Category: Fiction

  • The Kite Runner

    Khaled Hosseini

    My perspectives are a bit skewed because I have read the author’s works in reverse chronology. I think that probably explains why I found this a little underwhelming compared to “And the Mountains Echoed“. But if I move that out of the equation, then this is a good book, not just from the point of a universal human story, but for the fact that it is a window into life in Afghanistan.

    The book covers the time frame from a few years before the Soviet occupation to the post-Taliban era and covers three generations.
    The characters are really fleshed out and this is what works for the book. Amir’s loneliness living as a motherless child, his friendship with Hassan, his complicated relationship with Baba that continues even in adulthood, and his guilt stemming from what he let happen and made happen have all been well captured. Hassan is immediately lovable and the author is able to convince us that such a genuinely noble character can exist. All the others – Amir’s Baba, a complex character who never stops being a proud Afghan despite a massive change in fortunes, his wife Soraya who has her own relatively minor demons to conquer, her parents who probably fit Afghan stereotypes of an older generation couple, and Rahim Khan, who serves as a father figure to Amir and finally shows him the path to redemption – serve as perfect foils. (more…)

  • Em & The Big Hoom

    Jerry Pinto

    “Home is not an address, home is family” pretty much defines what the story is all about. Jerry Pinto’s debut novel is the story of one woman, her madness, and how her family lives through it in a 1 BHK flat in Mahim. There is no large canvas, no spectacular events, it’s a simple story about complex lives, narrated in the most disarming and sensitive manner.

    Em holds the story together, as she does her family too, despite (or because of) her manic and wild self that writes, embarrasses her kids, smokes beedis, attempts suicides, and in flashes, also reveals an understanding of raw human nature. In contrast is The Big Hoom, standing like a breakwater that calms the storms lashing through their lives. He is an enigma to me, and it would seem, to the narrator too! The nameless narrator and ‘Lao Tsu’ complete the family. The back stories and idiosyncrasies of the other characters give them an identity that does not get lost in the narrative. A good time to note that Bombay exists too, peeping out once in a while, though thankfully it doesn’t take itself seriously and is content being a backdrop. Goa probably gets a better role! (more…)

  • Sita

    Devdutt Pattanaik

    Fantastic!

    When I reached page 250 (almost 5/6th of the book!) – at which point Sita is freed – I finally allowed myself the comparison that had been bubbling inside my head for a while. Jaya, an illustrated retelling of the Mahabharata by the same author, ranks among my top five books of all time. Thus far, this book had not really touched those levels. Rationalisation was easy – the Mahabharata is perhaps a more complex and interesting tale because of the sheer number of characters, the back stories, and the grey shades that permeate every character in it. There were many little nuggets I hadn’t known about earlier, and that made the reading more exciting. On a relative note, the Ramayana is more ‘linear’, and there are a limited number of layers that the author can add to situations or characters. I consoled myself with the fact that the narration was as spectacular as Jaya, and I had gained at least a couple of perspectives beyond my current understanding of the epic and its underlying philosophies. (Aham, and Aham Brahmasmi, for example) I did wonder though, why the author had to call it Sita – there wasn’t really a justification. (more…)

  • A Thousand Splendid Suns

    Khaled Hosseini

    The author’s second book and also the second book of his that I am reading – that would be nothing out of the ordinary except that I read the third book first and I’m yet to read The Kite Runner, which often gets compared to this book. I think this has given me a different perspective – to summarise that quickly, I found ‘And the mountains echoed’ a better book and I can easily see the author’s growth both in terms of overall plot as well as narrative style.

    This novel is primarily centred around 3 characters (four, if one has to stretch) and using a now-familiar narrative style, we are introduced to their different worlds quite seamlessly. Mariam, an illegitimate child, is forced out of her relatively peaceful life in Herat after the death of her mother. It’s difficult to understand what affected her more deeply – the change in perspective about her father, or her being married off to her father’s acquaintance and sent to Kabul. Mariam’s marital life quickly deteriorates, as does the ‘character’ of her husband Rasheed, and one cannot but feel for the isolation and helplessness of this woman who is abused physically and mentally without respite by a husband who preaches one set of moral standards while hiding stash of porn in his drawers. (more…)

  • Caesar

    Colleen McCullough

    The fifth book in the Masters of Rome series, and my favourite thus far. (and I only have The October Horse left to read) I loved the tagline “Let the dice fly” – uttered by Caesar as he crosses the Rubicon, a crucial moment in his own and Rome’s destiny. (the translation is still being debated though)

    The author is clearly in awe of Caesar, and by the time the book is finished, we’d probably be pardoned for sharing the feeling. Since she rarely tampers with history and only adds interpretations (of character motivations) we have to assume that, according to known history, Caesar was indeed a god among men! His confidence in himself is absolute, and while the author, on a couple of instances, shows the change in how it manifests itself as he grows older, and though Caesar seems to seek some validation from his peers, it is largely a “I don’t think so, I know so” stance that he takes on situations, plans and people. (more…)