As I see it

Book Review : India : A Portrait (An intimate biography of 1.2 bilion people) by Patrick French India , as everybody would agree remains an enigma by very nature of its diversity, and dichotomy between an emerging India and a traditional one. It’s difficult to define our nation and any attempts at simplifying, classifying or taxonomizing her is a futile exercise.This book recounts India’s journey since its independence and takes a good view at it. I must say a very sympathetic one at that. Narrative is taken along with anecdotes but they overpower the narration . We are left with a string of anecdotes showing a glimpse of India and that’s it. The author has taken an unbiased and optimistic view of India. But he barely skims the surface of the Indian Society, Polity and its Riches. His anecdotes seem to have been picked for convenience and no contentious topic has been taken up. There seems to be hardly any new idea. The more sensationalized story in Indian media, the greater is t...

Book Review : Blink by Malcolm Gladwell We all have heard the adage a countless times i.e. the decision that we take about a person or an object is based upon the first glimpse and the first impressions that we have. This book is about these snap decisions taken by us based on our instinct or intuition. Malcolm Gladwell has argued that sometimes lesser the knowledge available to our senses, more accurate are our decisions. He goes on to recount many incidents where the first impression formed a decision and that proved to be better than a decision based on documentation. But, he also recounts the times when the snap decisions taken in a blink of our eyes was not only inaccurate, but potentially deadly. Thus our unconscious might be right most of the times but unless we have a certain expertise in the area in which we are taking quick decisions based on first impressions only , we might be wrong. Especially decisions that are taken on the face value of a person or on the biases lying ...

Room by Emma Donoghue I haven’t read any other book by Emma Donoghue but just on the basis of this book, I can say very definitely that she ranks among one of my most favorite authors and she is one of the finest practitioner of the art of words. The narrator of this book is a five year old child Jack who has grown up in the Room and we view the Outside through his eyes. He feels secure, safe and happy in the Room where he lives with his Ma and his Ma is his world. Our endearing and brave hero symbolizes the possibilities, hopes and contentment of a happy childhood. The little brave guy deserves a standing ovation. His mother is a tribute to mothers everywhere in this world, who smile through their tears for their children, and are always there for them. The narration reminds us of the first spring of our learning when the whole world was unknown, uncertain except for our mothers’ certain, comfortable and soothing presence. No place on earth is better for repose than a mother’s ...

The Invisible Gorilla: And other ways our intuition deceives us by Christopher Chabris and Daniel Simons We have a huge faith in our senses. We believe what we see; we react to emotions rather than logic; we feel more knowledgeable about things we use; we react to and believe in a personality and we see patterns in events which occur in a sequence i.e. something that has happened must have been triggered by a prior event. All of this happens because we have been endowed with an incredible brain capable of processing so much sensory information in a blink usually, perceiving details which form the basis of our decisions. We have evolved to look around ourselves, believe in what we see, feel we know what we use, empathize and bond with other living beings and recognize patterns for our safety and simplification of our surroundings. This mode of evolution has ensured our continual survival and development .This from of decision making is what we call our intuition , an invaluable too...

The White Castle By Orhan Pamuk “The White Castle” is the first novel written by Nobel Prize Winner author Orhan Pamuk. This book was also my first Orhan Pamuk book. I have read the English Translation. The narrative within the narrative forms the book and my first feeling was one of intense curiosity. As the narrative developed, I experienced the pleasure of a story well told with great characterization and a very troubling yet highly enlightening theme of self reflection and evaluation. The novel tells the story of the times when two different cultures were intermingling at the doorway to Europe & Asia,18th century Turkey. The time, place and people were fascinating, interesting and conflicting, characterized by a unique opportunity for interaction between Islamic culture and Christianity. The narrative of a Christian slave put to work with an Islamic Master resembling him, both of them sharing their knowledge, though a bit reluctantly by the slave and eventual swapping of pl...

Book Review-The Glass Palace Stars:- The Glass Palace: Palace here is the Grand palace of Burma formerly known as the Golden land . This novel is a long , long history covering events from the British conquest of Rangoon to its conquest by the military junta. The narrative covers the life of an Indian orphan Rajkumar, his love for the palace maid dolly, their future together, their kids, second world war, the dilemmas of an Indian soldier fighting on behalf of the British ( when India is in throes of its own Independence Movement),the reconciliation of past with the present covering three generations,discourses on vintage cars, cameras, elephants, anthrax and many more , reminding of an era when rubber was newly introduced and was banned for sale by the German Govt. during WW1.. phew... Hmm, so the sweep of the book is so vast and so many characters come and go that you feel reading a collection of stories , loosely bound by a genealogy and a progressing timeline rather th...

Author: Amitav Ghosh I must confess that Amitav Ghosh is one of my favorite writers. His stories are about human beings whether they are poor farmers from 17th century U.P. or present day Sunderbans. He transcends time and space with ease but his characters portray timeless emotions. His prose is lyrical in depicting the environment and etching his characters,without descending into incoherent descriptions . In his book, the Hungry tide, Amitav Ghosh introduces us to the vagaries of life in a part of India that is known of by all but understood very little---the scenic, mysterious and beautiful Sunderbans ---the abode of Royal Bengal Tigers. A lot has been said about the mangroves and the unique biodiversity of the region and dangers posed to it by modernization and encroachment by human beings ,but very little is known about the life of people inhabi...