Reading List

This section will be under constant revision. I would like to add reviews or comments to individual titles in the future.

last updated: September, 2009


Currently Reading

Emotional Awareness by Paul Ekman and Dalai Lama

Elements of Fiction Writing:
Beginnings, Middles & Ends by Nancy Kress

The Dragonbone Chair by Tad Williams

Black Sun Rising by C.S. Friedman



Books I liked and/or found helpful & inspiring

Art

Die Gestalt des Menschen by Gottfried Bammes
[note: wonderful anatomy book with clear diagrams, but somewhat lacking because all text is in German. It's worth having and supplementing with other anatomy books]

Painting Fantasy Landscapes & Cityscapes by Rob Alexander
Layout and Design Made Amazingly Simple by Brian Lemay
Japanese Comickers Volume I & II
Dressing a Galaxy: The Costumes of Star Wars
Star Wars Episode III Art Book
Kung Fu Panda Art Book

Fiction

The Night Angel Trilogy by Brent Weeks
Inda (Books I and II) by Sherwood Smith
Emily of New Moon trilogy by L.M. Montgomery

Ideas

The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle
Elements of Fiction Writing:
Characters and Viewpoints by Orson Scott Card
The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho
The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde
The Journal of Ralph Waldo Emerson

Link: Days with my Father

http://www.dayswithmyfather.com/

I just want to share with everyone this site I found through a friend. It's a poignant photo-journal that really touched me. It's a very powerful reminder of how we should never take for granted the time we spend with our loved ones, because you never know when you'd wake up one day and realise that they will be gone sooner than you'd expected.

excerpt:

my mum died suddenly on sept. 4th, 2006

after she died, I realised how much she'd been shielding me from my father's mental state.

he doesn't have alzhemimers, but he has no short-term memory, and is often lost.

I took him to my mother's funeral, and to the burial, but when we got home, he'd ask me every 15-20 mins where my mother was. I'd explain carefully that she had died, and we'd been to her funeral.

This was shocking news to him

Why had no one told him?
Why hadn't I taken him to the funeral?
Why hadn't he visited her in the hospital?

He had no memory of these events

After a while, I realised I couldn't keep telling him that his wife had died.

He didn't remember, and it was killing both of us, to re-live her death constantly.

I decided to tell him she'd gone to Paris, to take care of her brother, who was sick.

And that's where she is now.

This site is a journal.

An ongoing record of my father, and of our relationship.

For whatever days we have left together.

The photos that touch me the most are the simple words the old man have left behind on pieces of paper or notebook pages.

Scribbles - Venus Flytrap Snake Thing?

For some reason I have that Kardinal Offishall song (Dangerous) in my head when I drew this... I have no clue why. =P But I digress.

Scribbles - Muted Comfort

I really want to name that stuffed toy, but can't come up with anything cute/dopey enough XDD any ideas?

Scribbles - he was a boy, she was a girl

random scribbles of different characters/couples.