Another 2010 book down. I pat myself on my back to have started borrowing books from the library, even when they are still “ON ORDER”, paying attention to recommendations from AAM, and getting Google Alerts about “asian american literature”!! From the latter, the most consistent recommendations have come from Asian American Literature Fans, a Livejournal blog, an article from which nearly spoiled the novel for me if I hadn’t closed the browser tab as soon as it started to delve into plot points.
I had begun reading Jean Kwok’s 2010 debut novel, …

Summer is drawing to a close way too quickly. I was saddened last week when I was working for my parents and it was frightfully dark already at 8:30. I do not appreciate all of Vancouver’s seasons equally even if the rains bring so-called lush greenery, and am only grateful that imminent cool weather will make flies go into hibernation (or die or whatever) and despite it raining seemingly 95 of 100 days, I really am grateful my commute is really short.
In some respects, I had the most boring summer …

We were at the Village Taphouse in The Village at Park Royal where NPY noticed the Specials card that advertised a dinner deal: $50 gets you a bottle of wine and unlimited Caesar salad and spaghetti for two people. He thought it was a nice deal but I, and any of you, could easily do better. What do you wanna bet that it’s at best a $17 bottle of wine at the liquor store marked up to $30 at the restaurant and the pasta meal is consequently “only” $10 per …

I try to recall the media furor over the captivity of Laura Ling and Euna Lee last year but I can’t really separate in my mind “actual” coverage by mainstream news and the re-coverage and opinion by bloggers. I followed Angry Asian Man and he echoes a lot of Asian-American-related news for his readers’ benefit and this news story just didn’t go away. Then the highest levels of American government finally got involved and it was finally all over mainstream American news.
I don’t suppose many people knew who Laura Ling …