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[ttechne-reads]

i think you've noticed that i haven't used this blog in a hot minute lol

i'm now over on instagram as @/lavender.eads if y'all are interested!

[ttechne-reads]

Quick Update

Hi, y'all!

So, I've only had this blog for a little while now, but now. . . I won't be the only one behind it!

My best friend, Taskel, is gonna join me soon and we'll both be posting content here. I've been slowly editing the blog to encompass both of our info here and I'll be helping her post and such.

Hopefully you guys enjoy this change (and thus much more content)!

- Techne

[ttechne-reads]

Holiday Haul!

Given to me by my best friend, Ts! I loved the movie growing up and she knew I was reading some depressing stuff at the time she bought it (i.e.

Howl's Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones

Given to me by my best friend, Taskel! I loved the movie growing up and she knew I was reading some depressing stuff at the time she bought it (i.e. The Astonishing Color of After). I know that the movie and the book are crazy different, so I'm very excited to see the differences. This book will also serve as my first dip into fantasy books for the first time in years.

Lust for Life by Irving Stone

Kinda a strange one, gifted to me by my aunt. Irving Stone is known for writing semi-autobiographical books of famous figures and I grabbed his Michelangelo book during one of my last visits to Barnes and Noble. I now own both of his artist based books, but I am far more excited for the Van Gogh one instead of the Michelangelo one. The Michelangelo one is so dense in comparison to Van Gogh. I'm planning on reading both in the next year, but I'll see what happens to poor Michelangelo.

Silence by Shusaku Endo (translated by William Johnston)

Another strange one, gifted to me by my parents. To be honest, I was drawn to this one the last time I was at Strand because the cover they had looked crazy cool. After looking into it, I knew it was something I was into due to it being historical fiction and it takes place during a period in Japan that I know a bit about.

I hope you all had a good holiday! ❇

[ttechne-reads]

So, uh, this was totally meant to be done at the start of the month, not days before the end of it.

Due to some shipping issues, this box got stuck in shipping and BoTM customer service shipped out another one recently. Turns out, my original box showed up and my new one is still going to arrive as of today, December 29th. . .whoops.

Taskel convinced me to get a membership and I was honestly considering canceling it if this box didn't show up and if the other one also got stuck in shipping. With customer service's response, I am going to keep my membership and most likely get a box for January!

As for the book, Taskel was confused as to how I was able to get a book with my credit that wasn't one of the books of the month. To be honest, I have no idea how, either. But, I chose this book due to hearing really good things about it (and Taskel has been begging me to read a certain book by V.E. Schawb that isn't up my alley at all: this one is). It also has historical aspects, which is up my alley! It is somewhat fantastical, which I don't entirely enjoy, but I'll see what happens due to the fact that I definitely want to read this book next.

Be on the lookout for a review in the coming weeks! 🌸

[ttechne-reads]

Here is my 2022 TBR list! I have so many books that I’ve been wanting to read in my bookshelf and I’m dedicating 2022 to getting them done. I also have a resolution to attempt to read more, so these are what I want to complete, but I’m sure I’ll read more outside of this TBR due to getting more books for the holidays/my birthday and my BoTM subscription. 

Hopefully I’ll be posting reviews about these in the next year! 🌺

[ttechne-reads]

Finally finished The Astonishing Color of After, which means it’s time for the first review post of this blog! **not spoiler free**

Overall, I give this book 4/5 stars. I liked some portions of the book, but there were some issues with it that I picked up on pretty quickly.

Favorites

> I loved the representation of emotions via color. Leigh and Axel ask each other “what color?” in order to get a better grip on how the other is feeling. Being an art lover myself, it was so easy to imagine the color in my head and how each character feels.

> This may be weird to say, but I also liked the representation of Dory’s depression and every character’s form of grief, due to the fact that everyone experiences things differently. My family and I have dealt with various forms of grief and depression and I saw a mirror image of it.

Dislikes

> Feng was a ghost/Jingling the whole time. Unless I missed some cues, which might have happened, there really wasn’t too much to suggest this until the reveal of it at the end of the book. The only things I picked up on was that Feng was oddly close to the grandparents and that she knew all of Dory’s favorite things. She also wasn’t cracked when the world was falling apart: when Leigh saw her dad later, he was cracked.

> I wasn’t the biggest fan of Caro and Cheslin’s relationship. I think that it did not do much to move the plot along and felt kinda forced. I feel like it was included just so that the novel had LGBTQ+ rep in it. On the other hand, Caro did help move the plot along.

Overall, I'm willing to read more novels by her! What I didn't like is overpowered by what I did actually like. I've heard that she is coming out with a book in 2022, so maybe I'll pick that up and review it. I hope y'all liked my first review: there will be more to come! ✻

[ttechne-reads]

Ah, Murakami. . .an author I’ve loved for over a year now! I’ve read a handful of his books, but there are so many more by him that I want to read. Here, I want to review what I’ve read over the past year. **not spoiler free, except for 1Q84 and First Person Singular** 

The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle (1994-95, English translation 1997) 

The novel that started it all for me. This was a required book for a class I took junior year of college and I wasn’t expecting to love it so much.

Something about his writing style kept drawing me back to his books even after my class had ended.

This plot is quite simple: Toru’s wife disappeared and his cat is now missing. It follows his hunt for wife and cat and his “underground” travels while doing so. All of the characters here are interesting and are full of dimension, but the plot is also crazy due to shifting between at least two different plot lines at a time. It’s confusing at first, but everything converges nicely. 

5✧

Norwegian Wood (1987, English translation 2000)

I didn’t like something about this novel and I can’t really put my finger on it. I think it was because I was expecting a novel like The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, since I read this mere weeks after completing it. Spoiler alert: this novel is more of a coming of age of a college student rather a magical realism adventure like what is seen in the other novels in this post.

All of the Murakami novels I’ve read, minus The Strange Library have an aspect of “romance” in them (I use romance lightly here because some of the romance is adultry, but I digress), but this novel had the most romance in it. The main character, Toru, is looking for romance for a good majority of the plot and seems to be driven by the girls that he falls for. 

Unrelated to the book, but I kind of read this in my mind as a prequel to The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, due to the protagonists having the same name. In some aspects, it strangely makes sense? I may be crazy, but it kind of works.

3✧

The Strange Library (1984, English translation 2014)

So, I don’t actually own this book, but I’m pretty sure I read it as a palette cleanser between Norwegian Wood and Killing Commendatore when the pandemic first started.

The Strange Library is Murakami’s only children’s novel, but it still has his signature magical realism aspects. It chronicles a young boy who is trapped in a library overnight and his escape from the library and the strange goat-man who inhabits it. 

4✧

Killing Commendatore (2017, English translation 2018)

My favorite novel by Murakami.

Being an art history major and someone who just loves art in general, it was super cool to see a novel following an artist and his supernatural experiences in an isolated cabin in the woods. The main character (whose name is never mentioned) also describes many of his experiences and such in the terms of viewing art and creating it, which I love. 

Unfortunately though, I felt like the narrator was just an extension of Toru from The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, along with most of the book feeling like an extension of the novel, as well. I started to make a list of the comparisons between both books and leads, but I recently realized that it’s just Murakami’s style of writing because Tengo from 1Q84 also reminds me of both characters.

Murakami also has a knack for writing really strange, yet philosophical characters, as seen in the Commendatore himself once the main character discovers him. 

5✧

First Person Singular (2020, English translation 2021) (on TBR)

I’ve had this one since it came out and I’ve only read one of the short stories in it. I’ve gotten sidetracked from it and I would love to read the full thing at some point.

Unfortunately, though, I haven’t heard the best things about it. A lot of people are disappointed in it, due to it not “feeling like Murakami.” I can’t say anything about that right now, so I may come back and write an update here about it.

1Q84  (2009-10, English translation 2011) (currently reading)

This book is a behemoth. It’s over 1,000 pages, making it Murakami’s longest work as of late. It was originally split across three novels and it can still be bought like that in a box set if that is preferred, but it is more expensive compared to the single novel the last time I checked.

Without giving much away to those who want to read it (and myself), I’m keeping the synopsis vague and based off of what I know already. The book follows two characters, Aomame and Tengo, and their radically different lives. Aomame discovers something a little strange and the two lives start to converge.

So far, I’m finding it interesting, but it’s taking me a while to chug through it because some parts of it are crazy dense and complicated. The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle is dense due to the writing style; this is dense due to the sheer amount of writing there is. 

I purposely didn’t go into too much detail just in case y’all want to read these at some point, but I’m always down to talk more about Murakami.

Hope you all enjoy this post and I’ll be back with another post soon! 🌹

[ttechne-reads]

Here is my updated bookshelf! I just recently moved some stuff around and I like how this set up looks a lot better than how I had it before.

This is a three shelf unit (my bottom shelf has the two volumes of Orange that didn’t fit with the third volume, random books that didn’t fit here, and some storage) that I’ve had for years now, hence the light coming in through the back and that deep bend in the top shelf. I’m doing a little bit of a room redo in the new year and I need a new bookshelf in order for it to happen, so this will update within the new year.

I used to organize my books based on whether or not it was a series/multiple books by the same author, then single books all alphabetized by author. Now, in order to make room for more books after the holiday season and my birthday, I’ve only alphabetized by author. The two stacks on the top shelf had to be stored horizontally because the books on the bottom of each stack, The Art Thief and Rose Madder, did not fit normally. 

Then, I have my stack of manga and light novels on the second shelf. To be honest, I’m trying to ween off of reading manga by going into the world of light novels, but Toilet-Bound Hanako-Kun is an addiction! I’m planning on selling them off or donating them in the near future, though, along with my two volumes of Given. 

I’m planning on doing a few posts in depth about some of the books I have, so be on the look out for those. I hope you all enjoyed this quick post! 🌸

[ttechne-reads]

I recently got three books and I thought I would talk about what made me drawn to them as my first post on this new blog.

 **spoiler free. . .especially since I haven’t read two of these and I’m in the process of reading the remaining one. TW for suicide, terminal illness (cancer)**

The Astonishing Color of After by Emily X.R. Pan (Magical realism YA novel)

I saw this in a book recommendation video on YouTube and knew that I had to have it based on just the back cover information alone. I am a huge fan of magical realism and art: that plays a role in the novel, which is fun to see.

 The novel follows a teenager named Leigh who “is absolutely certain about one thing: When her mother died by suicide, she turned into a bird.” Due to the fact I’m reading this now, I’m going to leave the summary of the book here. 

I have to say, the writing is beautiful. Pan uses amazing descriptions of color in order to describe emotion and I do find myself imaging the color as I read. The description of depression in Leigh’s mother (so far) is also quite touching to me: someone close to me has a chronic illness, which has led to some depression. I unfortunately saw her in the descriptions of Leigh’s mother. The one instance where Leigh is aware her mother is not doing well, but she had enough energy to make her a birthday cake hit me the most.

I’m planning on doing a longer post about this book once I’m done with it, so be on the lookout for that!

Yolk by Mary H.K. Choi (contemporary fiction YA novel)

Another book I saw in a book recommendation video!

The plot of this book follows two sisters, Jayne and June, who are quite different and are living two different lives, but are suddenly brought together with June’s cancer diagnosis. The diagnosis shows how far family is willing to go, even if it means switching identities. 

I was drawn to this book mainly due to the cover. I’ll admit it: I’m not one to judge a book by it’s cover, but I’m a sucker for nice covers. But after reading the back cover, I knew that I had to read it. I have dealt with cancer in my personal life (I was not the one diagnosed) and a part of me is still kind of coping with it. I am curious to see how Yolk deals with cancer in the plot.

Breasts and Eggs by Mieko Kawakami (contemporary fiction)

Surprise: I didn’t see this one in a video! I discovered this one on my own. According to my best friend, I’ve been eyeing it “for years” and I figured it was high time to finally get it. 

The book explores themes of motherhood, having children (and the lack thereof) and body image as one ages. It is told from one woman, but also shows the perspective of her older sister and her daughter. 

I started looking into this book because I read an article saying that Haruki Murakami recommended this novel. Murakami is my all time favorite author and I was totally willing to read something that he suggested. 

So, that’s all! Let me know if you would want to see posts about Yolk and Breasts and Eggs after I read them. I also hope y’all enjoy my first post: more will be coming! 💐