reading notes

Hiromi Goto ISBN: 1551521571 There are eleven mostly odd stories in this collection. I mean that in a good way. Reading so many stories with unapologetically Canadian (folks wear toques, not winter hats) and Japanese characters, I realized how “scrubbed” many short stories are — too many happen in generic places with generic people. The [...]

by Anosh Irani ISBN: 1551928035 Irani knows how to set up a story: There will be magic, poverty, thievery, music, pollution, dancing, murder, and lust and very little prayer. His novel, set in a bizarre and fantastic Bombay, does have all of these things. It also has lepers, a limb market, beauty, and acts of [...]