Finished Sputnik Sweetheart from Murakami…(btw j. did you buy all your books in the UK…they all have the prices in pounds…)…
some text….

I turned face-up on the slab of stone, gazed at the sky, and thought about all the man-made satellites spinning around the Earth. The horizon was still etched in a faint glow, and stars began to blink on in the deep, wine coloured sky. I gazed among them for the light of a satellite, but it was still too bright to spot one with the naked eye. The sprinkling of stars looked nailed to the spot, unmoving. I closed my eyes and listened carefully for the descendants of Sputnik, even now circling the earth, gravity their only tie to the planet. Lonely metal souls in the unimpeded darkness of space, they meet, pass each other, and part, never to meet again. No words passing between them. No promises to keep.

and the last two paragraphs of the book….

….I get up out of bed. I pull back the old, faded curtain and open up the window. I stick my head out and look up at the sky. Sure enough, a mouldy-coloured half-moon hangs in the sky. Good. We’re both looking at the same moon, in the same world. We’re connected to reality by the same line. All I have to do is quietly draw it towards me.
I spread my fingers apart and stare at the palms of both hands, looking for bloodstains. There aren’t any. No scent of blood, no stiffness. The blood must have already, in it’s own silent way, seeped inside.

so that’s two books for me in about 2 weeks…wow!!!! Look at me…now on to “Fortress of Solitude” by Jonathan Lethem.

someone is cooking cabbage or asparagus in this building…ugh!