Codename Tutubi

Tutubi, Tutubi, 'Wag Kang Magpahuli sa Mamang Salbahe by Jun Cruz Reyes

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


It was supposed to be a satirical outburst of the character named Jojo, a scholar in a State University relating to the few days after the declaration of Martial Law... but it ended with an unresolved question that none of the characters answered to conclude the story. It felt open-ended. It left me with more questions, actually.

The epilogue made me shed a tear. People are taught to forgive and forget, but the experience was too hurtful, it cut so deep, that even I, as a reader, find it hard to forgive whatever they did, and finally forget the horror it caused.



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Manong Xerox(es)

Seroks, Iteration 1: Mirror Man by David Hontiveros

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


A collection of short stories interwoven in a flashback, geeky and dystopian future of the motherland. Hard to imagine the suits and the armors, the netheads and all that chips and codes inside your head. Piracy is rampant, I can imagine that. And also the typhoon and the Pinoy flicks and the corrupt actor who became the President of the bleak future Philippines. Very very good prose, since its inspiration came from a Palanca-award-winning story of Kaming Mga Seroks.

The most meaty story in the collection is Salbahe, the Twelfth Hour, and the Thirteenth Hour. Most of the action or movement came in these 3proses. The others, are actually fill-in details to give color in a historic setting, or a bridge-in to what has happened in the past and present.

The ending's open-ended, giving you an anticipating outlook to look forward to the next novel.



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Beach Bonding?

The Beach Book by Melcher Media
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Good collection of short stories, set in the wonders of the beach, either basking in the sun at high noon, or showcasing the wonderful colors of sunset and dusk and night time.

There is one story that bored me, all about the Pirates and its long journey. I believe it did not fit perfectly in the collection since the other stories reveal a genre of slice-of-life, of adventures and misadventures combined, and some tall-tales being bequeathed from one generation to the next.

I loved the missing kid in Dahl's short story collection, and its ability to talk to animals and the rare chance to ride a pawikan. It made me dream to go back to Dumaguete and go straight to the Apo Reef, where I can be a mermaid again, swimming with the pawikan and little fishies.

I definitely missed the beach. And the beach book helped me remember my happy moments with it.


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Shinkai's Graphic Journey - Byousoku 5 Centimeter

5 Centimeters per Second by Makoto Shinkai

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


It's supposed to be 5-stars but you made an alternative ending - leaving it open-ended, instead. Why did the creator do that? Why didn't he stay loyal to what was in the movie?

But the feels. The lines. The panels. And the kiss. It remained melancholic and romantic. :)



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Kidism in Action - Hector's Travels

I first found this in Lucy's store (@_FullyBooked) 

And the book was so simplistic, written in the style of The Little Prince, but his adventures were so vast, you cannot just write a true review. So there you go, for one to appreciate happy-ness, one has to embark on a journey to search for its meaning. 

As we go along with life, we get tangled in a variety of emotions, of which, happiness seemed hard to find but easy to forget.

Homage to Murakami? No.

Utsubora - The Story of a Novelist by Asumiko Nakamura

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

"That misaligned dual viewpoint is what allows for a three-dimensional field of vision. That you have two points of view - subjective and objective. It's through sustaining the misaligned pair in tandem that our world becomes real."

Delivered via Royal Mail (view spoiler)[thank you, Book Depository (hide spoiler)], this one-volume manga by Asumiko Nakamura explores the visions of a writer being tangled in a crime. One has to be challenged in a non-linear writing style, in its gothic strokes of black and white, and in its sensual experiment of drawing a scene where an intercourse is not done, but still made it amorous.

The first read is a challenging, all the while I thought I was able to solve the mystery, but it left me with questions of WHYs. What is the relationship of the author with the woman? What is the relevance of the phone? Why is the police so attached to the case? Why is the editor so puzzled? The graphic novel gave a hangover, more than a day and compelled me to do a re-read.

The second read made me understand some of the shouts, and of reflections (or you may call it introspection, I guess?) I cannot spoil the reader much, one has to be curious enough to read the book and join the adventure. :)



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Valentine Read for Two Years

What We Talk About When We Talk About Love by Raymond Carver

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

“All this, all of this love we're talking about, it would just be a memory. Maybe not even a memory. Am I wrong? Am I way off base?”

In the first read of the book, I made it part of the 2013-reading challenge and a Valentine read. Curious of the genre called dirty realism, it gave me a hangover by having the collection of stories ending abruptly - or not even ending, at all. It's just there - stuck in you. Later did I know (view spoiler)[thanks to Mr. Wikipedia for having some info database (hide spoiler)] that this is one effective literary device to engage the readers to think deeper and introspect, and maybe, to sympathize with the characters in the short story.

In the second read of the book,(view spoiler)[and as part of a required read for a book discussion (hide spoiler)] I even considered the tonality and the technicality of the short stories. I appreciated the usage of alcohol as a literary device. In addition, it amused me how one statement can change a mood, from melancholia to angst. Imagine the power of words and its capability to make the reader think.

Disclaimer: I still love Viewfinder, as one of my favorites in the short story collection. And I learned to love Everything Stuck To Him. While when asked for the least favorite, it was Popular Mechanics



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Ten Months Of Choleric Reading

Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcí­a Márquez

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

“The only regret I will have in dying is if it is not for love.”

After six failed attempts of fast-reading and more than ten months of patiently and painfully reading Gabriel Garcia Marquez and his writing, I can so declare that this book is so great, it spanned two lifetimes of two lovers, their hardships and their joys, and how they lived and continuously lived on their lives.

There are stories that are so boring ang dragging it can bring you to sleep, but there are redeeming points that will make you gush and feel that love is far beyond the feels, it spanned rivers, technological updates, epidemic catasthropes and of years. I survived 10 months understanding how they go on with their lives and how did they prepared themselves to take a risk - after all were said and done before.

The feeling of intense joy after reading the last statement is priceless.



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Enough With The Mommy Porn!

Bared to You by Sylvia Day

My rating: 1 of 5 stars


A slappy romance full of word vomit, inexplicable pasts and "victims" that are not justified. This literotica is nonsense.
AND THIS HAS A SEQUEL UGH. I cannot even -

GAH.



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Power of Imagination

The Secret Life of Walter Mitty by James Thurber

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


It was an American classic, a short story written in 1930's. I love how the prose became poetic, and how the author switched Mitty from an ordinary husband doing a weekly chore to become a surgeon. And a hero - inscrutable to the last.

There is something about onomatopoeia that made the short story appealing. It adds up to the reader imagining how Mitty quickly triggers a daydream. At one moment he is an assassin. And then he became a surgeon.

The thing with this short story is it leaves you a sort of a plot hang-over. He just waited. Stood there. And just like death via firing squad, he stayed motionless. Yet proud.

I guess this is what the author wanted to impart to the reader. Once the pen stopped he became still. And he was proud of his creation.

(view spoiler)[Thanks for the free audiobook and the newyorker archive. :) (hide spoiler)]



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