The Steady Read

Your home for book reviews, recommendations, and more

Tag: Male Author

  • Review: The Strange Library by Haruki Murakami

    Review: The Strange Library by Haruki Murakami

    Murakami is an author who has grown on me. I have many of his acclaimed novels and non-fiction works resting on my bookshelf, but I have yet to read most of them because Murakami is an author that requires you to be in a certain mood — an attentive, glum, and thoughtful one. Because I…

  • Review: Let the Old Dead Make Room for the Young Dead by Milan Kundera

    Review: Let the Old Dead Make Room for the Young Dead by Milan Kundera

    After spotlighting it in a recent Book of the Week post, I was spurred to give Milan Kundera’s Faber Stories release a read. I also learned that the author himself passed in July 2023, which surprised me upon seeing that many of his other works were now forty or fifty years old. Let the Old…

  • Review: Fuck Yeah, Video Games by Daniel Hardcastle

    Review: Fuck Yeah, Video Games by Daniel Hardcastle

    Most YouTubers, especially those who do let’s plays and gaming content, aren’t highly regarded as great writers. The same is somewhat true of Daniel Hardcastle (of Nerd³ fame), but his passion and comedic edge shine through in this love letter to video games. Part autobiography, part educational, part review; Fuck Yeah, Video Games stands as…

  • Review: Patriotism by Mishima Yukio

    Review: Patriotism by Mishima Yukio

    Perhaps one of the most tense and disturbing short stories I have ever read, leaving me unsure whether to praise it or regret having ever read it. The story itself follows the suicide of a young Japanese lieutenant, and his even younger wife, at the tail end of February 1936. The premise sounds simple and…

  • Review: The Catcher in the Rye by J. D. Salinger

    Review: The Catcher in the Rye by J. D. Salinger

    A novel with an attitude, or that’s how it comes across to most readers. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye is widely recognised as a novel that wants to pick apart the superficiality of twentieth century society, but I feel that undermines its appeal. Societal critique is a common facet of many novels, so that’s…

  • Review: Animal Farm by George Orwell

    Review: Animal Farm by George Orwell

    A novella that many people like to reference, Animal Farm is a suitable criticism of capitalism, greed, and the nature of how we humans — or perhaps any being — inevitably take advantage of the power afforded to us. Whilst not as deep or as clever as some claim it to be, Orwell’s relatively compact…

  • Review: South of the Border, West of the Sun by Haruki Murakami

    Review: South of the Border, West of the Sun by Haruki Murakami

    An excellent display of all of Murakami’s talents, bundled nicely into a much shorter package than that of his hit novel Norwegian Wood. South of the Border, West of the Sun follows Hajime, a flawed but very honest portrayal of a man who has had plenty of luck and success across his life, yet is…

  • Review: Behind the Prison by Kafū Nagai

    Review: Behind the Prison by Kafū Nagai

    A short story about a Japanese man, one who descended from a very well-off lineage, finding himself quite at odds once he returns home to his family’s large estate in Tokyo. Unsure of how to deal with his emotions and thoughts about the current state of Japan, he writes a lengthy letter to his Excellency….

  • Review: Tokyo Express by Seichō Matsumoto

    Review: Tokyo Express by Seichō Matsumoto

    A short, riveting tale of a mystery that involves what seems to be nothing more than a tragic lover’s suicide quickly becomes quite an entrancing step-by-step deduction to the true motive behind two cyanide-filled corpses – a government worker and a waitress – turning up on a secluded beach in Hakata, Japan. Despite not expecting…

  • Review: The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro

    Review: The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro

    Beautiful, sombre, and touching. Often touted as Ishiguro’s most sincere and top-quality release, The Remains of the Day certainly earns that title. The story itself is unassuming, following Stevens, a long-serving butler at Darlington Hall, as he takes a short summer trip in his employer’s Ford. Despite being set in 1956, much of the story…