My Reading List of Oct '13

Reading list of July '13

Tawny, ageing books send me reeling into a nostalgic old world charm. They remind me that someone gazed into this very book and spiralled into a world quite different from what each one of us lives in. Someone grazed through these very pages that I hold and emoted similarly as I move from emotion to emotion. So if I'm sure of it being a good read, and if it's economical I would definitely buy second-hand books. And I came across just what I wanted when YMCA gave space to some second-hand book dealers space in one of their halls in Thiruvananthapuram. I grabbed a copy each of Don't Blink by James Patterson and The Girl who played with Fire by Steig Larsson.

Before reading about James Patterson I had heard about him inCastle, the television series(I'm a huge fan!). I kept muttering that dialogue of and from Castle, "Oh, I'm not James Patterson rich, but I do ok" for all the few days I had Don't Blink with me but didn't read it. So finally I dig into it and I finished Don't Blink in the blink of an eye. And now I'm a James Patterson fan too, waiting to lay my hands of another book of his. Inspite of having read it in May this book deserved a mention here more so as this helped trigger my insatiable thirst for good books all through the month of June. Come June I had finished that and moved on to a bunch of interesting books.So here goes the tiny list of books that took me through Oct-Sept 2013.

The Shiva Trilogy:

Mythology has always been my favorite genre next only to crime-thrillers. I fell in love with the genre with Devdutt Patnaik's Jaya. Through I had issues with the passive language, the narrative and the inner meaning of the stories left me spell-bound, that I went on to read The Pregnant King, also by the same author. And no, I wasn't disappointed. But after the two books I never found anything worth my time in the genre till the Shiva Trilogy. Though I was reluctant to read it, The Immortals of Meluha reached me through a friend who insisted that I read the book.So I started the month with The Immortals of Meluha, the first from the Shiva Trilogy by Amish Tripathi.

While I dug into the book I heard many a friends, interested in the genre themselves, express their reservations about Shiva being depicted as a casual, pot smoking, free-willed mortal. They didn't want their beliefs about Lord Shiva to be questioned or influenced after turning a few leaves of the book. Frankly being an agnostic myself, I found the books a logical explanation of why Shiva is revered the way he is. Tripathi made me respect the intricacy with which myth is woven into a logical story, with the right amount of magic sprinkled on it. 

The language is plain and the story a melodramatic strain. Its runs a risk of sounding like a mythological drama somewhat like your everyday K-brand of television serials. While the war description is painstakingly long and laborious, Tripathi's language is simple and sweet in handling emotions and relationships.

Rating: 4/5

The Girl Who Played With Fire
I had read the 1st book from the Millennium series, 'The Girl with the Dragon tattoo,' a long time back. This girl, Lisbeth Salander fascinated me with her complete mysterious ways of detachment from the society. The 2nd installment in the series, 'The Girl who played with Fire,' gives you answers regarding her peculiar behavior. This book here is less about Mikael Blomkvist & more about Lisbeth Salander. Go, read it for her.

Gives you a better picture of why Lisbeth is the way she is.

Rating: 3/5

They Do It With Mirrors
They do it with mirrors pretty much refused to move. It gave me sleepless nights & restless days. This one being my first Agatha Christie book, I'm not sure I'll go back to one. Having said that, though the book was not all bad the exercise seemed oh-so-trivial.

This one is a neatly written slow story that dragged on to meet a rather flimsy climax.

Rating: 2/5

Whose Kahaani is it anyway?

Movie   :Kahaani (2012)
Director:Sujoy Ghosh

Actors   : Vidya Balan, Parambrata Chattopadhyay, Nawazuddin Siddiqe, Indraneil Sengupta, Kharaj Mukherjee, Saswata Chatterjee

Movies are always end-products of a collective creativity. Many might argue about whose craft a movie is in the end. The director, producer or the lead? With Vidya Balan soaking in all the glory for winning the National award for her stalwart performance in Dirty Picture, there couldn't have been a better timing for her to see Kahaani released. Undisputed that Kahaani is yet another feather on her cap, before showering praises let me just give the rest of the gang their shares of the credit.

The very first thing that caught my eye about the movie Kahaani was it's trailer.Quite lucid and yet cryptic. Giving away almost nothing about the movie and yet keeping the viewer at their toes. I thought, "Wow! This is how trailers should be made!" Lot of times I've known what twists and turns to expect from a movie right after the trailer. Kahaani's trailer left me gnawing for answers. So 10/10 there.
Reviews for a movie good or bad,always begin with the director. We shall make no exceptions here, especially when the co-writer, director and co-producer of this wonder is one man. Sujoy Ghosh, who debuted his career with an off-beat like Jhankaar Beats hadn't been in many talks there after. With Home Delivery:Aapko...ghar tak and Aladin (inspite of Sanjay Dutt and Mr.Bachchan) bombing in the box office, there wasn't much to talk about. And hence Ghosh did a comeback and how?! Well, it wasnt intended as a comeback, says Ghosh. He was already toying on Kahaani's kahaani when Aladin was yet to release. So it was a natural progression? Fine by me.Sujoy Ghosh, bong by birth was brought up in London. And yet he has managed to keep Kolkatta a subtle character throughout the film, with seemingly deliberate attempts of avoiding the overwhelming tourist spots.But frankly, I would have enjoyed wee bit more of the bong flavor especially because it's been a relief to watch a city other than Mumbai,Delhi or even Punjab, in a Bollywood movie. But credits to Ghosh for choosing Bengali actors over Hindi speaking Bollywood actors who could  have spoit the whole deal for me.
Be it Parambrata Chattopadhyay as the doting policeman who turns  'Arjun ka saarathi' Satyaki' a.k.a Rana or Saswata Chatterjee as the contract killer and part-time insurance agent Bob Biswas, both were a spectacle, to say the least! But the list of Bengali actors in the crew does not end there, and that is a comfort. The freshness and authenticity is quite enjoyable. The 'V' being absent from Vidya and Vishnu making it both Bida and Bishnu, the reference to 'running hot water' and the frequented Bengali mixed Hindi have all added to the salt of the earth script of the movie.So hence arises the question again, who is the real star of the show? The writer (in this case writers), director, or lead? But with all this I also wish to mention how pretty much flawlessly the story was carried by the music. 

Be it 'Eklo cholo' by Big B himself, or 'Aami shotti bolchi' by Usha Uthup, the Visha-Shekhar duo deserve a round of applause for their un-intrusive melancholy of music. Each of the song has an individual character to boast about, which is interesting in itself. Not that 'Tore bina' & 'Piya tu kaahe' are not mention worthy, but 'Eklo cholo' and 'Aami shotti bolchi' are my personal favorites. the soulful rendition has made it stand apart for me. But what has really made the movie the talk of the town has to be Ms.Vidya (Bida) Balan!

This woman has definitely proven that she has some iron gut acting prowess! She isn't kidding anyone here. Her acting is pretty much flawless as the director puts it. But at the end of the whole exerciser one doubts if she began acting knowing it was a revenge driven story and not search hunt! More so because at times she doesn't come across just as serious as one might expect. But still the director-cum-writer was seen arguing that her playfulness is with Rana who she wanted to steer in her advantage without making her look like the obvious seductress. The bonding had to be innocuous and innocent in order to appeal to the sympathetic audience. So that part can be pardoned. But Ms. Balan is yet to astonish me with some unexpected, powerful performance, as some of it looks familiar from some of her earlier movies (Parineeta, No one killed Jessica, Dirty Picture). Also it wouldn't hurt to train on some variants of voice modulation. It's been some time since I've seen any from her. But all that said, Vidya Balan has now steered clear all the filmmakers who have been apprehensive about making women-centric movies. With a Priyanka Chopra in a possible shoulder-to-shoulder competition, atleast for now, Balan is a clear choice for the thinking man's muse for a woman-centric role. But my question still remains.

Sujoy Ghosh did show some real guts to bring out a movie with only a heroine, that too a pregnant one. Hats off to that! But Balan has also made the effort worthwhile. So who do you think is the real star here? Ghosh or Balan?