Book Review: Adrift: A Junket Junkie in Europe by Puneetinder Kaur Sidhu

Title: Adrift – A Junket Junkie in Europe
Author: Puneetinder Kaur Sidhu
Publisher: Leadstart Publishing
ISBN: 978-93-80154-31-2
Genre: Non-Fiction, Travel
Pages: 106
Source: Publisher
Rating: 4/5

I do not enjoy travel books. I never have. May be it is because I am envious that I wasn’t there while the author was enjoying and making the most of a new city in a new country or it is because I so want to be there that I’d rather be there than read about it. I enjoy travelling more than reading about it. I always thought I would not enjoy a travelogue till Blogadda.com sent me a copy of, “Adrift – A Junket Junkie in Europe” – written by Puneetinder Kaur Sidhu.

Adrift thankfully is not your usual Eat, Pray, Love travel kind of book. It is genuinely different and how so you may ask? First it is a book only of 106 pages and that is great for any reader who wants to read a travelogue – because the author is not giving away much and yet at the same time enough has been written to evoke interest. Adrift is one summer in the author’s life in Europe – its sights, smells, tastes, sounds and enriching experiences. She has described almost everything – the airport, the places she stayed at, the houses, the scenes from the houses and most importantly the cities she visited.

I loved the structure of the book – from the journey to the end of it – the places you visit with the author as you go along – Germany, Sweden, Denmark, Netherlands, Hungary, Austria, France, and Great Britain. Puneetinder does not let her writing get too sentimental or too pedantic at any point. The style is easy going and would appeal to almost any reader, even the one who does not like reading the travel genre. The writing keeps things simple – it does not tend to confuse the reader. Moreover the pictures in the book spread across eight pages only spreads a smile across the reader’s face.

Adrift makes you believe that even you can actually take off and visit Europe the way the author did. Her description is breathtaking in the sense that you just want to take off and visit those places. Every place is meticulously described and the good thing is that it doesn’t end up being a Lonely Planet Guide. Puneetinder keeps in mind about the pace and content of the book. What I also liked was that before every chapter there was a quote mentioned by a famous author – from Steinbeck to St. Augustine to Dorothy Parker.

Adrift is one of those books that you want to curl-up with. It isn’t preachy. It isn’t boring. It isn’t what you think it will be. Adrift is a book that will keep you company as you are waiting in a lobby of a hotel to meet someone or at a cafe and trust me: You will daydream about the places as you read.

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Book Review: The Red Market: On the Trail of the World’s Organ Brokers, Bone Thieves, Blood Farmers and Child Traffickers by Scott Carney

Title: The Red Market: On the Trail of the World’s Organ Brokers, Bone Thieves, Blood Farmers and Child Traffickers
Author: Scott Carney
Publisher: Hachette India
ISBN: 978-93-5009-351-1
Pages: 241
Genre: Non-Fiction
Source: Publisher
Rating: 5/5

Let me make you aware right at the outset: The Red Market is not going to be an easy read. If you are looking for something nice and warm and mushy, then don’t even pick it up, however if you want to know reality and what goes unnoticed and unseen, then this is the book you must read. Through ten detailed, sometimes nauseating chapters (trust me at one point I thought I would throw up), Scott Carney removes the mask from the many layers of exploitation, experimentation, harvesting, and piecemeal selling of humans and human organs.

Targeted subjects include: the organ harvesting of corpses; the selling of kidneys and lungs and the thin red line of social acceptance it has reached in certain provinces in India; the kidnapping and subsequent cross-continental adoption of children from third world nations; the pharmaceutical practice of using willing human guinea pigs to test potentially dangerous new medicines; and even the growing market for real human hair.

I was astounded on reading some of the chapters. To know what takes place behind the curtain is discomforting for sure, however this kind of education is much needed. Carney an investigative reporter is allowed that insider’s perspective into the on-goings of the market of organ trafficking and selling. The book is full of individuals whose lives have literally been taken from them – who have been coerced into selling their blood (drained almost), women and men who owing to circumstances have no choice but to sell their kidneys and other body organs, of parents whose child is taken away from them (in the name of adoption) and settled in America, only to be abused for work.

The writing is frank and not for once does Carney mince his words. He tells it the way it is even if it means that readers have to squirm at the thought of it. It is not easy to take note that even during the age of globalization and policies and procedures, there are brokers who are adept at finding loop holes in the system – from selling of organs to surrogate pregnancies to stealing babies. Carney also takes a close look at the underlying issues – the anonymity in organ donation (which works best for the middlemen), the nature of fluctuating demand where growing technology is concerned and the relationship between the free market and the individual’s choice or the lack of it.

Carney writes in first-person, making you feel that you are right there as the events unfold. The reading is not difficult – it is simply written. Just that I had to pause several times while reading it, so I could move on with it, considering the topic. Scott Carney has done an outstanding job with this book. He has unearthed the darker side of humanity and the extent to which human beings reach the bottom-most level. He asks difficult questions for which there are no answers. The Red Market is a gripping account of an invisible crime wave that lurks between us and wings itself in every medical breakthrough. It will make you wonder and think a lot about the issue on hand, probably not the way that you would have earlier.

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Book Review: 1888 Dial India by Anuvab Pal

Title: 1888 Dial India
Author: Anuvab Pal
Publisher: Random House India
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 9788184001587
Pages: 230
Source: Publisher
Rating: 4.5/5

Anuvab Pal is one of the wittiest writers I have read in a while. I would not classify his writing as necessarily funny. His writing style is more sarcastic and satirical than anything else. He writes about India – today’s India and what it means to its citizens and how outsiders view it. I remember watching his play, “The President is Coming” with much trepidation – as he wasn’t a known playwright back then. I also recall enjoying the play a lot and then also watching the movie with the same enthusiasm. As I read his new book, “1888 Dial India” I was certain that I would read more by him in the future.

1888 Dial India is a book about new India and its follies. It is about the illusions it is creating and how people are emerging to be a part of the consumerist culture that is taking over half the country. The year is 2009. America is in a financial mess. Unemployment is in the air and doesn’t seem to go away easy. Enter: Arun Kumar: Entrepreneur, pragmatism personified, evangelist of new India’s dreams and under the impression that he can outsource the saving of American lives to India as well.

That is the crux of the book, however there is more to the surface than what meets the eye. Anuvab’s eye to detail is brilliant – the nuances of everyday living are skilfully displayed – from the BPO culture to the merging of India’s past, present and future perceptions. Corporate culture is most certainly written about a lot, however not in the usual boring tie and meetings affair – Pal’s writing comes from observation and there are so many instances that I could relate to having worked in that environment for most of my professional life to date.

I enjoyed reading the book more so because of the writing style. It is well-paced and it is at times in your face, however that is where the humour stems from, so one can overlook it. The writing nonetheless is crisp and to the point. It does not at any point get preachy, which is how ideally one should write when talking about current issues.

For me reading 1888 Dial India was a welcome change from the usual literary fare. It was something that happened by chance and I will re-read it for a laugh or two. It is definitely a perfect read for one of those lazy Sunday afternoons.

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Book Review: Secrets by Ruskin Bond

Title: Secrets
Author: Ruskin Bond
Publisher: Penguin India
ISBN: 978-0-143-41749-1
Genre: Short Stories
Pages: 150
Source: Publisher
Rating: 4/5

There is only one Indian living writer I know who still manages to evoke my childhood memories that either seem long time gone or buried for good. That writer is Mr. Ruskin Bond. Though his stories are primarily set in Dehradoon, everyone who reads them can successfully conjure the picturesque beauty in his or her mind and that is the power of good writing.

My stint with Mr. Bond’s works began when I was all of sixteen and it wasn’t with his most acclaimed The Room on the Roof. It was with “A Flight of Pigeons” and it is but obvious that I fell in love with it, though it is one of his more serious works. What I love about Mr. Bond’s writing is that you don’t feel that you should be of a certain age to enjoy it. So when I received a copy of “Secrets” – his latest collection of seven new short stories, I was only too eager to read and review them.

The stories have the classic Bond touch – the description of a sleepy Dehra, the usual simple characters and a touch of quaintness, which is why I love reading what he writes. The stories in this book are set in the late 40’s – a time when India had just become an independent nation and Rusty was all of thirteen. His mother was a manager at a hotel called “Greens” at Dehra and he would stay there when visiting home from school on holidays. Times were tough and it wasn’t easy to make a living – amidst these circumstances, events started unfolding in and around the hotel, which form the crux of this book in the form of wonderfully told stories.

We meet “The Skeleton in the Cupboard”, where as the title suggests a Skeleton is found in one of the rooms and the mystery around it is uncovered. “Gracie” on the other hand is a sentimental tale of a Dehra girl’s descent into something else altogether as she marries a British Army soldier and moves to London. “The Late Night Show” revolves around the murder of a man in a theatre during the late night show and of course Ruskin was present – watching the show when the murder took place.

These three stories were my favourites, hence the mention. Not to say the other four are not worth it. It is just that these three appealed more to my senses. Ruskin Bond’s stories warm the heart and sometimes take you by surprise. They take your mind to a different time – a time when life was simpler and one did not have to think so much and but of course the credit goes to the way they are written. A must read.

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Book Review: Bedanabala. Her Life. Her Times by Mahasweta Devi

Title: Bedanabala. Her Life. Her Times
Author: Mahasweta Devi
Publisher: Seagull Books
ISBN: 9788170462910
Genre: Translated Fiction
Pages: 80
Source: Personal Copy
Rating: 5/5

Once again Mahasweta Devi has touched upon the lives of those who are never noticed, never cared for. And her pen cuts a deep wound in the minds of readers, forcing them to sit up and discern the essential from the inessential.

Bedanabala. Her Life. Her Times is a touching tale told in first person of a woman, Bedanabala, whose mother used to live in a brothel. These reminiscences are sometimes personal, sometimes historical. The story begins in the late 19th Century, with the “theft” of a beautiful girl child from a wealthy family. She is Bedanabala’s mother. She grows up in the house of ill repute, to be groomed to enter the profession once she has come of age. But then, Did’ma, the owner of the brothel, grows to love this beautiful child as she would her own daughter and does not want her to enter this profession. She seeks for her a life of a householder. It is story that is seldom told. Did’ma’s contribution to the war effort, her donations to the fighters of India’s freedom and her gifts to the mission are her way of atoning for her sins.

The story is set in a changing India, an India poised on the threshold of progress and transformation. New thoughts and ideas are forming in the minds of idealistic youth and nationalistic passion runs high. I like how she merges topics – nationalism with the issue of prostitution and yet none of them are glorified. She writes the way she imagines and the way she has known. There is not an ounce of superficialness in her penmanship skills.

Mahasweta Devi’s Bedanabala. Her Life. Her Times empathises with a section of women that is misunderstood and disapproved of. She narrates the story with great sensitivity, skilfully weaving into the story a changing India and nationalism. I am a great fan of her works and that is only because she knows how to write and write well. The book is translated by Sunandini Banerjee.

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Book Review: A Day in the Life of a Smiling Woman: The Collected Stories by Margaret Drabble

Title: A Day in the Life of a Smiling Woman: The Collected Stories
Author: Margaret Drabble
Publisher: Penguin Classics
ISBN: 978-0141196046
Genre: Short Stories
Pages: 256
Source: Publisher
Rating: 4/5

I had not read a single Drabble before reading her collected stories and at the end of it, I sat down and ordered two books written by her. Margaret Drabble’s writing is unique, to the fact that her characters are well-rounded (almost each and every one of them), and she does not shy away from writing about things as they are. Though the collection offers only fourteen stories written by her between 1964 and 2000, they are some of the best I have read this year.

Margaret Drabble’s people are British – with the usual stiff upper lip and the need to seem proper in all places and yet she displays the inner turmoils in a wonderful manner through this collection. For instance, the title story reveals to us the darker side of a marriage accounting to the wife’s success and how she is always smiling to show e the world that all is well with her. The emotions and expressions as etched by Ms. Drabble are both heart-breaking and thoughtful at the same time. I do not want to mention the other stories as I want other readers to experience these stories for themselves as I did.

There is almost everything in the book – an illicit affair, a broken home, intimacy issues, the need to communicate and not being able to do so and most of all the lingering sense of loneliness. Margaret Drabble gives only a certain power to her characters to change their circumstances. Most of them cannot and even if they can, they don’t. There is this sense of holding back.

Character sketches are done in a very chronological manner – considering that she started writing the first story in 1964 and they gradually reflect today’s time as the last story was written in 2000. The reader at the same time can also read and see for himself or herself, the changes that took place in the society in which these stories are set.

I would recommend this book to all readers who want to read more of Drabble or want to get familiar with her style of writing. Read Margaret Drabble for these things: Great stories to tell, Par Excellence Writing and Characters that you will love and empathize with.

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Book Review: Beyond the MBA Hype: A Guide to Understanding and Surviving B-Schools by Sameer Kamat

Title: Beyond the MBA Hype: A Guide to Understanding and Surviving B-Schools
Author: Sameer Kamat
Publisher: Harper Business, Harper Collins India
ISBN: 978-9350290781
Genre: Business
Pages: 200
Source: Publisher
Rating: 4/5

Sameer Kamat’s “Beyond the MBA Hype: A Guide to Understanding and Surviving B-Schools” comes as a welcome addition to the world of books. The reason I say this is while growing up we didn’t have such books to refer to. There was no hand-holding so to say. You were thrown in the big bad world and you either swam through or drowned. There was no direction.

MBA has been an integral part of the Indian Education System (or so it seems on the surface). Parents have always encouraged their children to pursue Master of Business Administration as “that’s where the money is”, and with education being turned into a battlefield everyone jumps on wearing their armour, assuming that they are ready for battle. However, it is a total different ball when the applications are turned in. The very optimistic and confident students are baffled when they don’t get accepted. Questions swarm the mind: Where did I go wrong? What could have been done better? What was wrong with my essay, so on and so forth.

Sameer Kamat’s book tries to provide direction to how to get into a B-School and understand its working. He lists down the essentials needed to impress the admission committee: What is it that they want? They do not want someone who knows business like the back of his hand, but the basics are needed. The necessary GMAT Score is much needed and wanted by B-Schools. They tend to gauge the candidate’s 50% of brain power through this.

Communication skills are the next thing they look for. The essays are the crux at this stage. What should it contain? What should it convey? How should it be written? All of that and most importantly the clarity and the length of the essay. Last but not the least what is required is Creativity. The ability to do things differently as the cliché goes.

Sameer Kamat does a wonderful job of explaining the nitty-gritties of getting in though I feel that it could have been fleshed out better. The list of common clichés is well laid out and will exactly tell the candidate what not to do. I found the book to be an effective handbook of sorts to gear the candidate and may be to a certain extent also gives hope for that entry into a B-School.

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Book Review: The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern

Title: The Night Circus
Author: Erin Morgenstern
Publisher: Harvill Secker, Random House UK
ISBN: 978-1846555244
Genre: Fantasy, Fiction
Pages: 400
Source: Publisher
Rating: 5/5

I am not the one who would willingly read novels from the fantasy genre. Somehow fantasy and I don’t go together. However, when I received a copy of The Night Circus, I knew this book was unlike any other fantasy book. In fact, I would say it charmed the pants off me. The Night Circus is a breath-taking book and I cannot help but gush and rant about it. It is that brilliant.

The story follows Marco and Celia, two young children pitted against each other by their older and clearly vaguely amoral guardians. A game is set up, a game to which the rules are unclear and the winner can take decades to determine.

These two young people are raised unconventionally, studying magic under their tutors’ philosophies, all the while knowing there will be a competition between the two of them some day. Enter impresario Chandresh Lefèvre, who has imagined something wondrous. He explains:

“More than a circus, really, like no circus anyone has ever seen. Not a single large tent but a multitude of tents, each with a particular exhibition. No elephants or clowns. No, something more refined than that. Nothing commonplace. This will be different, this will be an utterly unique experience, a feast for the senses. Theatrics sans theater, an immersive entertainment. We will destroy the presumptions and preconceived notions of what a circus is and make it something else entirely, something new.”

Their arena? But of course the Cirque des Rêves (The Circus of Dreams). But the plot focuses on more than just the battle between these two (which involves snow gardens, wishing trees and mazes) it looks at the dynamics of all the relationships that exist as a result of this game; and the effect the game has on the wellbeing of the characters.

Some characters flourish within the confines of the circus whilst others go decidedly downhill, struggling with the concept that their lives do not fully belong to them, that they are being manipulated in ways they could never have imaged. Poppet and Widget were by far my favourite characters, children of the Night Circus, they are gifted and not entirely what you would expect from normal children. I loved the way Bailey was fitted into the plot; it was subtle and very elegant.

The circus, it is said, “arrives without warning.” Not so this novel. There have been all kinds of pre-pub buzz and hype for this title. There’s a reason; this book is so special that almost all who read it take note. Ms. Morgenstern’s tale transcended the page and brought true enchantment to my oh-so-ordinary life. As it happens, one of the characters could be speaking for the author herself:

“I find I think of myself not as a writer so much as someone who provides a gateway, a tangential route for readers to reach the circus. To visit the circus again, if only in their minds, when they are unable to attend it physically. I relay it through printed words on crumpled newsprint, words they can read again and again, returning to the circus whenever they wish, regardless of time of day or physical location. Transporting them at will.”.

It’s amazing that this is Morgenstern’s first novel, the writing is haunting and fanciful; befitting of such an enigmatic circus. She handles the descriptions of the various circus tents and acts beautifully, it is never monotonous hearing about the circus, in fact, I wish she’d publish a whole separate book outlining each and every detail. She ties all the elements together with a grace that seems effortless.

Some have compared The Night Circus with Audrey Niffenegger and yes, I can see slight similarities given that both authors are visual artists. Others mention Alice Hoffman and yes, I can see some elements in common but Erin Morgenstern has created a unique world with the Cirque de Rêves and for those who are on the right wavelength she has provided a pathway to a singularly enchanting universe, one in which my inner child revelled. Highly recommended for all “reveurs”/dreamers.

Here is the gorgeous book trailer:

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Book Review: Hiding Out by Jonathan Messinger

Title: Hiding Out
Author: Jonathan Messinger
Publisher: Featherproof Books
Genre: Short Stories
ISBN: 978-0977199235
Pages: 183
Source: Publisher
Rating: 5/5

Hiding out is a weird book – a happy weird book. It makes you want to read more stories like the ones in the book, but in vain! One has to wait for the next Jonathan Messinger to be published. I am a total and huge fan of the short story form. I honestly believe that every living writer should follow and apply the craft of short story writing before venturing to the novel form. In my opinion it only is needed to hone and work on the craft of writing. To make it more lucid and sketch better characters and plots. It is after all not easy to encompass an idea or a thought in four pages and emerge a winner at the end amongst the readers.

Hiding Out by Jonathan Messinger is one such book. It took me a while to get into the book. The way it is written is radically different and a regular reader may take some time to absorb and get familiar with the style. Having said that, once that happens, then it would be very difficult to tear the reader away from the book. The book is about stories centred on people – regular people who are avoiding the consequences of their poor decisions – their unknown errors and now they do not want to face the outcome and trying to connect at the same time, which on one hand is quite ironic and on the other, it is as real as they come.

A jilted lover dresses as a robot to win his ex back. A man builds a time machine to embrace the identity he always denied (This holds true for so many of us). A zoo has a latest addition – a man-eating wolf. A teenager finds the key to everlasting life in a video game. It is as though the characters do not somehow have a life of their own.
Jonathan’s writing is crisp and to the point.

The short stories do not occupy more than three pages and yet as I reader, I wanted to read more of a couple of stories. The rhythm to the writing is easy and does not change. The stories on the other hand will surprise you, make you laugh, cry and shock you as well. The range of emotions will be experienced and will leave you wanting for more. The stories are just more than thought provoking, they just make you reflect on your life at some point as well.

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Book Review: Long Past Stopping: A Memoir by Oran Canfield

Title: Long Past Stopping: A Memoir
Author: Oran Canfield
Publisher: Harper Paperbacks
ISBN: 978-0061450761
Genre: Non-Fiction
Pages: 321
Source: Publisher
Rating: 5/5

Oran Canfield’s memoir is part Running With Scissors, part Mommie Dearest. It’s the antithesis of the trite feel good books by his father, Jack Canfield. The Chicken Soup books are supposed to make you feel good, but lack any real substance. Long Past Stopping, on the other hand, makes you feel terrible, but is filled with dense narrative.

Instead of a typically standard timeline, Canfield takes two tracks, simultaneously, and weaves one around the other. In the first, we witness a child slowly becoming a man. His strange journey through oddball alternative schools, summer camps and traveling circuses read like a fantasy gone wrong. It’s Fellini-as-life but the film won’t end. This serves as his colorful background to the second, equally important but certainly less light-hearted track.

The second reveals the man as he goes through an endless and depressing cycle of addiction/rehab/addiction. Creating his book without the first track would be wrist-slitting, leaving readers hopeless. Canfield is just that deeply addicted to nearly every thing he gets his hands on. He crushes our hopes for him ad nauseum. The chapters dealing with his unending, bottomless drug sprees are highly frustrating to read. But the fact that I had to continue on proved he trapped me. I liked him in spite of himself. When a writer can do that, it says something. And the device of two tracks serves as a balance rather than an annoyance.

The only thing I wasn’t sure about initially was the way the chapters were arranged. Each chapter alternates between adulthood and childhood. Initially I found this distracting and disruptive to the pacing of the book, but as I continued to read I found that he intentionally does this to interweave certain childhood experiences with more recent ones. He’ll plant seeds for you in stories of his childhood that you pick up on and become more relevant in a situation he has in his twenties. I later discovered that it makes the pacing genius, as he ends each chapter with a teeth grinding nail-biter that you are forced to wait for two chapters to find out the outcome.

The writing is strong in this very personal saga. You get a realistic, first-hand look at what life is like for someone hopelessly addicted to heroin. It’s not romantic or pretty and it’s heartbreaking. Canfield writes it in a way that keeps our interest levels high, even though the subject matter is downright horrible. Like the video from a crime scene security cam, each chapter is written in gritty detail and we can’t look away. A subtle sense of humor is sporadically injected to help give us a bit of relief. Even his short chapter descriptions are a sign that this is a man who sees the funny side of the crappiest existence possible during his horse latitudes.

While the book does cover a lot of bizarre and painful moments in Oran’s life, it is written well and it is written with an amazing amount of humor. I definitely laughed out loud as many times as I cried. Oran is a very good writer. He has a gift with words. He has definitely found his voice. He has a real talent for writing in a way that keeps you turning the pages–wanting to know what happens next.

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