Review Archive

Like many others, I heard about Naoki Higashida’s The Reason I Jump on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. I was moved by David Mitchell’s emotional praise of the book, so I picked it up on my Kindle that day and read the introduction. Sure enough, Mr. Mitchell’s passionate endorsement of the book won me over, but it didn’t prepare me for the way that Naoki Higashida’s captivating words, the depth of his understanding, and the conversational delivery of his incredible pain. The book is structured as a series of straightforward questions (“Why do people with Autism do ________?”) followed by a short answer . Many of the questions are similar to one another, and the answers end up feeling identical to others from time to time, but there is a constant thread that binds them; it is tremendously moving. Naoki is fully aware of his condition. He is aware that

Marion Zimmer Bradley is a somewhat interesting figure, in my opinion. She boasts an enormous catalogue of published works, The Mists of Avalon being her best-known work. What I find particularly interesting is that it is called a “feminist” work, but I think that label is inappropriately applied. I’m not certain this book is all that empowering. It’s a tough subject for me to write about, as I have just about no right to comment on it, but I can at least attempt to justify my reasons for thinking the label of “feminist fiction” has been misapplied here. In essence, I think that Feminist literature would be work that portrays powerful female characters who are empowered not by their nature as women, but by the strength of their characters. For example, The Mists of Avalon follows the tales of Arthur from the perspectives of the women associated with him, but

Look, I know it’s redundant at this point. I read books by Brandon Sanderson. Well, dear reader, I’ll have you know that I read other stuff, too! “But this is getting ridiculous!” You surely scoff. “What have you read lately that wasn’t by Brandon Sanderson?” Proudly, I puff out my chest and announce in a clear, melodious tone: “other stuff.” I’ll get to reviewing the other stuff on the blog later. We amicably continue our walk down my imaginary promenade while I regale you with my feelings on yet another excellent book by Brandon Sanderson: The Rhithmatist. The Rithmatist is the first book in (what I believe will be) a trilogy adventure designed for a younger audience. Not only does it depart from Sanderson’s standard fare of more “mature” fantasy novels,  it’s also a Steampunk(ish) book. When I first heard this, I imagined to myself that Brandon Sanderson was sitting at his computer and

I am on a plane and have literally just finished Ray Bradbury’s The Illustrated Man. There is within me a burning immediacy, a furnace of response and emotion that is bubbling to the surface and simply *must* get out. I hadn’t read Bradbury since high school, and I had only engaged with the requisite Fahrenheit 451 and The Martian Chronicles, though I remember both being very, very good. What I want out of life is to write, and to write well. In order to write well–at least according to many authors, bloggers and the relative wisdom of my personal experience–one must read as often or more often than one sits with pen or at the keyboard. Insert pause here, wherein I deplane, get a ride back to work, hop in my car, drive home, unpack, relax, get completely distracted reestablishing myself at home, then wake up the next morning to

About two weeks ago I reached into the mailbox and shuffled through the pile of adverts and trash, extracted several bits of actual mail and entered the house. There was a bill for a roommate, a Netflix DVD for another, a bill and New Yorker issue for me, and an unexpected interloper; a small brown envelope addressed to Mr. Alan Samuel. The envelope was not marked with a return address, and was postmarked as having departed from Seattle. This was an unexpected oddity. The first strange thing about this envelope is that it was clearly intended for me, but the sender misspelled my first name. My immediate thought was that this was intentional, and a return to an old moniker applied to me by my good friend Tony. Tony is one of my many friends who just absconded away, moving to Seattle and starting a new (and very exciting) life

It seems like all I’m doing these days is talking about Brandon Sanderson. Reading The Wheel of Time and Elantris started me on a journey through Sanderson’s work, and I’m finding it hard to catch up. The man writes so much it’s unbelievable. He’s a machine. Since my last post about Brandon Sanderson, I’ve read 2 novellas by him (Legion and The Emperor’s Soul, both of which were excellent) and 4 books (the trilogy-plus-one herein reviewed). I’m currently reading yet another novel of his and have (not joking here) 4 more, just of Sanderson’s, in my “next reads” list. Anyway, I’m here to talk about Mistborn. The first book of the trilogy, The Final Empire, was his second published novel and is, in my opinion, truly unique approach to fantasy literature. To begin, this story takes place in a world consumed by darkness, overruled by a tyrannical god-king, where ash rains