Heroine Complex by Sarah Kuhn was fantastic! This is the first novel in a new series about Evie Tanaka, personal assistant and best friend to San Francisco’s number #1 superheroine, Aveda Jupiter. They have been BFFs since they were kids when Aveda was only Annie Chang. They were obsessed with a Michelle Yeoh action flick, “The Heroic Trio”, where martial arts heroes battled The Evil Master. It inspired Aveda to become a hero in real life even before a demonic portal opened up in the […]
Do not read if you are not doing carbs right now
I’ve never been to California in my life. I’ve never even been to the West Coast. I kind of have this image in my head that everybody is either Guy Fieri or Mark Zuckerberg with surfboards in cosplay, which intellectually I know isn’t accurate, but I still have a hard time picturing the San Francisco area otherwise. Similarly, the corporate pieces of the story totally matches with the general idea of what your typical tech San Francisco start-up must be like ( I say that […]
Myth, history and culture collide
Ho Lin’s short story anthology was an interesting read. Each tale aimed to shed light on random moments from varying points of view. He pulls in the reader with unexpected juxtapositions of settings and tone. The collection exudes emotion as if the stories were collective memories meshed together. He rarely delves deep into any specific narratives. The stories bounced between Asia and American even within the same story. We meet an American ex-Pat in China, then a host of characters in San Francisco, while another […]
It’s probably not normal to say this book reminds you of your childhood
It’s true, though–Tales of the City always reminds me of my childhood, because of how much I adored the PBS series when I was younger. I think I was 11 or 12 when I first saw it–my parents and I were watching it, and about ten minutes in, the nudity started. I remember my dad asking my mom if she thought I was too young to be watching, but they let me watch anyway. And I’m glad they did, for 2 reasons: 1) the scene […]
This is the Zodiac Speaking.
I can’t believe it took me so long to read this book. I’ve been fascinated by the Zodiac case for years, ever since I first saw David Fincher’s movie based on this book, but I think I always felt like the book was too dated to bother with since it was written in 1985. Well, I was wrong. This book is completely engrossing. I think most people probably know the basic outline of the Zodiac murders–a serial killer murdered several people in San Francisco in […]
Historical Fluffiness from the Forties
Lisa See, the author of [i]Snow Flower and the Secret Fan[/i], which was a really good book, has delivered a less interesting and slightly faded remix of the same themes Snow Flower had – namely, friendship and Chinese culture. The characters are wooden: good-girl Grace, scandalous Ruby, cantankerous Helen. The story limps along like a wounded homing pigeon, following the “glamour” of the Forties while skipping any of the realities of the second World War. (It does make an appearance, as do the Japanese internment […]
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