I suddenly have Asia on the brain because my mom and sister called two nights ago from Shanghai and told me how it is amazing and puts NYC to shame and how they are never coming home. In a couple of weeks my dad will be flying over to meet my sister in Vietnam for a week. My sister is travelling all over Asia this summer. Even tho I just got my tickets for Italy yesterday, I have still managed to feel deprived.

I am also completely massively into the Natsuo Kirino novel Out, which this lovely woman at Random House sent to me and which I currently feel is the BEST BOOK EVER. She just sent me Kirino's next book Grotesque. I then remembered that a while ago my friend Barry had suggested I try Japanese noir, and now I have five more books on the way and I want to read every Japanese crime novel ever written.