Book Review: The Newlyweds by Nell Freudenberger

Title: The Newlyweds
Author: Nell Freudenberger
Publisher: Viking
ISBN: 978-0670921843
Genre: Literary Fiction
Pages: 352
Source: Publisher
Rating: 4/5

When people from two different cultures marry each other, there is a lot at risk. The knowing that adaptation would have to be the order of the day at some point is very difficult to come to terms with. Not only that, but also the everyday living becomes a herculean task, which then becomes something to deal with. To make a life together is something that one needs to think of as top priority. This is the theme of Nell Freudenberger’s book, “The Newlyweds”.

The book is written more from the perspective of the wife than the husband, but then I am sure the author had her reasons for doing so. The plot: Amina and George are not your typical American couple. Amina is a Bengali woman from Bangladesh, flying to Rochester, New York to marry an American she met online. She will go to any lengths to bring her parents to America to live with her. From the first page the action in the book begins and lasts throughout with immense force, depicting not only cultural differences but also emotional ones.

Nell Freudenberger has created a poignant and real drama of how couples live today. The story is mainly about Amina and her dreams. The means and methods used by her to make them come true. I was a little disappointed that George’s character was explored fully, and thought that maybe he had a lot to say and do, which would have only added to the book’s overall experience.

Freudenberger’s world is fascinating to observe. The daily on-goings between the couple and the others who are a part of their lives, are interesting to watch. The Newlyweds is an interesting read. It is a portrait of a peculiar marriage and yet there is so much more beneath that. What do we share? Who do we trust? What secrets do we want to disclose? The Newlyweds is a love story, a story of alienation, a story of wanting it all and sometimes not getting it all. It is a book that exudes emotion on every page and does not get too sentimental about it. A great read for sure.

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Book Review: Capital by John Lanchester

Title: Capital
Author: John Lanchester
Publisher: Faber and Faber
ISBN: 978-0571234608
Genre: Literary Fiction
Pages: 592
Source: Publisher
Rating: 5/5

I had not read anything by John Lanchester till I got the opportunity to read “Capital”. It was a great debut (for me) read. First, let me tell you something about the title of the book. Capital derives two meanings in the book – first being money, one of the central themes of the book and second, being London, where most of the action takes place and it being the Capital city of England.

Capital is a big book and has too many characters, close to twenty of them, out of which ten are primary and the other ten are secondary. All of them are connected to one street (Pepys Road), in one way or the other. A postcard arrives in almost everyone’s mail box stating, “We want what you have” and thus the story begins in unusual circumstances.

The story is set in 2007, around the time of banking crisis (hence the title is applicable here as well). The economy is down and everything is haywire. The characters are well-detailed and that is what hooked me to the book. The banker, who is desperate for a £1m bonus to maintain his wife’s and his own expectations of living standards, the Zimbabwean refugee, who is working as a parking attendant and overqualified to do that, the Asian family who own and work in the corner shop – with their own set of tension of love between and across generations, the Polish plumber, in his pursuit of a dream, the oldest resident of the street – an eighty-two year-old lady, coping with her health and the impact of this on her family, and the 17 year-old recent arrival in London, who is fast becoming a premiership football star.

The plot takes place here and like I said, lives are inter-connected (or not) only to make the book reach its fantastic (spoiler, hence not revealed) ending. Now something about the writing style. John Lanchester sure knows how to make almost every character (even the secondary ones) come alive. What works the most for the book is that the premise is global, though set in London. The readers can relate to the hardship, hopes, aspirations, dreams and lives of the citizens on Pepys Road and that for me is a great achievement of this book.

John Lanchester brings the entire novel to life with his writing. The interaction between characters is superlative and fits in brilliantly with the subtle themes. The entire novel has a Dickensian air about it and that only adds sometimes to the bleak narrative running through. The suspense element of the book remains intact right till the end, and shows itself all along. I enjoyed reading the book a lot. There were times I would also laugh out loud and times when I would feel bad for the characters. The book is laced with wit, compassion and above all truth of the situation and the society that we inhabit. Capital is one joyride of a read. I would definitely read more books written by him. As of now, this one is highly recommended.

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Book Review: Stories for Nighttime and Some for the Day by Ben Loory

Title: Stories for Nighttime and Some for the Day
Author: Ben Loory
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 978-0143119500
Genre: Short Stories
Pages: 224
Price: $15.00
Source: Publisher
Rating: 5/5

Stories for Nighttime and Some for the Day is a strangely compelling little book. Contained within it are thirty-nine short short stories (one is only three sentences long) and a longer fortieth story, grudgingly appended by the author.

Usually with short story collections I want to read the stories one at a time, to savor them. I couldn’t do that with Stories for Nighttime and Some for the Day though. Loory’s stories–the publisher calls them contemporary fables and I think that’s apt–are compulsively readable. They are poignant and unsettling, simple and profound. And I wanted to eat them all up!

So of the stories I liked better than others. For example: The Book, a story that teaches you to use your imagination. The Octopus, a story that shows you that you can always return home. Also there was the story, The End of It All, about a husband and a wife, where the wife is taken by an alien. The man searches all over to find her to no end. Though, the man never finds his wife, he would not trade anything in the world for the time that he did get to spend with her. Of course, there were some stories that I did not like as well. Than there were the dark stories. Stories for Nighttime and Some for the Day has a little bit of everything for everyone to enjoy. Don’t be fooled by the title of this collection of stories and the stories can be read any time of the day or night.

I think saying they are reworked versions of age old stories is doing the collection a disservice, but my brain made connections to The Ugly Ducking, The Little Mermaid and The Emperor’s New Clothes among others, enough to feel that Loory was inspired by them.

I suppose this is one of those books you’re either going to love or hate. It brought a smile to my face and I was reluctant to put it down so it’s safe to say I loved it. I’m sure there’s lots of analysis that could be done but I’m going to leave it at that.

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Book Review: The Tunnel by Ernesto Sabato

Title: The Tunnel
Author: Ernesto Sabato
Publisher: Penguin Modern Classics
ISBN: 978-0141194547
Genre: Modern Classic, Literary Fiction
PP: 160 pages
Price: £8.99
Source: Publisher
Rating: 5/5

This is a succinct novel told from the point of view of a man obsessed. The reader follows the narrative through the eyes of the main protagonist, a jailed artist, Juan Pablo Castel, explains why he murdered a woman. He recounts the story of his intense, destructive relationship with Maria: it begins with a fleeting, seemingly inconsequential moment but turns in to an obsession which consumes him completely.

This is written in sparse and succinct sentences which makes this easy to read but nevertheless the reader can relate totally with the narrator. You the reader start to understand and share his obsessions and frustrations.

The narrative voice is aggressively intellectual, but almost delirious, as Castel veers between self justification and self loathing, whilst trying desperately to fight against his own destructive impulses. But it’s also funny, and planted enough in reality that you can identify with his painful shyness, his jealousy, and his compulsion to find this woman and somehow ‘possess’ her. Anyone who has ever admired someone from afar, yet felt completely paralyzed when in their company will appreciate how brilliantly written these parts are.

Castel is well-named: he is an artist whose intellectual arrogance creates a castle in which his own psyche runs wild, uncompromised by the views of others. We follow him through the cold, hard passages of his mind as thoughts and fantasies feed on themselves and paint an increasingly perverted view of the world. Sabato creates another metaphor in the book’s title The Tunnel, referring to Castel’s sense of going through life cut off from everyone else.

The imagery is subtle yet satisfying, and the story echoes Camus’ The Outsider, although Castel is very much an Insider too, trapped in his own mind. There is irony too: as an abstract painter he cannot deal with the abstract responses of Maria, demanding empirical truth and solid facts. Denied them, he creates them for himself.

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The Tunnel

Book Review: Daughters – A Story of Five Generations by Bharati Ray

Title: Daughters: A Story of Five Generations
Author: Bharti Ray
Translator: Madhuchanda Karlekar
Publisher: Penguin India
ISBN: 9780143416487
Genre: Non-Fiction
PP: 336 pages
Price: Rs. 399
Source: Publisher
Rating: 5/5

I do not read bad books. I do not think it is fair to the reader to do so, and hence the books I pick/choose to read turn out to be the very best, like the one I have just finished reading, “Daughters: A Story of Five Generations” by Bharti Ray. I have always believed that men and women are equal and therefore when a woman tries to make me get off my seat in a bus that is not reserved for her, I do not get up. I believe that if we are equal, then maybe even she should experience what it feels like to stand in a crowded bus. Not that my perception or point of view has changed after reading this book, it has definitely become broader to accommodate these incidents and situations. Why so you may ask? Let me tell you why and with that start the review.

Daughters, as the title, suggests chronicles the lives of five generations of women in the author’s household. We witness the story spanning a hundred years – from the late nineteenth-century to the early years of the twenty-first century. What I loved is how the author, talks about her household, the women in the household, their likes and dislikes, their lives, and connects them all to the larger framework of Indian Social History. It’s almost like reading two parallel storylines, which I am not complaining about at all, as I loved it.

The book speaks of six women in all – starting with hierarchical importance – Sundar-Ma, the great-grandmother, married at a tender age of twelve and yet wanting to live life on her own terms. She was the character closest to my heart while reading the book. Ushabala, the author’s grandmother on the other hand was the proud wife of a college lecturer and a home-maker. I found her very endearing – wanting to give it all to her daughter, the author’s mother Kalyani and not wanting anything for herself. Kalyani was the first woman graduate in the family and yet she gave up her career to sit at home and take care of her family and yet did not lose her feistiness, and her passion for adventure and travelling.

While reading her portions, I was almost reminded of my mother at all times, who is also a stay-at-home-mom. Most Indian Mothers are of that mould – sit at home and take care of what belongs to you or what comes to you, whichever happens first, and thankfully that is now changing, or is it really? Well, it is to some extent.

Towards the end of the book, we get to meet the author – who had her own set of achievements, that of being a lecturer, a pro-vice-chancellor to a member of the Rajya Sabha. And last but not the last we meet the author’s daughters – Khuku and Tista, again very strong and different personalities, when compared to the other women.

The thread that ran through the entire book, from my perspective was that of daughters and mothers – the bond shared and sometimes the differences that emerge as strengths. I enjoyed reading this book a lot. For one, it made me think at all times about women in India and women in the rest of the world. Of the differences and the similarities. Of what is given and what is denied. All in all, this is one book that is not to be missed. You have to read it and find out what it is all about, in order to truly cherish the moments, sentiment and thoughts.

You can purchase the book here on Flipkart or on the PenguinIndia website