Read/read/reading: Kraken by China Miéville, Palo Alto by James Franco, Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer.

Kraken: This was strange, and not as good as Miéville’s straighter fantasy stuff (Perdido Street Station was the last of his I read, and that was magnificent), but still an exhilarating read. Miéville constructs worlds better than any other writer I know, and this continued that trend. Where this occasionally fell down for me is the reverent eye it attaches to London (in a way that, say, The Book of Dave by Will Self doesn’t), but the beauty is in the grotesque characterisation and odd events, which unfold more like a drug-addled nightmare than a narrative. Miéville, to me, has always felt like Hunter S. Thompson if he wrote fantasy novels - that same acerbic wit and savage sensibility translates perfectly, only this has an adrenaline shot of imagination to boot.

Palo Alto: Quick read, and occasionally felt a little like James Franco was jerking off on your face, but there were a lot of high points - there’s talent there, even if it feels a little unrefined. He’s constructed a cast of characters who feel young and nihilistic, but in an anti-Bret Easton Ellis twist, you end up caring for a lot of them. There are a lot of fucked up moments, but they pull you in rather than push you out.

I’ve heard good things about Extremely Loud, though not the movie - we’ll see. Reading is fun!

Read/reading: Norwegian Wood by Haruki Murakami, Kraken by China Miéville.

Norwegian Wood was odd, even though it doesn’t really dive down the rabbit hole of magical realism that (apparently) Murakami usually does; it’s frank when it comes to depression, but the greatest struggle in reading it is knowing that the protagonist is hopelessly blinkered. Imperfect narrators are few and far between, so it can be a bit of a shock when you come across one; that said, it’s masterfully written and there are long, extended sections that blew me away. And plenty of others that were surprising - though I suspect by now I’ve seen enough anime to see where values aren’t always cross-cultural.

Very excited for the next one. I’ve heard it’s a Kracker. Um. Cracker. Heh. Don’t shoot me.