A Touch of Genius

i've been reading a lot lately. oh shush you naysayers. i know i'm supposed to be studying. but while i was at korea, i've read bram stoker's dracula and finished john grisham's the street lawyer. at home i've treacherously read two books at once, a few roald dahl short stories while reading some from neil gaiman.

the most mundane? john grisham. he just doesn't cut it. not like salman rushdie. he brilliantly sets words into order such as to paint a picture of a character's emotions, mixed and all a-screwed as they are. it hits such a resounding homerun in me, that i find myself nodding in agreement.

but enough of him. i'm reading neil gaiman's short stories right now. and they are an absolute joy. short stories are one of the best things in literature. a short story, compared to a full length novel is like having a minature ship in a bottle along side a full-sides yatch.

anyway, lest i bore you, the first few paragraph of neil gaiman's 'shoggoth's old peculiar'. i found it particularly funny:

Benjamin Lassiter was coming to the unavoidable conclusion that the woman who had written A Walking Tour of the British Coastline, the book he was carrying in his backpack, had never been on a walking tour of any kind, and would probably not recognize the British coastline if it were to dance through her bedroom at the head of a marching band, singing "I'm the British Coastline" in a loud and cheerful voice while accompanying itself on the kazoo.

He had been following her advice for five days now and had little to show for it, except blisters and a backache. All British seaside resorts contain a number of bed-and-breakfast establishments, who will only be too delighted to put you up for the "off season." was one such piece of advice. Ben had crossed it out and written in the margin beside it: All British seaside resorts contain a handful of bed-and-breakfasts establishments, the owners of which take off to Spain or Provence or somewhere on the last day of September, locking doors behind them as they go.

He had added a number of other marginal notes, too. Such as Do not repeat not under any circumstances order fried eggs again in any roadside cafe and What is it with the fish-and-chips thing? and No they are not.

That last was written beside a paragraph which claimed that, if there was one thing that the inhabitants of scenic villages on the British coastline were pleased to see, it was a young American tourist on a walking tour.

hahaha, i tell you, this neil gaiman is a rockstar.