Continued from here.
Where Eagles Dare - Alistair MacLean. How have I not read MacLean before? The man is a genius. I think I started this after a couple of Forsyth novels so I was continuing the British vs Germany spy stuff. The story is pretty pacy, the narration style makes it thrilling and I imagined the protagonist (Major Smith?) as Rowan Atkinson in Blackadder goes Forth, which further enhanced my reading pleasure. There are once again, double crosses, double-double crosses, double agents, triple agents, confusing agents, etc. Such a pleasure to read spy stuff with barely any romantic content (Ian Fleming, take note wherever you are) and still exhilarating enough to keep the reader engrossed in the book. Lovely debut for MacLean (I mean not his first novel but the first I read by him) after my troubling experiences with other popular authors. 4.5/5
Ice Station Zebra - MacLean. Britain’s Artic ice station seems to be in trouble and there is barely any response to radio communication. There’s an advanced submarine being sent to rescue them but a man who calls himself a specialist doctor on human behavior in extreme weather conditions wants to be on onboard. What happened to the ice station? Is this doctor who he claims to be? Who are the moles and what’s their motivation? Can it all be resolved in time? The scientific stuff about submarine went over my head as usual but the story is thrilling like always. Don’t think there’s any female character. 3.5/5
HMS Ulysses - MacLean. If the submarine stuff in Ice Station Zebra was confusing, imagine my plight when reading HMS Ulysses. Of course, there’s no one to blame except me – whenever I pick a book from an author I never read before, I tend to go on a marathon of his/her books. My initial search of HMS Ulysses at regular spots actually gave me James Joyce’s Ulysses, which I realized only after reading a couple of pages. Then fortunately I found the one I wanted. I struggled a lot to understand the technical stuff but the story - I did get that! Book is pretty realistic and there’s absolutely no feel good factor in this. Gives you the stark narration of sailors lives aboard a war ship. Felt sorry for a few characters in the end. I can’t believe this is MacLean’s debut novel – pretty crisp writing. 3.5/5
Bapu Cartoons I & II – I was in two minds whether to include this in this list coz the books are a collection of several cartoons from Bapu. To the uninitiated, Bapu is like our version of RK Narayan – multi talented creative genius. The news of his death saddened me and I had to buy his books to go through his genius once more. Though he’s drawn several thousand cartoons, the collection can accommodate only a few of those. The cartoons contain wit, sarcasm, lighthearted humour, satire on politics, caricatures of people and of course a few from Budugu series (written by MV Ramana, his friend for 60 yrs – our version of Calvin or as his detractors refer to it: copy of Dennis the Menace). I miss the Bapu-Ramana duo :(. 4.5/5
The Prestige - Christopher Priest. I have a fascination with the books which got adapted to successful movies. I watched Nolan’s movie starring Bale, Jackman and Johansson (*drools*) several yrs ago and apart from them both being magicians I don’t remember a thing – which is good, btw. There’s very less narration from an outsider pov and the book is mostly a collection of entries from diaries of Angier and Borden, as read by their great grand kids. Ever since I read Cecilia Ahern’s Where Rainbows End (don’t judge me, I was forced into it), I have a unhealthy scare of books written completely as collection of letters or diary entries. Thankfully, it isn't that bad. But the climax was a bit iffy, details of magic work better on screen compared to narration, some parts get kinda boring and I have a feeling that the movie worked out better than the book in the end. 3/5
Foundation heptalogy - Isaac Asimov. Posted separately here. Series rating - 4.5/5.
Kothi Kommachi - MV Ramana. This is the first part of MV Ramana’s autobiography which came out as serialized in Telugu magazine Swathi a few yrs prior to his passing. I love the language he uses! It details his childhood, his struggles in Madras, his life as a journalist, his interviews with Bhanumathi R and NTR, Radio Annayya/Akkayya, his first story (during school), eminent personalities he’s met working as a journalist, his entry to movies, etc. Luckily for him, he’s worked through the golden cultural period and reading this made me want to buy all the books I’ve been wanting to read since school. And of course Bapu shadows him everywhere (they met when they were 14 and the friendship continued till Ramana passed away at 82 couple of yrs ago). Will take up the 2nd and 3rd parts some time this year. 4/5
God’s Debris - Scott Adams. I thought Dilbert Principle was the most serious of all Scott Adams’ works (I only skimmed through a few pages in a book shop). I was wrong – he’s written something on philosophy called God’s Debris. Of course I can’t say that this is completely about philosophy – I think Adams himself says that this is somewhere between fiction and non fiction. Recommended by a fellow bibliophile, I finished this book in a few hours (only 140 pages) – though it’s supposed to be read slowly allowing the reader to take in the essence. There are some fascinating points mentioned in the book, especially about free will, socializing (err, talk about people rather than ideas) and intelligence vs awareness. I have a trouble with the concept of God’s debris though. But next time someone mentions Alchemist, I’m gonna propose God’s Debris. Trying to find its sequel now – Religion War. Friendly advice: 4/5 (when sober). 5/5 (when drunk)
My Dateless Diary - RK Narayan. I was rummaging through my dad’s shelf coz my mom’s been nagging me to arrange the books neatly (“you two guys are absolutely hopeless in keeping the house clean”) and found this gem of a book gifted by my grampa to my dad during his college. Nostalgic! (of course I wasn’t there then). The back cover said it’s part travelogue, part diary and part collection of Narayan’s thoughts on his first visit to the US. It immediately reminded me of The Inscrutable Americans and Barrister Parvatheesam (“an Indian’s first visit to US and his experiences”) but of course it’s nothing like those two. Narayan’s not called a genius for nothing. The very first page itself where he details his breakfast experiences got me interested in the book and the story simply flowed after that. There’s an absolutely amazing view point on television, which I completely concur with nearly 5 decades later (TV’s a waste of space). Extras: RK Narayan meets Aldous Huxley and Greta Garbo. He also wrote the much acclaimed The Guide during this stay in US. Confession: this is the first complete book by RK Narayan that I’ve read. 4/5
Blog post continues further here.
No comments:
Post a Comment