Books I read this summer

The following is a list of books which I read in that past few months. These books weren’t necessarily read in >30 degree temperature. Some were even read under a rajai ( all in 2011 though). I liked the title to be this way.

·        Tuesday’s with Morrie

Author – Mitch Albom

Genre – nonfiction, memoir

My rating – 4/5

A few months back I was talking with a friend of mine on her birthday and in the middle of the discussion she told that she wanted to call up everyone whom she cared for and tell them how much they mean to her. Further ahead in the discussion I found that it was Tuesdays with Morrie which had brought this desire in her mind.

Tuesdays with Morrie is a real life account of the last few days of Morrie Shwartz, a professor of sociology in Brandeis University, Massachusetts. Morrie is diagnosed by Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS) and is destined to die a slow and painful death. The author, an old student of Morrie, hears about his condition and decides to pay him a visit. The author has penned those conversations which he had with his teacher before his teacher’s death.

The book is written in a much uncomplicated manner and touches one’s heart and one’s beliefs in a profound way.  This made me think a lot about how I want my life to be. And I kept thinking about these things even long after I finished the book. I would highly recommend this book for anyone who wants to venture into nonfiction literature.

·        Long walk to freedom

Author - Nelson Mandela

Genre – Auto Biography

My rating – 3.5/5

I came across this thick book while I was browsing through the politics section of the library hoping to stumble upon something interesting. I was instantly attracted towards this book. I have a bad track record with long books. I still decided to read this book even if it demanded an extra effort.

It is a beautiful read. Nelson Mandela portrays himself as an ordinary man who grew over the years and started doing extraordinary things, one thing at a time. What is most striking about this book is the irony in the manner in which Mandela describes his childhood in a primitive society with linguistic brilliance in an alien language, English.

Sadly, I couldn’t finish this book. Library deadlines to blame.

·        Animal Farm

Author – George Orwell

Genre – Fiction

My rating – 3/5

A satire, this book revolves around the lives of an animal colony aiming to achieve utopia. Initially the animal farm is run and maintained by humans. However, the animals have a strong desire for freedom and self governance. They overthrow the humans running the farm and lay the foundation of self rule. What follows is a pig led tyranny.

The novel is a satire on socialist way of doing things. The book was insightful and the author very skillfully proves the pointlessness of a communist form of governance.

·        Tipping Point

Author – Malcom Gladwell

Genre – Nonfiction, management

My rating –2.5/5

Although this book has remained on top of the charts in nonfiction category, I was not impressed much. The book talks about how a few actions by few people at the right time can lead to massive change. The book tries to bring out the 80/20 rule in essence, which says that roughly 80% of the effects come from 20% of the causes. A corollary says 20% of the people are responsible for 80% of the work that happens in this world. This book puts forward good many numbers of examples to drive some point. However they are incoherent and long winded. I didn’t like the book much. Many others like it though.

·      Hitchhiker’s Guide to Galaxy

Author– Douglas Adams

Genre – Fiction, Sci-fi, Humor  

My rating – 4.5/5

This is probably the most amazing book I have read in a long long time. It will be an offence to call it a book. It is the magna carta of modern day humor. If you have spent hours reading abstruse goose or other similar web comics you should definitely lay your hands on this book. Douglas Adams is a genius. Go grab a copy.

·        1984

Author– George Orwell

Genre – Fiction, Politics

My rating – 4/5

Big Brother, Room 101, Thought Police, Thought Crime, Unperson, Memory Hole, Doublethink, Newspeak. If you have ever read any of the above terms before, it is because it was mentioned first in 1984, a dystopian novel written by George Orwell. The most fascinating thing about reading this book was that I was reading a book written in 1948 about a fictional state in 1984, in the year 2011. The author imagines a ‘utopian’ society run by ‘the party’. It is a chilling book and would surely leave you restless and grossed out at times.

A compelling read.

·        The Slap

Author – Christos Tsiolkas

Genre – Fiction, drama

My rating – 2.5/5

I received this book as a gift from the Matrix club, BITS Pilani, for doing a book review. The book is about how a slap from an adult to a kid (who is not his own) leads to complications in various people’s lives. The novel is set in modern day Australia and has a very contemporary setting to the whole story. However the author has gone overboard with profanities and sex which was avoidable and did no value addition to the story.

·        Second Degree

Author – Prashanth John

Genre – Fiction, memoir

My rating – 2/5

This book came into the market during the post five point someone delirium. The author is an alumnus of the first PGPX batch of IIM Ahmadabad. The book starts from his admission into the PGPX batch and goes on till the placements at the end of the course. It has been written on the lines of other campus memoirs like Five Point Someone, Anything for You Ma’m etc however it lacks the much needed masala and humor to make this genre worth a read. The only reason I bothered to read it till the end was because it talked about IIM A and I am ready to read any nonsense about a place where I want to be someday.

·        Audacity of Hope

Author – Barack Obama

Genre – Nonfiction, Politics

My rating – 3/5

When our country was busy getting charmed by anything and everything Obama did during his visit to India, one of the television anchors mentioned  in passing about the book which he wrote about his life before he became the president(Letters to my father) and how good it was. It got registered in the back of my head, but I never remembered the name of the book. While I was browsing through the books on display during Basant book festival at Akshay this year, I came across Audacity of Hope and mistook it for that book. Audacity of Hope turned out to be a serious and OHT commentary about American Politics. Initially it was very difficult to make sense of the book; however, with grit and determination (boosted by the guilt of spending my money without confirming) I read some chapters and liked it to an extent. Obama has knack of summing up his arguments with appealing one liner. Obama is a good writer and I would definitely like to read his other books.

·        Chronicles of Narnia – The lion, the witch & the wardrobe

Author – C.S. Lewis

Genre – fiction, mythology

My rating – 3/5

I always wanted to read this book. But by the time I picked it up, I was definitely over-aged. The clear black and white nature of the story didn’t appeal to me. I am sure a 12 year old me would have loved this book.

·        Love Story

Author – Erich Segal

Genre – fiction, romance

My rating – 3/5

A friend suggested a few days back. A very thin book(76 pages), I finished it in a day. It is a classic love story. Boy meets girl. They have a tussle initially. Eventually boy falls for the girl and vice versa. What I find most appealing about the book was the relationship that the boy shares with his father. Read it if you have a few hours to kill.

Monsoon wish list:

·         Banker to the poor – Muhammad Yunus

·         Geek Nation – Angelica Saini

·         The World is Flat – Thomas L Friedman

·         Thousand Splendid Suns – Khaled Hosseini

·         Diary of Ann Frank – Ann Frank

·         Catch-22 – Joseph Heller

The Time Traveler's Wife

This is the debut novel of Audrey Niffenegger. This has been adapted as a movie as well. The whole book uses a beautiful alternating first person narration. It’s a story about a couple Henry DeTamble and Clare Abshire. The major theme of the story runs around the chaos and romance caused by the genetic disorder which Henry suffers from, which makes him time travel.

BACKGROUND:

Most of the part of the novel is set in the last 3 decades of 20^th century. The major selling point of the novel is the non linear flow of events. The author had a daunting task of making the story make sense to the reader and she succeeded in it. The story also makes references to real life incidents like the 9/11 attacks. In all, it is a love story of a young girl and an adult man and also a love story of a young man and a young lady. The catch being that the male and female were the same in both.

PLOT DESCRIPTION:

Henry DeTamble suffers from a rare genetic disorder which takes him into an involuntary (sometimes voluntary) time travel. The disorder showed itself up for the first time when he met with an accident in which his mother died. After this he had been time travelling over the years to known and unknown places in known and unknown times. In one of his time travels he meets his future wife in her childhood time. One major roadblock in time travelling was that whenever he time travelled and reached a destination, he would always be naked. So when he met young Clare, he asked her to get clothes for him. She fascinated him so much that he visited her often.

After a brief lull of a couple of years, Clare meets younger Detamble in a natural chronological event. The story keeps on making switches from one time to the other and narration switches from Henry to Clare but the general flow of the story matches Clare’s life.

What follows this is a chaotic love affair between Henry and Clare, marred by complications like abortions, scandals etc.


WHY READ:

The author has succeeded in blending two completely different genre, science fiction and romance, in a graceful manner. Her take on time travel actually makes the story devoid of paradoxes which plague time travel theories. Her use of multiple first person narration gives the story two strong characters to delve upon. The story is like two threads entangled all over each other; the chords representing the life of Clare and Henry. By the end of the story, the two threads get disentangled and everything starts making sense. The success of the story lies in its narration style. It is a compelling read.

WHY NOT:

The book lacks a definite storyline. Initial part of the story is interesting till the point where reader gets to understand the concept but after that the story lacks a definite sense of direction. The love story becomes over frustrating with repeated incidents of abortions and several other things.

My RATING : 3.5/5

To learn more about the rating, refer to this.

Kane and Abel

Disclaimer: The author of this blog considers himself a casual reader and claims to have a brain not any older than 20 and a half years. Hence the books being reviewed are done on their “value for time” criterion. There are certain handicaps about the author of the blog which the readers need to keep in mind. The writer is a mere engineering student and hasn’t read a single piece of Shakespeare in entirety, though he claims to have inherited the much needed sarcasm ( for any blog writer) from his few days in college.

KANE AND ABEL

Jeffrey Archer has produced bestsellers at an impressive rate. This particular novel was one of those which I wanted to lay my hand on since long.

BACKGROUND:

The setting for this novel is the times from early 20th century. A story of two individuals born on the same day, one( Kane) in an emerging nation called USA and the other ( Abel aka Wladek) in a less celebrated European country called Poland. The author has very gracefully stitched all the major incidents of the early 20th century and weaved the story of these two people around it. From the world wars to the great depression of 1929 and to rise of USA as a strong capitalist economy and even to the drowning of titanic, you are in for a wonderful ride of fiction in a non fictional setting.

PLOT:

Two people, born on the same day, in different parts of the world, in contrasting circumstances. One with a silver spoon stuck his throat, the other bleeding in the woods. The first half of the novel is the time before they encounter each other. One struggling from the pangs of the world war I , the other living his dream. William Kane grows up to become the chairman of one of the biggest bank of the United States, Abel Rosonovak becomes a minority stake holder in an upcoming hotel chain. Everything was going on fine till the Great Depression of 1929 hits the market and they encounter each other in an unpleasant way. What follows is a series of actions by both kane and abel to strike each other down.
The story boasts about many other characters which stay on for certain part of the story. From some generations before to some generations after, it can very well be summed up as combined biography of Kane and Abel.



WHY READ:

The novel takes you through the horrors of the world war and the heat of the boardrooms in an intriguing manner. As in his other pieces, Jeffrey Archer relies more on the twists of his story and high number of characters than over in depth description of the plot. What I likes most about this book was that it was fully in touch with the happenings of the then world. From the Nazis to the women, Wall street to gloated egos, one can relish popcorn while reading this.

WHY NOT:

One major weakness in the plot is the inadequate reason for the fight between Kane and Abel. In the middle the story goes through a point when everything is according to routine and nothing changes. Otherwise the story is pretty fast.

My RATING : 3.75/5

The scale is based on the markers given below:

0 -> My Electrical Sciences 1 text book
1 -> Read a railway notice board instead
2-> I can write better
3 -> Good
4 -> I strongly suggest you read this
5-> You are reading something in heaven.