8 Martin Suter - The dark side of the moon

The plot is quickly summarized: Successfull lawyer does shrooms, has a bad trip and gets weird. So this book just starts completely out of my comfort zone. Usually literature about drugs seems very forced to me. It's forcably spacy and weird and even tends to glorify drugs. And that just doesn't go over well with me.

The book starts exactly as I imagined it: Our lawyer is called Urs Blank and he is partnered with an important law firm, drives a fast car and is kind of a dick. He meets a young incense stick selling girl (that's a real job!) and cheats on his wife with her because she's younger and more fun and all that jazz. And his wife just let's it happen because that's what wives of really rich dudes do. So at this point I'm already over this book.

The only thing that kept me reading was the writing style. This books comes in paragraphs in which the point of view usually switches to another person's and that makes this novel really easy and fast to read. It feels really dynamic and gives the reader complete insight on what everyone is thinking in certain situations. It picks up the pace in all the right places and never feels too drawn out. I was impressed and continued and luckily I got rewarded for my patience:

Martin Suter describes the peronality changes Urs Blank goes through after his bad trip so well and not in a glorifying way at all. It feels real and raw. Blank and everyone around him react to this situation exactly as I would in real life which is not something I can often say and really makes for some good writing.

Also, it's very well researched. You can really tell a lot of time went into this. Also, I researchd the author and he looks exactly as I imagined Urs Blank. Here's a link to Martin Suter.

*SPOILER*

Dude starts killing people. That's when this book took a turn for the better, at least for me. And I'm not sure what that says about me.
But if you're looking for something easy yet something impressive (as in Martin Suter can write!) to read, I can recommend this. I'll rate this book 78 out of 90 shrooms.

Tomorrow I'm going to finish reading Martin Suter's "The dark side of the moon" and get a new book delivered. Both are more contemporary literature, in fact the book I'm receiving tomorrow from my trusted delivery man has just recently come out and had really promising reviews. It's called "Woman No 17" by Eden Lepucki and I already got to read an excerpt that left me wanting more.

Print is dead?

I was trying to sell an Ostrich feather duster the other day (yes, it seems very random but I will literally sell anything of yours if my hourly wage is decent) and there are a few things I like to mention and do to sell it. For example, I let people touch the feather duster because it's so soft, people will just buy it for its softness and never actually use it. That usually works like a charm. 

But some customers need a little more work; so did this woman that came in two weeks ago. She was not completly convinced, so I started listing all the great things you can clean with a feather duster (I make cleaning sound like a lot of fun, if you ever need motivation to clean, hit me up). I told her it's the easiest way to dust off bookshelves and books. The woman just looked me dead in the eye and said: Well, who reads books anymore, let's be serious.

What.

Luckily, my colleague swooped in, knowing that this was a touchy subject and I was about to yell at this woman to get her uneducated ass out of the store, throwing a heavy copy of 'Jane Eyre' after her.

Print is not dead, bitch.

7 Hermann Hesse - Siddhartha

I love that I'm catching up on all the classics in my twenties. And since I am also somewhat on a journey to self-discovery, Hermann Hesse's Siddhartha is a very fitting book choice.

The story follows a young man named Siddhartha (and I thought I had a weird name) on his path to find the true meaning of life which he believes is enlightenment. He and his friend Govinda join a religious group, then follow a true Buddha, but Siddhartha grows frustrated as he seems unable to find what he's looking for. So he goes a different path in his pursuit for happiness, one of sexuality and greed. But oh wonder, this isn't really what he's looking for either (men and their mid-life crisis) and so he decides to continue on his old path to enlightenment. He comes to a river where he hears a noise that ultimately signals the beginning of his new life.

I must admit I struggled a bit through the first half. It didn't capture me right away. I think Hermann Hesse is a brilliant writer though. You can feel that Hesse himself was looking for said enlightenment and when I did some research, I found out that the second half of the book took long to write because Hesse "had not experienced that transcendental state of unity to which Siddhartha aspires". So he lived in seclusion from society and got totally emerged in the Hindu and Buddhist teachings. 

The book was a good read but unlike a lot of reviews that I read, it didn't inspire anything in me. So I'm just stuck with a weird name and no enlightenment.