A Genteel Black Hole

Ally's bookish (and other assorted) rambles

  • Bookish Ramble: A Quiet Place

    Ally

    Title: A Quiet Place
    Author: Seicho Matsumoto
    (Translated by Louise Heal Kawai)
    Year: 1971
    Country: Japan

    Format: Paperback
    Pages: 231
    Read: 31 December 2025 – 4 January 2026
    First reading

    A Quiet Place is a crime thriller by prolific Japanese author Seicho Matsumoto. While away on a business trip, middle-aged bureaucrat Tsuneo Asai receives the devastating news that his younger wife Eiko has died of a heart attack. When he visits the small boutique where she collapsed, Asai is puzzled that his wife never once mentioned visiting the area. Nearby he notices several seedy couples’ hotels—quiet places. Was Eiko leading a double life? And was her death more suspicious than it first seemed?

    ~ Warning: The following contains significant plot spoilers. ~

    The cover of this book describes Seicho Matsumoto as Japan’s Agatha Christie. While that’s true for the other Matsumoto stuff I’ve read, I’d argue A Quiet Place is really more like a psychological thriller by Patricia Highsmith. Asai’s investigations reveal that his wife was having an affair—he’d been too devoted to his job to notice. Eventually he confronts Eiko’s lover and, provoked by the man’s apparent lack of remorse, impulsively murders him. From there, what started as a typical investigation plot pivots into Highsmithian paranoia. It’s an interesting development, and a genre I enjoy, so I’m not disappointed by it. But I do think it’s somewhat misleading to sell it as a Christiesque murder mystery. It’s not so much a whodunit as a howgetawaywithit.

    This is a quick and enjoyable read. Matsumoto’s social commentary is interesting—Asai is forced into impossible situations by Japanese social customs and his all-consuming dedication to work. And as a fan (and writer) of haiku, I love that a haiku plays a vital role in the investigation. But it’s not as evocative or as gripping as the other Matsumoto books I’ve read. In fact it’s probably my least favourite Matsumoto book so far. I’d recommend Inspector Imanishi Investigates or Tokyo Express as better starting places.

    (Just one more thing: The final scene unexpectedly made me laugh. Asai comes face to face with the very witnesses he’s been trying to avoid, and gives himself away by shrieking and running away. At that moment I couldn’t help but picture him as Homer Simpson!)

  • Project Glowing Rectangle: The Umbrellas of Cherbourg

    Ally

    Day 30 of Project Glowing Rectangle, in which I try to divert some of my daily doomscrolling time back towards a more nourishing oblong: Cinema.

    Title: Les Parapluies de Cherbourg
    (The Umbrellas of Cherbourg)
    Director: Jacques Demy
    Writer: Jacques Demy
    Year: 1964
    Country: France

    Format: Blu-ray
    Length: 91 minutes
    Seen: 3 January 2026
    First viewing

    Today’s film was The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (1964), a musical by French New Wave director Jacques Demy, with songs by Michel Legrand. It’s a beautiful, bittersweet story of lost love and missed opportunities. Catherine Deneuve and Nino Castelnuovo star as giddy young lovers, Geneviève and Guy, whose dreams of marriage are suddenly derailed when Guy is drafted into the army.

    I spent much of this film trying to decide exactly how I felt about it. The whole thing, though performed with non-operatic voices, is sung-through like an opera. There’s even a playful line where one of Guy’s work colleagues says—or rather sings—that he hates opera and prefers movies. Well, I’m not a fan of opera myself, nor am I traditionally a fan of movies from the French New Wave. At first I wasn’t sure if The Umbrellas of Cherbourg was going to win me over.

    But win me over it did! So much so, the final scene had me in floods of tears. The moment Geneviève’s car pulled up at the petrol station, I was gone.

    This was my first film of 2026, so the year is off to a good start. And I look forward to revisiting The Umbrellas of Cherbourg in the future, now I’ve made my mind up about it.

  • 2025 Wrap-up: My Year in Films

    Ally

    I’ve been tracking my film viewing since 2012. That year, at the height of my obsession, I watched 161 films! By the end of the decade, things had settled down to a more reasonable level, about 50 or 60 per year. But in 2022, due to a mixture of creative projects and health disasters, I watched just 11 films—and for the next couple of years that number didn’t go above 17. With less time spent on films, my doomscrolling ballooned.

    Enter Project Glowing Rectangle, my personal effort to simultaneously get my phone habit under control and reclaim my love of cinema: Two birds, one Sharon Stone! I started the project in late August 2025. By the end of the year I had watched 38 films, of which only 9 were pre-Rectangle.

    But numbers don’t tell the whole story. What actually happened is that I fell back in love with cinema. I had several transcendent movie experiences during the year. While my 2010s film binge was kickstarted by the Golden Age of Hollywood, my recent cinematic renaissance had a more Japanese flavour. I started the project with a rewatch of Yasujiro Ozu’s Floating Weeds and ended the year with Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s Cure. And that’s just two of the 14 Japanese films I watched—nearly all of them great! Ugetsu and Seven Samurai were two standouts, both seen for the first time in November. And Yasujiro Ozu has become a real favourite filmmaker for me: I watched the entire Noriko Trilogy and several more besides, and loved them all. I’m excited to explore more of his work in the coming year, as well as more Mizoguchi, Kurosawa, and other Japanese classics on my radar.

    Most of my biggest disappointments came pre-Rectangle. Miyazaki’s The Boy and the Heron was underwhelming, and Paul Thomas Anderson’s Licorice Pizza was a real slog. Then there’s Mitchell Leisen’s Midnight, a screwball comedy co-written by the great Billy Wilder. I was excited to watch it, only to find it utterly forgettable. So forgettable, in fact, I had already forgotten it! When I went to log it on Letterboxd, I was baffled to discover I had already watched it a decade ago; the rewatch hadn’t jogged my memory at all. Even if I couldn’t necessarily tell you what a film was about, I can usually at least remember that I’ve seen it! Maybe I’m getting old…

    Anyway, Project Glowing Rectangle has been a rousing success. Getting back into cinema feels like reclaiming a lost part of myself. It’s good to start feeling more like Me. I’m excited to see what cinematic discoveries await me in 2026.

    And now it’s time for the charts and lists!

  • Bookish Ramble: Night Watch

    Ally

    Title: Night Watch
    (Discworld #29)
    Author: Terry Pratchett
    Year: 2002
    Country: UK

    Format: Hardback
    Pages: 475
    Read: 21-30 December 2025
    Reread

    Night Watch is the twenty-ninth Discworld book, and the sixth starring Sam Vimes and the Ankh Morpork City Watch. Vimes is on the trail of Carcer, a vicious and unrepentant killer, when a freak accident transports them both back in time. Vimes finds himself stuck in the Ankh-Morpork of his youth, right as the Glorious Revolution of the Twenty-Fifth of May is about to kick off. But Vimes and Carcer’s arrival has changed history: John Keel, the man Vimes once knew as his mentor, is dead before his time. Vimes is forced to take Keel’s place and mentor his younger self, at least long enough for the History Monks to patch up history and send him back to the future.

    ‘I mean, doesn’t it change history even if you just tread on an ant?’
    ‘For the ant, certainly,’ said Qu.

    This is certainly one of the most dramatic Discworld books. Pratchett’s work is never completely devoid of humour, but in Night Watch the scales are tipped more towards tension, drama, and righteous anger. Pratchett incorporates themes of civil unrest, police brutality and torture, social inequality, nostalgia, grief, and corrupt politics, all within the framework of a fantastical time travel romp. It’s definitely Pratchett at the height of his powers.

    ‘They attacked the other Houses, and what’s the Night Watch ever done to hurt them?’
    ‘Nothing,’ said Vimes.
    ‘There you are, then.’
    ‘I mean the Watch did nothing, and that’s what hurt them,’ said Vimes.

    In fact, Night Watch seems to have a reputation among my fellow Terryvangelists as The Best Discworld Book. When I first read it, my expectations were high—perhaps too high, so I ended up faintly disappointed. But even then, I had a feeling it would improve on rereading. And it did! This time round, I absolutely loved it. This is a powerful book with a lot to say, and it manages to say it between—or sometimes with—silly puns and dirty jokes. Well, if it’s good enough for Shakespeare…

    And the foreshadowing was much more effective when, like the older and wiser Vimes, I already understood the full significance of the Twenty-Fifth of May and its lilacs.

    How do they rise up?

  • 2025 Wrap-up: My Year in Books

    Ally

    It’s that time of year when I fall down the Rabbit Hole of Introspection. Okay, maybe that’s just where I live! But at least the new year gives some structure to my musings.

    It’s been a strange year in a lot of ways. I started 2025 with a lot of big ambitions to read big books—chunky classics like David Copperfield and Anna Karenina… both of which I ended up DNFing! Not because I disliked them, I hasten to add. They both seemed great. But I didn’t approach them with the focus and dedication such hefy tomes demand. Seduced by other books, I let Dickens and Tolstoy linger on the shelf, unread, for so long that I lost motivation to pick them up again. If I do attempt either of them again, I’ll have to go back to the start.

    In fact I had bad luck with ‘classics’ in general. My first experience of Thomas Hardy was not a happy one! My first Anne Brontë, Agnes Grey, was… just fine. And worst of all, I ended up losing interest and DNFing A Passage to India. I had really hoped to enjoy that one, considering E.M Forster’s A Room with a View was my favourite read of 2024. Very disappointing!

    I struggled with my health, both mental and physical, through much of summer and into autumn. Long story short: My GP recommended some iron and vitamin supplements, which are slowly improving my energy levels. And I will soon be starting therapy to see if I can get my wonky brain back in shape too. Anyway, these issues evidently affected my reading, both in terms of how many books I read and how much I enjoyed them.

    But it’s not all doom and gloom! After accepting that chunky classic novels weren’t working for me, I pivoted towards shorter books. I read a lot of classic plays, falling deeper in love with the work of Henrik Ibsen. I also reignited my dormant love of sci-fi, reading excellent short story collections by Ursula K. Le Guin and Roger Zelazny. And I read plenty of delightful children’s fiction, falling deeply in love with Tove Jansson’s Moomins.

    Terry Pratchett remains my most reliable go-to author. I’ve had a great time going through the Discworld series in order. Most of those books are rereads for me. In fact I’ve filled in almost all the gaps now: I’ve read 40 of the 41 Discworld books. All that remains is the final book, The Shepherd’s Crown, which I’ll probably get to in 2027 at this rate. I plan to take my time and enjoy the journey.

    I also finished rereading Le Guin’s Earthsea series, which I can now confidently say is my favourite fantasy series ever. My admiration for Le Guin continues to grow all the time. I’m excited to explore more of her work outside of Earthsea.

    And one chunky book that didn’t let me down was Mervyn Peake’s Titus Groan. That book was a revelation. A bizarre, bewitching fictional world described in such obsessive detail, it felt more like visiting in person than merely reading about it.

    December saw a big uptick in my reading. I recently bought a phone-sized e-reader, which allows me to read comfortably while lying down at bedtime. It’s much less overstimulating than my actual phone, so bedtime reading has become a viable option again. I mostly read children’s books at night. It’s a good way to unwind at the end of the day. But whatever my bedtime read is, it’s helpful to have that extra variety in my book diet. (Watching more films in 2025 also helped with that. Whatever I’m not getting from my morning read, I can supplement with films, short stories, and bedtime books.) This past month I feel like I’ve enjoyed more of what I read, and I’m feeling optimistic about the year ahead.

    And now—drum roll please—it’s time for graphs, charts, and lists!

  • Auld Lang Syne (but make it psychedelic)

    Ally

    A few years ago I found myself wondering: What if Tim Smith (Cardiacs, The Sea Nymphs) had written Auld Lang Syne? It would probably have some wonky chords and trippy bits, wouldn’t it? So I recorded my best attempt at just such a thing. It’s not a perfect imitation of Cardiacs — more like my cover of a Tim Smith song that doesn’t exist.

    Recently I revisited the old demo and polished it up in the mix, added some programmed drums and stuff, and got it sounding generally decent.

    So what better day to share it than New Year’s Eve? Ring out the old year, ring in the new. Ring-a-ding ding!

  • Bookish Ramble: The Phantom Tollbooth

    Ally

    Title: The Phantom Tollbooth
    Author: Norton Juster
    Year: 1961
    Country: USA

    Format: E-book
    Pages: 255
    Read: 17-29 December 2025
    First reading

    The Phantom Tollbooth is a children’s fantasy by Norton Juster, with charming illustrations by Jules Feiffer. Milo is a chronically bored kid. Then one day he receives a mysterious gift: a magical turnpike tollbooth. The tollbooth transports him to the Kingdom of Wisdom, a whimsical land of puns, where he ends up on a quest to rescue Princesses Rhyme and Reason. Accompanied by his new friends — a Watchdog called Tock and a grumpy beetle called Humbug — Milo encounters a host of eccentric characters who collectively teach him how to find joy in learning.

    My inner child was delighted by this book. I’ve been a fan of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland as long as I can remember, and The Phantom Tollbooth has similar vibes: a child is transported to a surreal land full of baffling eccentrics and outlandish wordplay.

    However Tollbooth has a more obvious moral than Alice. It aims to get kids excited about knowledge for knowledge’s sake — a noble cause! But my adult self tends to prefer children’s stories that are a bit less on-the-nose. (I spent much of this year becoming a fan of Tove Jansson’s Moomins.) So while I delighted in the wordplay (a car that runs on silence: it goes without saying), the Kingdom of Wisdom probably won’t linger in my imagination the way Wonderland does.

    It’s too bad I didn’t read this when I was Milo’s age.

  • Project Glowing Rectangle: Cure

    Ally

    Day 29 of Project Glowing Rectangle, in which I try to divert some of my daily doomscrolling time back towards a more nourishing oblong: Cinema.

    Title: Cure
    Director: Kiyoshi Kurosawa
    Writer: Kiyoshi Kurosawa
    Year: 1997
    Country: Japan

    Format: 4K Blu-ray
    Length: 112 minutes
    Seen: 29 December 2025
    First viewing

    Back in August I started Project Glowing Rectangle — basically a conscious effort to watch more films. I’ve been neglecting my love of cinema for the past few years, and wasting too much time staring at The Bad Oblong (my phone). Project Glowing Rectangle is an attempt to correct both of these problems. Last year I watched a grand total of 16 films. This year it’s up to 38, of which 29 were between August and now. So far so good!

    Today’s film was Cure (1997), a psychological horror film written and directed by Kiyoshi Kurosawa — no relation to Akira Kurosawa.

    Koji Yakusho stars as a police detective investigating a spate of inexplicable killings around Tokyo. The perpetrators are unconnected, and each seems unable to explain their motives. And every victim is found with an X carved into their neck.

    I was very impressed by this film. Koji Yakusho (who I also loved in Wim Wenders’ Perfect Days) is excellent in the lead role, as is the whole supporting cast. It’s an extremely dark film, and the bleak atmosphere lingers long after the end credits have rolled.

    The question is, did I enjoy the experience? I think so. But it’s not one I’d want to repeat too often!

  • Friday Haiku 2025

    Ally

    At the start of 2025 I set myself a challenge to write a haiku every Friday for the whole year. The rule: They don’t have to be good, they just have to be done.

    And today is the last Friday of 2025. I completed the challenge, with only one skipped week (extreme fatigue) and a few belated haiku (forgetfulness) along the way. Overall I’m proud of how the project went. I achieved what I set out to do, and probably improved my haiku-writing skills along the way.

    But I don’t intend to carry the project over into 2026. Towards the end of the year it just stopped being fun. It was mandatory creativity to a deadline — too much like homework.

    To mark the end of the Friday Haiku project, here are all fifty haiku:

    ~

    January

    ~

    1 — January 3rd:

    Lingering malaise.
    Bartók on headphones, eyes closed —
    Time to recover.

    2 — January 10th:

    An old favourite show:
    Never used to watch alone —
    Blindsided by grief.

    3 — January 17th:

    Hollow red chamber
    Invaded by silver blade —
    Slicing a pepper.

    4 – January 24th:

    Victory is mine
    Until the blue shell descends:
    Mario Karted!

    5 – January 31st:

    When writing haiku,
    Please don't use ChatGPT:
    Suck on your own terms.

    ~

    February

    ~

    6 – February 7th:

    Glistening tarmac
    Glimpsed through a clouded window —
    Staying in today.

    7 – February 14th:

    I love you too much 
    For seventeen syllables 
    Ever to encompass.

    8 – February 21st:

    Cool air fills my lungs,
    I feel myself expanding —
    New CPAP machine.

    9 – February 28th:

    Daylight stretching out,
    Feeding my animal self:
    Winter retreating.

    ~

    March

    ~

    10 – March 7th:

    Vibrating, a string 
    Agitates air molecules:
    To the ear, music. 

    11 – March 14th:

    Squinting at pixels —
    "Is this better, d'you think?" 
    Editing thumbnails.

    12 – March 21st:

    Curious kitty
    Sniffing at my open door
    Beats a quick retreat!

    13 – March 28th:

    A Sondheim earworm
    Rolling merrily through my head:
    Who's like him? Damn few.

    ~

    April

    ~

    14 — 4th April:

    Mottled evening sky —
    Red kite pitches and rolls past,
    Sailing secret waves.

    15 — 11th April:

    Spate of sleepless nights
    Depleting my battery: 
    Can't even write a

    16 — 18th April:

    Inscrutable words
    Decorate the evening air —
    Language of the birds.

    17 — 25th April:

    The birdies have sung,
    Our modern dance is ended:
    Farewell, Pere Ubu.

    [In memory of David Thomas.]

    ~

    May

    ~

    18 — 2nd May:

    Opportunities
    Like speeding taxis recede
    Into might-have-been.

    19 — 11th May (ahem):

    Totally on time,
    It's my regular haiku:
    Please ignore the date.

    20 — 16th May:

    Watching Taskmaster:
    Mathew Baynton's tiny shorts,
    Judiciously blurred. 

    21 — 23rd May:

    Pearly gates open:
    Angelic chorus cheers, "Norm!"
    So that's where George went.

    [In memory of George Wendt.]

    22 — 30th May:

    Razor blade in hand,
    You Fantastic! musicians
    Thwart the precedent.

    [Inspired by the experimental band, You Fantastic!]

    ~

    June

    ~

    23 — 6th June:

    Reading Titus Groan:
    Gormenghast's grim labyrinth
    Haunting my mind's eye. 

    24 — 13th June:

    In my room, surf's up:
    There's a riot goin' on —
    Dance to the music!

    [In memory of Brian Wilson and Sly Stone.]

    24 — 20th June:

    Window yawning wide,
    Curtains dancing in the breeze…
    Still too bloody hot.

    25 — 27th June:

    Hope is mere kindling:
    If you want there to be fire,
    You must strike the match.

    ~

    July

    ~

    26 — 4th July:

    White cassette, red sleeve,
    Blaring in my preteen ears:
    You really got me.

    [Inspired by The Kinks.]

    27 — 11th July:

    Mortification:
    The reeking fertiliser
    Through which our souls grow. 

    28 — 18th July:

    My waterbody:
    Where veins are tributaries
    Flowing with life force.

    [Inspired by Robert Macfarlane’s book, Is A River Alive?]

    29 — 25th July:

    The Prince of Darkness
    Unfurls his leathery wings,
    Soars into the void.

    [In memory of Ozzy Osbourne.]

    ~

    August

    ~

    30 — 1st August:

    Round the corner, leaves
    Beckon in a gentle breeze:
    Befriending a tree.

    31 — 8th August:

    Iambic music
    Waking up my sleeping ear,
    Measure by measure.

    32 — 15th August:

    .hindsight in Revealed
    contexts and meanings Hidden
    :reverse in Story

    [Inspired by series 9 of John Finnemore’s Souvenir Programme.]

    33 — 22nd August:

    A witness wonders,
    Why do they send five coppers
    To arrest one man?

    34 — 29th August:

    Watching Enterprise —
    The only Star Trek series
    With a shit theme tune.

    ~

    September

    ~

    35 — 5th September:

    Glowing in darkness,
    Twenty four flickering frames
    Help me find myself.

    [Inspired by my project to get back into watching films.]

    36 — 12th September:

    Most radiant smile,
    Transcending time and language:
    Setsuko Hara.

    37 — 19th September:

    Made my lovely eyes
    Sad, leaky, wet and wincey: 
    Petals float to earth.

    [Inspired by the long-awaited new Cardiacs album.]

    26th September:

    (No haiku. Too fatigued to write.)

    ~

    October

    ~

    38 — 3rd October:

    Golden leaves dancing —
    Watched through rain-streaked windowpane
    And a foggy brain.

    39 — 10th October:

    Pearly grey expanse
    Dotted with darting black birds,
    Flitting between trees.

    40 — 17th October:

    Malfunctioning brain:
    Called the mental mechanic —
    Time for a tune-up.

    41 — 24th October:

    Silver kintsugi:
    Break my heart and glue the shards,
    Tokyo Story.

    42 — 31st October:

    Hearing old music
    Made by a forgotten self:
    Time to remember.

    ~

    November

    ~

    43 — 7th November:

    Red and golden leaves
    Strewn upon the grey below:
    Autumn's casualties.

    44 — 14th November:

    Insatiable night
    Feasts upon the daylight hours,
    Tipping the balance.

    45 — 21st November:

    Late afternoon rays
    From a low, cold winter sun
    Catch the bare branches.

    46 — 28th November:

    Waxing crescent moon
    Floating in pale blue evening:
    A cut fingernail.

    ~

    December

    ~

    47 — 5th December:

    My Telecaster
    Beckons from its dusty case:
    Soon I'll play again.

    48 — 12th December:

    Christmas approaches
    But merriness can't be found:
    I'll try to make some.

    49 — 19th December:

    Saying “Oh, hiya!”
    Lubricates the social wheels, 
    Or so says Ozu. 

    [Inspired by the film Good Morning, the original Japanese title of which is Ohayo.]

    50 — 26th December:

    Slump across the line
    With a huge, exhausted sigh:
    Fiftieth haiku!

  • A Genteel Blog Hole

    Ally

    Hello and welcome to A Genteel Black Hole, the companion blog for my YouTube channel. My name’s Ally, and yours probably isn’t.

    I plan to post concise reviews of books and films—many of which I will discuss in a more rambly way on my channel. There may also be music, poetry, and whatever else I feel like posting. It’s my party and I’ll cry if I want to!

    I do not and will not use AI—I just happen to like em-dashes, okay?