currently reading

been gorging myself on books. finshed 4 books in 2 days, and felt a bit sick after that. must be because i forgot to eat and drink. lol.

Pact of the Fathers, Ramsey Campbell

billed as a psychological horror story, found this book a sleeper. yawn. something to do with secret soceities and the naughty deals the almost exclusively-male members made with each other in their youth. seemed promising. but found it hardly thrilling. characters and motivation were not really believable. like i said, a dozer.

The Kaisho, Eric Van Lustbader

ah. a lustbader book always offers the promise of sex, violence and more sex. why did i borrow it? was craving a trashy read, and this book did not fail to deliver. was not as twisted as the guy who wrote LA Confidential, but still, hmmmm, some parts were quite disturbing. what is it about the twisted things we do to each other that is so replusive and yet compelling?

the equivalent of the B-grade horror movie, The Kaisho follows the adventures of Nicholas Linnear, a half-Japanese, half-American ninja, who also happens to be the last of a mystical tribe with super psychic powers. told you it was trashy ^^. character developement is almost non-existent, or at least, I feel nothing for any of the main characters. borrowed it because of the lure of martial arts, but japanese martial arts is quite laughable to me nowadays. too stiff. i mean, yes, hands as tough as stone sound really cool, but, hmmm, i dunno, the martial arts just seemed bad. even the martial arts in Dune was better. more fluid and deadly. this just seemed to play on the mystical hype of japanese martial arts, which in reality, may not really live up to the hype. i mean really, how effective is a sword-strike (whatever that is) with the side of the hand to an enemy's pelvis? apparently, it is! cos your enemy will go crashing down, writhing in agony. hmmmmm. not for me to judge, but really, hmmmm.

oh well, at least it delivered, unlike Pact of the Fathers.

Four Days to VeraCruz, Owen West

Now we are talking. This book is an adventure chase, with an endurance hike thrown in. Picked it up and couldn't put it down. It is quite exciting, and the short tense chapters work quite well to help build momentum. This was written by a former Marine who took part in a number of Eco-challenges and the knowledge really added a sense of realism to the story.

What is Ec0-challenge? Just the most gruelling and challenging endurance sports in the world, you know, working at sustained physical exertion with no food or sleep at high altitudes for days on end, and pushing yourself until your body starts to cannibalise itself for lack of nutrition. These people really love to suffer, and there is not even a prize money at the end. Just a belt buckle to say, "I been there." Wow.

But this is really quite an exciting book, about a couple who are inadvently caught up in the middle of a drug chase in Mexico. Drugs, government conspiracies, guns and explosions, fun and excitement all around! Let's not forget the death-march. Read the title: four days to vera cruz give you any hint. ^^ i just love sporty people. They come up with the weirdest stories and make it believable. Yes. I think I thoroughly enjoyed this book.

The Last Confession, Morris West

The Last Confession is the story of Giordano Bruno, a Dominican monk and rationlist philosopher, who was burnt at the stake by the Catholic Church on Feb 17 1600. His questions about God and religion were considered dangerous and heretical, and he was incarerated for seven years in Rome's worst prison, where he underwent interrogation, harsh penal treatment and occasional torture. In the end, he was given the chance to recant but he choose instead to die for his beliefs.

The authour, Morris West, was not unlike Bruno. Morris West joined the Order of Christian Brothers after completing high school, took his first vows and spent eight years as a teaching monk. When he was twenty-six, he decided against taking his final vows and left the order and joined the Australian Army, where he started writing and published his first book under a pseudonym. Morris, by all accounts, has on numerous occassions found himself uneasy with the teachings of the church which claimed his allegiance, and like Bruno, he spent his life trying to get to truth by examining all ideas, even if they lay beyond the boundary of dogmatic teachings that most people consider the essence of faith. This was his last, uncompleted, work. He died at his desk, at the end of a particularly good paragraph.

The story takes the form of a diary, written by Giordano Bruno, in his final days. I think this book resonates with me because of this sentence, which really sums up my problem with Christianity: "This is the nature of the madness they propagate: to make a man confess a loving God, you burn him!" Yes, I too, do not understand why to bring to man to the mercy of God, you have to first threaten his soul with an eternity of damnation and torment.

Lest I turn others away from this book with my own personal beliefs, still, in the end, this is a book about a man of faith written by a man of faith. It is worth reading, and maybe it will highlight some valuable lessons.