Midnights with Mystic

After a small break from reading habit I picked this book "Midnights with Mystic" ,my favorite preacher jaggi vasudev's talk with Cheryl Simone.Had a good read as Iam interested into the subjects of spirituality,somewhere a beautiful balance added by it to my life.
  After reading this book,somehow got a strong affirmation to start with my yoga practises and courses. Many times books gives me direction with respect to "what's Next".If a person wants to know about chakras and a book on spirituality and its reflections in day today life,its a guide to it.

The Lowland by Jhumpa Lahiri

Had a good pace in completing "The Lowland" by Jhumpa Lahiri in a week's time.Jhumpa made me to walk in the lowlands of Bengal ,Bay area of Rhode's island,streets of california with mild tears in the corner of my eyes.I can't say I enjoyed the read as the storyline is quite  absorbing with promising realities.
    Story is about fear of facing realities and most of the characters jump out of the scene wherever they could not standby with their own situational excuses,let it be Gauri,Bella or subash.Gauri character is as hard as wood and I can find a self Centered heroine who can casually ditch her biological child with lame excuses.Bella,Gauri's daughter undergoes a trauma in facing the heat once she is left alone in the hands of her so called dad Subash.words, plot are carefully chosen to make the flow so fluid which can connect every reader to their own piece of past.
  Worth a good read,but colours could have been added for few characters who carries pain till the burial ground.A book of solitude,noisy silence and unexpected realities
Without a blanket of excuses.

PS: Thanks Chirax for presenting it and I went deeper than expected

The picture of Dorian gray

Yaay! The first book Iam reviewing after an obsessed read in 2015 " The picture of Dorian gray" by Oscar Wilde.This one book made me so much addicted to Oscar's classic. Such an intensive storyline with spontaneous flow in all ages.

  The way author has given lights to the character Dorian and then shades of human life with intense grey areas as time passes by are prolific,apt metaphors with exact measurement of words which can make anyone to stir their brain.

 Classics are just marvelous with their honey coated words which provides deeper meaning when we decode them in every line.

Innocent love,casual death,killer painting,youth pleasure, fear of upcoming death and bag full of regrets made this book to strong in my mind.A must read novel in the list of everglowing  classics

The fountain head

Yaay! Long read came to an end.Happily closed The fountainhead book by Ayn Rand.Its a solid read and I had a feel I walked with each character in a parallel world.As like Ayn Rand or anyother reader me too liked the hype created  for the immutable,self sufficient character Howard Roark.The jargons ,comparisons and the depth of human psychology reflects in her selection of words.
    Its a book which slices individualism,alturism ,freedom of being a species by itself without a bend and bow.Author has left few loops unclosed with if's and but's which adds a feel of reality without a fairy tale touch.girl character Miss.Dominique is equally competitive to any other character and she makes unpredictable move let it be filing divorce previous evening and to get set for next wedding immediate afternoon.Let it be Mr.Toohey who preaches sacrifice for his self fame,Mr.Keating who can complete a life by pursuing borrowed dream,Mr.Wynand who loves his words more than his deeds and all other petty characters  conceived a deep image in reader's mind.
    Learning to move with characters with a soft smile as I move with any characters of my day today life without judging it.words of few book can move me so much and leave me in an island of thoughts .

PS: Thanks Sumitra for the book,as I thoroughly rejoiced it.

Nine lives by William Dalrymple

I am done with nine lives by William Darlymple.This book took enough space in my brain to think and rethink about the characters scattered around India.Every life from north to south,east to west has its own beautiful excuses ,strong belief  and its own contradictions.
 William has written in an amazing way connecting land and people with their own native convictions.From Devadasi to Fakhir,from singers to sadhus ,from Rebellious monk to Theyyam dancers.I found one similarity in all nine lives, either they have their excuses in the name of God or strong belief over whatever they do ,let it finding Kali ma in cremation ground or Devi at temple.
Its a good ,simple read with incredible detailing of simple beings whom we see in our day today life.

Reading Marathon

My booklist is ready now.Few irresistibles to be consumed before  sending 2014 as memory in my blog.
Nine lives by William Dalrymple
 Fountain head by Ayn Rand
Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri
Ground beneath her feet by Salman Rushdie
Gone with the wind by Margaret Mitchell
Thank you Jeeves by P.G wodehouse

Just couple of months in my hand to consume all.I have heard about mentioned authors ,read reviews but want to experience the thrill while traveling with them through their books.Let me start with reading marathon now.

To kill a mockingbird

Took such a long time to write review on "To kill a Mocking bird",doubting my wittiness while condensing it .One such book I enjoyed thoroughly where nearby voices became mere sound.Author Harper Lee has given life to characters by her casualwords and powerful ideas.Its a book which made me feel the intangible thing lying beneath every soul which is rarely exposed after a threshold point.Let it be black,white,kid,lunatic,father or a friend everyone has a view ,that need to be respected ,can be negated without crushing their view.Author has penned down  her beautiful experimentation with human behavior.Atticus,Scout and Jem Finch are memorable characters.I found a great impact on me by this solid book.Atticus has a powerful convincing skill as a father, as a lawyer,as a citizen,as a fellowmate and he can do justice to any role he gets at any point.I am impressed by his graceful context switching.
                         One such read might take quite longer time to forget.

who moved my cheese

This time I started up with this tiny book "Who moved my cheese" by Spencer Johnson.In two sittings I am done with it.writer starts with a story using mice and little people as his characters adding lot of strategies to move their cheese.As a whole its about change and adapting to change wherever we go.very simple book to consume it ,if energy level is low.As a whole its a one time read with lot of cheese diagrams and tiny messages for the day.

Mahaswetha

 Tiny book of 200 pages which I consumed In one travel to my native.I am so much touched by the postscript which expresses art as an impression of life.How well a book can be a trigger,ahem.
Author Sudhamoorthy has used Indian characters from  name selection to stage plays .In a land where 80% of books having masala stuff,I found this book crystal clear with its gist.After so called love and wedding what's next when a girl prone to leukoderma all of a sudden,what's her prejudice in small village in spite of her hubby being a doctor.How she pulls her back and starts a life from scratch in a bigger city all by herself when man made relationships fail.I liked the weightage given to each character, bringing a doctor as hero and twisting the shades  followed by many other .Author has done justice by weaving the plot as good it can be.underlying thoughts of any human which is rarely questioned has been brought out well ,introducing relationship tags.well written simple story for a night.

Timekeeper

hurrah! completed a boring book "The Time Keeper",by Mitch Albom at my office infront of my manager.No other reason as I dont have anything to invest my time and so timekeeper.Not a good read.Though he is my favorite author,he could not bring out fiction in his books.Purposefully,I skipped last few pages as it squares up my boredom.Author made a character who tried to measure time and later he is punished for his sin of measuring time.How he tried  to convince two different characters about significance of time is the story.
 Time is something which brings in insecurity to human, whereas  not the case with any other organism over here.I felt Time is the pivot for  balanced process in human existence.If not hierarchy,dynasties,respect ,life expectancy etc could have gone for a toss.
In few places author made me to think more about magic of time and his micro stories on each character made my mind to multitask.If you don't have magazines at office,locked in a room without LAN connectivity it can help you to ponder your thoughts about time.
Last but one,I hate the usage of Father time in this book, as a whole its a book to skim once.

Iam Malala

After 3 months,I completed "Iam Malala" by Christina Lamb.Its not so easy to come out of the critical trauma which Malala underwent.Iam swept off by the second half.More than 5 Major operations with cranial plastotherapy to various major operations with screws.
When one part of world speaks about women empowerment,equal rights, unbiased education other part  is living in a darker zone with "religious romanticist" Talibans.I can visualise the heights of gender discrimination from colour white to education, further penetrating into all boundaries.There are parts of world where living itself a revenge and living is no more a happy journey at Pakistan,Afghanistan and in Swat Valley.I find a pattern from my sister nation SriLanka to Afghanistan.Partition to subpartition ,micropartition ,nanopartition in the name of 100 reasons with the manure of million bloodsheds ,where nature is raped mercilessly.
"Iam Malala" speaks about a dream loving father and bravo daughter Malala ,how they blown away tough obstacles while bringing education as equal right in Swat valley .Many thought provoking lines which made me to fold the pages for later-visit.
Talibans,gunshots surpassing fireworks,lonely ladies,brutal punishments ,flood,hunger, helpless patients can be the words which can define life at Swat and history knows always heroes are made here and this time heroine.

SITA

       Today I got some more time to think about Indian mythology and its characters,while Iam in the verge to finish the book SITA by Devdutt .He has done a good research on Ramayan to come out with this book SITA.She is still living in my eyes and Iam melted with the way how he has portrait her.Devdutt left no pages  from Kamba Ramayan to Valmiki Ramayan and those info snippets are available in each chapter,for people interested so much into its history.
         Author has given voice for all five sense creatures to Devas and Asuras.I had a feel like standing with those characters in the plot.He has tried all his best to give visual control along with his pencil sketches.He has potrait Sita as a daughter of earth,sister of trees,witty wife whose questions remain unanswered by scion of Raghu clan.As a whole Ramayan leaves a person helpless ,blaming karma which is easy to do for anyone and same for RAM.I found Ram as a person who uses his witty thoughts to reason those age old principles ,without bending it whereas,Sita is a person who cant take answers in the name of principles,which has paved way for complete story.
       

I liked this book without any expectation and it is more than my expectation,as Iam not from the background of mythology.Very beautiful read ,as I dont have the habit of judging books and authors .It created a curiosity to have a trip to Lanka to see all those historical places which stands as ruins now.In nutshell,Devdutt has done a modern art with age old paintings.
PS:Lot to know from Indian mythology

Have a little faith

Recently my reading habit is fading away,but somehow dusting it out with some strategies.Picked this lightweight book "Have a little faith" by Mitch albom.Few pages really enjoyed which has my pencil mark to reread it .What a touch man!!! Mitch has become my favourite author who says one simple story to the world in each book .Next comes Five people I met at heaven.
Here its about the importance of faith as like salt in food,author speaks about people hailed from different faith ,different status.Here author sits for writing eulogy for this Reb Albert(If I remember his name),how his weekends are filled with interviews and later the emptiness after Reb's death which is unbearble.Direct questions about sensitive topic "The faith",genuine answers without whitewash from Reb,something I loved it.
Simple words without forgetting to capture the subtle stuff here ,there and everywhere.One catchy line "Its not that easy to write about one's dad or husband in a book" ,of course that's true
Definitely one time read with good number of revisit in between,who need some more answers for having little faith.

The difficulty of being good

The difficulty of being good:
      I should really really feel abashed to write review for this book after a span of 5 months.I bought this book when I had less currency in my hand,such a hasty want made me to roll on for a span of 5 months.I will badly miss "The difficulty of being good" in my Bus journey to Indira Nagar.My 1 hour bus journey just fleets  away by leafing these pages.Iam so much immersed in the book wherever philosophy comes.I experienced the glossary of dialogue "Books are your friends".This book added every nerve to the proverb.
    Gurucharan Das ,the ex-CEO of P&G has taken his academic vacation and penned down such a lengthy,narrative book which digs the root of vedic scriptures,exclusively Mahabharatha and Bhagavad Gita.I wont glorify it to the core,as I felt draggy pages amidst that big fat book.On the whole ,its a gentle read with too many questions over DHARMA.I too accept dharma is subtle.Writer took the same stand of modern writers saying neither right nor wrong ,better to say preferred side.Each chapter speaks about the icons of Mahabharatha from Dhuryodhana to Krishna ,Karna to Dhravpadi.He has dug into the cuticles of Rig veda too,clearly visible out of his references.Few lines which lives in my mind after a span of 5 months ,after the completion of book,Yuddhistra says "I have to do it,as its my duty" and Dhraupadi's words "Why we want to be good".
  In nutshell,author has compared those days incidents with today's, which adds some more lightning to it.If something happens,it happens.nothing much could be done except again trying to arrange the life beautifully.A good read for people who love to read the same book for long long months .

Seven Secrets of Lord Vishnu by Devdutt

           

 The time which I consumed to accomplish seven secrets is such a damn lengthy period literally more than a month,a badcheck  measuring my letters consumption .Devdutt Patnaik,the author has shown his mirror image of his mythological cells from the letter A to z.A big credit for incorporating mythological paintings and snaps which drives readers like me who is crazy behind pictures,stories and logics stringing it together.

               As Iam poorest of the poor in my root epics and vedhas,this read  is an enlightening read.It was such a tortoise slow read till I cross 60 pages and as my fingers are towards the end I felt the "rasha" of Lord Vishnu henceforth now fallen crazily for Lord Krish.If we are going for language flow ,we will be cheated as the author has taken his pen to make things as simple it could be.In nutshell,its a book of exploration and excavation for people deficient in mythological literature.

               It has added the fuel to my Bhagavad Gita discourse,as its an epic season in my jungle.On the whole its a lightread  where we can go lost in thin air by the beautiful paintings printed in the leftleaves of the book.Always excavating the past is as fun as constructing the roads to future.Now desperate enough  to hang with Mahabharatha.

No needs,None at all: ANGER

Taking a great privilege to pen down my review for Harini Padmanabhan's short story all about fuming "Anger" compiled in Emoticons.Its indeed a good write with aphorisms wherever it request for.It would have added additional face value if and if my face turned red out of wrath apart from "Nandu" the heroine.

I was waiting for this first release "Emoticons" for a long stretch of time , from day one I saw the status in media ,an unveiled author to society who makes art out of scratch in virtual world.Somehow managed to place an order through our famous flipkartians.I unwrapped my package on early friday,to get set well for weekend read."No needs,None at all" a story woven with wrath as its nucleus ,anger imbibed in every nerve of the heroine "Nandhini" out of absurdity and her over-intelligence.Author has used "stream of conciousness" technique at  certain spots which makes readers not to get exact placeholder .I felt people can be responsible for what they say and not for what they think ,here our heroine dwells in her own world gathering too much mass of her past,present and future which finally blurted out as "ANGER".I really love the climax lines,which adds fragrence to the emoticon "Anger".

On the whole ,I enjoyed the ride of 10+ pages with needed exclamations and punctuations .Really a good kick-off "HARINI" .Your intelligence adds innocence to the characters u weave :)

King of clubs-Less twist and more turns

    My legendry hero "Hercules Poirot" has unwinded his magic wand in King of Clubs too.Agatha christie has the spell to burn readers time  much with crime detectives.The play starts with the voice "murder" and the girl of fame "Santclaire" touched the floor out of saturated scene.Mr.X ,the victim can be unwinded as time falls in the hand of Poirot.
   The style Agatha used is unique of its own,picturising a thriller movie in our eye balls.All the minute she makes me fall for her slang and greycells.Its the time of verge when Prince of Mauretina want to make this beautiful dancer as his wife,graveful incident happened to take wishes out of line. Poirot untied the sack of clues one by one ,where investigators gasp ,space between words too adds an answer to his question.Its a murder happened in "y" villa after a good supper in its library.Poirot was about to come with faulty detection,history and christie never want to itch the err,hence again some questions in his grey cells ,perhaps landed up with right murderer,brother of SaintClaire.
   Hercules dug even till the heredity of Santclaire ,henceforth came to the judgement, whole family knows to act,playing a bridge game with a deck of 51 cards leaving the king of club in the pack ,the fourth player who should have played in the library with Mr.X.
    On the whole twist within twist ,mere coincidence of the card "King" at two different situations added up in writing a good climax .One time read.

P.S:  To be read for her greycells and the word culture.

Cat o' nine tales-The man who robbed his post office

         Still eight more tales are left unturned ,the spice about these novels are the one has its birth when ARCHER was in prison for couple of years.The man who robbed his own post office ,a lightweight tale where we would expect for its end in three different break points.In each breakpoint he has briefed in three different tracks,again has its start from the breakpoint.The tale starts as a law verdict where Mr.Justice Grey immersed in an exclusive robbery case,where the characters robbed their own postoffice to take back their lost investment.Mr.Chris Haskins and Mrs.Sue Haskins were the victim out of time's game.
       Growing from the scratch ,stingingly rich, back to square one,again starting from the scratch and looping it nearly for thrice the same process is the beauty of this tale.Iam just reminded of "IF" poem by Kipling,piling up the fame and again starting it from the scratch ,its all in the game. Author made a justice ,by adding a definite room for "imprisonment" afterall the birthplace of his thought process.I like the same style how words are thrown up in conversation and the tale was like staring a "Typical Annamalai(rajnikanth) Movie".
      Thrown light over pets ,love ,growth,passion towards fame as a whole its a light read.But definitely not my overlike or love towards it.

The jewel robbery at grand metropolitan-A good sit with Hercules

     Kudos for Hercules poirot,my recent hero but who lived many years ago in Christie's  list of novels.Should I give a plain round vooow for those grey cells resided in Agatha Christie reflecting in Hercules Poirot,the aristocratic detective.In this sketch,Hercules is in another air to reveal out the jewel theft.
        This sketch is somewhat close to my heart as because of the perfection not missed in any line.Countable characters made me to live the story as a spectator completely ,if not I have the problem in remembering names untill and unless sketch remains lengthy with n-times repetetion of names.Personally I love this one too close.Mr & Mrs Opalson,chambermaid,Frenchmaid and our alltime "wanted" characters Hercules Poirot and Captain Hastings.
      Its a plot not to detect a crime,but a theft.By the time Mrs Opalson,who loves to showcase the desire to gold rather than its craft,went to bring one of her favourite necklace,the scene happened.Poirot guided the inspector to boil down with right thief.The timing measurement for an act to be feasible or not adds spice to it.The mark of the box in an undusted empty room adds the second clue and the tactic he used to get fingerprint from chambermaid made this play a cherishing one.
     My mind starts to think in lateral direction when I sit with Hercules Poirot.I love to spend somemore time with you dear "Hercules poirot".

The affair at Victory Ball-Agatha christie

           Unlike a monthly casual visit to crossword,today I made a purposeful visit to crossword to fill my monthly list fueled  up by my one amidst the best pal.The first hit is so obvious ,world's favourite story teller's piece -"Jeffrey Archer" as my plan for the month is to be completely obssessed with his letters and to leave none of his masterpiece unturned.The choice in my bucket will be revealed later .
  
          Then comes my favourite crime thriller "Agatha Christie" and I hunted 50 stories as a whole for a big fat money.At seldom,after a good spent I used to make my mind to engineer thoughts- money " just papers".When I feel the smell of unturned pages of my favourite story tellers masterpiece lying  in my couch with a light music ,it worth awesome "feeling  heaven on earth".

           Hercules Poirot ,The Belgian refugee ,retired inspector is the hero whom christie engineered for his work.An aristocratic,having little grey cells in mind.Person who loves things in square rather than round.All these lines I just loved the way she threw.
            
            The plot of the play is to detect whether couple of crime is accidental or out of coincidence.Hercules poirot made a close look in a land of so-called "vision bearers" where the magic number is 5 and not 6 members in the party.The murder of Lord Cornshaw and his girlfriend inspired to have too much doping by Davidson made the show to stand still till I read the climax.Hence one crime is a murder and the next,an inspired murder .Its the way how he had a close look at Ball's constume brought the bag revealed.

          Waiting for one more night to turn the next story in his store.