Every 14 Days...(7)

Talking Cock (Richard Herring)

‘Hello, I’m a spitting penis…’ No, that’s not how this book reads. Nor did I read the hardback edition. Oh, the endless cock-based puns. Thankfully, ‘Talking Cock’ isn’t 296 pages of knob gags. The first 50 or so pages are, but beyond that it gets relatively more serious…sort of.

A result of his stand-up (ho ho) show of the same name which was a male answer to the ‘Vagina Monologues’, ‘Talking Cock’ is my favourite talking cock, Richard Herring’s, first book. Presenting the findings of his large cock (ho ho) survey, this is a semi (ho ho) academic look at all aspects of the phallus, from circumcision to the Prince Albert. Some of the thousands of responses given in the survey are quite alarming, as well as downright funny, such as the man who inserted his penis into a toilet roll spoon-filled with jelly; making the poor sap that inserted his into a jelly-less toilet roll seem quite unadventurous.  

Reading mainly on public transport, made this quite an embarrassing read, with little cocks drawn in the corner of each page, as well as huge wangs popping up (ho ho) here and there. Thankfully, this is more than just a crap, novelty humour book, and can stand up (ho ho again) as a good read all on its own.

Days to read: 12

Days per book: 16

1Q84: Books I, II and III (Murakami Haruki)

Murakami’s latest work to arrive in English is a three-part epic set in the Orwellian year of the title. At around a thousand pages combined, it is not the easiest of reads, telling the story through two, and later three, characters in alternate chapters.

The plot(s) thus: to start, we are introduced to the story of Aomame, a female assassin, hired to kill paedophiles and wife-beaters by a rich, aging woman, that she is also a personal trainer for; seemingly unconnected, the parallel story is that of Tengo, a Maths teacher and ghost-writer, asked to re-write an intriguing novel by an unusual 17 year old girl. As the book progresses, gradually the two stories converge into one as the connections between the two become more and more clear.

Two things become clear early on: a) this resembles two of Murakami’s best works in ‘Kafka on the Shore’ (parallel stories and converging) and ‘Wind-up Bird Chronicle’ (dividing the book into three parts); and b) this is a long book that maybe doesn’t need to be quite so. While the story is good and initially very intriguing, he has done similar books previously and better. 1Q84 is a book that requires a lot of effort, but is not as rewarding as some of his other works. The writing style doesn’t flow as well as in his other works either, more so in Book III, translated by Philip Gabriel rather than Jay Rubin, where there is a lot of repetition within the text.

This is, however, still a worthy edition to his oeuvre; it just doesn’t need to feel like it took twenty-eight years to read.

Book I

Days to read: 21

Days per book: 16.2

Book II

Days to read: 22

Days per book: 16.4

Book III

Days to read: 13

Days per book: 16.3

It’s been just over a year (26/11/10) since I began this failed experiment, attempting to read a book every two weeks. So far, I should have completed 29 books, though currently I am resting on 25 since beginning, taking just over two extra days on average to complete a book than my target. With 2012 providing new promises of Olympic failure, I hope to rein in those two extra days over the next twelve months…Next up, Spot the Dog and the Mr Men Collection.