Category Archives: books and shit

books and shit

white men write Africa

Posted on October 7, 2013 by rustichello

I went through a thing of African travel narratives a few months ago and there are some great ones. You can’t go wrong if you start with Mungo Park’s Travels in the Interior of Africa.  He wanders through West Africa … Continue reading →

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Three Crooked Kings

Posted on October 7, 2013 by rustichello

I’ve got a pile of books beside my now ancient and overheating tower unit: books I’ve read, books I thought I might write about, books I kind of hated. I haven’t written about them or put them away. For a … Continue reading →

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small worlds

Posted on September 17, 2013 by rustichello

Over the years I’ve collected quite a number of gaijin/gringo prison memoirs. They all follow roughly the same narrative toward the point where the gaijin/gringo (let’s call him GG) is able to sit in a relatively safe western location and … Continue reading →

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if the roof is on fire it’s an electrical fault

Posted on July 31, 2013 by rustichello

I’m sitting in a beachside bar with Sputnik. The beer is cold, cheap, and plentiful. The sun is high and hot, waves lap against eroded coral, a cool breeze floats off the Gulf of Thailand. It’s all good. We’ve indulged … Continue reading →

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pat malone

Posted on April 8, 2013 by rustichello

I read Jonathan Franzen’s second book of essays last week and they are well worth the time, they’re erudite and thoughtful and engaging. I spent a lot of time reading the title essay, Farther Away, which is a meditation on … Continue reading →

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not a fake moai

Posted on January 25, 2013 by rustichello

Shortly before Christmas I found myself at a rainy market, on a morning of cold showers and a harsh, gusting southerly. I braced myself with a bacon & egg roll and went wandering around. Somewhere there I saw a bunch … Continue reading →

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worthy burden

Posted on January 15, 2013 by rustichello

Ever read a Clive Cussler novel? There was a summer somewhere in the 1990s when I read quite a few of them, probably a dozen or so. Over the last fifteen years or so I have dabbled occasionally with Dirk … Continue reading →

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machine sans fantôme

Posted on January 7, 2013 by rustichello

After the fag ends of the cricket yesterday afternoon I found myself at the pub discussing the forthcoming technological singularity. This is supposed to be the point where all the creations of humanity reach a point of superabundant intelligence that those creations … Continue reading →

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may the odds be ever in your favour

Posted on September 27, 2012 by rustichello

Recently my brain has been on strike, it won’t do what it was doing a few weeks ago, it’s not doing what I ask it to do. I tried very hard the other night to read Black Mass, the John … Continue reading →

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Will Self’s Dorian

Posted on September 6, 2012 by rustichello

There’s a moment in Andrew McGahan’s Last Drinks where the most chronic of the alcoholics confesses to his shame regarding his wish to be cured of his disease. Initially there’s some confusion about this, it appears momentarily that he’s ashamed … Continue reading →

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