Reading List (April 2018)
Hit the sack with some of our favourite picks for this season, and simply unwind.
Is there anything in the world than reading a great book, sipping on iced tea swaying on a hammock on a summer afternoon? Only a soulful siesta can beat it, may be. Nah! So, to keep you company this April, we have books with love: pure, impossible, unrequited, dangerous even. For some reason, summer and romance are always paired up… wondering why you can’t shake off the summer love or the song, or forget Summer of 69 for that matter. It’s a mix of old and new, with a little touch of poetry. And given the complexities of Japanese culture and society, we have picked up some from the land of the rising sun.
A Tokyo Romance
Author: Ian Buruma
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
It’s a memoir of Japan’s lesser known history and an astonishing story of love of a young man, Buruma, who is exploring the new world, a self invention in a strange land. It’s an account of his amazing journey in 1970s, where he discovered a surreal metropolis full of neon lights, crimson lanterns, Japanese pop and cabarets. And through his adventures in the world of avant garde theatre, his encounters with carnival acts, fashion photographers, and moments on-set with Akira Kurosawa, Buruma underwent a radical transformation of his own.
Norwegian Wood
Author: Haruki Murakami
Genre: Coming of age
One of the best of Murakami’s works, the books takes us to the distant places of a young man’s first, hopeless and heroic love story. The protagonist Toru Watanabe and his relationship with the beautiful but emotionally fragile, Naoko, imparts numerous lessons on love and loss. Set in the turbulent times in Japan, the story talks about the complications faced by the Japanese college student exploring the independence in his encounters with a sexually liberated young woman.
The poetry of Pablo Neruda
Author: Pablo Neruda
Genre: Poetry
The words by this Chilean poet are sure to wake your soul up. This selection of his 600 poems is the most comprehensive single volume available in English language. You don’t get an excuse to read some of the best love poems ever written about women and oceans. You never know, it might just help you brush up your dating one-liners. As we can quote him here: My eyes were consumed by your loveliness, but you have become my eyes.
Wild at Heart
Author: John Eldredge
Genre: Christian literature
It might be one of the best reads to discover what actually happens inside a man’s heart. It’s a story of men, who have been in a constant battle with themselves, trying to answer the question: Am I enough? Every man as a child wants to become a warrior, a hero, but what happens when the real problems of the world take over, is the question that this book explores. Through this book, you can recover your masculine heart and free your soul.
From the April 2018 issue of FHM India.
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