"The Night Circus"

Everybody is going bonkers about Halloween! Both in the real world and in the cyber universe! I am going to be bold here and say something that might make me invidious, obnoxious, and maybe, offensive...I don't care about Halloween. I don't understand the fixation with scary pumpkins, ghosts, bloody eyes and other such gruesome scenes. Everywhere I look I see those bluntly exploiting, consumerist campaigns to make us do more, eat more, and ultimately spend more on things that are actually irrelevant to the real tradition of this day. We don't celebrate it in Greece and even here in Croatia (a very catholic country) people pay more attention to the day after Halloween. November 1st is a day of remembering those who left from this world to start their eternal journey. The days preceding Svi Sveti (All Saint's Day) are borderline frantic. Zagreb is full of people and flowers and small red lanterns which will be lit on Dan Svi Svetih and create a river of red light. OK all these take place in cemeteries and the light of the lanterns might remind you of blood but this is as gruesome as it gets! 

The Night Circus has nothing to do with Halloween and I did not chose to write about it today because of this. I want to write about it because it is extraordinary and enchanting, mysterious yet unaffected in its writing style. 

Many months ago, way before I started this here blog, I read a post written by a food writer describing a dessert she had created inspired by a book titled "The Night Circus". I had just bought my Kindle and I immediately went online and bought the book. That's how I am, very impulsive about the books I buy and read. I downloaded it and left it there on my virtual bookshelf for a long time. Since then many things concerning this book have happened. Hundreds, maybe thousands of reviews have been written. Some positive and glowing dubbing it the best book of that year, others not so much, pointing to weaknesses and problems.

I am not going to write a review. I don't know how to write reviews. I am just going to put down some of my thoughts about this book... 

I drunk this book like a soothing, remedial potion. I read somewhere that "The Night Circus" can cure cancer. It was meant as a joke and you might laugh, but at some point while reading it, the same thought crossed my mind. If it cannot cure cancer, it can definitely help alleviate stress and anxiety. Why is that though? I cannot say for sure. Is it the fantastical world of magic? Is it the circus itself that brings childhood memories of astounding miracles happening in a place like nowhere else? I cannot put my finger on it but I think it might be because it is a book that does not demand anything from the reader, only to open his mind and imagine being in that mystical place, "Le Cirque de Reves". 

And it is really easy to do so because the author offers him exquisite, detailed blueprints of anything he might need to get there.

This Halloween don't get disarranged by all those asking you to become absorbed by their marketing strategies for bigger, more orange, even scarier, bloodier and darker delirium.  Stay true to the actual tradition of All Hollow's Eve and if you can spare a moment read "The Night Circus". It will take you where you want to go like the simplest fairytale did when we were children. 

"Sea of Poppies"

I don't know if it happens to you, but sometimes I buy a book and let it rest on my bookshelf for years. I look at it but don't dare read it, as if I knew that when I start there will be no going back. I would be swept away by the narrative and the characters to an alternate reality, a universe where I'd be controlled by them.

This is exactly what happened with the "Sea of Poppies" by Amitav Ghosh. For days now I've been moving back and forth between the mundane present and enchanting world created by Ghosh's ability to create fascinating art with words.

"The Hunger Games"

Sometimes I am completely oblivious to what's happening around me! People might be going on and on about a new super cool gadget or an amazing "must read" book  but I wont give a damn. Anything with a "i" prefixed to it is to be avoided at all costs and books that are written and published with the sole purpose of becoming huge commercial successes, Hollywood blockbusters, coffee mugs and calenders will never find a place on my bookshelves. I avoid these things like the devil and in my eyes the bigger the hype around them, the better the reason for me to continue to ignore their existence. 

I have to be honest though. Sometimes I succumb to the hype. But only for books...because they are books after all! And I have something for books. Call it soft spot, call it obsession. I cannot force myself to endure the agony of seeing them showcased in virtual and real life bookshops and not getting my hands on them, flicking through the pages and deciding for myself if it is worth all the hype! And this is what happened with The Hunger Games. For the past year or so, I saw it everywhere! Featured on Amazon, The Book Depository, Foyles, plus on the windows and selves of all the bookshops in Zagreb. I refused to buy it or read a review. And then the movie was released and the whole thing became even hypier! And I was certain that this was not going to be a book that I was likely to buy or yet like on the off chance that some crazy buying impulse (usually driven by the fact that books have no sizes and can quench your consumerist thirst without trying them on!) forced me to click on the "Buy Now" button. 

But I clicked and there it was just moments later listed in the contents of my Kindl. At this point I have to clarify one thing: I use my Kindl to read what I consider to be "lesser books", books that I wouldn't mind terribly if I didn't own the hard copy to put on my bookshelves, look at and remember the plot and the characters and the feelings invoked by reading it. So before I read it Hunger Games was definitely a "Kindl book" and unfortunately it remains as such even now that I have finished all three of the books.

Maybe it is the genre - Young Adult is not my thing, hence, no "Twilight" on my selves; But then again I read all 7 Harry Potters and seen the movies and actually enjoyed them! Not to mention "Lord of the Rings", "Narnia" or "His Dark Materials" series, three of my all time favorites!

I cannot talk about "Twilight", since I have not read the book nor seen the movie(s), but I think the reason why "The Hunger Games" did not satisfy my appetite as a bookworm was because, apart from the really compelling storyline, it is not a particularly well written book! Its literary style is that of simple words and sentences, which by all means, though, maximize the reader's addiction and compulsion to continue reading. Katniss Everdeen' s character sometimes seems one dimensional at least in the first book. Yes she is strong, and independent and she does not care about such trivial things like love, and marriage and children...she is so young but leads a hard life being the sole provider for her family and having to face the evil of the Capital and unintentionally become the face of the revolution. In writing this I realise now that there are a few parts in all three books that could have been explored a little bit deeper and maybe this would have given the story a more emotive and multi-dimensional quality, but then again this is my simple opinion.

"The Psychopath Test"

I did not actually read this book. I listened to it, narrated by Jon Ronson himself on a fancy little app called Audible.co.uk. I've never heard of Jon Ronson before and I must confess that when I downloaded the book I did it in a hurry and didn't really read any reviews. So imagine my surprise when I listened to the opening sentence " This is a book about madness" he read, in a very characteristic Welsh accent that brought back memories of years past. I thought the book was some sort of funny, light, modern novel! Well I could not have been more wrong!!! But I kept listening. The first chapter is a very odd introduction to the main theme of the book (psychopathy, mental disorders, the people who have them and those who diagnose them) but in my opinion it could actually serve as a nice short mystery story. I kept listening. Then things changed. Became somewhat darker, scarier more important. Scientologists where involved and visits to a real life scary high security mental hospitals and Haitian former death-squad leaders! I became a bit apprehensive. Was it real? Was it fiction?

I went online. Searched for reviews. Mostly good ones. I was relieved. I hadn't spent my money in some preaching manual of the occult. Jon Ronson is an investigative journalist albeit a more humorous than the rest of the bunch! Read a bit more about him and went back to the book; I din't want to spoil the trip of my discovering him.

Most of the reviewers mentioned that they got really scarred while reading the book. Strange, I didn't and I am a person who scares quite easily. Maybe because instead of reading I was listening and I could get the sarcasm with which he looked at some of the issues (the rudimentary test devised by a reality TV producer in choosing the subjects of her show - if you' re on Prozac you're mad enough to go on TV a bring home high ratings) but also the graveness in his voice when towards the end of the book he draws some really disturbing conclusions.

Do "psychopaths make the world go around"? Are the symptom check-lists comprising the DSM-IV manual and the 20 questions of the Bob Hare Psychopath Test, powerful weapons in the hands of psychiatrists and pharmaceutical companies and even parents who feel relieved having their over-active children diagnosed as bipolar? You can judge for yourself when you read the book. I was convinced!

PS.1 If I understood the writer correctly and if the selfreferencing parts scattered all over the book are true then I have to be careful of what I say in this post! I am sure he is the type of guy who Googles himself a little bit more often than the rest of us (I've done it also and came up with a portrait of a very old lady who was an inmate in a Greek prison in the 1900's!!!) and I really don't want to get on his wrong side.

PS. 2 Should I be troubled by the fact that my therapist refuses to comment on the questions posed by the book?

"Animal Farm"

When I told Georgie (my husband) that I'm reading his namesake's George Orwell's Animal Farm, he said that it is no longer relevant today, maybe it was 30 years ago but not today. I don't usually disagree with him but this time I really have to.


To me this book is as relevant today as it was when it was written. 


Animal Farm is seen as an allegory of the totalitarian and corrupted Stalinist regime. Even thought Orwell later denied this, there is no doubt that Comrade Napoleon is Comrade Stalin. If we look at it only as an anti Stalinist manifesto then yes it is outdated and only relevant for one place on the planet: North Korea.


While reading though, I came to realise that it does not take a lot of effort to apply the book's  societal structure, where "all animals are equal but some animals are more equal than others" to the largely unregulated, profit oriented global financial system controlled  by a tribe of Investment Bankers and CEOs, closely guarded by a pack of Rating Houses and blindly followed by a flock of governments. 


Maybe I'm affected by the financial troubles plaguing countries across the south of Europe. Or maybe I'm just overwhelmingly angry about the inability of the rest of the animals, both in the book and in reality, to perceive the severity of their exploitation and mockery by their rulers. 


To me, Animal Farm is a fable and as Aesop's Fables, its relevance is eternal, as long as the system remains the same and the horses choose to remain simple and obedient. 

"Hateship, Friendship, Courtship, Loveship, Marriage"

Discovering the obvious can be very embarrassing and quite frustrating when it comes to sharing your "discovery" with your peers. Comments like "have you been sleeping for the past 2 years" when you recount your amazement at the multitude of functions modern technology offers, of something like " you claim to be a bookworm but you've never heard of Alice Munro?" are quite a spoiler towards your need to boast about your newest discovery.

Well, what can I say, I've never heard 0f Ms Munro (a.k.a "Canadian Chekhov"). To my defence I was never a big fun of the short story genre, thus my complete ignorance of its Queen! I prefer my fiction to be longer, like a 7 course dinner plus a Brandy and a cigar at the end. The idea of just going in for a starter is, to put it mildly, completely unappealing. 

Then, Hateship, Friendship, Courtship, Loveship, Marriage came my way, ("came" is an understatement, it was forced upon me by my dear book club co-members) and that's how I discovered what for many years has been obvious to millions of readers around the world. Alice Munro IS positively, undeniably, most definitely an astonishingly talented author. Because it takes tones and tones of talent coupled with technique and imagination to be able to master so much is such a limited space. 

The plots are thick and unpredictable, but the turns are very smooth. The characters strong and engaging. No ink is wasted for frivolous descriptions. Each word has a well thought purpose and the reader is given the opportunity (or the challenge) to discover it for themselves. 

I will be rethinking my attitude towards short stories and I pledge to read more of her collections starting with Something I've Been Meaning to Tell You and Too Much Happiness. I cannot promise about my attitude towards dinner duration tough!

"Half of a Yellow Sun"

I had to read this book as part of my book club reading list. Even though it was sitting on my bookshelf for quite a while now, for some reason it was never high enough on my personal list of "to read" books. 

What a mistake! I should have read this book long time ago. Not because it made me a better person and not because I had fun reading it. This is not this type of book. It talks about war, the worst kind of war, civil war and famine and death. Not a fun subject unless you are seriously mentally disturbed.  But it is not a war novel and you are not overwhelmed by the dramatic to the point where you have nightmares. The strong and integrated characters make sure that this does not happen to you. You follow their everyday life in a country that became alive only to die unrecognised by the rest of the world. It's legacy, though, remains. And yes there are bombings and famine and death, but there is also love and passion and family. 

It is a well written book by a writer who does not pretend to know things she doesn't. It has the right amount of everything, history, politics, emotions and at the end it instigates a need in you to go and find more books and novels written by African writers about Africa.