Ever noticed those skimpy promotional one-liners by moderately famous blokes on the front cover of books? Something like 'A charming mix of fun and wiEver noticed those skimpy promotional one-liners by moderately famous blokes on the front cover of books? Something like 'A charming mix of fun and wisdom cloaked as a rollicking travelogue' by X, author of Y. These statements seem like marketing ploys to me, but it was true in this case.
The author is a self-proclaimed grump who picks up the gauntlet of traveling to various countries to determine what makes them tick. Interesting, I thought, the phrase 'searching for happiness' just became real. The book is divided into ten chapters, each titled after the names of the countries the author visited in his harebrained quest. You can't be blamed for thinking you'd get to know the cultures of ten countries, but actually he talks about just eight. Let me tell you how, and this is my biggest and only gripe with the book, which was otherwise as insightful and fun as a book can be.
The first chapter titled Netherlands is not about the country at all, but a preface in which the author expounds on the science of happiness. You stumble upon the amusing and sometimes counterintuitive conclusions of studies being done on happiness, like people are the least happy when commuting to work, men and women are equally happy (though women have a wider emotional range), wealthy people are happier than the poor, but only slightly, and so on. You get answers to some questions like what's the need to quantify happiness and how it can be measured, though not if it should be measured in the first place. To his credit however, the author does briefly switches gears to philosophical later on in the book. It's all well and good, but I expected more about Netherlands in a chapter titled Netherlands. The only thing you get to know about the peculiar brand of Dutch happiness is cycling and legalized marijuana and prostitution being the contributing factors to it. Okay, I guess.
What's absolutely not okay is his treatment of the final chapter on America. He analysed each and every country so well I expected more than this pathetic job on his home country. All you get are two anecdotes about two people, one of them wanting to move from one state to another where he thinks he'd be happier, another about a girl who has moved where she thought she'd be happier, and apparently is. What does excessive and easy availability of guns and the resultant frequent attacks on schoolkids by gun-toting teenagers say about the happiness levels of Americans? An average American consumes 16 times as much as an average Indian, and yet, Americans are not any more happier if you go by the numbers. He has not gone anywhere near those questions, let alone analyse them. Charity should've started from home.
The rest of the book is simply amazing. It's witty, insightful and entertaining. He delves deep into why Moldovans are the unhappiest creatures on Earth and how Indians can hold seemingly contradictory thoughts at the same time and still be unperturbed by it. He talks about why Swiss and the Icelandic people actively suppress envy, but for different reasons, and how, among other things, it contributes to both nations being some of the happiest nations on Earth. He talks about Bhutan's policy of Gross National Happiness and why the Bhutanese are obsessed with penises (yep!). My personal favourite chapter was about Qatar. He talks about the absence of Qatari literature, arts and music, which leads him to the logical conclusion that Qatar had no culture, at all. Watch out for the part where he plays the devil's advocate ("It has a national museum, so it must have a culture; every country has a culture,") and his interlocutor just smiles and takes him to the said museum to investigate. He describes the Qatari hotel where the servants were hell-bent on taking excessive care of him as 'The Tomb' and the country as 'an air-conditioned airport'. I serendipitously happened to watch Last Week Tonight's episode on Qatar's football stadiums just before I began reading the chapter on the country and I could somehow agree more with what he had to say about Qatar's culture, though the book was written way before the 2022 Football World Cup went on air.
I learned new things and I had my fill of laughs. I am in for whatever the author will write in the future and most definitely pick up his other books that are already out. Read it, it's a no-brainer....more
There's not much new information to be found here, just old ideas rehashed and presented in the author's unique writing style. It would appeal immenseThere's not much new information to be found here, just old ideas rehashed and presented in the author's unique writing style. It would appeal immensely to a reader new to the self-help genre, but it's more of the same-ol' for the seasoned readers.
Though I won't dismiss the book altogether. I found some ideas 'insanely practical', as the sub-title claims, like 'Rejections are normal' and 'People are weird', but these practical forthright assertions are few and far between.
A word about the writing style. Shwetabh uses the combination of reverse psychology and a harsh attitude towards his readership, almost like he's scolding, but in a good way. Personally, I don't know why this potent mixture works very well on me, but it does, Mark Manson made sure of that. I use the same approach in my classes when I want to convey a certain point to my students. Tough Love. Here though, it didn't work the way it should've. For comparison, the author's online self-help videos hit harder than this. Maybe it's my inherent bias against self-help, or maybe the book is objectively mediocre, but one thing's for certain: it's not 'the rudest book ever'. Missed that 'Mark' by a long shot.
I bought the book on a railway platform to keep me company for the brief train ride home and completed it under two hours by the time I reached the destination. I'd advise you the same to not take time out particularly for this book. There are far better alternatives available to explore....more
If the blurb is to be believed, you pick up Boomerang expecting Michael to talk about the financial disasters that unraveled around the world in the wIf the blurb is to be believed, you pick up Boomerang expecting Michael to talk about the financial disasters that unraveled around the world in the wake of 2008 U.S. subprime housing crisis. What you did not expect is it also happens to be a travelogue, and it worked like a cherry on the cake for me. Cruising through the streets of Ireland, Greece, Iceland and Germany for what Michael terms his 'meltdown tour', he also, uncharacteristically, finds hilarity in his narrative. From what I've seen in his interviews, I know the man has a terrific sense of humor, but his comic timing never reflected in any of his books I've of read before.
You'd also expect the financial disasters to be somehow connected with the U.S., but no, each country has its own story to tell. What would a country do if it's left in a dark room with an easy and seemingly unending supply of money? The disasters that followed tell you a lot about those countries. I deliver an entire four-hour lecture to C.A. Final students dedicated to the 2008 subprime mortgage crisis, but I never read about what happened in other countries before.
Apart from learning about the financial bubbles, I discovered some things about Iceland that made me remember an antediluvian but groovy Govinda's dance number 'It happens only in India', only the geographical indication turned to Iceland in my mind. For instance, Icelandic naming traditions blew my mind. In contrast, I found Greece to resemble a lot like India - their systemic government corruption, run-of-the-mill tax evasion, dummy real estate pricing, it's no different than us. Michael also turns his eye at his homeland, the United States, in the final chapter, but I found that bit to be a summary of his previous full-fledged work on the topic, The Big Short.
No one, or rather, a few do it as great as he does. He's only Michael Lewis because nobody else is willing to be - or maybe he's only Michael Lewis so that nobody else has to be. Either way, Boomerang: Travels in the New Third World is worth your time. ...more
In a sense, this book feels like an extension of The Fifth Risk. It's not mandatory to read the latter to understand this one, but it helps to come toIn a sense, this book feels like an extension of The Fifth Risk. It's not mandatory to read the latter to understand this one, but it helps to come to grips with the severity of the situation described in The Premonition: A Pandemic Story. Michael had hit home the importance of a functioning government in The Fifth Risk, and asked his readers the sort of question potent enough to keep us up at nights - what happens when the system fails? This book answers that question, and it's not a pleasing one.
Right off the bat, I fell in love with the health experts profiled in the book, especially Charity Dean and Carter Mecher, the courageous iconoclasts who rallied the country's response to the pandemic against all odds, which included not only the deadly infectiousness of the virus, but their own government's lethargy and ignorance. To be honest, what pushed my buttons was less about their leadership, and more about their pre-Covid era exploits and near-miss ambushes with disease. Charity Dean is such a badass! Sample these situations where she has to confront a group of male cops and doctors to cut up a dead body to find remnants of TB (she extracts the man's lungs herself in the end, puts it in a bucket, and drives away, leaving the men aghast) or evacuating an old-age home against the residents' wishes in the event of a strong probability of a storm (She ends up bearing the brunt of the state as 3 old people end up dead in transit AND the storm, for some reason, never occurs). "Men like that always underestimate me," she says. " They judge me by how I look. They've no idea of the things I've done, or what I am capable of. They think my spirit animal is a bunny. And it's a fucking dragon." You go, girl!
It was a revelation reading about the inefficiencies of the CDC in wartime. It not only does literally nothing to fight the virus, rather downplays the situation and obstructs the people who try to mitigate it. Trump is not the cause, Michael writes, he just happens to be a comorbodity. Why, I found myself wondering all the time. Why is the country the world looks forward to in such dire circumstances is its own worst enemy? Michael provides an answer to this question at the end of the book, with the unfortunate incident that happened with CDC's former Director David Sencer that started the institution's downfall, and it's heart-wrenching.
The solitary gripe I have with the narrative is that I found some details repetitive. The editor could've cut short some thirty pages or so. Otherwise, you are in safe hands. Michael Lewis has never been the one to disappoint. Once in a while, it pays to comprehend how genius looks like....more
The Fifth Risk is divided into three parts. On the face of it, the first part is all about how inefficient and obnoxious Donald Trump is, but essentiaThe Fifth Risk is divided into three parts. On the face of it, the first part is all about how inefficient and obnoxious Donald Trump is, but essentially, using Trump's example, Lewis is addressing the reader, telling us 'See, this is how the government works. It is doing everything the private sector couldn't or wouldn't do. It's keeping you alive, you idiot, and you thought the government does nothing!' Granted it is about the U.S. Government, but it did succeed in helping me appreciate my government a little more.
The second part takes a detour and talks about some extraordinary career employees in different departments of the U.S. Government. Lewis treads further on a tangent in the third part, which mostly talks about the Weather Service (I was astonished at the amusing nature of the riff between NWS and Barry Myers. You can't do that in India. In fact, you can't even imagine a private Weather Industry in India, per se).
I thought Lewis didn't start writing this as a book. I thought he had an idea to begin with, and the material later mushroomed into a book, because unlike his other books, Flash Boys for instance, this book didn't have a focus on a particular story. It kept galloping in different directions, returning back to its anchor, Donald Trump, from time to time. This is not a complaint however. All the detours Lewis takes us on are as riveting as Malcolm Gladwell's pop-science. You don't question Michael Lewis, you hold his hand and go for the ride. Even if you don't know where he's taking you, if Lewis demands your attention, you trust him blindly and let his words soak you. They will take you to such remarkable places you couldn't even think of. (Again, the riff between AccuWeather and NWS? Really? REALLY??? Couldn't have imagined it by myself ever. Ever.)...more
In an early chapter of This Land Is Our Land, the author describes a routine scene at Friendship Park, the only place along the 2000-mile U.S.-MexicanIn an early chapter of This Land Is Our Land, the author describes a routine scene at Friendship Park, the only place along the 2000-mile U.S.-Mexican border where migrants could meet their family face-to-face. You could not hug or even properly touch your loved ones, because a thick double mesh wire separates you from them. The only way to have physical contact is to stick your pinky inside the fence, as your dearest does the same from the opposite side, and your pinkies kiss for a brief moment before the guard at the tower howls at you to tear apart. TLIOL is divided into 4 broad segments, the very first of which sent me into an emotional tailspin. It is filled with heartrending stories such as the one I just described. At one point, I became so frustrated, disgusted, full of emotion that I was unable to read further. I put aside the book as faint whispers of ‘Hey Ram� involuntarily escaped my mouth, and I am an outspoken atheist.
Syrians, Hondurans, Salvadorans, Ghanaians, Mexicans, Iraqis, Guineans, Senegalese, Nigerians, Algerians, Moroccans, Burkinabe, Nicaraguans, Guatemalans, Guyanese, Ukrainians, Albanians, Bosnians, Burmese, Vietnamese, Bhutanese, Poles, Irish, Indians, Bangladeshis, Nepalis, Yemenis, Pakistanis, etc., half the world is on the move. The second part expounds why, as the author dedicates a chapter each to the top reasons of immigration: colonialism, the new colonialism, i.e. corporatisation, war and climate change.
Lack of economic opportunity in native countries isn’t the only factor driving migration. The accumulated burdens of history have made migrants� homelands less and less habitable. You don’t need to read Shashi Tharoor to know what the empire unleashed on its colonies. On being asked by an Englishman what he was doing in his country, the author’s grandfather says, ‘We are the creditors and we’ve come to take our due. We are here, because you were there.� People are just following the money the colonials stole from them.
The author stresses how corporatisation is the new colonialism. Multinationals divert money to tax havens and rob the countries of billions of dollars in taxes. Mehta also raises his voice against income inequality. The eight richest individuals on earth, all men, own more than does half the planet, or 4 billion people, combined. The top 1 percent have more wealth than the bottom 99 percent combined. And when the peasants come for the rich with pitchforks, the safest thing for the rich to do is to say, “Don’t blame us, blame them.� It’s something we notice in India too � how the government machinery keeps pointing to Muslims to blame for everything to distract us from relevant topics.
‘War� discusses how American government has supported countless coups in foreign lands to install leaders malleable to their will, or sometimes, just for the sake of selfish interests of some American corporation. ‘Climate change� presents us, once again, with horrifying numbers and scenarios which we do nothing about. The migrant crisis of Poland stands out peculiarly as the last dictator of Europe, the President of Belarus essentially manufactured a crisis as a response to EU’s economic sanctions for election fraud. I watched a ton of Vox videos on immigration after reading the book and noticed a shocking pattern: how rich countries basically outsource their dirty work of migration control � U.S. to Mexico, E.U. to Turkey and subsequently others, Spain to Morocco - basically turning the poor countries against their own citizens.
The third part deals with reasons of this irrational fear of migrants � how the populist leaders stoke it in the hopes of coming to power, how racism and xenophobia boost these fears, ultimately leading to white supremacists� (and their counterparts elsewhere) calling for arms to defend their nation. The author cites a study which predicts whites will not be the majority race in America by the year 2044. Trump’s anti-immigration policies might delay the crossing of the Rubicon by a few years, but cross it will. The author then goes on to pulverize the natives� putative fears one by one with sheer power of the numbers and reasoning - immigrants don’t take away your jobs or affect your wages, they don’t contribute to crime (in fact, the data shows otherwise). Yes, they do bring their own culture with them, the author cedes, but they also assimilate. And isn’t there something worthwhile in the diversity we bring with us, he asks. Natives could surely learn something by paying heed to our work ethic, our love of family, our gorgeous dresses or soulful music, our richly spiced cuisine or our complex myths.
America’s immigration policies have always been confounding to me. They want cheap labor, but they also want to build a wall. They do everything in their power to keep immigrants out, but once they are in, the country also has measures in place to legalize and naturalize immigrants over time, notably DREAM Act and DACA. Its leaders vent out against immigration on podiums, but its economy goes to ruins without them. This book shed some light on the reasons behind such hypocritical behaviour, but that’s what it is � hypocritical.
Lastly, the author argues encouraging immigration should serve as a form of reparations. Globally, a giant bill is due. If the rich countries don’t want the poor countries to migrate, pay them what they are due. Or, as the author puts it (and I literally clapped in support), if there were any justice in the world, the 1600-acre Bush family ranch in Texas should be filled with tents holding Middle Eastern refugees. You break it, you own it.
This Land Is Our Land was such a resounding polemic it’d be remiss on my part to not include it in year-end list for best books. The title comes from the ubiquitous America’s alternative national anthem ‘This Land Is Your Land� composed by an Okie named Woody Guthrie in 1944. Since then, innumerable variations of the song have been rendered in all forms of pop-culture and media. Contributing to the tradition, the author too tweaked the lyrics a bit in search of an apt title. What is lesser known, however, is that in these other variants of the song, there are additional verses which make it a protest anthem, and a prophetic one at that. I’ll take your leave with a couple of verses from these variants.
Was a big high wall there that tried to stop me. A sign was painted ‘Private Property�. But on the backside, it didn’t say nothing. This land was made for you and me.
Nobody living can ever stop me, As I go walking that freedom highway; Nobody living can ever make me turn back. This land was made for you and me. ...more
Oh, how beatific it feels to read a good, satisfying book! I've got so much to say about this one. Substandard books require no effort on my part whenOh, how beatific it feels to read a good, satisfying book! I've got so much to say about this one. Substandard books require no effort on my part when it comes to writing a review. Generally, the more pathetic a book is, the more notes I scribble down on my phone for the review. The extreme diabolical ones pretty much end up writing their review itself. This is one of those rare books which not only turned out great, but compelled me to take copious notes of its virtues. There's nothing revealing to ruin your reading experience ahead, but I feel obliged to toss you a heads-up about a few mild spoilers.
The central theme of the plot revolves around atheism. A searing satirical take on the sinuous singularities of religion, the book has also attempted to go meta in its narrative. The protagonist, Cass Seltzer, is dubbed 'an atheist with a soul' by New York Times after his book on atheism finds critical acclaim and a place on the bestseller chart. More than the book itself, Cass is widely recognized for the Appendix in his book, in which he exhaustively lays out the 36 arguments believers offer for the existence of God, and then goes on to logically obliterate each and every one of them, pointing out the flaws and fallacies inherent in them, which is exactly what the author, Rebecca Goldstein has actually done with the book. After the text ends, she has laid out every argument in its full structural, verbose glory and proceeded to annihilate them with panache.
The book, unsurprisingly, is divided into unevenly spaced 36 chapters, most of them focusing on a particular vulnerability, a kind of neurosis in humans. The timeline keeps shuffling back and forth between present and at various points in the past. The authorial prerogative of categorically refusing to explicitly mark the timeline might annoy certain readers as it takes an additional effort on your part to figure out the exact point in time at which a particular chapter takes place. Though the author sometimes tries to obliquely communicate that bit of information through dialogue, I could make out the time based on the grammatical structure of sentences.
It hasn't much to offer in the way of plot, but it has tons to amuse you in the form of its multifarious cast of droll characters. I, first of all, need to talk about Jonas Elijah Klapper. What a man, what a hell of a character! Klapper is Cass's dissertation adviser, a man he fell in awe of after reading his book. He's got one hell of a facetious catchphrase - 'The British have seem to lost, along with their empire, the ability to understand me.' Just like Cass, I instantly fell in love with the character, what with his rare genius and an extraordinary ability to recall sumptuous bits of excerpts at appropriate times and quoting them en masse, especially his trait of persistently coming up with words you've never heard of before. This man was on a mission to expand my vocabulary by leaps, it seemed. At one point, Rebecca writes about Klapper, 'Genius was a matter of incantatory intuitions and phosphorescent blasts into the dark. Genius was a matter of thunderclap reasons, of which reason knew nothing. Genius was oracular, overweening, and severe. It left it to others to grub around in dusty doubts and cavil in insect voices.' And then a transformation occurs. Slowly, but surely, I came to dislike the character. Just like Cass, I underwent a disillusionment of massive proportions, realizing the man was a classic narcissist. As Roz puts it, 'You never know what Krap the Klap might throw at you.'
Roslyn Margolis, or Roz, as Cass calls her, the anthropologist ex-girlfriend who returns from the jungles of Amazon to greet her long-lost friend after hearing about his book. She is a jolly intellectual who doesn't like to take life seriously, except when it comes to mortality. Roz aspires to be immortal. She swallows 'gelatin globules filled with yellow viscous fluid or reddish oils, shiny black pellets and lozenges of mahogany brown, and powders ranging from white to sandy tan to mocha brown' three times a day, a risky experiment she has chosen to conduct on her body to stay young - 'We all know what would happen if nature is allowed to take its course', she explains - until her initiative Immortality.org, or the broader scientific world discovers a way out of senescence. At one point, Cass and Roz dive deep into a conversation on immortality, which by far, has to be in the top five most interesting conversations I've read in books, if not the best. I couldn't help but fall in love with her beguiling quiddities.
Lucinda Mandelbaum, the erudite game theorist, the ravishing femme fatale, the love interest of Cass in the present timeline, I've reason to believe, is loosely modeled on the author herself. Though she doesn't get as much page-time as Roz, she leaves quite an impression. Armed with an aggressive style of questioning, she had coined the verb 'to fang' as an undergraduate at Harvard. 'To fang is to pose a question from which the questioned can't recover. You could see the stun, the realization of helplessness setting in.' We witness a rip-roaring fanging for ourselves when Lucinda mistakes Cass for someone else at a seminar and he is floored when she blows the speaker's talk to smithereens with her carefully crafted question. Get, set, choke! Loved everything about her except the gut-wrenching ending the author chose to endow to Cass and her relationship.
Azarya Sheiner, the kid with a heart of gold. Azarya is a child prodigy, a mathematical genius comparable with the likes of Gauss and Ramanujan. He is also the son of Valdener Rebbe, the rabbi of America's only shtetl. At one point, he draws Roz a number of nonsensical mathematical pyramids on a page, which, she only later finds out, are not nonsensical at all but portray a complex mathematical reality in simpler terms. I'd not go into the agonizing conflict this character faces as the book progresses, but you will root hard for him. I loved the character - I can't remember the last time I loved so many characters in a single book - but again, the ending given to his arc made my heart weep.
Though the book is about atheism, it's not until the end when Cass faces off with an eminent Nobel Laureate on a debate whether God exists, that the book chooses to openly address the question. Of course the Appendix is a beast of its own, but the text opts to save the best for the last. In all fairness, I may be biased towards the book as I identify as an atheist. You don't choose the book, the book chooses you, right? Books tend to weave their way to their interested audience, but I think this one is for all. It's for every human being who possesses the faculty of reason. Even if you identify as a believer, the least you can do is give the opposing view a chance to express itself....more
This is a historical novel centered around the journey of Esme Nicoll, a young girl growing up in Oxford in the early 1900s. Set against the backdrop This is a historical novel centered around the journey of Esme Nicoll, a young girl growing up in Oxford in the early 1900s. Set against the backdrop of the creation of the first Oxford English Dictionary, the novel explores the power of language, who controls it, and whose voices are often left out.
The author has tried to weave real-life incidents like Women's Suffrage movement and the outbreak of World War I with a fictional story. Even some characters that appear in the story are real, as acknowledged by the author in the epilogue. On paper, it sounds like a great idea, but the execution fell way short.
Maybe I feel that way because a particular book I've high praise for kept lurking in the back of my mind and I just couldn't shrug it off. Kory Stamper's Word by Word is part her autobiography as a lifelong lexicographer, part non-fiction about how dictionaries are made. And that book immediately lodged itself in my favourite shelf. I was already well-versed with the subject matter and felt the contents of this book repetitive, since almost all of it is set in a backyard room called Scriptorium where the OED took its shape. Real soon, it started to feel a bit too tedious for my liking.
The novel’s focus on Esme’s journey to collect “lost� words is compelling, especially as it ties into issues of gender and class, yet the pacing was way too sluggish. It brings up valuable themes about language and power but doesn’t fully capture the reader's attention. I'd rather recommend you to read Kory Stamper's Word by Word if you are interested in the making of dictionaries....more
Either this man has lost his mojo or my tastes have evolved.
I expect something more than just skirmishes, ambushes, confrontations and battles from a Either this man has lost his mojo or my tastes have evolved.
I expect something more than just skirmishes, ambushes, confrontations and battles from a 400+ page behemoth. (Oh, those words mean the same? Sorry if I am getting repetitive. You should tell that to the author too). The title said 'War', so probably I should've reined in my expectations, but it's tedious all the same.
As soon as a problem presents itself, someone is readily available with a solution or a workaround. The stakes never feel critical.
Lending scientific explanations to myths is an act of irresponsibility. He has dedicated an entire chapter to Ram and Co. explaining how Ram Setu will be built. While I admire the author's imagination and audacity, it does not change the fact that the bridge was a natural phenomenon after all. Trying to prove it otherwise is perpetuating the myth. A recent film called Ram Setu tried to do the same and I found it deeply disturbing.
Lastly, why the heck is everybody laughing so much? Why did the author felt the need to inject a (so-called) sense of humour in every character? If you are planning to read it - you shouldn't - do me a favour and count how many times the word 'laugh' or some version of it appears in the manuscript. I bet it'll atleast average out to one per page. And you know what's even more irritating? Not a single 'joke' manages to make you actually laugh. These banters are simply moronic. I heard parts of it on Audible and even the narrator laughing sounded fake! (Insert the meme of Hrithik's 'Not Funny' here). If he had to aim for comedic relief, he could've done it sparsely and effectively at opportune moments, but naah, everyone had to be a clown.
I feel bad for poor Ravana. A hero is as strong as you make the villain. He was this majestic, evil, larger-than-life villain in the third volume, but here, he's reduced to a soft and stupid doxy, blindsided by love. A huge disappointment....more
Alternating between the author's personal life and that of 4 of her patients, Maybe You Should Talk to Someone primarily revolves around mental healthAlternating between the author's personal life and that of 4 of her patients, Maybe You Should Talk to Someone primarily revolves around mental health issues. The author is a therapist, but the twist in the tale is she's also seeing a therapist for her own problems. Her patients range from an addicted and indecisive twenty-something to a septuagenarian estranged mother, from an imprudent Hollywood producer who lost his son in a car accident to a good-natured young woman who is soon going to die from a terminal illness. The book turned out surprisingly good. The author's writing style is refreshingly exemplary. The sheer perfect timing of idioms and phrases impressed me to no end. As a writer, I face much difficulty in pinning my finger down on the exact phrase to convey the meaning. Lori is a pro in this department.
As in therapy when a patient's deep-rooted fears and anxieties come to the fore only in later sessions, the narrative imitates the therapeutic process and takes time to unravel the central conflicts only late in the story. In fact, out of the four patients I talked about, two of the narrative threads start only after almost half of the book is completed. The first half exclusively deals with the other two patients, interwoven by the flashbacks of how the author came to be a therapist. Her backstory was the strongest suit of tue book for me. Not revealing much here as it'd spoil a central plot point, but I was particularly stunned (in a good way) by some things which may be the norm in the United States, but, let's just say are not common in this part of the woods, if not entirely taboo.
From time to time, the author dives deep in explaining the nitty-gritties of therapy. It's not technical, per se, but some may find it overtly preachy. I was not bothered by her long-winded approach. I personally enjoyed these interludes, finding them insightful and engrossing. I consider a book worthy of my time if at the end it leaves me with feeling like coming back to it. And I look forward to plunge in the middle of these pages again someday....more
Someone I liked once had an ingrained sensibility to see the good in people, admire the beauty of nature, naturally empathising not just with humans bSomeone I liked once had an ingrained sensibility to see the good in people, admire the beauty of nature, naturally empathising not just with humans but with animals and even trees and flowers. She was kind, pure, smiling, de facto, always seeking delights in small things. Incidentally, whenever she found something delightful, like a rare clean skyline at dawn on a bridge while everyone else was busy looking at their phones, she would inadvertently, elegantly coo 'Oh, my heart!' This book (even the title), in a sense, felt like a semblance of her, although topically restricted to films.
Throughout the book, the author exudes her love of cinema. It is impossible to not let some of her exquisite energy rub off on you. The campy, bite-sized essays talk about the films the author loved, industry people who have left an indelible mark on her psyche, and events she was privileged enough to be a part of. What I liked most about it was the one-liners from films she regularly kept dropping in chapter after chapter. Simply hilarious!
I intentionally picked up the book to start the year in a lighter vein, and it did not disappoint. A Place In My Heart is by no means essential reading, but I'd recommend it if you are looking for a moment of respite....more
The last time I read such a gripping, shocking account of inclusive investigative journalism was 2018's Bad Blood by John Carreyrou. This world works The last time I read such a gripping, shocking account of inclusive investigative journalism was 2018's Bad Blood by John Carreyrou. This world works overtime to protect men of power, money and influence. It is nothing short of a miracle then how the persistent efforts of two women, Jodi Kantor and Meghan Twohey, led to the downfall of a paragon of power, one of the most influential producers of Hollywood, a man who is famously thanked in Oscar speeches nearly as much or more than God, but whose only legacy that remains now is of a bully, a manipulator and a habitual sexual offender - Harvey Weinstein.
We all know what happened after the #MeToo movement exploded in 2017. Testimonies by women are coming in even today in 2022 as I write this piece! This book is about how the world came to this moment, beginning with the author duo's first uncertain days of reporting. They describe how they coax out secrets as Weinstein refused to go down without a fight. With an army of overpaid lawyers and PR teams working in overdrive to protect the man, Weinstein uses every underhanded tactic to sabotage the women's work. Despite having all the money and power in the world, it ultimately leads to the final showdown, his last stand in The New York Times office right before the publication, when he realized he was cornered. Aah, the power of media!
There's one thing I liked most about the book, but which ironically works against its commercial success and wide reach - the authorly prerogative to not make it a salacious, bawdy narrative despite having all the elements to make it so, but dealing with the subject matter with sincerety and respect it deserved, which ultimately might make it 'boring' for a lay reader. Having said that, it does not render the book any less absorbing. It was an important story to tell, and it deserved a respectful treatment.
People often use the phrase 'separate the art from the artist' in a positive connotation to defend an artist's work. I think yes, there's a ring of truth to that statement. But I don't use it in a positive way. Not everyone of us is as good a painter as Picasso, but I think most of us are better human beings than him. Let's normalize valuing and appreciating art, but simultaneously considering it okay to not like the artist as an individual....more
I have a rule in my reading. If I don't like a book, I give it atleast 100 pages to see if it gets interesting. In this case, I couldDNF'd at page 50.
I have a rule in my reading. If I don't like a book, I give it atleast 100 pages to see if it gets interesting. In this case, I couldn't even bear to indulge my own commitment. The sins are just too much to count.
Too many characters. Every one of them hackneyed and one-note. No sense of basic sentence-structuring. Criminal overuse of parenthesis. No attempts of scene and setting demarcation. Fatuous use of alliteration in chapter titles. Absurd and sudden shifts of language between English, Sanskrit, Punjabi and Telugu. Stupidest, dumbest, imbecile storyline.
Look, I am ready to suspend disbelief, okay? Tell me the weirdest fantastical story you can think of, I am here for it. But atleast make it legible. Follow the basic commandments of writing. And don't write to sound intellectual, write to tell a good story.
I grabbed this book at Ahmedabad Lock The Box fair. I saw a middle-aged guy standing in the vicinity of the shelf where The Hidden Hindu copies were stacked neatly. I browsed for 2 hours and the guy never left his place. He approached whoever came close to the shelf and started talking excitedly and animatedly with them. I assumed (correctly) that maybe he is the author. One man was clearly not interested in picking up the book, as was evident from his defeated expression, but the author just wouldn't stop exhorting the virtues of the book to him. Akshat Sir, if you are reading this, please write a good one next time. We give a book our hard-earned money, time and attention. The least we deserve is a sensible story.
Edit: Turns out the author did read the review. Slided in my DM to tell me how great his book is, considering that MS Dhoni is adapting the book into a webseries. Next time, don't judge me if I happen to be unaware of the fact that adaptation automatically metamorphoses a bad book into a good one, okay?...more
In part a lexicographer’s autobiography, part history of lexicography and the development of the English language itself, and partly a pointed but senIn part a lexicographer’s autobiography, part history of lexicography and the development of the English language itself, and partly a pointed but sensible inquiry into absurd grammatical conventions that are blindly accepted by teachers and students alike, Word by Word promises to be an incredible treat not only for epistemophiles and logophiles, but for anyone curious enough to know the history of and difference between the possessive ‘its� and the contractive ‘it’s�.
Kory starts off with debunking the popular myth that dictionaries are the sacred gatekeepers of the language. It doesn’t matter whether a word is considered ‘good� or ‘bad� by the general public; if it’s used often enough, it merits an entry into the dictionary. English is not a fortress to be defended (from corruption by ‘bad� words). A better analogy is to think of English as a child. We love and nurture it into being, and once it gains gross motor skills, it starts going exactly where we don’t want it go: it heads right for the goddamned electrical sockets. She then goes on to explain the history of this weird connection between morality and English usage, which still continues to this day, especially in India.
The title is a misnomer; do not dive into the book expecting a line-by-line explanation of new words. This book is not a dictionary, it’s a book about dictionaries. That being said, you won’t be disappointed if your goal is to expand your vocabulary. 20 years of being a lexicographer, Kory has this unparalleled ability to come up with words that fit the context perfectly well, something I struggle with despite actively googling 10 or more words daily.
The word ‘irregardless� gets an entire dedicated chapter. If you look up the word on the internet, it means ‘regardless�, which seems like a bad joke at first glance. The prefix ‘ir-� meaning ‘not� and the suffix �-less� also meaning ‘not�, ‘irregardless� is a double negative, literally meaning ‘with regard to�, which is exactly what the speaker is NOT trying to say. Kory’s got a mini character-arc of her own in this chapter: from being an absolute hater of the word from the deepest core of her heart, she goes on to become America’s foremost apologist for ‘irregardless� as she discovers in time that the word is an intensifier of ‘regardless�. Though it means the same, if you use ‘irregardless�, it means you want to put an end to the argument in question, you are done. Though she still advises us to opt for the safer ‘regardless�, otherwise people might think of you as a lunatic. I loved the part where an angry correspondent writes “‘Irregardless� is a made-up word that made its way into the dictionary through constant use�, to which she mails a rejoinder “That’s pretty much how this racket works. All words are made-up. Do you think we find them fully formed on the ocean floor, or mine them in some remote part of Wales?�
She talks about dialects, pronunciation, small words, big words, cuss words, the effect of the internet on lexicography (good and bad), and much more. Without really meaning to, the book teaches you to question the received wisdom when Kory talks about absurd grammatical rules that make no sense. The part where she talks about dialects also gives her an opportunity to touch upon sensitive topics like discrimination and systemic racism, of which she had been a victim in her teenage years.
Advice for the budding lexicographers? You must be possessed of “sprachgefühl,� a German word we’ve stolen into English that means “a feeling for language.� Sprachgefühl is the odd buzzing in your brain that tells you that ‘planting the lettuce� and ‘planting misinformation� are different uses of the word ‘plant�. Secondly, you should be a native speaker of English, because in daily line of work, you need to know, without being told, that ‘the cat are yowling� is not grammatically correct, whereas ‘the crowd are loving it� is just very British.
Given the tedious topic at hand, it could’ve easily been an insignificant, boring piece of literature if not for Stamper’s sharp wit and humorous writing. While at times the book did dip when the authoress went into the history and nitty-gritty of dictionaries, the content for the most part is itself so strong and interesting that it keeps your attention hooked throughout. Add Kory’s jokes in and the book is virtually unputdownable. Give it a go. ...more
The Glass Castle is stylized as a memoir, but it's more of a warning than a book. It could've easily been alternatively titled 'How NOT to do parentinThe Glass Castle is stylized as a memoir, but it's more of a warning than a book. It could've easily been alternatively titled 'How NOT to do parenting'. Inspite of her parents' criminal neglect, the fact that Jeannette Walls is still alive is a statistical marvel. You'd think her old man has done enough damage already, what can be worse than that? And then the man will do something so utterly disgusting it made me scream at the pages, 'WHAT! Come on! You are her father, you are supposed to do exactly opposite of that!' To name a few experiences, she suffered third degree burns at age three due to her mother's neglect, drowned by her father, bit by snakes and scorpions, nearly mauled by a cheetah, thrown out from a moving car, continually starved, locked in the back of a truck for 14 hours, all before the age of 10. There came a point when I just couldn't read further. I closed the book, set it aside and silently raged.
Despite these unforgivable acts, Jeannette does not speak ill of her parents at any point. She does not portray herself as a victim of her parents' neglect, instead she chooses to tell her story matter-of-factly, neither demonizing, nor justifying her parents' behaviour, which I felt was a wise decision.
I am a sucker for coming-of-age stories. Give me overwhelming odds, give me a heroic carving-out-a-successful-life-despite-the-odds story, I am here for it. And while the author does goes on to do that, becoming a journalist and then a gossip columnist at a prominent organization while finding the love of her life in the process, it isn't exactly heroic. It was a long, long journey, full of struggle and disappointments.
The book is full of shocking moments, but ironically, my takeaway is a particularly poignant scene that will linger in my subconscious for long (I say 'scene' because it's in the movie based on the book, not a part of the book itself. I went through the book and the movie in parallel to see how they'd adapted the source material). It's after Jeannette has establisbed herself as a journalist and having a dinner at an expensive restaurant with her fiance and his prospective client. When the client asks a waiter to take away the leftovers, the author requests her, 'If you don't mind, can you please have it packed and let me take it?' The woman nervously smiles and says 'You must be joking.' Walls, without a trace of hesitation, smiles casually and says, 'I never joke about food.'
Dear reader, I clapped for her in that moment. Go and read her story....more
Each and every line of this book is practical and no-nonsense. Each page is chock-full with good advice, written in an appealing and non-preachy voiceEach and every line of this book is practical and no-nonsense. Each page is chock-full with good advice, written in an appealing and non-preachy voice. You'd know I actively hate self-help books if you've been following my reviews for a while. This did not feel like self-help. It's just good advice, from a brother to another. It's the kind of book you keep coming back to from time to time. To use that cliched phrase, it's the kind of book that actually changes your life....more
Where's the story? It's just people running around from one place to another. The whole time. That's it.
And why Ashwin's characters talk like thUgh!!
Where's the story? It's just people running around from one place to another. The whole time. That's it.
And why Ashwin's characters talk like they are teaching students in a classroom? This is not how people talk irl. I think even Ashwin knew that there's nothing of substance to sell, that's why he either keeps juggling his characters from point A to B or frequently indulges in long unnecessary history lessons no one asked for.
Which brings me to my final and the most irritating qualm with the book: what the heck is up with history lessons? I didn't sign up to be told about obscure facts. I have the internet to do that. I would've considered paying attention to these facts had these somehow connected with the plot (of which there is none), and in fact for the first hundred pages I did bother to collect this trivia in a small section of my brain, hoping it'll come in handy when the pay-off comes, but alas! He's telling me about the history of Bombay, he's talking about history and geography of Parsis, while other times he's rambling about some Borzuya or Kalila dimna whatever. And then he's repeating things again and again. I am not kidding the bit about Zoroastrians getting persecuted by Muslims and fleeing from Iran gets mentioned like 50 times in the book. Dude, come on, I heard you the first time, move on!
It's less preachy than The Rozabal Line and Keepers of Kalachakra, but still, it's all over the place. I think it's time to pull the plug, I've had enough. Not picking up any more Ashwin Sanghi books now....more
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