Wednesday, July 14, 2004
Yesterday afternoon I decided to go to Zellers to see if they had any clocks, to replace the one that fell and smashed after I rehung it on the wall. I have a $25 gift card for Zellers, so I figured it'd be a good place to start. As it turns out, the Zellers closest to my place (at Grant Park) only had 4 or 5 differnt clocks, each of which was all garden-y and covered in fake vines. Eugh.
So, I figured I'd take a stroll down the mall to McNally Robinson, one hell of a bookstore. I usually drop by there every few weeks to check on the discount book section, as it's usually very good. Besides the fact that I need to always have a book to read. I found Robert Jordan's 'new' book, the prequel he wrote to his yet-unfinished Wheel of Time series. On my way to the discount section I passed the Staff Picks table, and happened to glance down at a red book titled Battle Royale. The book synopsis reads as follows:
Koushun Takami's notorious high-octane thriller is based on an irresistible premis: a class of junior high school students is taken to a deserted island where, as part of a ruthless authoritarian program, they are provided arms and forced to kill one another until only one survivor is left standing. Chriticized as violent exploitation when first published in Japan--where it then proceeded to become a runaway bestseller--Battle Royale is a Lord of the Flies for the 21st century, a potent allegory of what it means to be young and (barely) alive in a dog-eat-dog world. MAde into a controversial hit movie of the same name, Battle Royale is already a contemporary Japenese pulp classic, now available for the first time in the English language.
So, that was working in my mind as I went to grab RJ's prequel book. Then, as I started walking towards the till, I realised that I didn't even really want RJ's book anyways, I just needed to buy it to have it, the full series. I decided I'd just buy it when it came out in paperback, and pick up this Takami book instead.
The book starts out with 42 children, 21 males and 21 females. All with Japanese names. This should be fun to try to keep track of. At least they'll be dying off, so the number of characters I'll need to know will dwindle as the book goes on.
I'm really looking forward to reading this book, but don't think I can at work, because I won't be able to focus enough. Reading books at work usually isn't a problem for me, but I plan on giving this one more focus.
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