Kim's Review : To Catch a Bad Guy

To Catch a Bad Guy by Marie Astor is a very straight simple story masquerading as a detective novel.

Within the first few pages, you know which way the story is heading, who are the bad guys and who are the good guys. No surprises at all, other than the fact that I actually read until the end. Sigh!

And to think she made this a series (Janet Marple Series - hoping to cash in on Agatha Christies Miss Marple?)

This books is fine if you want a bit of summer fluff to read on the beach without taxing your mind, otherwise, don't bother.

Rating : 2 / 5

Brajesh's Review : Read This If You Want to Take Great Photographs

Ansel Adams quote of “You don’t take a photograph, you make it” caught my attention, and I speed read Henry Carroll's "Read This If You Want to Take Great Photographs" at the book-store.

A simple book, without too much jargon and complexity touched all the basic aspects of taking good photographs. The beauty of the book is that it gives proper weight to non-technical aspects of photography which is often neglected. I would recommend all budding photographers to invest in this book, or you can just look at my notes in the photo collage

Rating : 4 / 5

Kim's Review : The Queens Vow - Isabelle of Castille

C W Gortner's "The Queen's Vow" was my first book of Historical Fiction set in Spain, so there was an added sense of discovery while I started reading this.

Isabella is well known for being Columbus' Financier. Along with her husband Ferdinand, she was also recognised for routing the Moors out of Spain, but they were also responsible for the horrific Inquisition.

Gortner tries to humanise Isabella in this book, by putting all the circumstances together to build a case as to why she was helpless in stopping the Inquistion, but I'm not entirely convinced. I've just downloaded a 12 part TV series centering around her. It will be interesting to see what light she is covered in, in that.

Isabella had to grow up in trying times. As King Juan II's second wife, her mother was forced to flee with 3 year old Isabella and her 1 year old brother Alfonso when the King died and his son Enrique IV from a previous marriage took the throne. Inspite of Enrique's wife - Juana being a close relative of Isabel and Alfonso, she did not want them anywhere near the throne. So they were forced to live in near penury away from the capital until Juana herself bore Enrique a son and heir to the throne.

Enrique unfortunately was as weak a ruler as his father and was not a very popular ruler, which gave the dissidents a reason to rally behind Alfonso, which then plunged the country into war. Alfonso's untimely death led to another period of confusion with Enrique condemning his wife as an adulteress and denouncing his own daughter Joanna. A truce of sorts was arrived at with Isabellla refusing to take the throne until her half brother died a natural death. But courtiers kept playing the two against each other and Enrique's death set up "The War of Castillian Succession" between supporters of Isabel and those of Joanna.

Isabel of course, ascended the throne and married her cousin Ferdinand of Aragon, thus uniting the lands of Castille and Aragon against the French.

Through her trying times, Isabel was strongly Catholic and took strength from her faith, so when she came to power she did her best to clean out the rot within the Catholic Church in Spain, but that wasn't enough for her confessor Torquemada - who insisted that most Jews who had converted to Catholicism, were actually still practicing their old religion and he wanted them out of Spain. The Jews were integral to the society of that time, but Torquemada wanted them out along with the Moors and supporters of this view whipped up mob frenzies around the country.

In her drive to create a united nation, Isabella had to bow to these wishes and thus began some of the worst excesses of her regime, which at times even overshadows the leaps she fostered in the fields of education and exploration.

Isabel lived in complicated times, but her youngest daughter Catalina has surpassed her mother in public memory. Catalina is better known as Katharine of Aragon - the first wife of Henry VIII.

The Queen's Vow is a well written book, that immerses the reader directly into an extremely interesting period in Spanish history. He has written one more book centered on Spain - The Last Queen - features another daughter of Isabel and Ferdinand - Juana - their eldest surviving child at Ferdinand's death - also known as the Mad Queen. This is also now on my "To Read" List.

He has also written 3 books on the Tudors, one on Catharine de Medici and one on Coco Chanel.

Rating : 4 / 5

Kim's Review : The Wrong Girl (First Freak House Trilogy)

The Wrong Girl, is one of the Books that I downloaded for free online. There are loads of books that are offered free on ibooks daily and they work out as ideal reading for the tube for me. (I don't have the added weight of a book and I get to try a lot of new authors)

A lot of authors, offer their first book in a series for free, for a limited period, in the hopes that you will buy their other books if you like what you read. C J Archers "The Wrong Girl", is the first book in the last two months that spurred me to purchase the next 2 parts immediately.

The blurb almost made it sound like a Historical Teen romance novel, but it was categorised as paranormal, which was why I read until the end : It’s customary for Gothic romance novels to include a mysterious girl locked in the attic. Hannah Smith just wishes she wasn’t that girl. As a narcoleptic and the companion to an Earl’s daughter with a strange affliction of her own, Hannah knows she’s lucky to have a roof over her head and food in her belly when so many orphans starve on the streets. Yet freedom is something Hannah longs for. She did not, however, want her freedom to arrive in the form of kidnapping.

Taken by handsome Jack Langley to a place known as Freak House, she finds herself under the same roof as a mad scientist, his niece, a mute servant and Jack, a fire starter with a mysterious past. They assure Hannah she is not a prisoner and that they want to help her. The problem is, they think she’s the earl’s daughter. What will they do when they discover they took the wrong girl? Yes, fire- starter did sound promising. So I downloaded the book and I'm glad that I did.

The book was fast paced and intense. The Romance in this book at least, is 'All Audience', though it does promise / threaten to get a bit more 'involved' in the next 2 books. The characters were quite interestingly developed. Archer uses a technique of hinting at much much more than she reveals, which is what kept me hooked.

I cannot really say much more without revealing quite a few spoilers,  so I'll stop here and let you know how the other 2 books go.


Rating : 4 / 5

Brajesh's Review : Girl Meets Boy

After being bowled over by Karen Armstrong’s “A Short History of Myth” I ordered two more books in the Myth Series.

Ali Smith takes the story of Iphis in which Telethusa metamorphoses her child to keep her alive, and turns this mythical narrative into a powerful feminist novel.

The protagonist Anthea goes through the realization of her lesbianism and finally marries the girl she loves. The counter point is her sister Midge who has a strong traditional outlook and struggles with capitalism and conventional relationships. The story is quite confusing in the first 30 pages where our personal gender stereotypes make it difficult to follow the narrative, but once you get comfortable with the style, the story moves at a fast clip and ends explosively.

Rating : 3 / 5

Brajesh's Review : Way of the Warrior - The Legend of Abhimanyu

I have become a total fan of Saurav Mohapatra’s Graphic Novels. His story vision always brings-out beautiful emotions through powerful designed pages. The story of Abhimanyu is no different.

Obviously the story is known by heart to most of us, but the beauty and power with which this short story comes alive over 80 pages is a treat to the senses.

I keenly look forward to any work done by Saurav Mohapatra after being impressed with him through Devi, Mumbai Confidential and Moon Mountain – each a signature representation.

Enjoy the collage below and then go buy the book.

Rating : 3.5 / 5

Also See : Kim's Review of Way of the Warrior - The Legend of Abhimanyu

Kim's Recommendations : Top Retellings of Indian Mythology

A friend asked me which modern Indian mythological renditions I would recommend, after reading my review of Asura. I thought I would share it here, for others who had the same question.

Gripping Reads I would say:
1. Heavily, heavily recommend : In Search of Sita
2. Chitra Bannerjee Diwakaruni - Palace of Illusions
3. Ashok Bankers - Ramayana Series - I haven't read his Mahabharath series or the Krishna Corrolis yet, so not sure about those.
4. Amish Tripathis - Shiva Trilogy
Immortals of Meluha
Secret of the Nagas
Oath of the Vayuputras
5. Malyalam classic finally translated to English - Bhima - the Lone Warior
6. Anand Neelakantan's - Ajaya
7. The Last War - Mahabharata in a modern setting, think Omkara from Othello types.
8. Breaking the Bow - Speculative Fiction


Second Lot:
1. Samhita Arni's - Speculative Fiction - The Missing Queen
2. The Outcast's Queen - from Karna's wife's perspective.
3. The Winds of Hastinapur - Ganga's Perspective.
4. If you can read in Hindi - Manu Sharmas' entire series of Atmakathas - like Draupadi ki Atmakatha

Others whose story is good, but not a very smooth read (could use editing)
1. Pratibha Ray's - Yajnaseni - I've heard the Oriya version is great, I could only read the translation
2. Devdutt Pattanaik is a brilliant story teller, but his books are not as easy to read (people like us will take an hour to read each page trying to understand and google the multiple concepts on each page)
3. Anand Neelakantan's Asura

Kim's Review : 10 Fun Things to Do with a Microwave

The cover had a jaunty looking chocolate cake popping out of a polka dotted cup, so obviously I picked it up, expecting some really interesting microwave recipes. To my surprise this book turned out to be more science text book than recipe book.

Some of the experiments do look like fun, but I don't think I will be trying out any of them any time soon.

The book does have a few recipes and link to a few others, but there are plenty of brilliant recpes online, you don't need this book for that purpose.

Rating :
As a science book - 3 / 5
As a recipe book 0.5 / 5

I don't think this book has come out in Print (too many linkables to make a print book feasible) It was available for free at the ibook store when I downloaded it.

Kim's Review : Asura

Asura is actually the first published book of Anand Neelakantan who wrote Ajaya - Epic of the Kaurava Clan (a book I had loved, earlier last year). Asura is the Ramayana from Ravana's perspective.

I had bought this book long before I bought Ajaya, but hadn't gotten around to reading it and ended up reading Ajaya (even though it was just the first of 2 books and the second one still hasn't been published) before Asura. I'm glad I did.

If I had read Asura first, I may never have dared to pick up Ajaya. The simple fact of the matter is that being the authors first book and self published (my copy) - it needs quite a bit of editing. Reading a badly edited book, is frustrating for me because as a one time editor and one time lecturer, I find I then begin to focus on spotting the errors, rather than letting the story wash over me.

Coming to the story itself, it is very interesting and its a completely new perspective. I sent the Hindi translation to Brajesh's dad and he was quite disturbed as to how an author could say that Rama was flawed - maybe I shouldn't have sent him this book, because it does shake the core of your beliefs and could be quite upsetting if you take your beliefs seriously.

However, just because he questions Rama's actions, he doesn't conversely put Ravana on a pedestal either. Anand's Ravana too is flawed and egoistical and naive and suffers from human frailties.

Bhadra is an extremely interesting character. He keeps appearing (almost Forrest Gump like) at the most opportune (or inopportune moments) and he too is instrumental in moving the narrative further. To me Bhadra is a bigger hero in this book, than Ravana himself.

At times Asura gets extremely philosophical and drags a bit. There were many times, that I considered dropping the book, but the perspective kept me hooked.

Asura has a lot to offer, but it also needs a good editor to trim, prune and polish the story just a little bit to keep the reader completely engrossed.

Rating : 2.75 / 5

Kim's Review : Gone Girl

I had ordered this book by Gillian Flynn, over a year ago. It had been heavily recommended on multiple bestseller lists and by friends whose opinions I truly value. But somehow I never got around to reading it. Even the movie version came out (I haven't watched it yet), but I still didn't get around to it.

Then I finally landed in the UK and with hardly any furniture and kitchen equipment, I barely had anything to keep me busy after the move (while I hibernated without a mobile connection or internet) and I had promised myself time to catch up on reading and this was the first book I pulled out and I Loved it, loved it, loved it.

Gone Girl is such a brilliant piece of story telling and Gillian Flynn has her readers exactly where she wants them along every step of the way. The way, she leads you across the story line is absolutely marvelous, the way she makes you react to her characters, empathise and pity them, love or loathe them in turns. . . I've never felt so manipulated before (and since it was through a work of fiction, I thoroughly enjoyed it)

One thing that did strike me, apart from all the things mentioned before is how her characters felt an ennui with their lives and reacted to situations, the way they had seen on screen in movies. It is like they are completely out of touch with themselves and have forgotten how to react genuinely and react in a way that Hollywood tells them to. Its quite a depressing thought, if this is what we as a society are headed towards.

Rating : 4 / 5