Lajja by Taslima Nasrin

Lajja is a description cum documentary on the spiral effects of the demolition of Babri Masjid in Bangladesh. The wounds inflicted upon the Hindus, the torture, the fires, snatching the porperties of the Hindus made for a very gruesme reading. The facts on such behaviour were put all through the book. It was the story of Dr Sudhamoy Dutta who did not want to leave Bangladesh because of the torture, was forced to ultimately leave his homeland after his daughter Nilanjana was abducted and there was no trace of her. His son Suranjan had lost his first love Parveen who was a Muslim to a Muslim businessman. His wife Neelima had given up singing hymns as it was considered as characterless. They had lost their ancestral property and the once upon a rich family was forced to live from hand to mouth. In the wake of the unrest, even Muslim friends were not acknowledging the relationship they shared because none had the courage to do so.

Overall, a very serious book. Not meant for the typical rainy day reading. Sounds like a newspaper article at places. Very poor language, practically sounds like someone is translating Hindi into English.

Rating: 2.5 star

Fleeced by Carol Higgins Clark

Regan Reilly, the central charater is a private investigator in California and is home to attend the crime convention conducted by her mom. One of her friends, Thomas, the manager of Settler's Club calls to inform her about a death that loked like a normal death but may have been a murder. The death of Nat, the jeweller seemed to be like a murder since the diamonds worth 4 million dollars had been missing and he was found in a bathtub that he never used. The pace is fine but doesn't still set the heart racing. There was no conlcusion as to whether Nat was killed and if he was killed who was the murderer was left open-ended. The diamonds were found since I guess they had to be to end the story.

Fleeced by Carol Higgins Clark was one of her disapoointing works. She has been one of my favourite writers but this time around clearly "Fleeced" fails to make its mark. The pace of the book or the writing fails to leave you at the dge of your chair. The lesser I write, the better! Did not even deserve a mention. All in all, a disapoointment or her fans.

Rating: 2 star.

Veronika Decides to Die by Paulo Coelho

Veronika decides to die is about a young girl Veronika, who decides to die since she is tired of the monotony in her life. She had studied law but had taken up a librarian's job due to the job security it offered. Her life was a routine of going to the library, then with her latest boyfriend and then back to her hostel, the typical reason being the timelines at the convent. She is so tired of the routine that she decides to end her life with an overdose of sleeping pills as any other mode would be too painful and would also embarrass her parents. While waiting for her death after consuming an entire bottle of sleeping pills, she was reading a newspaper where a journalist did not know Slovenia, the place where she stayed. She was so upset that she left a suicide note in the name of the newspaper and the journalist. Unfortunately she did not die from such an overdose as she was young enough to take the blow. However, she landed up in Vilette, the mental hospital because of the suicide note she left behind.. Who would kill herself for a journalist who did not know Slovenia, except a mad woman? She met Zedka who suffered from depression and wanted to have a happy life with her husband and children, one of her first friends at Vilette. Mari, a guide, who was suffering from panic attacks, wanted to spend the rest of her days doing social service. Eduard, the great love of her life, who was a schizophrenic, wanted to become a painter to paint the Visions of Paradise and for whom she played the piano with all that she had. Dr. Igor who was the doctor in charge of the hospital and was writing a thesis on effects of Vitriol, had told her that her heart was weak and would only last for at best a week. Veronika is terrified of the wait for death and decides to live the remainder of her life each moment at a time. It is because of this dying girl that all the inmates of the mental hospital understood how to live their life to the fullest, taking risks they always wanted to, doing things they always wanted to. She had taught them how to live again. Veronika and Eduard fell in love with her playing the beautiful sonnets and sonatas and decided to escape Vilette and go to the castle. They hugged each other when there was a clutching pain in her heart again and she wished for death in his arms. Lo and behold! The next morning she is still alive and they have one more day to go. Little did they know that the pains in her heart were artificial and caused by medication administered by Dr Igor who wanted to try this experiment to know what is it that made the essence of life. The fear of death only made people live their life fuly. Even if Veronika went to any other doctor she would know that the story about her heart was untrue but the way she lived her life thinking it would be no more was something that would never be repeated.

One of Paulo Coelho's very well written books. A wonderful lesson on how to live. At some point, heart in heart, all of us know that we have forgotten how to live, this is a book that makes you want to live all over again. And people who really know how to live are often called mad! All that you would want to do is t be done and today is something that we miss out since we assume life will be today, tomorrow and a year hence also. We forget that if life were to go the next momenht, we would have those desires left unfulfilled, that part of life woul dhave never been consumed.

Rating: 4 star

Almost SIngle by Advaita Kala

Almost Single is a refreshing new perspective on being single by a Delhi girl. The story is about three girls, two of whom are single and one happily divorced. A story about how the three girls take risks in their lives, Misha takes on upon herself to get hitched, Anushka who dumps her husband when she founds him cheating on her and Aisha who does not look around to get hitched but finds a particular Karan Verma due to the conspiracy of fate and God. Misha sells insurance part time, Anushka a happily married homemaker and Aisha, a Guest Relations Manager who worked with Grand Orchid. Misha keeps hooking people and does not find Mr Right and ultimately finds herself in the company of her father's elder brother's friend's son and starts loving his company and decides to get married to him. Anushka had always been a devoted homemaker and did not know anything other than her childhood sweetheart Sameer. She ultimately dumps him on the grounds of infidelity and moves oon to do her own business in Italy with another partner. Aisha keeps meeting one of her guests Karan Verma in the funniest of circumstances like when she was wrapping a car with toilet paper or when she walks into him naked in the porch of his terrace room. A series of hilarious incidents before Karan asks her out and introduces her to his Gucci Mama. Aisha being Aisha was scared of commitment and turns him down and suddenly on her way to her native place Nashik, Eureka! and she realises it would be better to stay with a person who loves her than have a loveless marriage like her Lata didi. She scampers off to Mumbai where Karan had gone for some business and poses to be his wife and goes to his room and is in the bubble bath with a bottle of wine when Karan's boss walks in. All hell breaks loose and she has a hard time explaining to Karan how and whta she was doing in that room. Karan finally understands since the two rooms were booked in his name, the confusion.

Very interesting and keeps you hooked on! All in all, keeps you in splits all through out! If you have a bad day, opt for the book since it just makes you feel that there is a world where mistakes keep happening and mistakes are but natural and these mistakes could sometimes be so crucial that they bring Karan and Aisha closer and closer to each other until they decide yes, they are meant for each other. Leaves you with a feeling if only it happened in your life. Plot was perfect but at places does leave you with "I've read this before" taste.

Rating: 4 star

Brida by Paulo Coelho

Brida is an ordinary girl next door in search of magic, that links the visible world with the invisible world. She tries learning through the Tradition of the Sun and the Tradition of the Moon and ultimately finds her true calling in the latter mode. On learning about magic through the Tradition of the Moon by Wicca, Brida learns that Lorens is her soulmate. However, on exploring the Tradition of the Sun, she learns that Magus who teaches her the Tradiiton of the Sun, is also her soulmate which causes the confusion. She realises that there could be multiple soulmates since there is a part of her in each of the persons. However, she ultimately opts for Lorens because in him, she sees a world that she has never known.

This book of Paulo Coelho is one of the most highly over-rated books in recent times. It talks about magic in the form of black magic, wizardry and witchcraft, which is highly unthinkable. The book also digresses from magic to past life relationships and the connection between the two is not very distinct. The scientific explanation for the past life relationships do make interesting reading but when it comes to magic, it loses its charm. All in all, easily missable book.

Rating: 3 star