Battle Royale

By Koushun Takami

Do you ever know what another person is thinking?


This wonderful piece of dystopian fiction, from a Japanese perspective, has been touted as the Japanese Hunger Games. I prefer to compare it to Lord of the Flies. 


More important, it is much longer and more satisfying than the Hunger Game series. I look forward to reading book two!


"Worse yet, it wasn't simply a mass execution. The students had to kill each other, competing for the throne of survivor. It was the most terrifying version of musical chairs imaginable. But . . . it was impossible to oppose the Program. It was impossible to protest anything the Republic of Greater East Asia did." Pg 43


". . . The hatchet was lodged in so deeply, it was stuck.
Shuya took a deep breath. Oh God.
Then he thought about it. No. What's this about God? Ms. Anno was a devoted Christian but no thanks to her faith in God she ended up getting raped by Sakamochi. Ah, praise the Lord.
Shuya felt another surge of anger." Pg 134


"'Exactly. That's why I think no one here really wants to kill anyone. I think it's because we're so terrified we become deluded that everyone else is out to kill us and so we resort to fighting. And in that state even if no one attacked, we might even end up attacking others on our own.'" Pg 157


"Shinji nodded and tried to write out the name of the fertilizer compound, but he didn't know how to spell it. He was a casualty of spellcheck. Anyway, what mattered was the molecular formula." Pg 316


"He couldn't blame Yutaka for doubting him. The path they'd taken here was covered with trees, both large and small. Even if they managed to drag the wire out while avoiding G=7 and tugged on it later, the wire might get caught. It would make for an odd-looking piece of outdoor contemporary art. 'This installation piece is gigantic, but five meters away it turn obscure. The piece addresses the delicate balance between nature and humans . . .'"
Pg. 354


"Shogo then continued,'What I mean is that, even a dumb ass like me can think everything's pointless. Why do I get up and eat? It all ends up shit anyway. Why am I going to school and studying? Even if I happen to succeed I'm going to die anyway. You wear nice clothes, you seek respect, you make a lot of money, but what's the point? It's all pointless. Of course, this kind of meaninglessness might suit this crappy nation. But . . . but, you see, we still have emotions like joy and happiness, right? They may not amount to much. But they fill up our emptiness. That's the only explanation I have."
Pg. 525


"But of course they're part of you now." Pg 616


Book 54

Let the Right One In

By John Ajvide Lindqvist

A Swedish vampire tale told in an entirely unique way. Described as "romantic, social realist" in genre it is a story told from a young boys perspective. In the beginning I thought it was a good teen geared story but the unfolding story and complex characters, often gruesome in their humanity, convinced me this was not the case. An important vampire book for anyone series about the genre.

"It was school. That's all. This was school. They told you to do a lot of things and you did them. The whole thing had been invented so teachers would be able to hand out photocopies. It didn't mean anything." Location 1605

"The credits for the nature program rolled on the TV. Eli put a finger on the woman's throat artery. It felt like a beating bird heart under her fingertips." Location 3857

"Yes. Everything is in the brain. From the beginning. The body is simply a kind of service unit that the brain is forced to be burdened with in order to keep itself alive." Location 6729

Book 53

The Ledge

By Jim Davidson

A survival story about two friends falling into an ice crevasse on Mount Rainer. The determination and self discovery that take place through the colossal feat to get out of the crevasse  are the heart of this interesting story.

Book 52

Real World

By Natsuo Kirino

There is no easy way to describe this book. As all Kirino's books, I am not even sure how to put them in a genre. Case in point, her other books were in the Mystery section of the library and this one was in the Fiction. This story exposes the edges of identity in a gripping coming of age story of a group of school age girls. A murder in the neighborhood starts a chain of events that force each girl, in their own way, to look at themselves carefully. Each finding surprising pieces that don't always have a place to rest within them.

Book 49

Middlesex

By Jeffrey Eugenides

This was an incredible book about a young women's journey into boyhood. Eugenides has a lyric, dreamy and intimately engaging style of writing that ropes the reader in to being complicit with the story.

"To think that a toilet had once been a haven for me! That was all over now. I could see at once that men's rooms, unlike the ladies', provided no comfort. Often there wasn't even a mirror, or any hand soap. And while the closeted, flatulent men showed no shame, at the urinals men acted nervous. They looked straight ahead like horses with blinders." pg.451

"Every morning a great wall of fog descends upon the city of San Francisco. It begins far out to sea. It forms over the Farallons, covering the sea lions on their rocks, and then it sweeps onto Ocean Beach, filling the long green bowl of Golden Gate Park. The fog obscures the early morning joggers and the lone practitioners of tai chi. It mists up the windows of the Glass Pavilion. It creeps over the entire city, over the monuments and movie theaters, over the Panhandle dope dens and the flophouses in the Tenderloin. The fog covers the pastel Victorian mansions in Pacific Heights and shrouds the rainbow-colored houses in the Haight. It walks up and down the twisting streets of Chinatown; it boards the cable cars, making their clanging bells sound like buoys; it climbs to the top of the Coit tower until you can't see it anymore; it moves in on the Mission, where the mariachi players are asleep; and it bothers the tourists. The fog of San Francisco, that cold, identity-cleansing mist that rolls over the city every day, explains better than anything else why the city is what it is." pg 469

Book 51 (I caught an error in my numbering system back on book 11)

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The Forest of Hands and Teeth

By Carrie Ryan

"And suddenly I wonder what right we have to believe our childhood dreams will come true. My body aches with this realization. With this truth. It is as if I have cut something important away from myself. The loss is almost overwhelming. Almost enough to make me give up." Page 105

"I stand at the edge of Beth's grave and stare out into the Forest and wonder how it is that we are never truly prepared for death." Pg 174

Book 48

American Gods

By Neil Gaiman

Book 47

Matched

By Ally Condie



Book 45