Merlyn's bookshelf: read en-US Sun, 27 Apr 2025 06:23:13 -0700 60 Merlyn's bookshelf: read 144 41 /images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg Lapvona 59693959 In a village in a medieval fiefdom buffeted by natural disasters, a motherless shepherd boy finds himself the unlikely pivot of a power struggle that puts all manner of faith to a savage test, in a spellbinding novel that represents Ottessa Moshfegh’s most exciting leap yet

Little Marek, the abused and delusional son of the village shepherd, never knew his mother; his father told him she died in childbirth. One of life’s few consolations for Marek is his enduring bond with the blind village midwife, Ina, who suckled him as a baby, as she did so many of the village’s children. Ina’s gifts extend beyond childcare: she possesses a unique ability to communicate with the natural world. Her gift often brings her the transmission of sacred knowledge on levels far beyond those available to other villagers, however religious they might be. For some people, Ina’s home in the woods outside of the village is a place to fear and to avoid, a godless place.

Among their number is Father Barnabas, the town priest and lackey for the depraved lord and governor, Villiam, whose hilltop manor contains a secret embarrassment of riches. The people’s desperate need to believe that there are powers that be who have their best interests at heart is put to a cruel test by Villiam and the priest, especially in this year of record drought and famine. But when fate brings Marek into violent proximity to the lord’s family, new and occult forces upset the old order. By year’s end, the veil between blindness and sight, life and death, the natural world and the spirit world, civility and savagery, will prove to be very thin indeed.]]> 313 Ottessa Moshfegh Merlyn 3 hardcore-fiction 3.53 2022 Lapvona
author: Ottessa Moshfegh
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.53
book published: 2022
rating: 3
read at: 2025/04/27
date added: 2025/04/27
shelves: hardcore-fiction
review:

]]> A Happy Death 15682 A Happy Death is a fascinating first sketch for The Outsider, but it can also be seen as a candid self-portrait, drawing on Camus's memories of his youth, travels, and early relationships. It is infused with lyrical descriptions of the sun-drenched Algiers of his childhood - the place where, eventually, Mersault is able to find peace and die 'without anger, without hatred, without regret'.]]> 144 Albert Camus Merlyn 0 to-read 3.89 1971 A Happy Death
author: Albert Camus
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.89
book published: 1971
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/28
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Justine, Philosophy in the Bedroom, and Other Writings]]> 53130 753 Marquis de Sade 0802132189 Merlyn 0 to-read 3.71 1791 Justine, Philosophy in the Bedroom, and Other Writings
author: Marquis de Sade
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.71
book published: 1791
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/19
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Death of Ivan Ilych 18386
How, Tolstoy asks, does an unreflective man confront his one and only moment of truth?

This short novel was an artistic culmination of a profound spiritual crisis in Tolstoy's life, a nine-year period following the publication of Anna Karenina during which he wrote not a word of fiction.
A thoroughly absorbing, and, at times, terrifying glimpse into the abyss of death, it is also a strong testament to the possibility of finding spiritual salvation.]]> 86 Leo Tolstoy Merlyn 0 to-read 4.12 1886 The Death of Ivan Ilych
author: Leo Tolstoy
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.12
book published: 1886
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/02
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Notes from Underground 49455 Notes from Underground marks the dividing line between nineteenth- and twentieth-century fiction, and between the visions of self each century embodied. One of the most remarkable characters in literature, the unnamed narrator is a former official who has defiantly withdrawn into an underground existence. In complete retreat from society, he scrawls a passionate, obsessive, self-contradictory narrative that serves as a devastating attack on social utopianism and an assertion of man’s essentially irrational nature.

Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky, whose Dostoevsky translations have become the standard, give us a brilliantly faithful edition of this classic novel, conveying all the tragedy and tormented comedy of the original.]]> 136 Fyodor Dostoevsky 067973452X Merlyn 0 to-read 4.21 1864 Notes from Underground
author: Fyodor Dostoevsky
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.21
book published: 1864
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/02
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Stranger 49552 The Stranger has long been considered a classic of twentieth-century literature. Le Monde ranks it as number one on its "100 Books of the Century" list. Through this story of an ordinary man unwittingly drawn into a senseless murder on a sundrenched Algerian beach, Camus explores what he termed "the nakedness of man faced with the absurd."]]> 123 Albert Camus Merlyn 5 philosophy 4.04 1942 The Stranger
author: Albert Camus
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.04
book published: 1942
rating: 5
read at: 2025/03/02
date added: 2025/03/02
shelves: philosophy
review:

]]> The Myth of Sisyphus 91950 The Myth of Sisyphus transformed twentieth-century philosophy with its impassioned argument for the value of life in a world without religious meaning.]]> 192 Albert Camus 0141182008 Merlyn 0 to-read 4.25 1942 The Myth of Sisyphus
author: Albert Camus
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.25
book published: 1942
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/11
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Fall 11991
The Fall (French: La Chute) is a philosophical novel by Albert Camus. First published in 1956, it is his last complete work of fiction. The Fall explores themes of innocence, imprisonment, non-existence, and truth. In a eulogy to Albert Camus, existentialist philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre described the novel as "perhaps the most beautiful and the least understood" of Camus' books.]]> 147 Albert Camus 0679720227 Merlyn 0 to-read 4.07 1956 The Fall
author: Albert Camus
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.07
book published: 1956
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/11
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Castle 333538 Translated and with a preface by Mark Harman

Left unfinished by Kafka in 1922 and not published until 1926, two years after his death, The Castle is the haunting tale of K.’s relentless, unavailing struggle with an inscrutable authority in order to gain access to the Castle. Scrupulously following the fluidity and breathlessness of the sparsely punctuated original manuscript, Mark Harman’s new translation reveals levels of comedy, energy, and visual power, previously unknown to English language readers.]]> 328 Franz Kafka 0805211063 Merlyn 0 to-read 3.97 1926 The Castle
author: Franz Kafka
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.97
book published: 1926
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/11
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Last Days 4309446 Last Days is a down-the-rabbit-hole detective novel set in an underground religious cult. The story follows Kline, a brutally dismembered detective forcibly recruited to solve a murder inside the cult. As Kline becomes more deeply involved with the group, he begins to realize the stakes are higher than he previously thought. Attempting to find his way through a maze of lies, threats, and misinformation, Kline discovers that his survival depends on an act of sheer will.

Last Days was first published in 2003 as a limited edition novella titled The Brotherhood of Mutilation. Its success led Evenson to expand the story into a full-length novel. In doing so, he has created a work that’s disturbing, deeply satisfying, and completely original.]]> 201 Brian Evenson 0980226007 Merlyn 4 horror 3.70 2009 Last Days
author: Brian Evenson
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.70
book published: 2009
rating: 4
read at: 2024/12/31
date added: 2024/12/31
shelves: horror
review:

]]> Last Days 15793201 531 Adam L.G. Nevill 1250018188 Merlyn 0 to-read 3.70 2012 Last Days
author: Adam L.G. Nevill
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.70
book published: 2012
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/12/28
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> No Longer Human 194746 No Longer Human, this leading postwar Japanese writer's second novel, tells the poignant and fascinating story of a young man who is caught between the breakup of the traditions of a northern Japanese aristocratic family and the impact of Western ideas. In consequence, he feels himself "disqualified from being human" (a literal translation of the Japanese title).

Donald Keene, who translated this and Dazai's first novel, The Setting Sun, has said of the author's work: "His world … suggests Chekhov or possibly postwar France, … but there is a Japanese sensibility in the choice and presentation of the material. A Dazai novel is at once immediately intelligible in Western terms and quite unlike any Western book." His writing is in some ways reminiscent of Rimbaud, while he himself has often been called a forerunner of Yukio Mishima.

Cover painting by Noe Nojechowiz, from the collection of John and Barbara Duncan; design by Gertrude Huston]]> 176 Osamu Dazai Merlyn 5 3.99 1948 No Longer Human
author: Osamu Dazai
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.99
book published: 1948
rating: 5
read at: 2024/05/13
date added: 2024/12/26
shelves: philosophy, merlyn-s-top-books
review:

]]> Jonathan Livingston Seagull 71728
Jonathan Livingston Seagull is no ordinary bird. He believes it is every gull's right to fly, to reach the ultimate freedom of challenge and discovery, finding his greatest reward in teaching younger gulls the joy of flight and the power of dreams. The special 20th anniversary release of this spiritual classic!]]> 112 Richard Bach 0743278909 Merlyn 5 3.87 1970 Jonathan Livingston Seagull
author: Richard Bach
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.87
book published: 1970
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2024/12/26
shelves: merlyn-s-top-books, philosophy
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Quantum Bullsh*t How to Ruin Your Life with Advice from Quantum Physics]]> 61263731 224 Chris Ferrie 172826605X Merlyn 4 physics 3.54 Quantum Bullsh*t How to Ruin Your Life with Advice from Quantum Physics
author: Chris Ferrie
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.54
book published:
rating: 4
read at: 2024/06/12
date added: 2024/12/26
shelves: physics
review:

]]> The Flowers of Buffoonery 61340205 The Flowers of Buffoonery opens in a seaside sanitarium where Yozo Oba — the narrator of No Longer Human — is convalescing after a failed suicide attempt. Friends and family visit him, and nurses and police drift in and out of his room. Against this dispiriting backdrop, Yozo and his visitors try to maintain a lighthearted, even clownish atmosphere: playing cards, smoking cigarettes, vying for attention, cracking jokes, and trying to make each other laugh. Dazai is known for delving into the darkest corners of human consciousness, but in The Flowers of Buffoonery he pokes fun at these same emotions: the follies and hardships of youth, of love, and of self-hatred and depression. A glimpse into the lives of a group of outsiders in prewar Japan, The Flowers of Buffoonery is a fresh and darkly humorous addition to Osamu Dazai’s masterful and intoxicating oeuvre.]]> 96 Osamu Dazai 0811234541 Merlyn 4 philosophy 3.83 1935 The Flowers of Buffoonery
author: Osamu Dazai
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.83
book published: 1935
rating: 4
read at: 2024/06/24
date added: 2024/12/26
shelves: philosophy
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Some Things I Still Can't Tell You: Poems]]> 58315381
This book is a compilation of small observations and musings. It's filled with moments of reflection and a love letter to simple joys: passing a simple blade of grass on the sidewalk, the freedom of peeing outdoors late at night, or the way a hand-built ceramic mug feels when it's full of warm tea on a chilly morning. It's a catalog and a compendium that examines the complicated experience of being all too human and interacting with a complex, confounding, breathtaking world … and a reminder to stop and be awake and alive in yourself.]]> 144 Misha Collins 1524870544 Merlyn 3 poetry 4.08 2021 Some Things I Still Can't Tell You: Poems
author: Misha Collins
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.08
book published: 2021
rating: 3
read at: 2023/02/28
date added: 2024/12/26
shelves: poetry
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Empire of Gold (The Daevabad Trilogy, #3)]]> 52166786 The final chapter in the Daevabad Trilogy, in which a con-woman and an idealistic djinn prince join forces to save a magical kingdom from a devastating civil war.

Daevabad has fallen.

After a brutal conquest stripped the city of its magic, Nahid leader Banu Manizheh and her resurrected commander, Dara, must try to repair their fraying alliance and stabilize a fractious, warring people.

But the bloodletting and loss of his beloved Nahri have unleashed the worst demons of Dara’s dark past. To vanquish them, he must face some ugly truths about his history and put himself at the mercy of those he once considered enemies.

Having narrowly escaped their murderous families and Daevabad’s deadly politics, Nahri and Ali, now safe in Cairo, face difficult choices of their own. While Nahri finds peace in the old rhythms and familiar comforts of her human home, she is haunted by the knowledge that the loved ones she left behind and the people who considered her a savior are at the mercy of a new tyrant. Ali, too, cannot help but look back, and is determined to return to rescue his city and the family that remains. Seeking support in his mother’s homeland, he discovers that his connection to the marid goes far deeper than expected and threatens not only his relationship with Nahri, but his very faith.

As peace grows more elusive and old players return, Nahri, Ali, and Dara come to understand that in order to remake the world, they may need to fight those they once loved . . . and take a stand for those they once hurt.]]> 766 S.A. Chakraborty 0062678167 Merlyn 4 fantasy 4.47 2020 The Empire of Gold (The Daevabad Trilogy, #3)
author: S.A. Chakraborty
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.47
book published: 2020
rating: 4
read at: 2023/02/19
date added: 2024/12/26
shelves: fantasy
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Kingdom of Copper (The Daevabad Trilogy, #2)]]> 39988431 Return to Daevabad in the spellbinding sequel to THE CITY OF BRASS.

Nahri’s life changed forever the moment she accidentally summoned Dara, a formidable, mysterious djinn, during one of her schemes. Whisked from her home in Cairo, she was thrust into the dazzling royal court of Daevabad and quickly discovered she would need all her grifter instincts to survive there.

Now, with Daevabad entrenched in the dark aftermath of the battle that saw Dara slain at Prince Ali’s hand, Nahri must forge a new path for herself, without the protection of the guardian who stole her heart or the counsel of the prince she considered a friend. But even as she embraces her heritage and the power it holds, she knows she’s been trapped in a gilded cage, watched by a king who rules from the throne that once belonged to her familyand one misstep will doom her tribe.

Meanwhile, Ali has been exiled for daring to defy his father. Hunted by assassins, adrift on the unforgiving copper sands of his ancestral land, he is forced to rely on the frightening abilities the marid, the unpredictable water spirits, have gifted him. But in doing so, he threatens to unearth a terrible secret his family has long kept buried.

And as a new century approaches and the djinn gather within Daevabad's towering brass walls for celebrations, a threat brews unseen in the desolate north. It’s a force that would bring a storm of fire straight to the city’s gates . . . and one that seeks the aid of a warrior trapped between worlds, torn between a violent duty he can never escape and a peace he fears he will never deserve.]]> 625 S.A. Chakraborty 0008239444 Merlyn 4 fantasy 4.37 2019 The Kingdom of Copper (The Daevabad Trilogy, #2)
author: S.A. Chakraborty
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.37
book published: 2019
rating: 4
read at: 2023/02/01
date added: 2024/12/26
shelves: fantasy
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The City of Brass (The Daevabad Trilogy, #1)]]> 32718027
But when Nahri accidentally summons an equally sly, darkly mysterious djinn warrior to her side during one of her cons, she’s forced to accept that the magical world she thought only existed in childhood stories is real. For the warrior tells her a new tale: across hot, windswept sands teeming with creatures of fire, and rivers where the mythical marid sleep; past ruins of once-magnificent human metropolises, and mountains where the circling hawks are not what they seem, lies Daevabad, the legendary city of brass, a city to which Nahri is irrevocably bound.

In that city, behind gilded brass walls laced with enchantments, behind the six gates of the six djinn tribes, old resentments are simmering. And when Nahri decides to enter this world, she learns that true power is fierce and brutal. That magic cannot shield her from the dangerous web of court politics. That even the cleverest of schemes can have deadly consequences.

After all, there is a reason they say be careful what you wish for...]]> 532 S.A. Chakraborty 0062678108 Merlyn 4 fantasy 4.12 2017 The City of Brass (The Daevabad Trilogy, #1)
author: S.A. Chakraborty
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.12
book published: 2017
rating: 4
read at: 2023/01/20
date added: 2024/12/26
shelves: fantasy
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Golden Enclaves (The Scholomance, #3)]]> 55858638 New York Times bestselling trilogy that began with A Deadly Education and The Last Graduate.

The one thing you never talk about while you're in the Scholomance is what you'll do when you get out. Not even the richest enclaver would tempt fate that way. But it's all we dream about, the hideously slim chance we'll survive to make it out the gates and improbably find ourselves with a life ahead of us, a life outside the Scholomance halls.

And now the impossible dream has come true. I'm out, we're all out--and I didn't even have to turn into a monstrous dark witch to make it happen. So much for my great-grandmother's prophecy of doom and destruction. I didn't kill enclavers, I saved them. Me, and Orion, and our allies. Our graduation plan worked to perfection: we saved everyone and made the world safe for all wizards and brought peace and harmony to all the enclaves of the world.

Ha, only joking! Actually it's gone all wrong. Someone else has picked up the project of destroying enclaves in my stead, and probably everyone we saved is about to get killed in the brewing enclave war on the horizon. And the first thing I've got to do now, having miraculously got out of the Scholomance, is turn straight around and find a way back in.]]> 407 Naomi Novik 0593158369 Merlyn 3 fantasy 4.08 2022 The Golden Enclaves (The Scholomance, #3)
author: Naomi Novik
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.08
book published: 2022
rating: 3
read at: 2023/01/01
date added: 2024/12/26
shelves: fantasy
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Last Graduate (The Scholomance, #2)]]> 55559887 A budding dark sorceress determined not to use her formidable powers uncovers yet more secrets about the workings of her world in the stunning sequel to A Deadly Education, the start of Naomi Novik’s groundbreaking crossover series.

At the Scholomance, El, Orion, and the other students are faced with their final year—and the looming specter of graduation, a deadly ritual that leaves few students alive in its wake. El is determined that her chosen group will survive, but it is a prospect that is looking harder by the day as the savagery of the school ramps up. Until El realizes that sometimes winning the game means throwing out all the rules . . .]]> 388 Naomi Novik 0593128869 Merlyn 3 fantasy 4.20 2021 The Last Graduate (The Scholomance, #2)
author: Naomi Novik
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.20
book published: 2021
rating: 3
read at: 2023/01/01
date added: 2024/12/26
shelves: fantasy
review:

]]> The Eyes Are the Best Part 195703882 Crying in H-Mart meets My Sister, the Serial Killer in this feminist psychological horror about the making of a female serial killer from a Korean-American perspective.

Ji-won’s life tumbles into disarray in the wake of her appa’s extramarital affair and subsequent departure. Her mother, distraught. Her younger sister, hurt and confused. Her college freshman grades, failing. Her dreams, horrifying… yet enticing.

In them, Ji-won walks through bloody rooms full of eyes. Succulent blue eyes. Salivatingly blue eyes. Eyes the same shape and shade as George’s, who is Umma’s obnoxious new boyfriend. George has already overstayed his welcome in her family’s claustrophobic apartment. He brags about his puffed-up consulting job, ogles Asian waitresses while dining out, and acts condescending toward Ji-won and her sister as if he deserves all of Umma’s fawning adoration. No, George doesn’t deserve anything from her family. Ji-won will make sure of that.

For no matter how many victims accumulate around her campus or how many people she must deceive and manipulate, Ji-won’s hunger and her rage deserve to be sated.

A brilliantly inventive, subversive novel about a young woman unraveling, Monika Kim’s The Eyes Are the Best Part is a story of a family falling apart and trying to find their way back to each other, marking a bold new voice in horror that will leave readers mesmerized and craving more.]]> 278 Monika Kim 1645661237 Merlyn 3 horror 3.81 2024 The Eyes Are the Best Part
author: Monika Kim
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.81
book published: 2024
rating: 3
read at: 2024/10/09
date added: 2024/12/26
shelves: horror
review:

]]> No Matter the Wreckage: Poems 18288210 No Matter the Wreckage presents readers with new and beloved work that showcases Kay's knack for celebrating family, love, travel, history, and unlikely love affairs between inanimate objects ("Toothbrush to the Bicycle Tire"), among other curious topics.

Both fresh and wise, Kay's poetry allows readers to join in on her journey of discovering herself and the world around her. It's an honest and powerful collection.]]> 143 Sarah Kay 1938912489 Merlyn 3 poetry 4.20 2014 No Matter the Wreckage: Poems
author: Sarah Kay
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.20
book published: 2014
rating: 3
read at: 2023/03/03
date added: 2024/12/26
shelves: poetry
review:

]]> The Dark Between Stars 40531948 Now a New York Times bestsellerFrom the internationally bestselling author of LOVE HER WILD comes THE DARK BETWEEN STARS, a new illustrated collection of heartfelt, whimsical, and romantic poems from Instagram poetry sensation, Atticus.Atticus has captured the hearts and minds of nearly 700k followers (including stars like Karlie Kloss, Emma Roberts, and Alicia Keys). In his second collection of poetry, The Dark Between Stars, he turns his attention to the dualities of our lived experiences = the inescapable connections between our highest highs and lowest lows. He captures the infectious energy of starting a relationship, the tumultuous realities of commitment, and the agonizing nostalgia of being alone again. While grappling with the question of how to live with purpose and find meaning in the journey, these poems offer both honest explorations of loneliness and our search for connection, as well as light-hearted, humorous observations. As Atticus writes poignantly about dancing, Paris, jazz clubs, sunsets, sharing a bottle of wine on the river, rainy days, creating, and destroying, he illustrates that we need moments of both beauty and pain = the darkness and the stars = to fully appreciate all that life and love have to offer.]]> 242 Atticus Poetry 1472259343 Merlyn 3 poetry 3.78 2018 The Dark Between Stars
author: Atticus Poetry
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.78
book published: 2018
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2024/12/26
shelves: poetry
review:

]]> Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde 51496 139 Robert Louis Stevenson 0451528956 Merlyn 3 horror 3.84 1886 Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
author: Robert Louis Stevenson
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.84
book published: 1886
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2024/12/26
shelves: horror
review:

]]> Kafka on the Shore 4929 Kafka on the Shore, a tour de force of metaphysical reality, is powered by two remarkable characters: a teenage boy, Kafka Tamura, who runs away from home either to escape a gruesome oedipal prophecy or to search for his long-missing mother and sister; and an aging simpleton called Nakata, who never recovered from a wartime affliction and now is drawn toward Kafka for reasons that, like the most basic activities of daily life, he cannot fathom. Their odyssey, as mysterious to them as it is to us, is enriched throughout by vivid accomplices and mesmerizing events. Cats and people carry on conversations, a ghostlike pimp employs a Hegel-quoting prostitute, a forest harbors soldiers apparently unaged since World War II, and rainstorms of fish (and worse) fall from the sky. There is a brutal murder, with the identity of both victim and perpetrator a riddle—yet this, along with everything else, is eventually answered, just as the entwined destinies of Kafka and Nakata are gradually revealed, with one escaping his fate entirely and the other given a fresh start on his own.]]> 467 Haruki Murakami 1400079276 Merlyn 0 to-read 4.14 2002 Kafka on the Shore
author: Haruki Murakami
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.14
book published: 2002
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/12/26
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Woman in the Dunes 9998 The Woman in the Dunes, by celebrated writer and thinker Kobo Abe, combines the essence of myth, suspense and the existential novel.

After missing the last bus home following a day trip to the seashore, an amateur entomologist is offered lodging for the night at the bottom of a vast sand pit. But when he attempts to leave the next morning, he quickly discovers that the locals have other plans. Held captive with seemingly no chance of escape, he is tasked with shoveling back the ever-advancing sand dunes that threaten to destroy the village. His only companion is an odd young woman, and together their fates become intertwined as they work side by side through this Sisyphean of tasks.]]> 241 KĹŤbĹŤ Abe 0679733787 Merlyn 0 to-read 3.89 1962 The Woman in the Dunes
author: KĹŤbĹŤ Abe
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.89
book published: 1962
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/12/26
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Snow Country 14028 Snow Country is widely considered to be the writer's masterpiece, a powerful tale of wasted love set amid the desolate beauty of western Japan.

At an isolated mountain hot spring, with snow blanketing every surface, Shimamura, a wealthy dilettante meets Komako, a lowly geisha. She gives herself to him fully and without remorse, despite knowing that their passion cannot last and that the affair can have only one outcome. In chronicling the course of this doomed romance, Kawabata has created a story for the ages, a stunning novel dense in implication and exalting in its sadness.]]> 175 Yasunari Kawabata 0679761047 Merlyn 0 to-read 3.63 1948 Snow Country
author: Yasunari Kawabata
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.63
book published: 1948
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/12/26
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Artemis 34928122
Well, sort of. Life on Artemis, the first and only city on the moon, is tough if you're not a rich tourist or an eccentric billionaire. So smuggling in the occasional harmless bit of contraband barely counts, right? Not when you've got debts to pay and your job as a porter barely covers the rent.

Everything changes when Jazz sees the chance to commit the perfect crime, with a reward too lucrative to turn down. But pulling off the impossible is just the start of her problems, as she learns that she's stepped square into a conspiracy for control of Artemis itself—and that now, her only chance at survival lies in a gambit even riskier than the first.]]> 305 Andy Weir 0553448129 Merlyn 0 to-read 3.66 2017 Artemis
author: Andy Weir
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.66
book published: 2017
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/10/18
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[This Is How You Lose the Time War]]> 43352954 Burn before reading. Thus begins an unlikely correspondence between two rival agents hellbent on securing the best possible future for their warring factions. Now, what began as a taunt, a battlefield boast, grows into something more. Something epic. Something romantic. Something that could change the past and the future.

Except the discovery of their bond would mean death for each of them. There's still a war going on, after all. And someone has to win that war.]]> 209 Amal El-Mohtar Merlyn 0 fantasy, currently-reading 3.86 2019 This Is How You Lose the Time War
author: Amal El-Mohtar
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.86
book published: 2019
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/10/09
shelves: fantasy, currently-reading
review:

]]> Piercing 14288
One night, as this struggle unfolds once more, Kawashima makes a decision to confront his demons and sets into motion an uncontrollable chain of events seeming to lead inexorably to murder. The follow-up to In the Miso Soup from a cult favorite writer, Piercing confirms Murakami as the master of the psycho thriller—terrifying, sickening, and utterly gripping.]]> 184 Ryū Murakami 014303863X Merlyn 4 horror 3.69 1994 Piercing
author: Ryū Murakami
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.69
book published: 1994
rating: 4
read at: 2024/07/31
date added: 2024/07/31
shelves: horror
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Redemption of Time (The Three-Body Problem Series Book 4)]]> 42646354 Set in the universe of the New York Times bestselling Three-Body Problem trilogy, The Redemption of Time continues Cixin Liu’s multi-award-winning science fiction saga. This original story by Baoshu—published with Liu’s support—envisions the aftermath of the conflict between humanity and the extraterrestrial Trisolarans.

In the midst of an interstellar war, Yun Tianming found himself on the front lines. Riddled with cancer, he chose to end his life, only to find himself flash frozen and launched into space where the Trisolaran First Fleet awaited. Captured and tortured beyond endurance for decades, Yun eventually succumbed to helping the aliens subjugate humanity in order to save Earth from complete destruction.

Granted a healthy clone body by the Trisolarans, Yun has spent his very long life in exile as a traitor to the human race. Nearing the end of his existence at last, he suddenly receives another reprieve—and another regeneration. A consciousness calling itself The Spirit has recruited him to wage battle against an entity that threatens the existence of the entire universe. But Yun refuses to be a pawn again and makes his own plans to save humanity’s future…

At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.]]> 259 Baoshu 1250306019 Merlyn 0 to-read 3.93 2011 The Redemption of Time (The Three-Body Problem Series Book 4)
author: Baoshu
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.93
book published: 2011
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/07/12
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]]> <![CDATA[Death's End (The Three-Body Problem, #3)]]> 65645376 Half a century after the Doomsday Battle, the uneasy balance of Dark Forest Deterrence keeps the Trisolaran invaders at bay.

Earth enjoys unprecedented prosperity due to the infusion of Trisolaran knowledge and, with human science advancing and the Trisolarans adopting Earth culture, it seems that the two civilizations can co-exist peacefully as equals without the terrible threat of mutually assured annihilation. But peace has made humanity complacent.

Cheng Xin, an aerospace engineer from the 21st century, awakens from hibernation in this new age. She brings knowledge of a long-forgotten program dating from the start of the Trisolar Crisis, and her presence may upset the delicate balance between two worlds. Will humanity reach for the stars or die in its cradle?
Praise for The Three-Body Problem :
'Your next favourite sci-fi novel' Wired
'Immense' Barack Obama
'Unique' George R.R. Martin
'SF in the grand style' Guardian
'Mind-altering and immersive' Daily Mail
Winner of the Hugo and Galaxy Awards for Best Novel]]> 605 Cixin Liu Merlyn 0 to-read 4.46 2010 Death's End (The Three-Body Problem, #3)
author: Cixin Liu
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.46
book published: 2010
rating: 0
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]]> <![CDATA[The Dark Forest (The Three-Body Problem, #2)]]> 66562105
Earth has. Now the predators are coming.

Crossing light years, the Trisolarians will reach Earth in four centuries' time. But the sophons, their extra-dimensional agents and saboteurs, are already here. Only the individual human mind remains immune to their influence.

This is the motivation for the Wallfacer Project, a last-ditch defence that grants four individuals almost absolute power to design secret strategies, hidden through deceit and misdirection from human and alien alike. Three of the Wallfacers are influential statesmen and scientists, but the fourth is a total unknown.]]> 513 Liu Cixin 1784971588 Merlyn 0 to-read 4.50 2008 The Dark Forest (The Three-Body Problem, #2)
author: Liu Cixin
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.50
book published: 2008
rating: 0
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]]> <![CDATA[The Three-Body Problem (Remembrance of Earth’s Past, #1)]]> 20518872 472 Liu Cixin Merlyn 0 to-read 4.07 2006 The Three-Body Problem (Remembrance of Earth’s Past, #1)
author: Liu Cixin
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.07
book published: 2006
rating: 0
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]]> White Nights 1772910 82 Fyodor Dostoevsky Merlyn 0 to-read 4.16 1848 White Nights
author: Fyodor Dostoevsky
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.16
book published: 1848
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/05/31
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]]> The Setting Sun 194740
The story is told through the eyes of Kazuko, the unmarried daughter of a widowed aristocrat. Her search for self meaning in a society devoid of use for her forms the crux of Dazai’s novel. It is a sad story, and structurally is a novel very much within the confines of the Japanese take on the novel in a way reminiscent of authors such as Nobel Prize winner Yasunari Kawabata – the social interactions are peripheral and understated, nuances must be drawn, and for readers more used to Western novelistic forms this comes across as being rather wishy-washy.

Kazuko’s mother falls ill, and due to their financial circumstances they are forced to take a cottage in the countryside. Her brother, who became addicted to opium during the war is missing. When he returns, Kazuko attempts to form a liaison with the novelist Uehara. This romantic displacement only furthers to deepen her alienation from society.]]> 175 Osamu Dazai 0811200329 Merlyn 0 to-read 4.00 1947 The Setting Sun
author: Osamu Dazai
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.00
book published: 1947
rating: 0
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]]> Kokoro 762476 The New Yorker as "rich in understanding and insight,"

Kokoro—"the heart of things"—is the work of one of Japan's most popular authors. This thought-provoking trilogy of stories explores the very essence of loneliness and stands as a stirring introduction to modern Japanese literature.

What is love, and what is friendship? What is the extent of our responsibility to ourselves and to others? A trilogy of stories that explores the very essence of loneliness, Kokoro opens with "Sensei and I," in which the narrator recounts his relationship with an intellectual who dwells in isolation but maintains a sophisticated worldview. "My Parents and I" brings the reader into the narrator's family circle, and "Sensei and His Testament" features the eponymous character's explanation of how he came to live a life of solitude.

Natsume Soseki (1867–1916), perhaps the greatest novelist of the Meiji period, remains one of Japan's most widely read authors. He wrote this novel in 1914, at the peak of his career, and it remains an excellent introduction to modern Japanese literature.]]> 256 Natsume Sōseki 0809260956 Merlyn 0 to-read 4.05 1914 Kokoro
author: Natsume SĹŤseki
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.05
book published: 1914
rating: 0
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]]> <![CDATA[The Diving Bell and the Butterfly: A Memoir of Life in Death]]> 193755 Elle, suffered a massive stroke that left him completely and permanently paralyzed, a victim of "locked-in syndrome." Where once he had been renowned for his gregariousness and wit, Bauby now found himself imprisoned in an inert body, able to communicate only by blinking his left eye. The miracle is that in doing so he was able to compose this stunningly eloquent memoir, which was published two days before Bauby's death in 1996 and went on to become a number-one bestseller across Europe.

The second miracle is that The Diving Bell and the Butterfly is less a record of affliction than it is a celebration of the liberating power of consciousness. In a voice that is by turns wistful and mischievous, angry and sardonic, Bauby tells us what it is like to spend a day with his children; to imagine lying in bed beside his lover; to conjure up the flavor of delectable meals even as he is fed by tube. Most of all, this triumphant book allows us to follow the flight of an indomitable spirit and to share its exultation at its own survival.]]> 132 Jean-Dominique Bauby 0375701214 Merlyn 5 merlyn-s-top-books, memoir 4.00 1997 The Diving Bell and the Butterfly: A Memoir of Life in Death
author: Jean-Dominique Bauby
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.00
book published: 1997
rating: 5
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]]> The Life of a Stupid Man 24874322
Autobiographical stories from one of Japan's masters of modernist story-telling.

Introducing Little Black Classics: 80 books for Penguin's 80th birthday. Little Black Classics celebrate the huge range and diversity of Penguin Classics, with books from around the world and across many centuries. They take us from a balloon ride over Victorian London to a garden of blossom in Japan, from Tierra del Fuego to 16th-century California and the Russian steppe. Here are stories lyrical and savage; poems epic and intimate; essays satirical and inspirational; and ideas that have shaped the lives of millions.

Ryunosuke Akutagawa (1892-1927)

Akutagawa's Rashomon and Seventeen Other Stories is also available in Penguin Classics.]]> 55 Ryūnosuke Akutagawa 0141397721 Merlyn 0 to-read 3.65 1927 The Life of a Stupid Man
author: Ryūnosuke Akutagawa
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.65
book published: 1927
rating: 0
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]]> The Satanic Verses 12781
From the back cover.]]> 561 Salman Rushdie 0312270828 Merlyn 0 currently-reading, philosophy 3.73 1988 The Satanic Verses
author: Salman Rushdie
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.73
book published: 1988
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/05/31
shelves: currently-reading, philosophy
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]]> Love: A History 10179796 294 Simon May 0300118309 Merlyn 0 to-read 3.84 2011 Love: A History
author: Simon May
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.84
book published: 2011
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/01/09
shelves: to-read
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]]> Dark Places 5886881
Since then, she has been drifting. But when she is contacted by a group who are convinced of Ben's innocence, Libby starts to ask questions she never dared to before. Was the voice she heard her brother's? Ben was a misfit in their small town, but was he capable of murder? Are there secrets to uncover at the family farm or is Libby deluding herself because she wants her brother back?

She begins to realise that everyone in her family had something to hide that day... especially Ben. Now, twenty-four years later, the truth is going to be even harder to find.

Who did massacre the Day family?]]> 424 Gillian Flynn 0307341569 Merlyn 0 to-read 3.95 2009 Dark Places
author: Gillian Flynn
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.95
book published: 2009
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/11/01
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]]> <![CDATA[Guilty Pleasures (Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter, #1)]]> 30281 355 Laurell K. Hamilton 0425197549 Merlyn 0 to-read 4.05 1993 Guilty Pleasures (Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter, #1)
author: Laurell K. Hamilton
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.05
book published: 1993
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/11/01
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]]> Blindness 2526 No food, no water, no government, no obligation, no order.

Discover a chillingly powerful and prescient dystopian vision from one of Europe's greatest writers.

A driver waiting at the traffic lights goes blind. An ophthalmologist tries to diagnose his distinctive white blindness, but is affected before he can read the textbooks.
It becomes a contagion, spreading throughout the city. Trying to stem the epidemic, the authorities herd the afflicted into a mental asylum where the wards are terrorised by blind thugs. And when fire destroys the asylum, the inmates burst forth and the last links with a supposedly civilised society are snapped.

This is not anarchy, this is blindness.

â€Saramago repeatedly undertakes to unite the pressing demands of the present with an unfolding vision of the future. This is his most apocalyptic, and most optimistic, version of that project yet’ Independent]]> 326 JosĂ© Saramago Merlyn 0 to-read 4.04 1995 Blindness
author: José Saramago
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.04
book published: 1995
rating: 0
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]]> House of Leaves 24800
Of course, neither Pulitzer Prize-winning photojournalist Will Navidson nor his companion Karen Green was prepared to face the consequences of that impossibility, until the day their two little children wandered off and their voices eerily began to return another story—of creature darkness, of an ever-growing abyss behind a closet door, and of that unholy growl which soon enough would tear through their walls and consume all their dreams.]]> 710 Mark Z. Danielewski Merlyn 0 to-read 4.11 2000 House of Leaves
author: Mark Z. Danielewski
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2000
rating: 0
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]]> Requiem for a Dream 46945
Entranced by the gleaming visions of their futures, these four convince themselves that unexpected setbacks are only temporary. Even as their lives slowly deteriorate around them, they cling to their delusions and become utterly consumed in a spiral of drugs and addiction, refusing to see that they have instead created their own worst nightmares.

"Selby's place is in the front rank of American novelists . . . To understand Selby's work is to understand the anguish of America." —The New York Times Book Review]]> 279 Hubert Selby Jr. 1560252480 Merlyn 0 to-read 4.11 1978 Requiem for a Dream
author: Hubert Selby Jr.
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.11
book published: 1978
rating: 0
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]]> <![CDATA[The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo (Millennium #1)]]> 2429135
An international publishing sensation, Stieg Larsson’s The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo combines murder mystery, family saga, love story, and financial intrigue into one satisfyingly complex and entertainingly atmospheric novel.]]> 480 Stieg Larsson 0670069019 Merlyn 0 to-read 4.17 2005 The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo (Millennium #1)
author: Stieg Larsson
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.17
book published: 2005
rating: 0
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]]> The Metamorphosis 485894 Alternate cover edition of ISBN 0553213695 / 9780553213690

"As Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from uneasy dreams he found himself transformed in his bed into a gigantic insect. He was laying on his hard, as it were armor-plated, back and when he lifted his head a little he could see his domelike brown belly divided into stiff arched segments on top of which the bed quilt could hardly keep in position and was about to slide off completely. His numerous legs, which were pitifully thin compared to the rest of his bulk, waved helplessly before his eyes."

With it's startling, bizarre, yet surprisingly funny first opening, Kafka begins his masterpiece, The Metamorphosis. It is the story of a young man who, transformed overnight into a giant beetle-like insect, becomes an object of disgrace to his family, an outsider in his own home, a quintessentially alienated man. A harrowing—though absurdly comic—meditation on human feelings of inadequacy, guilt, and isolation, The Metamorphosis has taken its place as one of the most widely read and influential works of twentieth-century fiction. As W.H. Auden wrote, "Kafka is important to us because his predicament is the predicament of modern man."]]> 201 Franz Kafka 0553213695 Merlyn 0 to-read 3.90 1915 The Metamorphosis
author: Franz Kafka
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.90
book published: 1915
rating: 0
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]]> <![CDATA[Flowers in the Attic (Dollanganger, #1)]]> 43448 Such wonderful children. Such a beautiful mother. Such a lovely house. Such endless terror! It wasn't that she didn't love her children. She did. But there was a fortune at stake—a fortune that would assure their later happiness if she could keep the children a secret from her dying father. So she and her mother hid her darlings away in an unused attic. Just for a little while. But the brutal days swelled into agonizing years. Now Cathy, Chris, and the twins wait in their cramped and helpless world, stirred by adult dreams, adult desires, served a meager sustenance by an angry, superstitious grandmother who knows that the Devil works in dark and devious ways. Sometimes he sends children to do his work—children who—one by one—must be destroyed.... 'Way upstairs there are four secrets hidden. Blond, beautiful, innocent struggling to stay alive....']]> 389 V.C. Andrews 0743496310 Merlyn 0 to-read 3.84 1979 Flowers in the Attic (Dollanganger, #1)
author: V.C. Andrews
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.84
book published: 1979
rating: 0
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]]> 1984 61439040
Alternate cover edition can be found here.]]> 368 George Orwell 0452284236 Merlyn 0 to-read 4.21 1949 1984
author: George Orwell
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.21
book published: 1949
rating: 0
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]]> A Clockwork Orange 41817486 A Clockwork Orange is a frightening fable about good and evil and the meaning of human freedom. This edition includes the controversial last chapter not published in the first edition, and Burgess’s introduction, “A Clockwork Orange Resucked.”]]> 240 Anthony Burgess 0393341763 Merlyn 0 to-read 4.04 1962 A Clockwork Orange
author: Anthony Burgess
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.04
book published: 1962
rating: 0
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]]> Nickel Bay Nick 17465440 Ěý
Eleven-year-old Sam Brattle is already having the worst Christmas ever – his dad’s bakery is going bankrupt and his mom is spending the holidays with her new family. To make things worse, Nickel Bay Nick, the anonymous Good Samaritan who leaves hundred-dollar bills around Nickel Bay at Christmastime, is a no-show, so this year the rest of the town is as miserable as Sam. When he stumbles upon the secret identity of this mysterious do-gooder, Sam is stunned to learn that he might now be his town’s only hope. But before he can rescue Nickel Bay, Sam has to learn the skills of a spy and unravel some even darker secrets that will change his life forever.]]> 272 Dean Pitchford 039925465X Merlyn 0 to-read 4.22 2013 Nickel Bay Nick
author: Dean Pitchford
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.22
book published: 2013
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/11/01
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]]> The Veldt 120555 45 Ray Bradbury 0886821088 Merlyn 0 to-read 4.15 1950 The Veldt
author: Ray Bradbury
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.15
book published: 1950
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/10/22
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]]> <![CDATA[Jenntte Mccurdy New Memoir, I’m Glad My Mom is Dead: An Extremely Complicated Relationship With Her Mother, Career And Eating Disorder]]> 61935013 This book does not in any capacity mean to replace the original book but to serve as a vast summary of the original book.

IN THIS BOOK, YOU WILL About the original book Jennette McCurdy was six years old when she had her first acting audition. Her mother’s dream was for her only daughter to become a star, and Jennette would do anything to make her mother happy. So she went along with what Mom called “calorie restriction,” eating little and weighing herself five times a day. She endured extensive at-home makeovers while Mom chided, “Your eyelashes are invisible, okay? You think Dakota Fanning doesn’t tint hers?” She was even showered by Mom until age sixteen while sharing her diaries, email, and all her income.

In I’m Glad My Mom Died, Jennette recounts all this in unflinching detail—just as she chronicles what happens when the dream finally comes true. Cast in a new Nickelodeon series called iCarly, she is thrust into fame. Though Mom is ecstatic, emailing fan club moderators and getting on a first-name basis with the paparazzi (“Hi Gale!”), Jennette is riddled with anxiety, shame, and self-loathing, which manifest into eating disorders, addiction, and a series of unhealthy relationships. These issues only get worse when, soon after taking the lead in the iCarly spinoff Sam & Cat alongside Ariana Grande, her mother dies of cancer. Finally, after discovering therapy and quitting acting, Jennette embarks on recovery and decides for the first time in her life what she really wants.]]> 43 Cassandra kiesel Merlyn 0 to-read 4.10 Jenntte Mccurdy New Memoir, I’m Glad My Mom is Dead: An Extremely Complicated Relationship With Her Mother, Career And Eating Disorder
author: Cassandra kiesel
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.10
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rating: 0
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date added: 2023/08/31
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]]> When Breath Becomes Air 25899336
At the age of thirty-six, on the verge of completing a decade's worth of training as a neurosurgeon, Paul Kalanithi was diagnosed with stage IV lung cancer. One day he was a doctor treating the dying, and the next he was a patient struggling to live. And just like that, the future he and his wife had imagined evaporated. When Breath Becomes Air chronicles Kalanithi's transformation from a naĂŻve medical student "possessed," as he wrote, "by the question of what, given that all organisms die, makes a virtuous and meaningful life" into a neurosurgeon at Stanford working in the brain, the most critical place for human identity, and finally into a patient and new father confronting his own mortality.

What makes life worth living in the face of death? What do you do when the future, no longer a ladder toward your goals in life, flattens out into a perpetual present? What does it mean to have a child, to nurture a new life as another fades away? These are some of the questions Kalanithi wrestles with in this profoundly moving, exquisitely observed memoir.

Paul Kalanithi died in March 2015, while working on this book, yet his words live on as a guide and a gift to us all. "I began to realize that coming face to face with my own mortality, in a sense, had changed nothing and everything," he wrote. "Seven words from Samuel Beckett began to repeat in my head: 'I can't go on. I'll go on.'" When Breath Becomes Air is an unforgettable, life-affirming reflection on the challenge of facing death and on the relationship between doctor and patient, from a brilliant writer who became both.]]> 208 Paul Kalanithi 0812988418 Merlyn 0 to-read 4.41 2016 When Breath Becomes Air
author: Paul Kalanithi
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.41
book published: 2016
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/07/13
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]]> The Midnight Library 52578297
When Nora Seed finds herself in the Midnight Library, she has a chance to make things right. Up until now, her life has been full of misery and regret. She feels she has let everyone down, including herself. But things are about to change.

The books in the Midnight Library enable Nora to live as if she had done things differently. With the help of an old friend, she can now undo every one of her regrets as she tries to work out her perfect life. But things aren't always what she imagined they'd be, and soon her choices place the library and herself in extreme danger.

Before time runs out, she must answer the ultimate question: what is the best way to live?]]> 288 Matt Haig 0525559477 Merlyn 0 to-read 3.96 2020 The Midnight Library
author: Matt Haig
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.96
book published: 2020
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/07/13
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]]> <![CDATA[Before the Coffee Gets Cold (Before the Coffee Gets Cold, #1)]]> 44421460 What would you change if you could go back in time?

In a small back alley in Tokyo, there is a café which has been serving carefully brewed coffee for more than one hundred years. But this coffee shop offers its customers a unique experience: the chance to travel back in time.

In Before the Coffee Gets Cold, we meet four visitors, each of whom is hoping to make use of the café’s time-travelling offer, in order to: confront the man who left them, receive a letter from their husband whose memory has been taken by early onset Alzheimer's, to see their sister one last time, and to meet the daughter they never got the chance to know.

But the journey into the past does not come without risks: customers must sit in a particular seat, they cannot leave the café, and finally, they must return to the present before the coffee gets cold . . .

Toshikazu Kawaguchi’s beautiful, moving story explores the age-old question: what would you change if you could travel back in time? More importantly, who would you want to meet, maybe for one last time?]]> 213 Toshikazu Kawaguchi 1529029589 Merlyn 0 to-read 3.66 2015 Before the Coffee Gets Cold (Before the Coffee Gets Cold, #1)
author: Toshikazu Kawaguchi
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.66
book published: 2015
rating: 0
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]]> The Alchemist 18144590 The Alchemist has become a modern classic, selling millions of copies around the world and transforming the lives of countless readers across generations.

Paulo Coelho's masterpiece tells the mystical story of Santiago, an Andalusian shepherd boy who yearns to travel in search of a worldly treasure. His quest will lead him to riches far different—and far more satisfying—than he ever imagined. Santiago's journey teaches us about the essential wisdom of listening to our hearts, recognizing opportunity and learning to read the omens strewn along life's path, and, most importantly, following our dreams.]]> 182 Paulo Coelho 0062315005 Merlyn 0 to-read 4.01 1988 The Alchemist
author: Paulo Coelho
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.01
book published: 1988
rating: 0
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]]> <![CDATA[The Perks of Being a Wallflower]]> 22628 offers a unique perspective. But there comes a time to see
what it looks like from the dance floor.

This haunting novel about the dilemma of passivity vs. passion marks the stunning debut of a provocative new voice in contemporary fiction: The Perks of Being A WALLFLOWER

This is the story of what it's like to grow up in high school. More intimate than a diary, Charlie's letters are singular and unique, hilarious and devastating. We may not know where he lives. We may not know to whom he is writing. All we know is the world he shares. Caught between trying to live his life and trying to run from it puts him on a strange course through uncharted territory. The world of first dates and mixed tapes, family dramas and new friends. The world of sex, drugs, and The Rocky Horror Picture Show, when all one requires is that the perfect song on that perfect drive to feel infinite.

Through Charlie, Stephen Chbosky has created a deeply affecting coming-of-age story, a powerful novel that will spirit you back to those wild and poignant roller coaster days known as growing up.

(back cover)]]> 213 Stephen Chbosky Merlyn 0 to-read 4.24 1999 The Perks of Being a Wallflower
author: Stephen Chbosky
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.24
book published: 1999
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/06/13
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]]> Girl in Pieces 29236380
Every new scar hardens Charlie’s heart just a little more, yet it still hurts so much. It hurts enough to not care anymore, which is sometimes what has to happen before you can find your way back from the edge.]]> 416 Kathleen Glasgow 1101934719 Merlyn 0 to-read 3.94 2016 Girl in Pieces
author: Kathleen Glasgow
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.94
book published: 2016
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/06/13
shelves: to-read
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]]> Speak 39280444
"Speak up for yourself—we want to know what you have to say."

From the first moment of her freshman year at Merryweather High, Melinda knows this is a big fat lie, part of the nonsense of high school. She is friendless, outcast, because she busted an end-of-summer party by calling the cops, so now nobody will talk to her, let alone listen to her. As time passes, she becomes increasingly isolated and practically stops talking altogether. Only her art class offers any solace, and it is through her work on an art project that she is finally able to face what really happened at that terrible party: she was raped by an upperclassman, a guy who still attends Merryweather and is still a threat to her. Her healing process has just begun when she has another violent encounter with him. But this time Melinda fights back, refuses to be silent, and thereby achieves a measure of vindication.

In Laurie Halse Anderson's powerful novel, an utterly believable heroine with a bitterly ironic voice delivers a blow to the hypocritical world of high school. She speaks for many a disenfranchised teenager while demonstrating the importance of speaking up for oneself.

Speak was a 1999 National Book Award Finalist for Young People's Literature.]]> 224 Laurie Halse Anderson 0374311250 Merlyn 0 to-read 4.13 1999 Speak
author: Laurie Halse Anderson
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.13
book published: 1999
rating: 0
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]]> Go Ask Alice 46799
Read her diary.

Enter her world.

You will never forget her.

]]> 213 Beatrice Sparks 1416914633 Merlyn 0 to-read 3.75 1971 Go Ask Alice
author: Beatrice Sparks
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.75
book published: 1971
rating: 0
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]]> <![CDATA[A Child Called "It" (Dave Pelzer, #1)]]> 60748 Also see: Alternate Cover Editions for this ISBN [ACE]
ACE #1

This book chronicles the unforgettable account of one of the most severe child abuse cases in California history. It is the story of Dave Pelzer, who was brutally beaten and starved by his emotionally unstable, alcoholic mother: a mother who played tortuous, unpredictable games—games that left him nearly dead. He had to learn how to play his mother's games in order to survive because she no longer considered him a son, but a slave; and no longer a boy, but an "it." Dave's bed was an old army cot in the basement, and his clothes were torn and raunchy. When his mother allowed him the luxury of food, it was nothing more than spoiled scraps that even the dogs refused to eat. The outside world knew nothing of his living nightmare. He had nothing or no one to turn to, but his dreams kept him alive—dreams of someone taking care of him, loving him and calling him their son.]]> 184 Dave Pelzer Merlyn 0 to-read 4.14 1995 A Child Called "It" (Dave Pelzer, #1)
author: Dave Pelzer
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.14
book published: 1995
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/06/13
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]]> When Nietzsche Wept 21031
Josef Breuer, one of the founding fathers of psychoanalysis, is at the height of his career. Friedrich Nietzsche, Europe's greatest philosopher, is on the brink of suicidal despair, unable to find a cure for the headaches and other ailments that plague him. When he agrees to treat Nietzsche with his experimental "talking cure", Breuer never expects that he, too, will find solace in their sessions. Only through facing his own inner demons can the gifted healer begin to help his patient.

In When Nietzsche Wept, Irvin Yalom blends fact and fiction, atmosphere and suspense to unfold an unforgettable story about the redemptive power of friendship.]]> 310 Irvin D. Yalom 0060748125 Merlyn 0 to-read 4.36 1992 When Nietzsche Wept
author: Irvin D. Yalom
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.36
book published: 1992
rating: 0
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]]> Demons 5695 0679734511. (ISBN13: 9780679734512)

Inspired by the true story of a political murder that horrified Russians in 1869, Fyodor Dostoevsky conceived of Demons as a "novel-pamphlet" in which he would say everything about the plague of materialist ideology that he saw infecting his native land. What emerged was a prophetic and ferociously funny masterpiece of ideology and murder in pre-revolutionary Russia.]]> 733 Fyodor Dostoevsky Merlyn 0 to-read 4.31 1872 Demons
author: Fyodor Dostoevsky
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.31
book published: 1872
rating: 0
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]]> Alexander's Infinity 58619459
The experience turns into a springboard for a daring new escapade into a life of self-discovery and reconciliation. In an effort to find answers to his troubled love affairs and ambivalent relation to religion, the once reticent loner undertakes a spiritual experiment in the East. He leaves his comfortable but predictable life behind, and becomes a seeker.

From the yoga ashrams of India to the Buddhist monasteries of Burma, this spiritual novel takes the reader on a pilgrimage through the thicket of human insecurities and aspirations. Alexander learns to navigate the perilous landscape of modern spirituality, con-masters and authentic teachers, and as a result he discovers, articulates and manifests his own response to the baits of love and faith, radically different from the ones he had once held.]]> 256 Lidija Stankovikj 9354901115 Merlyn 0 to-read 5.00 Alexander's Infinity
author: Lidija Stankovikj
name: Merlyn
average rating: 5.00
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]]> Impermanence 35851712 Daniel Frisano Merlyn 0 to-read 4.27 Impermanence
author: Daniel Frisano
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.27
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rating: 0
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]]> <![CDATA[Why Fish Don’t Exist: A Story of Loss, Love, and the Hidden Order of Life]]> 50887097 A wondrous debut from an extraordinary new voice in nonfiction, Why Fish Don’t Exist is a dark and astonishing tale of love, chaos, scientific obsession, and—possibly—even murder.

David Starr Jordan was a taxonomist, a man possessed with bringing order to the natural world. In time, he would be credited with discovering nearly a fifth of the fish known to humans in his day. But the more of the hidden blueprint of life he uncovered, the harder the universe seemed to try to thwart him. His specimen collections were demolished by lightning, by fire, and eventually by the 1906 San Francisco earthquake—which sent more than a thousand of his discoveries, housed in fragile glass jars, plummeting to the floor. In an instant, his life’s work was shattered.

Many might have given up, given in to despair. But Jordan? He surveyed the wreckage at his feet, found the first fish he recognized, and confidently began to rebuild his collection. And this time, he introduced one clever innovation that he believed would at last protect his work against the chaos of the world.

When NPR reporter Lulu Miller first heard this anecdote in passing, she took Jordan for a fool—a cautionary tale in hubris, or denial. But as her own life slowly unraveled, she began to wonder about him. Perhaps instead he was a model for how to go on when all seemed lost. What she would unearth about his life would transform her understanding of history, morality, and the world beneath her feet.

Part biography, part memoir, part scientific adventure, Why Fish Don’t Exist reads like a fable about how to persevere in a world where chaos will always prevail.]]> 225 Lulu Miller Merlyn 0 to-read 4.15 2020 Why Fish Don’t Exist: A Story of Loss, Love, and the Hidden Order of Life
author: Lulu Miller
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.15
book published: 2020
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/06/13
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review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Creative Act: A Way of Being]]> 60965426 From the legendary music producer, a master at helping people connect with the wellsprings of their creativity, comes a beautifully crafted book many years in the making that offers that same deep wisdom to all of us.

"A gorgeous and inspiring work of art on creation, creativity, the work of the artist. It will gladden the hearts of writers and artists everywhere, and get them working again with a new sense of meaning and direction. A stunning accomplishment." --Anne Lamott

"I set out to write a book about what to do to make a great work of art. Instead, it revealed itself to be a book on how to be." --Rick Rubin

Many famed music producers are known for a particular sound that has its day. Rick Rubin is known for something else: creating a space where artists of all different genres and traditions can home in on who they really are and what they really offer. He has made a practice of helping people transcend their self-imposed expectations in order to reconnect with a state of innocence from which the surprising becomes inevitable. Over the years, as he has thought deeply about where creativity comes from and where it doesn't, he has learned that being an artist isn't about your specific output, it's about your relationship to the world. Creativity has a place in everyone's life, and everyone can make that place larger. In fact, there are few more important responsibilities.

The Creative Act is a beautiful and generous course of study that illuminates the path of the artist as a road we all can follow. It distills the wisdom gleaned from a lifetime's work into a luminous reading experience that puts the power to create moments--and lifetimes--of exhilaration and transcendence within closer reach for all of us.]]> 406 Rick Rubin 0593652886 Merlyn 0 to-read 4.00 2023 The Creative Act: A Way of Being
author: Rick Rubin
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.00
book published: 2023
rating: 0
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]]> Monsters: A Fan's Dilemma 61685822 From the author of the New York Times best seller Poser and the acclaimed memoir Love and Trouble, a passionate, provocative, blisteringly smart interrogation of how we make and experience art in the age of #MeToo, and of the link between genius and monstrosity.

In this unflinching, deeply personal book that expands on her instantly viral Paris Review essay, What Do We Do with the Art of Monstrous Men? Claire Dederer asks: Can we love the work of Hemingway, Polanski, Naipaul, Miles Davis, or Picasso? Should we love it? Does genius deserve special dispensation? Is male monstrosity the same as female monstrosity? Does art have a mandate to depict the darker elements of the psyche? And what happens if the artist stares too long into the abyss? She explores the audience's relationship with artists from Woody Allen to Michael Jackson, asking: How do we balance our undeniable sense of moral outrage with our equally undeniable love of the work? In a more troubling vein, she wonders if an artist needs to be a monster in order to create something great. And if an artist is also a mother, does one identity inexorably, and fatally, interrupt the other? Highly topical, morally wise, honest to the core, Monsters is certain to incite a conversation about whether and how we can separate artists from their art.]]> 257 Claire Dederer 0525655115 Merlyn 0 to-read 3.75 2023 Monsters: A Fan's Dilemma
author: Claire Dederer
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.75
book published: 2023
rating: 0
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]]> Gertrude 34352 Gertrude, Herman Hesse continues his lifelong exploration of the irreconcilable elements of human existence. In this fictional memoir, the renowned composer Kuhn recounts his tangled relationships with two artists--his friend Heinrich Muoth, a brooding, self-destructive opera singer, and the gentle, self-assured Gertrude Imthor. Kuhn is drawn to Gertrude upon their first meeting, but Gertrude falls in love with Heinrich, to whom she is introduced when Kuhn auditions them for the leads in his new opera. Hopelessly ill-matched, Gertrude and Heinrich have a disastrous marriage that leaves them both ruined. Yet this tragic affair also becomes the inspiration for Kuhn's opera, the most important success of his artistic life.]]> 256 Hermann Hesse 0312424639 Merlyn 0 to-read 3.91 1910 Gertrude
author: Hermann Hesse
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.91
book published: 1910
rating: 0
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]]> The Trial 17690 The Trial is the terrifying tale of Josef K., a respectable bank officer who is suddenly and inexplicably arrested and must defend himself against a charge about which he can get no information. Whether read as an existential tale, a parable, or a prophecy of the excesses of modern bureaucracy wedded to the madness of totalitarianism, The Trial has resonated with chilling truth for generations of readers.]]> 255 Franz Kafka Merlyn 0 to-read 4.00 1925 The Trial
author: Franz Kafka
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.00
book published: 1925
rating: 0
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]]> Final Girls 32796253 Ěý
Now, Quincy is doing well—maybe even great, thanks to her Xanax prescription. She has a caring almost-fiancé, Jeff; a popular baking blog; a beautiful apartment; and a therapeutic presence in Coop, the police officer who saved her life all those years ago. Her memory won’t even allow her to recall the events of that night; the past is in the past.
Ěý
That is, until Lisa, the first Final Girl, is found dead in her bathtub, wrists slit, and Sam, the second, appears on Quincy's doorstep. Blowing through Quincy's life like a whirlwind, Sam seems intent on making Quincy relive the past, with increasingly dire consequences, all of which makes Quincy question why Sam is really seeking her out. And when new details about Lisa's death come to light, Quincy's life becomes a race against time as she tries to unravel Sam's truths from her lies, evade the police and hungry reporters, and, most crucially, remember what really happened at Pine Cottage, before what was started ten years ago is finished.]]> 352 Riley Sager 1101985364 Merlyn 0 to-read 3.81 2017 Final Girls
author: Riley Sager
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.81
book published: 2017
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/06/13
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]]> Elatsoe (Elatsoe, #1) 49089632
There are some differences. This America has been shaped dramatically by the magic, monsters, knowledge, and legends of its peoples, those Indigenous and those not. Some of these forces are charmingly everyday, like the ability to make an orb of light appear or travel across the world through rings of fungi. But other forces are less charming and should never see the light of day.

Elatsoe lives in this slightly stranger America. She can raise the ghosts of dead animals, a skill passed down through generations of her Lipan Apache family. Her beloved cousin has just been murdered in a town that wants no prying eyes. But she is going to do more than pry. The picture-perfect facade of Willowbee masks gruesome secrets, and she will rely on her wits, skills, and friends to tear off the mask and protect her family.]]> 362 Darcie Little Badger 1646140052 Merlyn 0 to-read 3.98 2020 Elatsoe (Elatsoe, #1)
author: Darcie Little Badger
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.98
book published: 2020
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/04/24
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]]> <![CDATA[The Sailor Who Fell from Grace with the Sea]]> 162332 This is an alternate cover edition of ISBN 9780679750154

The Sailor Who Fell from Grace with the Sea tells the tale of a band of savage thirteen-year-old boys who reject the adult world as illusory, hypocritical and sentimental, and train themselves in a brutal callousness they call "objectivity." When the mother of one of them begins an affair with a ship's officer, he and his friends idealize the man at first; but it is not long before they conclude that he is in fact soft and romantic. They regard their disappointment in him as an act of betrayal on his part, and react violently.]]> 181 Yukio Mishima Merlyn 4 philosophy 3.87 1963 The Sailor Who Fell from Grace with the Sea
author: Yukio Mishima
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.87
book published: 1963
rating: 4
read at: 2023/04/12
date added: 2023/04/15
shelves: philosophy
review:

]]> Demian 24861 193 Hermann Hesse Merlyn 5 4.18 1919 Demian
author: Hermann Hesse
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.18
book published: 1919
rating: 5
read at: 2023/02/22
date added: 2023/04/12
shelves: merlyn-s-top-books, philosophy
review:

]]> Baby Teeth 35410511
She’s the sweet-but-silent angel in the adoring eyes of her Daddy. He’s the only person who understands her, and all Hanna wants is to live happily ever after with him. But Mommy stands in her way, and she’ll try any trick she can think of to get rid of her. Ideally for good.

Meet Suzette.

She loves her daughter, really, but after years of expulsions and strained home schooling, her precarious health and sanity are weakening day by day. As Hanna’s tricks become increasingly sophisticated, and Suzette's husband remains blind to the failing family dynamics, Suzette starts to fear that there’s something seriously wrong, and that maybe home isn’t the best place for their baby girl after all.]]> 304 Zoje Stage 1250170753 Merlyn 3 horror 3.56 2018 Baby Teeth
author: Zoje Stage
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.56
book published: 2018
rating: 3
read at: 2023/04/01
date added: 2023/04/01
shelves: horror
review:

]]> We Need to Talk About Kevin 80660 The gripping international bestseller about motherhood gone awry.

Eva never really wanted to be a mother - and certainly not the mother of the unlovable boy who murdered seven of his fellow high school students, a cafeteria worker, and a much-adored teacher who tried to befriend him, all two days before his sixteenth birthday. Now, two years later, it is time for her to come to terms with marriage, career, family, parenthood, and Kevin's horrific rampage in a series of startlingly direct correspondences with her estranged husband, Franklin. Uneasy with the sacrifices and social demotion of motherhood from the start, Eva fears that her alarming dislike for her own son may be responsible for driving him so nihilistically off the rails.

]]> 400 Lionel Shriver 006112429X Merlyn 0 to-read 4.07 2003 We Need to Talk About Kevin
author: Lionel Shriver
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.07
book published: 2003
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/04/01
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]]> Choujin X, Vol. 1 61317872
Being a superpowered creature isn’t all it’s cracked up to be, though. Tokio has to hide his transformation from his family and dodge a truancy charge at school, all while dealing with the increasingly odd incidents happening around town!]]> 262 Sui Ishida 1974736695 Merlyn 0 to-read 3.70 2021 Choujin X, Vol. 1
author: Sui Ishida
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.70
book published: 2021
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/03/19
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]]> <![CDATA[The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas]]> 92625 Some inhabitants of a peaceful kingdom cannot tolerate the act of cruelty that underlies its happiness.

The story 'Omelas" was first published in 'New Dimensions 3' (1973), a hard-cover science fiction anthology edited by Robert Silverberg, in October 1973, and the following year it won the prestigious Hugo Award for best short story.

The work was subsequently printed in Le Guin's short story collection 'The Wind's Twelve Quarters' (1975).

Ursula K Le Guin (1929–2018) was an American writer who published twenty-two novels, eleven volumes of short stories, four collections of essays, twelve books for children, six volumes of poetry & four of translation, and has received many awards: Hugo, Nebula, National Book Award, PEN-Malamud, and more. She was known for her treatment of gender ('The Left Hand of Darkness' (1969), 'The Matter of Seggri' (1994)), political systems ('The Telling' (2000), 'The Dispossessed' (1974)) and difference/otherness in any other form.]]> 32 Ursula K. Le Guin 0886825016 Merlyn 0 to-read 4.38 1973 The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas
author: Ursula K. Le Guin
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.38
book published: 1973
rating: 0
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]]> In the Miso Soup 17810
From postmodern Renaissance man Ryu Murakami, master of the psycho-thriller and director of Tokyo Decadence, comes this shocking, hair-raising roller-coaster ride through the nefarious neon-lit world of Tokyo’s sex industry.]]> 217 Ryū Murakami 014303569X Merlyn 4 horror 3.63 1997 In the Miso Soup
author: Ryū Murakami
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.63
book published: 1997
rating: 4
read at: 2023/02/26
date added: 2023/02/26
shelves: horror
review:

]]> <![CDATA[A Deadly Education (The Scholomance, #1)]]> 50548197
A Deadly Education is set at Scholomance, a school for the magically gifted where failure means certain death (for real) — until one girl, El, begins to unlock its many secrets.

There are no teachers, no holidays, and no friendships, save strategic ones. Survival is more important than any letter grade, for the school won’t allow its students to leave until they graduate… or die! The rules are deceptively simple: Don’t walk the halls alone. And beware of the monsters who lurk everywhere.

El is uniquely prepared for the school’s dangers. She may be without allies, but she possesses a dark power strong enough to level mountains and wipe out millions. It would be easy enough for El to defeat the monsters that prowl the school. The problem? Her powerful dark magic might also kill all the other students.]]> 320 Naomi Novik 0593128486 Merlyn 4 fantasy 3.93 2020 A Deadly Education (The Scholomance, #1)
author: Naomi Novik
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.93
book published: 2020
rating: 4
read at: 2023/01/01
date added: 2023/02/22
shelves: fantasy
review:

]]> Almost Transparent Blue 14287 Almost Transparent Blue is a brutal tale of lost youth in a Japanese port town close to an American military base. Murakami's image-intensive narrative paints a portrait of a group of friends locked in a destructive cycle of sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll.

The novel is all but plotless, but the raw and often violent prose takes us on a rollercoaster ride through reality and hallucination, highs and lows, in which the characters and their experiences come vividly to life. Trapped in passivity, they gain neither passion nor pleasure from their adventures.
Yet out of the alienation, boredom and underlying rage and grief emerges a strangely quiet and almost equally shocking beauty.

Ryu Murakami's first novel, Almost Transparent Blue won the coveted Akutagawa Literary Prize in 1976 and became an instant bestseller. Representing a sharp and conscious turning away from the introspective trend of postwar Japanese literature, it polarized critics and public alike and soon attracted international attention as an alternative view of modern Japan.]]> 126 Ryū Murakami 4770029047 Merlyn 0 to-read 3.36 1976 Almost Transparent Blue
author: Ryū Murakami
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.36
book published: 1976
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/02/22
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]]> Ring (Ring, #1) 38379
Asakawa, a hardworking journalist, is intrigued by his niece's inexplicable death. His investigation leads him from a metropolitan tokyo teeming with modern society's fears to a rural Japan--a mountain resort, a volcanic island, and a countryside clinic--haunted by the past. His attempt to solve the tape's mystery before it's too late--for everyone--assumes an increasingly deadly urgency. Ring is a chillingly told horror story, a masterfully suspenseful mystery, and post-modern trip.]]> 282 KĹŤji Suzuki 1932234411 Merlyn 0 to-read 3.79 1991 Ring (Ring, #1)
author: KĹŤji Suzuki
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.79
book published: 1991
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/02/22
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Fight Club 36236124 Fight Club’s estranged narrator leaves his lackluster job when he comes under the thrall of Tyler Durden, an enigmatic young man who holds secret after-hours boxing matches in the basement of bars. There, two men fight "as long as they have to." This is a gloriously original work that exposes the darkness at the core of our modern world.]]> 224 Chuck Palahniuk 0393355942 Merlyn 0 to-read 4.18 1996 Fight Club
author: Chuck Palahniuk
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.18
book published: 1996
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/02/22
shelves: to-read
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]]> The Idiot 12505 667 Fyodor Dostoevsky 0679642420 Merlyn 0 to-read 4.22 1869 The Idiot
author: Fyodor Dostoevsky
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.22
book published: 1869
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/02/22
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]]> Lolita 7604 Librarian's note: Alternate cover edition of ISBN 9780141182537.

Humbert Humbert - scholar, aesthete and romantic - has fallen completely and utterly in love with Dolores Haze, his landlady's gum-snapping, silky skinned twelve-year-old daughter. Reluctantly agreeing to marry Mrs Haze just to be close to Lolita, Humbert suffers greatly in the pursuit of romance; but when Lo herself starts looking for attention elsewhere, he will carry her off on a desperate cross-country misadventure, all in the name of Love. Hilarious, flamboyant, heart-breaking and full of ingenious word play, Lolita is an immaculate, unforgettable masterpiece of obsession, delusion and lust.]]> 368 Vladimir Nabokov 0679723161 Merlyn 0 to-read 3.87 1955 Lolita
author: Vladimir Nabokov
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.87
book published: 1955
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/02/22
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]]> Lord of the Flies 7624 182 William Golding 0140283331 Merlyn 0 to-read 3.70 1954 Lord of the Flies
author: William Golding
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.70
book published: 1954
rating: 0
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]]> Norwegian Wood 11297
A magnificent blending of the music, the mood, and the ethos that was the sixties with the story of one college student's romantic coming of age, Norwegian Wood brilliantly recaptures a young man's first, hopeless, and heroic love.]]> 296 Haruki Murakami 0375704027 Merlyn 0 to-read 4.01 1987 Norwegian Wood
author: Haruki Murakami
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.01
book published: 1987
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/02/22
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]]> Almond 52219386 This story is, in short, about a monster meeting another monster.Ěý

One of the monsters is me.

Yunjae was born with a brain condition called Alexithymia that makes it hard for him to feel emotions like fear or anger. He does not have friends—the two almond-shaped neurons located deep in his brain have seen to that—but his devoted mother and grandmother aren’t fazed by his condition. Their little home above his mother’s used bookstore is decorated with colorful post-it notes that remind him when to smile, when to say "thank you," and when to laugh. Yunjae grows up content, even happy, with his small family in this quiet, peaceful space.

Then on Christmas Eve—Yunjae’s sixteenth birthday—everything changes. A shocking act of random violence shatters his world, leaving him alone and on his own. Struggling to cope with his loss, Yunjae retreats into silent isolation, until troubled teenager Gon arrives at his school and begins to bully Yunjae.Ěý

Against all odds, tormentor and victim learn they have more in common than they realized. Gon is stumped by Yunjae’s impassive calm, while Yunjae thinks if he gets to know the hotheaded Gon, he might learn how to experience true feelings. Drawn by curiosity, the two strike up a surprising friendship. As Yunjae begins to open his life to new people—including a girl at school—something slowly changes inside him. And when Gon suddenly finds his life in danger, it is Yunjae who will step outside of every comfort zone he has created to perhaps become a most unlikely hero.Ěý

The Emissary meets The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime in this poignant and triumphant story about how love, friendship, and persistence can change a life forever.]]> 272 Sohn Won-Pyung 0062961373 Merlyn 0 to-read 4.16 2017 Almond
author: Sohn Won-Pyung
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.16
book published: 2017
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/02/22
shelves: to-read
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]]> Steppenwolf 16631 Steppenwolf is a poetical self-portrait of a man who felt himself to be half-human and half-wolf. This Faust-like and magical story is evidence of Hesse's searching philosophy and extraordinary sense of humanity as he tells of the humanization of a middle-aged misanthrope. Yet his novel can also be seen as a plea for rigorous self-examination and an indictment of the intellectual hypocrisy of the period. As Hesse himself remarked, "Of all my books Steppenwolf is the one that was more often and more violently misunderstood than any of the others".]]> 256 Hermann Hesse 0140282580 Merlyn 0 to-read 4.15 1927 Steppenwolf
author: Hermann Hesse
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.15
book published: 1927
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/02/22
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Audition 3392668
Of the thousands who apply, Aoyama only has eyes for Yamasaki Asami, a young, beautiful, delicate and talented ballerina with a turbulent past. But there is more to her than Aoyama, blinded by his infatuation, can see, and by the time he discovers the terrifying truth it may be too late…

Ryu Murakami delivers his most subtle and disturbing novel yet, confirming him as Japan’s master of the psycho-thriller.]]> 208 Ryū Murakami 0747589488 Merlyn 0 to-read 3.50 1997 Audition
author: Ryū Murakami
name: Merlyn
average rating: 3.50
book published: 1997
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/02/19
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Burning God (The Poppy War, #3)]]> 45857086 The exciting end to The Poppy War trilogy, R. F. Kuang’s acclaimed, award-winning epic fantasy that combines the history of twentieth-century China with a gripping world of gods and monsters, to devastating, enthralling effect.

After saving her nation of Nikan from foreign invaders and battling the evil Empress Su Daji in a brutal civil war, Fang Runin was betrayed by allies and left for dead.Ěý

Despite her losses, Rin hasn’t given up on those for whom she has sacrificed so much—the people of the southern provinces and especially Tikany, the village that is her home. Returning to her roots, Rin meets difficult challenges—and unexpected opportunities. While her new allies in the Southern Coalition leadership are sly and untrustworthy, Rin quickly realizes that the real power in Nikan lies with the millions of common people who thirst for vengeance and revere her as a goddess of salvation.Ěý

Backed by the masses and her Southern Army, Rin will use every weapon to defeat the Dragon Republic, the colonizing Hesperians, and all who threaten the shamanic arts and their practitioners. As her power and influence grows, though, will she be strong enough to resist the Phoenix’s intoxicating voice urging her to burn the world and everything in it?Ěý]]> 622 R.F. Kuang 0008339147 Merlyn 0 to-read 4.29 2020 The Burning God (The Poppy War, #3)
author: R.F. Kuang
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.29
book published: 2020
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/02/19
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]]> <![CDATA[The Dragon Republic (The Poppy War, #2)]]> 41118857
With no other options, Rin joins forces with the powerful Dragon Warlord, who has a plan to conquer Nikan, unseat the Empress, and create a new Republic. Rin throws herself into his war. After all, making war is all she knows how to do.

But the Empress is a more powerful foe than she appears, and the Dragon Warlord’s motivations are not as democratic as they seem. The more Rin learns, the more she fears her love for Nikan will drive her away from every ally and lead her to rely more and more on the Phoenix’s deadly power. Because there is nothing she won’t sacrifice for her country and her vengeance.

The sequel to R.F. Kuang’s acclaimed debut THE POPPY WAR, THE DRAGON REPUBLIC combines the history of 20th-century China with a gripping world of gods and monsters, to devastating effect.]]> 658 R.F. Kuang Merlyn 0 to-read 4.36 2019 The Dragon Republic (The Poppy War, #2)
author: R.F. Kuang
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.36
book published: 2019
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/02/19
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]]> <![CDATA[The Poppy War (The Poppy War, #1)]]> 35068705
When Rin aced the Keju—the Empire-wide test to find the most talented youth to learn at the Academies—it was a shock to everyone: to the test officials, who couldn’t believe a war orphan from Rooster Province could pass without cheating; to Rin’s guardians, who believed they’d finally be able to marry her off and further their criminal enterprise; and to Rin herself, who realized she was finally free of the servitude and despair that had made up her daily existence. That she got into Sinegard—the most elite military school in Nikan—was even more surprising.

But surprises aren’t always good.

Because being a dark-skinned peasant girl from the south is not an easy thing at Sinegard. Targeted from the outset by rival classmates for her color, poverty, and gender, Rin discovers she possesses a lethal, unearthly power—an aptitude for the nearly-mythical art of shamanism. Exploring the depths of her gift with the help of a seemingly insane teacher and psychoactive substances, Rin learns that gods long thought dead are very much alive—and that mastering control over those powers could mean more than just surviving school.

For while the Nikara Empire is at peace, the Federation of Mugen still lurks across a narrow sea. The militarily advanced Federation occupied Nikan for decades after the First Poppy War, and only barely lost the continent in the Second. And while most of the people are complacent to go about their lives, a few are aware that a Third Poppy War is just a spark away . . .

Rin’s shamanic powers may be the only way to save her people. But as she finds out more about the god that has chosen her, the vengeful Phoenix, she fears that winning the war may cost her humanity . . . and that it may already be too late.]]> 545 R.F. Kuang 0062662597 Merlyn 0 to-read 4.16 2018 The Poppy War (The Poppy War, #1)
author: R.F. Kuang
name: Merlyn
average rating: 4.16
book published: 2018
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/02/19
shelves: to-read
review:

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