Wednesday, September 12, 2007

Read I must...

I have a way of reading books......that is of reading at least 3 simultaneously..hate it but will continue doing it! (It's called habit!)

So a while back i picked up 3 -
1. My Name is Red - Orhan Pamuk
2. The Kite Runner -
Khaled Hosseini
3. Innocent
Eréndira and other Short Stories - Gabriel García Márquez

Supposedly one of his best, My Name is Red didn't do much for me - though the narrative goes back and forth (something I always like!) and is interestingly styled with first- person perspectives, somewhere the plot just isn't convincing enough. I picked it up with much expectations but alas.. i give it 3 stars out of 5 - purely for the style!

It is always easy to appeal to the sadist in us all. That's where Hosseini socres!
He has sketched the characters beautifully, each one of them but he hasn't managed to sustain them through the book. The plot meanders into futile tales, picks up a bit and then fizzles out all together. 2 out of 5

Márquez is one of my favourite people! But this book was too dark for my taste. I couldn't even bring myself to finishing it. :(

...but I shall feed on dreams of hope as I start my tryst with the next 3 -
1. The Tin Drum -
Günter Grass - splendid narrative so far, very promising...
2. The Siege of Isfahan - Jean Christophe Rufin - hmm...
3. Self-Realisation - B V Narasimha Swami - about the life and teachings of Ramana Maharishi. Incomparable!

Looking forward to -
The Snow or The White Castle(I want to give Orhan Pamuk another go),The Nose
(1836, short story by Nikolai Gogol, the basis for an opera by Dmitri Shostakovich), The Squabble by Gogol again, The Ground Beneath her Feet by Rushdie, White Mughals by William Dalrymple... quite a few aye?!?!?



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