...shoOOonya...

Over the last 2 months, i have not only tried to be more active on the blog but also managed to cover a significant part of my book-reviews back log. I still have a lot of book reviews to post but I have another patch of life where the blog needs to take a back seat.  Along with my usual role of a Change Management Consultant, with the resignation of the Project Manager; i have been given the additional role of 'acting/interim' Project Manger and it is seriously taking up all my time (and more).  Also, my younger brother is getting married in a little over a week so I will be busy in that too.  All in all, I dont see myself posting anything on the blog for almost a month from now. Hopefully, life in office would have stabilized a bit by then and I would have time for my blog and pending book reviews once again.    See you later ... 

​   Book: The Great Indian Democracy Author: Manivannan K No. of Pages: 208 Genre: Fiction, Humor Publisher: Pirates     How do I review this book? It reminded me too much of the DORK series. I could draw some invisible parallels between the two books in terms of core concept. The GID is a light read with a heavy dose of satire on the Indian Political system, the stand-up comedy trend and even on the way guys look at and think of girls (and categorize them in weird categories). All with a help of a dork like character who encounters other dorky characters to fulfill their mission of making his life hell … in a humorous kind of way. The climax unexpectedly turned out to be quite predictable ... what an irony ! The author actually had some good context and situations to weave a better story ... it could have been better. Maybe the author needed a push to be more creative with the storyline and sequence of events and their treatment. ...

​ Book: Potluck: Metro Diaries Author: Namrata No. of Pages: 162 Genre: Fiction, Short Stories   Publisher: Amazon   A collection of very mushy love stories with an occasional spark of bold and scandalous variety sprinkled in between for some change and spice. I am not really a reader of the love story genre but an occasional foray into the mushy / emotional stuff is not bad for the reading appetite. And the risk with short stories is definitely less.   In the Metro Diaries, the author takes you on a near poetic ride of the emotional world of hearts in love … and that too, love which is not simple but complicated as usual. The author spends most of the words on exploring the inner thoughts and feelings of the people in love or those who are grappling with the concept of love and are unable to make up their mind about it. The stories hardly have too many things happening or sequence of events forming a storyline – there are a running comme...

  ​  Book: The Art of Seductive Communication Author: Karma Peters No. of Pages: 151 Genre: Non-Fiction, Self-Development Publisher: Self Published using Smashwords   Plenty of good straight-forward to-the-point advice in bite sized chapters (calling them chapters is actually a hyperbole) The book is easy to read and assimilate with each chapter offering a piece of advice followed by explanations and examples. Most of the advice is pretty much common-sense but it is good to have it all in one place … as a reminder for you. If you had no time, you could read the table of contents and get a gist of the book. Also, the table of Contents is a summary of the book and can serve as a quick reminder for you when you have read the book and want to remind yourself the key principles. Mind you, it has a looong table of contents. Of course, the worth of such a book is not in the beauty of how well it is written. It is in how well you a...

As a voracious reader and a budding author who is too lazy to write, i have a soft corner for books and their authors. So i will always be ready to extend a helping hand when it comes to reviewing books and talking about authors. So this post is a spotlight on the book "Metro Diaries' by the blogger author Namrata who is popularly known by her online identity of Privy Trifles. She is a prolific reader herself and reviews books at http://www.privytrifles.co.in/ Well, as i said, this post is to shine a spotlight on a book and the author. So here we go ... About the Book: Love is one of the most amazing feelings on this earth, one that makes you the most powerful person or the most helpless person in a split second. These stories capture those feelings of despair, longing, love, lust, desire, want, dejection and admiration to create deja vu. Hold onto your hearts as you flip through these pages and take a walk down the memory lane as "Metro Diaries" w...

Preface to the blog post J Blogs are conversations Sometimes they are conversation which the blogger has with himself / herself while there are times when the conversation is with the readers. If the reader has a point of view and would like to join the conversation, he/she will comment and the conversation continues. Sometimes, conversations lead to blog posts. Ideas discussed spark off things in the bloggers head and they end up writing about it on their blogs. This blog post is one such conversation which started with email exchange and then the summary of that email exchange culminates in the blog post. I came across the news item about Myntra 'shutting down' their website and going completely mobile. Since Myntra is now owned by Flipkart, it was their decision to do this and I had a perspective on it. I share the news item and my perspective with the one and only one, Nikhil Kulkarni , with whom I have had countless discussions and brai...

  ​  Book: Lead Tin Yellow Author: Doug Gunnery No. of Pages: 348 Genre: Fiction Publisher: Partridge India   Difficult to rate this book ... I liked reading it but wasn't really excited about it. It could have been a fast paced action suspense thriller but the author chose to give it a steady pace without end-of-the-chapter cliff-hangers which are typical in murder mystery and chase oriented novels. Surprisingly, I did not feel bored though. It was different and I somehow liked it, even though it was not my usual taste. There was a certain definite quality of the writing (I can't really place my finger on) which kept me going till the end. It was an interesting read and the 'relatively slower' pace also made it more believable. The unsuspecting protagonist thrown into a dire situation suddenly becomes a hero doing things he couldn't have imagined. That's not what happens here. The response of the pr...