettiest girl at the bal, Aurora had stunning beauty and voice, Snow-White was the fairest of them all, but Ana is just Ana. So what it teaches us is that we believe ourselves to be fucking average, with Nothing special and all dream of an exceptional man who’d think we are totally mistaking about being plain and should be crowned Miss Universe.

Hot, Generous with you and with poors, Mysterious, Nice with your familySocially higher than you, Rich. BUT Prince Charming 2.0 can give you awesome sex. that’s about it.

I like to fantasize about Grey, but dear I’d never consider dating someone like that in real life. I’m way too independent for that kind of a man. I’d go away in a second. What the fuck you don’t want me to work? What the fuck I don’t get to eat what I want?

Also, as a psychology grad, I find repulsive how of course Christian had a super deranged childhood and SO CONSEQUENTELY became a freak. Let’s get things clear : we all have stuff in our childhood that will impact our adult lives, they always do, but not ALL beaten kids will beat their own or will need to beat someone to get off. Plus, sadism is not a bad deranged thing, it is a perversion in the most freudian sense since it does not serve reproduction but hey guess what so is homosexuality. Perversion does not mean wrong it means “serving other purposes than reproduction” i.e pleasure.

Pleasure is perverse and I’m a proud perverse myself I hope you are too.

The story was nothing special but was catchy enough, it had the big advantage of being the most popular novel of the genre so that all others appear as pale copies.

I had a better time reading Grey, his mind is much more like mine and the naïvity of Ana wasn’t getting on my nerves anymore.

Now do you want me to talk about the sex part a little? Of course you guys do. Honestyl they sucked. Big big time. I was more hooked by all the romance stuff than the supposedly hot stuff. Ana’s innocence tended to get to my nerves real quick, how she couldn’t even think of words like cunt, pussy, etc. She stayed in her romantic vision of sex and I stayed in my fun vision of it. I sighed at moments like when she received first editions (I do have this blog for a reason haha) so yeah that was more romantic. I’d rather read Tumblr smut tha 50 shades of grey if I want sexy action.

[book-cravings]

“Battle Royale”

Battle Royale

Kôshun Takami

First published in japanese in 1999

Français

In an alternative future Japan, junior high students are forced to fight to the death. Every now and then in the Republic of Great Asia a class of junior high school students is taken to a deserted island where, as part of a ruthless authoritarian program, they are provided arms and forced to kill one another until only one survivor is left standing.

I decided to read this book after hearing many people say Hunger Games had plagiarized it. I don’t care about plagiarism, my grandpa used to say there were like 10 main stories top, all written long ago in ancient times and that we were merely doing relectures since the begining of times. Relectures are a difficult exercize anyway because you need to bring somthing new. I won’t let you hanging too long : hell yeah, it’s pretty similar, and perhaps that’s why it was so good.

Oh Lord the difficulty it was memorizing the Japanese names! I was furious because except for Shuya Nanahara our hero I had finally managed to memorize one dude and he died like two pages later. I was disappointed. I have to admit how well done it was because I ended up remembering who was who whenever it was necessary : some characters were unsignificant to be honest but it was easy remembering ‘the bully’, ‘the slut’, etc.

It is interesting how the bio of each character is constructed by mentionning them all in the bus and then focusing on them for just a chapter. It definitely echoes Agathat Christie’s “And Then There Were None“ but in such a smart way that it is delightful.

I think the facist dictature was well illustrated and the free-thinkers characters were refreshing. Many references to the great American enemy were a tasteful allusion to the Cold War and cultural points were made all along the novel. I’d say this is the strenght of this novel. You don’t need futuristic gears or nuclear wars not even imaginary disease, all you need to build a desperate country is right here before our eyes and we refuse to see it. A bit a history, a dash of politic, the author manages to teach us while entertaining us.

Preach the japanese : the battles were absolutely amazing. One in particular described a fight between two students ending up with one ripping the eyes of the others and frankly I was feeling a tad nauseous. I was extremely surprised because I was never one hungry for blood or such but this book turns you into a real killer/survivor.

Negative point was that I sometimes found the writing a bit naïve and sugary, girls especially would say things I expect from a 10 year old or less, not high-schoool chicks. Let’s keep in mind that this is Japan, this is 1995 at the time the author was writing, and I read it in french so perhaps it’s that translation that fails, I am not sure to be in place to say anything.

In this novel, the mechanisms of psychological manipulation are more accurately described than in any other similar book I read. In Hunger Games, there was no friendship whatsoever that made it hard to kill, here the teens are classmates and none thinks the others to be capable of such things, yet trust the Government to twist their minds... Being especially interested in totalitarian political models, this book was an unexpected bonus for me.

I’d like to see the movie now :)

[book-cravings]

“The problem with loving to read books too much is that its never just ‘one last chapter then I go to bed’ because after that one chapter, its always 'okay, I still have time for one more chapter’ then the next thing you know, its 4 am and you finished the book…….. Then you stress about how and when you’ll be able to get your hands on book 2,3,4,5……. ‪

SG (via magical-pensieve)

An this, ladies and gents, is precisely how you end up going to your finals with just an hour of sleep or so !

[book-cravings]

“Dans le jardin de l’ogre”

Dans le jardin de l’ogre

Leïla Slimani

Galimard 2014

Français

Extract :

"Une semaine qu'elle tient. Une semaine qu'elle n'a pas cédé. Adèle a été sage. En quatre jours, elle a couru trente-deux kilomètres. Elle est allée de Pigalle aux Champs-Elysées, du musée d'Orsay à Bercy. Elle a couru le matin sur les quais déserts. La nuit, sur le boulevard Rochechouart et la place de Clichy. Elle n'a pas bu d'alcool et elle s'est couchée tôt. Mais cette nuit, elle en a rêvé et n'a pas pu se rendormir. Un rêve moite, interminable, qui s'est introduit en elle comme un souffle d'air chaud. Adèle ne peut plus penser qu'à ça. Elle se lève, boit un café très fort dans la maison endormie. Debout dans la cuisine, elle se balance d'un pied sur l'autre. Elle fume une cigarette. Sous la douche, elle a envie de se griffer, de se déchirer le corps en deux. Elle cogne son front contre le mur. Elle veut qu'on la saisisse, qu'on lui brise le crâne contre la vitre. Dès qu'elle ferme les yeux, elle entend les bruits, les soupirs, les hurlements, les coups. Un homme nu qui halète, une femme qui jouit. Elle voudrait n'être qu'un objet au milieu d'une horde, être dévorée, sucée, avalée tout entière. Qu'on lui pince les seins, qu'on lui morde le ventre. Elle veut être une poupée dans le jardin de l'ogre".

_

Adèle Robinson has it all. A husband, a child and a good job. This is what you’ll see. What you won’t is that she despises her husband with whom she does not have sex anymore, does not manage to unleash any maternal instinct, is bored to death in her job obtained thanks to some connections. Her only desire in life is actually to be desired : to be watched, desired, needed. She does not care about anything else. Like Marilyn Monroe who just wanted to be fabulous, Adèle would trade her everything for a night of hot sex with a stranger. And boy she does. She escapes her condition as often as humanly possible, putting everything she has at risk. Adèle loves sex, or does she? What Adèle truly likes is to see fire in these men’s eyes, to make them feel desperate. She tries to fit in, best she can, but it empties her a little more each time, she feels her self leaving her body.

I’ve enjoyed reading this book for it echoes to Flaubert’s Madame Bovary. The writing is easy and pleasant, short sentences inviting you to feel the course of Adèle’s own thoughts and the dullness of her mind : a mind so well anaesthesized that nothing sparks her imagination. Adèle lives the cliché life society wants us to wish for, yet she does not find the promised satisfaction in it. Desillusioned, she seeks feelings, any kind of feeling. She does not even want pleasure but the thrill of it, the thrill from the flirt and the chase. It’s a very blunt and honest book about female modern sexuality. To me it also reflects how sexuality became a hard compromise for XXIst century women : we want equality but also chivalry, we want respect but sometimes dominance.

Freud described neurasthenia in the early XXth and I believe that we are now experiencing a modern form of it. A woman should have a valuable carreer but not too much because she needs to stay under the man and to have time to care for a house and kids, she should be a sweet mom always planning the coolest crafts on week-ends but she should be a freaking tiger in bed, she should be drinking classy cocktails in regular girls night out but also keep her house looking like it belongs to a Marie-Claire Déco magazine while of course going to pilates during lunch break. Where is the individual in all of this? These expectations barely leave room for any sort of personal aspirations, time to dream. To me, this book allows to think outside the tank and gives us all a moment to remember watching ourselves as individual human beings. What is good for someone is not necessarly good for all, there isn’t just one way of doing things, of living.

[book-cravings]

[book-cravings]

“The declaration”

The declaration

Gemma Malley

Bloomsbury Publishings (2007)

English

The plot :

2140, death is no more a fatality since longevity-drugs have been discovered and Queen’s who wants to live forever has never been more accuate. Sixteen-year-old Anna should not have been born. Ressources are limited and no one wants another mouth to feed, being born is a crime. She lives in a Surplus Hall, where unwanted children go to learn valuable lessons, perhaps making amend for even existing by becoming a valuable slave . . . . One day, Peter, a new inmate arrives. Anna's life is thrown into chaos. He says things about her parents and the Outside that couldn't possibly be true . . . Or could they?

I had a good time reading this. The plot is really interesting and

The atmosphere at Grange Hall is depicted with taste and at times it felt like I was playing ‘Rule of Rose’ again [Rule of Rose was a horror video game on PS2 and if you happen to still own one of these antiquity like I do you should totally allow yourself to try it].

Unfortunaltely I do not have the same opinion on parts that aren’t descriptions, they are simple, perhaps a little too simple and sometimes give the feeling of reading a children’s book. This could be explained by the hypothetical fact that maybe the author’s intention was to make you enter Anna’s mind. Strong possibility since Anna keeps a journal so +1 for my idea.

Anna has no personality other than the one built for her, she denies herself as an individual and being Grange Hall’s most ancient student she is also the most docile which does not make her a very deep character. Yes, Peter comes and make her question things, but not enough. She does not really questions in fact, she follows his lead.

Also, the functioning of the Surplus Hall is nearly sectarian, and if the narration can seem a bit redundant with the ever present motto on Surpluses, to me it was not too heavy : after all, this is how people are endocrinated.

You can’t avoid a few stereotypes and heavinesses, the mean headmistress has of course a secret wound that made her that mean, the sappy love-story that pops out of nowhere, the way Anna suddenly starts changing... Some pieces seems to be missing while some others were told quite enough times for readers to understand.

Anyway, I have to admit that the book does manage something interesting : it makes you think. A lot. What about me, would I want to take longevity drugs? What do I think about that?

Though I regret the lack of surprise at reading the book : it was fun, it was catchy, but terribly predictable. The main reproach I could make to this book was its clumsy construction : everything seems to happen out of the blue, yet predictably. Nevertheless it is only a 1/3 so maybe more is to be discovered and I feel like reading the sequel, it is a pleasant read, it’s super quick, and mind-twisting.

[book-cravings]

Welcome

Hello and welcome to you all folks!

I have a severe addiciton to reading. It has always been there. I read anywhere I can on any support I can, I even have the awful habit of reading as I walk in the streets or in shops.

I still buy actual books. I like their smell, the feeling of the paper, the oddities in some mispprinted copies. I like second-hand ones better, they carry a story within their story. My most precious possesion is a copy of Anne Frank given by a Bergen-Belsen survivor whom had personaly known her.

Critic : noun crit·ic \ˈkri-tik\ a. One who expresses a reasoned opinion on any matter especially involving a judgment of its value, truth, righteousness, beauty, or technique. b. One who engages often professionally in the analysis, evaluation, or appreciation of works of art or artistic performances.

All I will say here is purely personal and does not have more value than the one you are willing to give it, I do not own any kind of truth, only reasoned opinions that I want to share respectfully.

I will probably try to classify books

Fiction/Non-fiction

French/English

Stay tuned for more :)

xxx Isis