Book Review: Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck

Title: Of Mice and Men
Author: John Steinbeck
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 978-0142000670
Genre: Literary Fiction
Pages: 107
Source: Library
Rating: 5/5

“Of Mice and Men” by John Steinbeck is the kind of book that fills you with hope, makes it stay for a while and then reveals the true nature of men and the world we live in, shattering the hope that it started off with.

I had heard a lot about this book and also own it. (It is there somewhere. I cannot seem to find it though.) I thought I would eventually read it and I did not tell I borrowed a copy from the library and finished it in a single sitting. If you do decide not to read it in a single sitting, take it from me, this book will haunt you. It will not let you be till you have completed it. Now to the plot.

Of Mice and Men is the story of two alienated men who work as farm labourers, drifting from job to job in California. Lennie is a gentle giant (who is a little slow). George guides and protects him and depends on him for companionship. They dream of owning a farm one day and tend rabbits. This however is not meant to be. They arrive at a new farm; work with new people, make friends, till the owner’s son’s Curley’s wife ruins it all for them.

The title of the book is from a poem by Robert Burns, “To a Mouse”, which goes: “The best laid schemes of mice and men, go often awry, and leave us nothing but grief and pain, for promised joy!” Steinbeck draws on these lines in the book very subtly, making sure that the plans do not go as they dreamt of, because after all that is the story.

The narrative is strong and descriptive as is the case in most books written by him. I remember reading East of Eden in a period of two days. I just could not get off the book. Of Mice and Men flows with dialogue and action. The scenes happen so quickly in the book that it sometimes takes the reader by surprise.

You feel sorry for the men. You want them to achieve what they wanted and you know that will not be possible. The writing is so strong that you empathize with them and that’s how a book should be written. The plot is complex but the writing is not and that’s the wonder of the book. Steinbeck almost structured the novel as a play and may be that is why it has been so easy to convert it to play and three movies I guess.

Steinbeck depicts the impossibility of dreams being achieved and explores brotherhoods in humans – the strengths, the weakness in man and sometimes the angst. Of Mice and Men is a classic in every sense that should not be missed. I am glad that I finally read it.

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Here is the trailer of the movie starring John Malkovich and Gary Sinise:

Book Review: The Gods of Gotham by Lyndsay Faye

Title: The Gods of Gotham
Author: Lyndsay Faye
Publisher: Amy Einhorn Books
ISBN: 978-0399158377
Genre: Thriller, Crime Fiction
Pages: 432
Source: Publisher
Rating: 4/5

It is not easy to write a good thriller and a crime novel. All the elements need to be in place – the setting, the place, the characters and the crime but of course. Everything to the finest detail – after all nothing can go amiss in such type of a genre. This is what Lyndsay Faye has effortlessly achieved in her book, “The Gods of Gotham”.

The book is set in mid-nineteenth-century New York. The city is in shambles. We are talking about 1845 New York. The Great Potato Famine had struck Ireland and thousands of Irish Catholics were surfacing in New York, adding religious turmoil to the already volatile city. There is political upheaval and radicalism. Everything seems to be changing in the city and the story is wrapped around the founding of New York City’s first police department (The Copper Stars) and the recruit and protagonist in question – Timothy Wilde.

Wilde is a luckless man. At 27, he is unlucky in love, works at a small Manhattan oyster bar, till the Great Fire (another important angle to the story) destroys his workplace, leaving him penniless and without a job. His politically connected brother gets him a job in the newly constituted police force and that’s where Timothy’s story starts off. He hopes for a career, till he stumbles on a blood-drenched child and only discovers that there is more to what meets the eye and sets out to solve the crime. With this he faces a lot of problems – both political and personal and of course solves the crimes of children being exploited by the end of the book.

The Gods of Gotham is a taut and nicely written book. To set a novel in the past is quite challenging, what is more so is to synchronize the story with the characters’ mindset and how they would behave in that culture.

The book is layered with several sub-plots: Timothy’s relationship with his brother Valentine, his devotion to his sweetheart Mercy Underhill, and more so his relationship with New York City, which Faye has done a fantastic job of describing. There were times while reading this book that I had to look up Google Images to see what New York would have looked like in those times and the descriptions could not be truer.

The mystery in the book keeps the reader going and thinking. Wilde is a likeable narrator and a competent detective for sure. Faye has managed to make him come into his own without overshadowing the other characters in the book – from the whorehouse madam to Mercy’s father to other policemen and the engaging child Bird. New York as a major part (or character) of the book, is always standing tall in the background adding the much-needed life and period-specific texture to the book.

The Gods of Gotham will keep you to the edge of your seat. It is feisty and also thrilling, describing life in 1845 at its grittiest best and paced excellently. There is a sequel in the offing and I cannot wait for it.

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Here is a quick book trailer:

Book Review: The Storm at the Door by Stefan Merrill Block

Title: The Storm at the Door
Author: Stefan Merrill Block
Publisher: Faber and Faber UK
ISBN: 978-0571269594
Genre: Literary Fiction
Pages: 368
Source: Publisher
Rating: 5/5

Stefan Merrill Block’s, “The Storm at the Door” speaks of illness, mental illness at that. He combines his family facts and fiction to give readers a book that sometimes makes you stop in your tracks and think about it. The Storm at the Door is astonishingly original and quite compelling. Block has taken his maternal grandparents’ lives and blended fact with fiction – often reading as prose and then memoir and then fact. To be able to combine all elements in one book is not only a marvellous feat but also requires a lot of thinking and some good writing skills.

The Storm at the Door metaphorically speaks of a storm at a couple’s door – the one that isn’t easy to tackle – mental illness, which spreads across the family’s three generations. The book is about Frederick and Katharine, their love affair, their marriage and relationship over years that lasts, despite Frederick’s mental illness and infidelity. The book further speaks of Frederick’s stay at the Mayflower Institute, loosely based on the famous McClean Hospital in Boston which housed several celebrities and is known to be the highly innovative and one of the best asylums in America.

Block brings a chunk of his family, the missing page so to say to life in this book. It is not easy for a writer to recount his family’s history and document it – more so as a work of fiction. What I loved was the dense and quite often painful picture of the asylum Block paints as it was in the 60’s. To write about being mad and its effects on one’s wife and family is not an easy thing to do.

The pace is slow at times but the writing is lyrical and every word seems to be in its place. There is wonderful representation of a fragment of reality and to write an entire book on it is commendable. Stefan’s prose is sharp, at times biting, empathetic and realistic at most times. It does not become sentimental. It depicts both the sides of the story – that of Frederick’s and then of Katharine’s and then of course of the metaphorical storm. At times the novel is in-your-face and bitter and at others it is a depiction of a marriage gone wrong and what it takes to get it back on track. I enjoyed the book a lot. Of all the books I have read this month, this one is on top of the list.

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Book Review: A Life in Words: Memoirs by Ismat Chughtai

Title: A Life in Words: Memoirs
Author: Ismat Chughtai
Translator: M. Asaduddin
Publisher: Penguin India, Penguin Classics India
ISBN: 978-0-670-08618-4
Genre: Memoirs, Autobiography, Non-Fiction
Pages: 282
Source: Publisher
Rating: 5/5

It is sometimes sad to know that readers (most of them) only remember Ismat Chughtai for “Lihaaf” or “The Quilt”. She has written a lot more and the “more” is even more interesting than “Lihaaf”. I remember the first time I was introduced to her works. I had turned twenty-three and my friend had taken me to watch a play, “Manto Ismat Hazir Hain” produced by Motley, – which featured two short stories by Manto, a story by Chughtai and an essay by her as well with reference to the court trial that almost got both the writers imprisoned in the 1940s for so-called “obscenity” in their writing.

I was mesmerized after watching the play. The urge to know more of her and read more works by her was immense. I had read a bit of Manto earlier, however Chughtai took my attention and held it there. Prithvi theatre bookshop was the ideal place to find her books, though translated in Hindi (now I cannot read Urdu. I only wish I can someday). I remember reading almost all of her books, except her memoirs, “Kaghazi hai Pairahan” which I ultimately did. I did struggle a bit as I do not read so many books in Hindi (and am not proud of the fact). The beauty of the language was brilliant. The words used to describe her life from early childhood to being a mother and a wife and a famous writer before all of that resonated way after finishing the book.

I received the much-awaited English translation of “Kaghazi hai Pairahan” from Penguin Books India, aptly titled, “A Life in Words: Memoirs” and delightfully translated by M. Asaduddin. The minute I started reading this edition, memories of the Hindi edition came sweeping by. The same intensity with which Ismat Aapa (I cannot think of anything better to call her) wrote in the original (I am assuming) is captured vividly and precisely in this translation.

One cannot define Ismat Chughtai’s character as anything but colourful and introspective. May be to a large extent that passed down to her by her large and varied family. When you read the memoirs, it almost feels like you are reading a story. One gets the necessary information about her works as well – from short stories to novels to essays (as footnotes) which is needed while reading about a writer. What I loved the most about this book was Chughtai’s family and their antics. Ismat Aapa was born into a large family – she had nine siblings – so one can only imagine the life lead during the Indian Independence and seeing times through Partition, her schooling, her youth, her stubborn nature, her want to get educated and then subsequently the need to write and tell tales.

Chughtai’s tone is fictional and caustic throughout the book. There are a lot of diversions which are fun, despite the danger of losing track of semi-plots and characters, but I guess that can be overlooked when reading memoirs. It is quite natural that the tone will shift, which works well to hang on to the reader’s attention. There are pieces which I loved – for instance, “Aligarh” – which depicts the writer’s hostel life, “In the Name of Those Married Women” – the piece on the much talked about courtroom trial of Manto and Ismat, “Sujat” – revolving around politics and “Chewing on Iron” – depicting class differences.

For me, reading this in English was a treat, thanks to the wonderful translation by M. Asaduddin, who has translated Chughtai’s other works. The translation is subtle and he doesn’t shy from using the words as used in Urdu by the writer sometimes, owing to the fact that there is a glossary as well, which serves the purpose well.

“A Life in Words: Memoirs” by Ismat Chughtai is an honest and stark account of a writer’s life – from childhood to youth to old-age. The ideas in the book are numerous – from women’s liberation to class differences to the inner-life of a Muslim girl. Here is a book that is integral to its ideas, structure and words. I cannot recommend this one enough and while you are at it, please read more of Chughtai’s works. You will not be disappointed at all.

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Book Review: Behind the Beautiful Forevers by Katherine Boo

Title: Behind the Beautiful Forevers
Author: Katherine Boo
Publisher: Penguin Books India
Imprint: Hamish Hamilton
ISBN: 9780670086092
Genre: Non-Fiction
Pages: 280
Source: Publisher
Rating: 4/5

When I first started reading, “Behind the Beautiful Forevers” by Katherine Boo, it didn’t strike me as a different book. I mean I had read the similar story in Suketu Mehta’s, “Maximum City” (Honestly I didn’t think much of it), though it was in brief. It was still more or less the same – Mumbai and its dichotomy (like every major cosmopolitan), its slums, its smells and sights and the hidden side to the city, which we ignore or pretend doesn’t exist most of the time. Then what made this book so different that I finished in almost a day?

The difference lies in the way Katherine Boo has written the book – from providing a perspective on the what, the why and the how to experiences that will sometimes warm the heart and sometimes break it, knowing that this is the condition of a city that never sleeps. Having said that, there were also gaps in the book – the way it jumped from one story to another and how that was written almost in a haste which at times provided some disconnect with the overall structure.

The book, “Behind the Beautiful Forevers” is essentially about “Annawadi” – a slum in Mumbai next to the International airport and close to the luxury hotels there (again another facet of the caste and class division). The Annawadians are full of hope as the Indian Economy rises without any realization that nothing is going to change for them. The parity will exist if not widen itself. The under-city and over-city are explicitly portrayed in the book and that makes the reader think: Is this my city? Or could this be any booming cosmopolitan in the nation? The story (I call it that because it reads like one at times) is essentially about these people and their lives – some more and some less.

Abdul, a teenager sees a future beyond counting the recyclable garbage that the city’s rich throw away. He is quick at sorting waste. He is almost there in fulfilling his family’s dreams of moving out of the slum. Asha, a woman of the world and witty at the same time, opts for a different way out of this misery: political corruption. She wants her daughter to become the first female graduate of the slum and will not stop to make that dream come true. And just when all seems to fall in place, there is global recession and Abdul is falsely accused of a terrorist attack and the dream-world they are hoping has crashed to pieces.

Boo’s writing is stark and in your face. There is no pretense and cannot be when one is writing life-stories. The people in the book may seem stereotypical but they aren’t. Each of them is as different as you and I and with their own story to tell, which Boo captures beautifully. There are times when she appears disjointed in the book and fragmented, however in the larger scheme of the plot and writing, the reader tends to easily overlook that.

“Behind the Beautiful Forevers” is a depiction of our times and where we live. It represents the societies we create and how we take advantage of those to fulfill our selfish ends. The book removes masks that we sometimes wear and compels readers to take a better look at their worlds and surroundings. A disturbing read at times, however quite stark and impactful in its essence.

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Penguin Spring Fever : Twenty Five Years of Penguin India

Hello everyone! Penguin India has completed 25 years of glorious publishing years and to commemorate this, they are hosting the Spring Fever festival in Delhi till the 25th of March 2012, covering all facets of art from Books to Readings to Conversations to Poetry, Music and Performances.

Authors such as Amit Chaudhuri, Madhuri Banerjee, Vikram Seth, Rahul Bhattacharya and Gurcharan Das will be in conversation sharing their insights on topics of conversation and debates.

Please find the schedule given below for tomorrow:

20th of March 2012: The Ultimate Movie Quiz with a special round with the ultimate and superstar Rajinikanth!

Indian Cinema turns 100! This is at 7 pm at the Amphitheatre, India Habitat Centre, Lodhi Road, New Delhi.

On-Spot registrations start at 6:45 pm

Enjoy!

Book Review: The Buddha in the Attic by Julie Otsuka

Title: The Buddha in the Attic
Author: Julie Otsuka
Publisher: Penguin Fig Tree
ISBN: 9781905490875
Genre: Literary Fiction, Short Stories
Pages: 129
Source: Personal Copy
Rating: 5/5

What does home mean to you? That was a very difficult question posed to me at the end of “The Buddha in the Attic” by Julie Otsuka. Julie Otsuka’s book is about immigrant Japanese women, set about a century ago, who have come to America to their husbands and new lives. Their lives away from their homes to create new ones – the magic and dream of America that once existed, is revived in this beautifully written short book.

The eight almost inter-linked (because of the theme) and yet isolated (because of what each story centers on) stories are real, heartbreaking and sometimes hopeful. For me immigration has not been an alien concept. I have heard stories from my grandparents about how they had to move from Pakistan to India during Partition (though it is very different from these tales) and it does ring a bell when I read anything about leaving your country for a new one. To start anew and especially when you are expected to be the obedient Japanese wife to her husband who has not told her about the truth of his job, what she would have to undergo in a strange place and what her life would be like. These women worked from dawn to dusk, lived with men who they did not love or loved but their love was not returned. They worked in fields, as maids, as anything, as long as it was work and paid them.

I had read a part of this book; the first story that is, “Come, Japanese!” in a Granta series titled, “Aliens” and was immediately taken in by it. I knew then that I would read it when it would be made available. The stories are subtle, sharp and sometimes they wrench the heart and make you want more. The basic idea of having to master a new language after say thirteen years (as young) or thirty seven (as old) of thinking and dreaming in Japanese is a task for these women. Otsuka follows these women as they enter the early days of WWII, when entire Japanese-American communities disappeared (Pearl Harbor and Hiroshima and Nagasaki being the reasons) to their relocation to desert camps.

The Buddha in the Attic is about the human touch. Always about it. Julie Otsuka does not for once waver from it. The writing is beautiful and easy to read, without losing the emotion it wants to convey. At the heart of the book, there is a lot of hope and love for the women in strange ways. I cannot for one wait to read her first book, “When the Emperor was Divine”.

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Book Review: Homesick by Roshi Fernando

Title: Homesick
Author: Roshi Fernando
Publisher: Bloomsbury
ISBN: 978-1408826362
Genre: Literary Fiction
Pages: 200
Source: Publisher
Rating: 4/5

When I first started reading, “Homesick” by Roshi Fernando, it came to be like any other book of displaced families and forgotten voices. Of the second generation and third generations, wanting to search themselves and what they stand for. However, though the book did run on these lines, it had a different voice to it.

Homesick is a book of many layers and each layer has a unique and original voice. When I say layers, I but obviously mean the inter-connected stories and at the same time, there is something that tugs at the heartstrings that gives the book the enrichment and understanding it deserves.

Homesick is a collection of seventeen stories – telling the tales of SriLankan immigrants carving out new lives in sometimes warm and a sometimes hostile Britain. The narrative is cohesive and sticks to the larger framework of the book – of alienation and getting to know the new ways of living. At the same time it is contemporary (the issue will always be at hand, no matter what nationality) and complex, being careful about the emotions and voices of characters. There is a silent boy who experiences life through Charlie Chaplin, a man stuck in the aftermath of a war, to a family’s life destroyed by a child’s murder, each story comes together and linked by the theme of cultural displacement and its trauma, so to say.

Roshi Fernando’s writing is crisp and razor-sharp. She does not sugar-coat emotions, though there are moments in the book when she had me laughing or at least smiling at the situation. There is an ambience created by the writer that lingers in the readers’ heads long after one has finished the book. The cast of characters is intricate and appear in more than one story, unraveling themselves, little by little; getting the reader familiar and that is what I love about interconnected stories. The transitions are handled with ease, from one story to another and that is what also makes the book so strong. The questions of identity and belief are still left unanswered, which in a way works to the book’s advantage. All in all, Homesick is an evocative study of what home means and sometimes what is takes to create a new one.

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Book Review: Narcopolis by Jeet Thayil

Title: Narcopolis
Author: Jeet Thayil
Publisher: Faber and Faber, Penguin Books
ISBN: 978-0571283071
Genre: Literary Fiction
Pages: 304
Source: Publisher
Rating: 4/5

Narcopolis by Jeet Thayil is a book that doesn’t leave you till you have finished it. It is not only a disturbing read, but also highly intense. It captures all elements of Bombay, who is coincidentally the hero or heroine of the story, which is what I loved the most about the novel. Bombay is the protagonist as it always is – harsh, sometimes sweet, sometimes bitter, sometimes cunning and sometimes giving, and the action of the book is set here, for its characters to play on this wide canvas, to let their emotions and feelings take a different turn altogether.

Narcopolis is everything you imagined but were too scared to say it out aloud – blue smoke, drugs, opium drug dens, heroin and Bombay at the heart of it all – the glitter of the city juxtaposed with its bleakness, its gutters and its diseases of race, class, religion, violence and death.

Amidst all this is Dimple and this is her heart-breaking tale. Dimple is a eunuch and her story unfolds as does the story of the city and then there is also the enigmatic Mr. Lee from China who lends a totally different approach to the story. The story takes you on a roller-coaster ride – and sometimes the funny part is, you don’t know which turn is going to come next. Bombay has various aspects to it as a city and Mr. Thayil has beautifully explored each and every one of its aspect.

The writing is packed with punches and more. It will not make you want to keep the book down at any point. At the same time you feel really bad when the book ends, because you don’t want it to. I remember Jeet Thayil reading poetry once at a book launch and I wondered why he didn’t write fiction. Now that he has, I am wondering when the next book will be out. All in all, Narcopolis is a great read and I would recommend it to all.

Book Review: Chanel: An Intimate Life by Lisa Chaney

Title: Chanel: An Intimate Life
Author: Lisa Chaney
Publisher: Fig Tree, Penguin Group, Penguin Books
ISBN: 978-1-905-49036-3
Genre: Non-Fiction, Biography
Pages: 496
Source: Publisher
Rating: 4/5

One icon that instantly comes to my mind is “Coco Chanel” and it is not because of the laurels. It is because of the life she led. So when I received a detailed biography of Chanel’s life, I jumped at it and finished it in a matter of two days. Prior to this I had seen the movie based on her life, “Coco Chanel” starring Shirley MacLaine (who by the way made a perfect Chanel in her later years) and wanted to know about the designer who ruled the fashion scene for years.

Lisa Chaney’s book, “Chanel – An Intimate Life” is the most comprehensive biography there is on Chanel’s life and I say this after the research I have done on works written on her. Chanel not only chronicles Coco’s life before she turned Coco, but also proves to be an entertaining read.

The sadness and deprivation of her early years are heartbreaking – when the family did not have enough to eat and survive. Lisa then moves on from here to her emergence into fashionable society and the love affairs that defined her, to the man she loved the most and lost (Arthur ‘Boy’ Capel), to the point when she became a brand thereby changing the face of fashion to the war years as well as the loneliness of her later years to the re-emergence of Chanel in fashion.

Chaney clearly has the extraordinary ability to enter into and make her readers also understand the lives of people who were closely connected to Chanel. The writing did get pedantic in parts; however I ignored it because the rest of it was beautifully written. I liked how the author described the times Chanel lived in and how difficult it was then for any “new fashion sense” to make its presence felt. The analysis of the artistic scene then (Dali, Picasso, Cocteau) had a great impact on Chanel’s work and Lisa has given us a brilliant take there in most chapters.

Chaney’s book is an honest attempt to detail one of the most talked about lives in Fashion. It is a moving portrayal of a strong woman who did not let go of what she thought and believed in. Chanel makes for a great read.

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Coco Chanel: An Intimate Life