...shoOOonya...

Book: Shoes of the Dead Author: Kota Neelima No. of Pages: 285 Genre: Fiction / Political Publisher: Rupa Publications Kota Neelima introduces you to the grim world of farmers and their plight leading to suicidal tendencies with the influence, local and state politics has on it besides the direct impact of the local moneylenders and other powerful people have.   Kota grabs your attention right from the first few pages giving you a perspective of the farmer suicides that you probably never had – that of normal deaths being labeled as farmer 'debt-related' suicides in a bid to get compensation which the government offers to their families. As the story moves forward, you are introduced to a host of characters. A reporter trying to figure out the truth behind the farmer suicides, a politician trying to save his skin reeling under his father's reputation as a seasoned politician, a lady social worker whose husband has vested interests in the village where fa...

It has been a busy time and I haven't had time at hand to write about my April reading yet. So here is just an interim post to list down my April reading without any comments on individual stories/novels etc. I will prepare the detailed posts about the stories and novels as and when I get time and post them in coming month along with May Reading posts.   1         Novel: Tantra by Adi 2         PKD Shorts: The Cookie Lady by Philip K Dick 3         PKD Shorts: Beyond the Door by Philip K Dick 4         PKD Shorts: The Cosmic Poachers by Philip K Dick 5         Novel: The Rozabal Line by Ashwin Sanghi 6         O Henry Shorts: How Willie Saved his Father by O Henry 7         O Henry Shorts: Simmon's Saturday Night by O Henry 8         O Henry Shorts: A Strange Case by O Henry 9         3I Series by MZ - Short: Christmas in Rocky Beach by Mark Zahn 10     Short Novel: Trouble Up Finny's Nose by Dana Mentink ...

What an irony of life ...  Tour companies provide Honeymoon packages with 'per person" prices  AND  tucked in 'terms & conditions' u see 'prices on twin sharing basis'  

Book: Chanakya's Chant Author: Ashwin Sanghi No. of Pages: 441 Genre: Fiction Publisher: Westland After 2 disappointments from Ashwin Sanghi and an assurance from a good friend Abhishek Khetan – that this one will not be that bad – I picked up the only remaining novel of Ashwin Sanghi. To my surprise, Ashwin has actually done a good job at it. Wonder what happened to him while writing The Rozabal Line (TRL) and The Krishna Key (TKK). All through Chanakya's Chant (CC), I was imagining it as a movie (very much on the lines of the Bollyood movie - Rajneeti) with a similar star cast and look-n-feel. CC is a 2-in-1 novel with 2 separate storylines in two different ages. One story is that of Chanakya from 2300 year ago while the other is that of Gangasagar who belongs to the present times of the 21 st century. Both stories are well written and well executed with enough twists-n-turns with interesting surprises written into the plot. The old as the new story int...

Book: Business Sutra Author: Devdutt Pattanaik No. of Pages: 432 Genre: Management Publisher: Aleph Book Company I have read Devdutt Pattanaik (DP) earlier but those were the Mythology related ones – the Seven Secrets of Shiva and Myth=Mithya kind of books. I did know about the Management books by DP but never got excited enough to actually pick them up. When Business Sutra by DP came up for review at BlogAdda, I got my chance to lay my hands on this non-mythological work of DP. Seriousness of the book is distinctly communicated with the hard-bound nature of the book. The seriousness is lightened by the numerous illustrations and writing style of DP making the book easy to navigate and understand and assimilate and relate and apply . The difficult part is patience. This book can be compared to a slow novel where the author spends a lot of time developing the plot, the characters, bringing out their complexities and inner demons and their inter-relationships. It's...

Book: Salvation of a Saint Author: Keigo Higashino No. of Pages: 384 Genre: Fiction, Suspense Thriller,   Publisher: Little Brown Book Group 'The Devotion of Suspect X' was an absolute delight to read last year and recently I realized that there was another suspense thriller by the same author. I had this book added in my 'wish-lists' for my next round of book buying spree. Incidentally, it came up for review on BlogAdda and I applied (giving me a chance to bring it on priority in reading order)   Devotion was about a murder where you know the murder and how it happened … the whole novel is about the cover-up; and the climax leaves you speechless and you are dumbstruck with the 'devotion' of the man covering up the crime. Salvation introduces the murderer in the first chapter and the murder happens in chapter two, also revealing that the death/murder was caused by poisoning. And if you are reading Keigo for the first time, you are won...

Just a few days ago I posted that I am trying a 5 day GM diet … a shorter version of the 7 day diet plan. And now I have to report that it was cut short-er by another 2 days due to preponement of my trip to Lucknow. So now my GM diet survived only 3 days … so I will not be counting this one as an attempt. Will try to go on the diet after I return to Mumbai and have a 2 week period of home-stay. Hopefully mid-May would be a good time for another attempt at GM Diet