The Woman Who Died A Lot- Jasper Fforde

I read somewhere about how a writer should never review books because they are ever going to be unbiased. That was why I was missing all this while- I was away thinking about it. I still haven't made up my mind about that but I had this need to talk about this book s, so here I am. This is not a review then , folks.

I am a Jasper Fforde fan. Okay, a Thursday Next and Nursery Crime fan. I didn't like Shades of Grey, I admit.
So it was with a lot of anticipation that I started this book. I don't know , may be it is my fault. May be my Diminishing Marginal Utility Curve for Thursday Next dipped below the x-axis. if that is not the explanation then I am sorry, this book falls short of the standard set by the earlier books.
I missed the inside jokes about the writing process, the funny and brilliant observations about genres and characters, the pace, the way the books are usually structured at two levels and a lot of other things
The book was almost tedious in places , the plot dragged a bit and after some time I really didn't care what happened to Thursday or Landen or Friday or anything at all. More for old times sake than anything else I finished the book and heaved a sigh of relief that it was over.
It was like saying goodbye to a dear old valued friend.

Disgrace- J M Coetzee

 The social order in South Africa is changing and you can pick it up even on a holiday. There is talk of danger, the unease is openly displayed and stories are told, retold and passed around.  There ‘race’ is not politically incorrect and nobody is hiding the anger or the fear.

But it took Coetzee Disgrace for me to really understand what was happening there- the extent of it, the politics of it and the weight of its history.

It is superfluous to talk of Coetzee narrative skills, his insights and his brilliant characters- so let’s consider them said.

Disgrace begins with the story of the sexually active professor of  Romantic Poetry David Lurie.  He has an affair with a student, an affair with strong over- tones of Lolita, an affair doomed to go wrong. It does and he is summoned to face a committee of inquiry. He admits his guilt but refuse to apologize for it and he is forced to resign.

He moves in with his daughter who is running a farm. They become victims of a violent and horrific attack, an attack with sinister implications. Coetzee explores the issues that are at the heart of south Africa’s socio-cultural-political climate of south Africa yet the story remains the tale, the journey and the struggle of a single man.

A brilliant book. It will leave you with a sense of discomfort, many questions and like all great writing many insights too.

©Maya

The Sense of an Ending- Julian Barnes

This is the book of the year. And that says it all. I could well end my entry here. But there is, I think, some unspoken rule, that demands elaboration and substantiation. so, superfluous as it may be, I shall try.

This is not a book really. It is an experience. You open the first page and let yourself in and allow the book to happen to you. Like many worthwhile experiences, you find joy, heartache, discoveries, regrets, acceptances and finally realisation.

An unexpected legacy takes Tony Webster back to his past, right up to his school-days, when he first met Adrian. Now, Tony discovers the a past that brings him new knowledge not only of his friends but also himself.
Barnes writes easily, deftly and with insight.

The book leaves you wondering about your own memories of your past.

There is only one reason to read it- it's a master piece and most likely a definitive work in the continuum of the curve of Fiction.

Mister Pip- Lloyd Jones

Let me admit this and get it out of the way- I didn't finish the book and this time the fault is mine. I abandoned the book purely because I  was too chicken to  see it through. Even though the book was compellingly told with interesting characters and an original voice.
Briefly- Matilda is a young girl in the tropical island of  Bougainville. Mr Watts is the only white person in the island. His black wife calls her self Sheba and the couple have a strange daily ritual which entails him pulling a wooden platform on which she stands. An act that puzzles the whole island and the reader- we discover the answer in the end. But I digress for this quaint ritual has little bearing on the course of  the story.
The story- Mr Watts becomes the self- appointed teacher of the village school and the only book he as is Dickens' Great Expectations. Pip enters their world and acquires a life of his own. So real does he become the when civil war comes, the solders come looking for Mr Pip. Yes, Civil war is the menace that threatens this little idyll and it is a menace that comes to pass. There is a lot of loss, of  varying  kinds and degrees.As they fight this threat from outside , the islanders have to also deal with the threat that Dickens and Watts bring by the way of questions and new beliefs to the young students that oppose the ideas of the old. Of course, Pip's life does mirror ,in some small  manner Matilda's
I skipped and peeked- so I  know  how the book  ends. But I am more interested in hearing from  somebody who finished the whole book.

This is a must read - for even though I abandoned the book, the book didn't let go off me. I pick it up and flick  page or too and I wait for the day when I stop[ being  a wimp long enough to actually finish it.

The Notebooks of Don Rigoberto- Mario Vergas Llosa

I can't make up my mind about this book. I am staring at it and trying to decide- did I like or didn't I. Let me get the things I am sure about out of the way- Llosa is a genius and I don't like erotica. But  this book cannot be dismissed as just erotica. This book is many things but before we get to that-

The eponymous ( I always wanted to use that word) Rigoberto is an aesthete and an erotomaniac who spends his days as an insurance executive and the nights fantasising about his separated second wife, Lucrecia. whom he still loves passionately. Hi s son Fonchito sets about trying to unite them.Fonchito- innocent boy or a fiend. Fonchito is obsessed with  the Viennese painter Egon Schiele and uses Lucrecia and her maid Justiniana.Very soon you discover that something occurred , something unforgivable between the boy and the step-mother that caused the separation It is never told to you and you are left wondering till  the end.

There are enough erotic scenes described in the book except the one that you desperately want to know about. Yet all that you know is that it happened and in Lucrecia's bed. and you are not sure who was the seducer and who was seduced. Does the boy know what he is saying and doing or is unaware? You never find out.

The couple however do unite and much remains unresolved, much unspoken and others hinted at. As Rigoberto asks in the end- In spite of everything, we are a happy family , are we not and I couldn't decide whether they were or not.

And this is layered with the many letters Rigoberto writes on art, sexuality and sports. and the anonymous letters that are exchanged between the couple. These make the reading rich, funny and erudite.

Now you  see why I can't make up my mind. I would love to know what other readers feel/think.
Oh and just for record- Llosa won the Nobel in 2010.

The Master of Petersburg - J.M.Coetzee

Every body has to read a Coetzee. Once I decided that, I went in search of one. I picked the Master of Petersburg because it's about a writer, Dostoevsky, none less. No, it's not a biography, nothing could be further than that. Coetzee, I quote the blurb here, 'dares to imagine the life of  Dostoevsky.'
No, not the whole life, the events that unfold after sudden death of his stepson.

A few pages of reading and the book reached out and grabbed me with such force that I had to stop every few pages just to breathe. The  overwhelming reaction made me record as I wrote. And here is some of that:




This is one of those books which needs to be recorded as the journey of it's reading unfolds. You'll see why.



Page 45- I have to stop and gasp for breath. Coetzee has wound around me silken bonds , so effortlessly and skillfully , of deep emotions and sly thoughts and I notice only now when the bonds begin to chaff. I have to go away and sort Fyodor's emotions towards his son. his son's death, to his landlady and his grief. There is much for me to feel and much more to think.

Page 98- I have to stop again. Nothing has happened yet much has happened in the last 53 pages. His son comes to life to me, and so does Fyodor. I can'/t be sure I like him but I can reach out and feel his grief and his need for - I don' t know what to call it, closure seems so tame to the richness of his emotions- but for now, closure will have to do. I feel for the ring at the end of my nose , through which Coetzee has strung this rope with with which he leads me through this maze of his making.

Then Nechaev appears, his son begins to take shape , the daughter of the landlady, the Finnish comrade of Nechaev and even the police- you are no longer sure who is right and who is wrong and what really happened the day the stepson died . Fydor, you are increasingly convinced is the product of pre-revolutionary idea and  you buy Coetzee 's  idea of how great literature can be born out of a tormented mind.
And walk away with a feeling that Coetzee might well be as much a genius as Dostoevsky.

Read it- It should be required reading for everybody who worships at the alter of  the BOOK.

Pligrim's India- ed. Arundhathi Subramanium

I bought this book to gift to a seeker, a pilgrim I wasn't going to read it, really. But the book seduced me into picking it up, by it's promise of translations from ancient texts and also just lying there on my center table, throwing me sly beckoning looks.

I succumbed and picked it up and was drawn into its many journeys, multiple quests and myriad voices.  The pieces are so carefully and beautifully selected- thanks Arundhati with a satisfying mix of prose and poetry ancient and contemporary.

I was hooked from the first piece - Jerry Pinto's visit to the Kumbh Mela and traveled into Kabir's poetry, Khasi folk tale. and more. There are visits to Dargha, churches, Sikh sacred destinations and the original fire temple. There are the famous shrines and road side destinations And of course the foreign seeker and the one who tries to find it with chemical help. The book is as secular as it is possible for a search for the divine can get. That is the strength of this book.

The writing is uniformly good and the translations are satisfying. They don't leave you with the half- satisfied feeling of having missed the main spice in a iconic dish that many translations often do. Again, another thanks to the editor

Of course , not all the journeys were satisfying. Some accounts  was a little too dry to keep me fully interested and the one about  the meeting with Sankaracharya of Kanchi a little too superficial to be satisfying.

But the sum is bigger than the parts. And more satisfying. And left me with questions about my own quest for the sacred. Namely- maybe it's time to start one.

A must for everybody who wondered about spiritual India.

Pomegranate Soup - Marsha Mehran

This was a book I read after a long hiatus. What can I say except what a perfect book to come back to reading with.
A book that warms you on cold wintry nights.
Marjan, Bahar and Layla escape the terrors of  Iran into the unpronounceable Irish town of Ballinacroagh . There Marjan starts her Babylon Cafe. There she serves the local exotic dishes seasoned with mysterious spices that hint of hope , dreams and other forbidden pleasures. There snakes in this paradise  and the sisters have to deal with them.

This is an evocative narrative that is filled with the fragrance of the Marjan's cooking, the lushness of Layla's burgeoning beauty yet shadowed by the dark despair that follows Bahar.

Pick it up- You'll love not only the three sisters and the townspeople , you'll also be tempted to try the recipes from Marjan's kitchen.
A perfect book-club selection