Book: Into Thin Air

Title: Into Thin Air

Author: Jon Krakauer

Genre: Non-fiction, Mountaineering

Rating: 4/5

"I quickly came to understand that climbing Everest was primarily about enduring pain. And in subjecting ourselves to week after week of toil, tedium, and suffering, it struck me that most of us were probably seeking, above all else, something like a state of grace."

As mentioned in my previous post, my trek to Himalayas was cancelled due to the ongoing pandemic. So in order to find some solace, I turned to the next best thing to be on mountains – read a book about mountains or expeditions.

That led me to this wonderful and fulfilling book, Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer.

A personal account of his Mount Everest expedition and the horrific tragedy that took place in May 1996 where few of the climbers from his group and other groups died in the storm at the top.

The book written mainly to reveal all the events that happened on the mountain on that dreadful day of the tragedy, goes through all other aspects about how expeditions are planned and carried out, the different perspectives and intensions of the climbers coming to the mighty Everest, the life of Sherpas and their beliefs in general. And the author has also penned down about the ongoing problem i.e. the traffic jams being caused on the mountain.

The things which I liked the most was the disclosure of the mental psych of a climber when he is attempting such a big task of Everest summit. Of course, the accident and the details of the people dying during the storm was heart breaking to read. Jon, due to a sense of moral obligation, has gone through a lot of R & D and interviewing different stake holders from his group before writing this book which is apparent when one reads about all the minute details of the expedition and people associated.

At some point, few details of the climbers and events seemed unnecessary but one can excuse the author for that considering the circumstances he has gone through and also who had to relive it while writing this book.

A haunting story which also covers about all the insane risks associated with high altitude mountaineering.

Book: The Last Mile

Title: The Last Mile
Author: David Baldacci
Genre: Suspense/Thriller
Rating: 4/5

I realized I'm up for a very good read the moment I read the first few pages. And boy, I really liked this book. It starts with the character, Melvin Mars, who is counting his last few days in prison. He is in prison last 20 years and is about to be executed for murdering his parents. As he gets ready for his execution, new information and findings are brought to the notice and the course of the proceedings changes.
From then on the story takes you through a roller coaster ride. A real page-turner with well crafted characters make the book real interesting. Major part of the book grabs your full attention and the little cliche here and there, some predictable parts and illogical segments in the story can be ignored and forgiven for sure.
If you are looking for a fast paced thriller, I would strongly recommend you to grab a copy of The Last Mile.

Book: The Book Thief

Title: The Book Thief
Author: Markus Zusak
Genre: Fiction/Historical
Rating: 4/5

This book is about a girl during World War and is narrated by the Death itself. I thought the narration added more value to the book through it's interesting take and perspective about things in the world. The story revolves around Liesel, her love for the books and words in her small world consisting of her foster parents, her friend Rudy and Max. Liesel has to go through a lot during the World War and  finds solace in her interest with books and words.
Author has provided a very nice read with interesting characters and plot. Though the story surrounds during the holocaust, the details about it is kept to the bare required limit. Here are few things I would have expected the author to handle properly:

• The events or climax were revealed in advance and the details came later. This, I think, took some intensity off the story telling
• The situations deserved more emotions than what has been provided.
• Less description about the weather on many occasions would have been better

Nonetheless, a very good read one would enjoy, though not a fast paced.

Book: And Then There Were None

Title: And Then There Were None

Author: Agatha Christie

Genre: Mystery/Thriller

Rating: 4/5

First and foremost, this is the first book I've read written by Agatha Christie.

The story is about 10 people with all different backgrounds being invited to a private island. The host is someone they knew about vaguely but were given valid and just enough reason for them to agree for the visit.

Upon their arrival, they were shocked to witness something of their past being revealed. Their past had something in common; some secret which led to someone else's death. The host plans to kill each one of them on that island and provide justice to all what they have done in their past.

The story gets interesting immediately after few turns of pages and the plot never takes off readers' attention. There are many twists and turns as each one of them is confronted with death. They try to find who the killer is but it will be too late. They will be dead before anyone finds out. Yes, the mystery is not solved by the investigating police as well. And don't worry, the book never ends with no answer. It does reveal the killer (or should I say, the author?!) through a smart way which the killer had devised in the plot.

Frankly speaking, during the narration I found few faults in the story like:

- Even in that dire situation when they know all of them will be dead, Mr & Mrs Rogers, the cook and help, continue to provide their service to all others obediently. And that I find very strange.

- And even in the scene where the Justice Wargrave was killed. I mean, how can a person be sitting on a chair when everybody else ran to Vera's room to find what happened there.

Till the very end, the reader is kept guessing as who is the killer and how could it happen. A good read and a different way to end as well.

The Martian

It was quite sometime I hadn't read a science fiction book. Thanks to my friend Archana who gifted me this book.

This is a story about Mark Watney, an astronaut who is left stranded on Mars by his fellow astronauts, who mistook him to be dead, during a dust storm. He finds himself all alone with all the NASA R&D equipment and setup, and just enough food to survive for few more weeks. The book talks about how he motivates himself, plans for survival and also to establish communication with NASA back on earth. There are quite a few accidents and action which keeps the narration exciting. 
The best part of the character Mark Watney was his humor. Even in moments of great danger and low, Mark's character and his humor keeps things very interesting and makes you lol at many occasions.

I read initial few pages and due to many activities couldn't continue. But after a week, I could get hold of book and finished the remaining 90% in 2 days time frame. Just couldn't keep the book down.

There was the same movie running in the theaters as well, so decided to watch it as well. As expected, the book turned out to be much better. However, there were few scenes and the climax which was done differently in the movie.

A good read and would recommend if science-fiction is what you are looking for.

Can love happen twice?

This is the sequel to 'I too had a love story' in which Ravin loses his love, Khushi in a tragic accident. 

After this loss, Ravin finds it difficult to come to terms. Deciding to move on with his life, he travels to Belgium on one of his project requirements. There he finds Simar, who is pursuing her MBA there, and starts getting acquainted with her. As he starts getting close to her and getting attached, many things comes to his mind questioning his loyalty with his past. Considering this as a second chance he moves on with the relation with Simar. Simar was overwhelmed when she finds about Khushi from him. He asks her to read his book 'I too had a love story' written in remembrance of his first love. She was moved with this and in fact brought her closer to him. Ravin falls in love the second time.

But one fine day, Ravin is told of his project moving to offshore because of which he has to return to India. This news comes hard to both of them but they decide to keep things going by being in constant touch and moreover finding solace in the fact that Simar is due to finish her MBA in few more months. 

Back to India, Ravin finds it difficult to be away from her during his initial days but slowly get back to his routine as even Simar gets busy with her internship. And now when they start deciding about their future, difference in opinion develops and things turn sour. Ravin finds Simar to be totally a different person now with her new demands and future plans but tries hard to bring the relationship back on track. His efforts go in vein and Ravin's life goes for a toss when he eventually couldn't do anything to bring her back in his life.
This story is narrated by Ravin's friends in a radio show where they were invited including Ravin, who couldn't turn up, to talk about the success story of 'I too had a love story'.

There were few things which I liked a lot like the truth-or-dare game Ravin and Simar play. The author was inconsistent with few others like when she creates a scene after getting drunk in a restaurant and never talk about it any time later not even the next day. I had thought the feathers which Simar had gifted him would be used for some good later in the story, with the importance given to it, but that didn't happen. I also felt the twist brought at the end of the story was a misfit, just because of the way the story had built up.
Nonetheless a good read perhaps not as good as 'I too had a love story'.

I too had a love story

One not-so-fine day, bored with the activities in office, I decided to shop online. I went through few newly released books and then I happened to stop at the book by Ravinder Singh, 'Can love happens twice?'. It was quite sometime, I was searching for his first book 'I too had a love story' with my friends as I had read good reviews about it. So I went ahead and ordered both of his above mentioned books. The books were delivered in couple of days and was happy to get back to reading during my bus commute.

"Tere jaane ka asar kuch aisa hua mujh par,

tujhe dhoondate dhoondate, maine khud ko paa liya"

The book starts with these nice words and was quite apparent from this, and with few prior reviews, that I'm up for a true love story with a sad ending. The story is about Ravin and Khushi who happen to meet in a matrimonial site and suddenly in no time get close to each other over phone and eventually fall in love. They soon find themselves smitten with one another that they cannot wait to talk to each other even if it just for few minutes at the end of day. They decide to marry before meeting even for once. The magical love had cast its spell on them. After many days of talking over the phone, life gives them a chance to meet up.
The author then takes us through this wonderful rendezvous; the airport scene where they meet for the very first time, where he totally gets lost in her beauty, his introduction to her folks at her place and the drama that follows where Ravin & Khushi had to lie to her mom and escape in order to spend some quality time with each other. Not to forget the eventful journey they encounter while returning to home.
Life was beautiful for them now. Everything was falling in place as per their plans. Their parents met and decided on the engagement and the marriage. Everyone was getting ready with the engagement preparations which was due in couple of days time and that's when something terrible happened. When one was experiencing a beautiful fairy tale, fate decides to show the bitter side of life. A wonderful love story ends with a very sad note.


The author has given the readers with enough romantic substance to feel for, humour and drama to enjoy and a lot of genuine sentiments and emotions that makes one cry. And one can spare the author with his first book for trying too hard at just few instances.
I enjoyed this wonderful, simple and touching story.

Life is what you make it

'Life is what you make it' by Preeti Shenoy is a story of a girl, Ankita. I can divide the story into two parts. The first part talks about her stint with Vaibhav through letters and phone calls, her college life, about the entry of Abhi in her life, her new relationship with him and her ambition & decision to move to Bombay from Kochin to pursue her MBA.

During this transition, Abhi dies. She goes through the ordeal and she is somehow responsible for his death. She knows it and this fact affects her so much that her life turns upside down, well, though very slowly and gradually in the second part of the story. Initially, things were all good when she moves to Bombay and her MBA college. As a matter of fact, it was great as she sees a high in her academics with full of energy. This high level of energy and enthusiasm was the first sign of something which was waiting to hit her so hard that nobody would've even imagined. Ankita suffered a mental illness because of her past and present events. She goes through a lot of ordeal but finally comes out of it with a new zeal and perspective and starts seeing things differently in life.

The few things which I liked about this book was the pace with which the author began the story and maintained it till the end. The author made sure to keep the readers glued to the story of Ankita's and also with the flow of thoughts during her emotional turmoil. The details regarding the mental illness is well researched and well written. In all, its a page turner. When I checked the time after finishing the book it was 2:30am and that hasn't happened before with me :) 

Shiva Trilogy

'The Immortal of Meluha' is the first book of the Shiva Trilogy by Amish Tripathi. This book was strongly recommended by my friend who went all gaga about this book. With the initial details provided by my friend, I was skeptical about picking this up as this, I assumed, is a mythological book. But to my surprise, this proved to be quite a well written fiction. The actual mythological characters are revisited with a different and logical story. And that too without a loophole. I must say, its an impressive book. A true page-turning and a gripping narration.

'The Secret of the Nagas' is the sequel. I couldn't just keep my mind off this story. I had to read this immediately after its first book. Fortunately, I read the first one just before the sequel was supposed to be released. So without any delay in between I completed both the books in a stretch. I simply loved them.

Very much impressed by the author's style of writing. Would love to read more of his work. Guess, I have to wait for quite sometime as the final book is scheduled to be released only next year. Hmm.

P.S: Presently reading 'Love, Life & All That Jazz'

Anything for you, ma'am

I bought this book, written by an Indian author, Tushar Raheja, having found no other good books at the store. Frankly speaking, I have not read many interesting books by Indian authors and so was hesitant to pick this up(Guess, readers can recommend me few). But my urge to experiment something new made me to finally buy this.
The start was not impressive as per me. To be specific, the author, in his narration, has time-traveled and for me that is not cool. And the narration was intermittent w.r.t the main theme of the book as well. Hence I didn't find this interesting to continue. But again, I forced myself to flip pages and found it comparatively better as the story started unfolding. Turning point was when the hero meets his heroine, of course. And I should appreciate author in making this scene really interesting and beautiful by his narration and sense of humor.
Once the hero decides to meet his heroine, the actual story begins and that too with many hurdles in his way. The book is all about the hurdles he faces, the way he manages out of them to face a few more in the process. I should say, this is a typical Bollywood-type story with good amount of funny scenes which makes you laugh a lot and excites you at the same time with the events that unfold.
In his narration, on many occasions, has emphasized on the fact by explicitly mentioning that he is here to impress the readers and so has taken decisions to explain few things in detail or has moved out providing limited information. Again, this is no good, as per me.
Having said all that, I would like to tell that the book is 'okay' one which will make you laugh and wonder at the events. A good first-timer book. If you like Bollywood type movies/stories then this book shouldn't disappoint you.

P.S: Presently reading 'The immortals of Meluha'.

A walk to remember

One line from the book rightly said, "In every way, a walk to remember". And I couldn't agree more. This book introduces you two characters Landon and Jamie, the unusual circumstances they meet in to get closer, their sweet moments together, the changes that bring in them and more importantly their walk together.
A beautiful book which will surely make you feel for the characters with good humor at times during the course of the story.

Oliver's story

Yet another interesting read, I must say. Author's narration of Oliver's story, with details concerning his fights with his own self after Jenny's death and also about his new relationship with Marcie which actually put him in more confusions about his feelings, is completely admirable. Though, I personally didn't like the end to Oliver's story. May be I wanted a happy ending. Nonetheless a good story to read.

Not a Penny More, Not a Penny Less

Finally I finished reading this book!

Well, I took more than a year to complete this book :( Not that I'm a dyslexic or the book is boring but just that I couldn't get on with it for many reasons. Now that I've completed it, I'm satisfied and happy. More because the book never disappointed me at any point of the read.

The story is all about how the 4 dupes plan and get back their every penny they invested from the cunning businessman who cons them in a major investment scandal. The plot is cleverly paced with no flaws and the characters are well defined.

Do read it if you like the trick-the-tricker stories.

And suggest me of any good fiction books now...