Pop Babylon

First line : 'Kylie Minogue is sitting on my face'

Imogen Edwards-Jones have come up with ‘Pop Babylon’ by the information obtained from some folks of Pop industry. This book tells about a year long work of ‘The One Management’, a music company in building a boy band.

Though it tells about the building of ‘Band of Five’, the interesting part of this book is not the story but the anecdotes and the gossips about the pop industry. It tells about the problems involved in forming the girl band, about the drugs and scandals in this industry and the reasons for the failure of most of the bands. The author had brought the evil face of the industry into lime light.

I have read some non fiction but this one is different from them. This book is completely filled with information like ‘How much they spent for Spice Girls album?’ , ‘What is the share of manager, distributors and blah blah’ and a lot like this. This book was not so catchy to me as I’m not interested to know about Pop industry. I recommend this book to the people who are interested to know about Pop world.

The Virgin Suicides

First line : ‘On the morning the last Lisbon girl took her turn at suicide – it was  Mary this time…….’

The Virgin Suicides is a non-fiction by Jeffery Eugenides. The story tells about the life of five Lisbon girls who end their lives by suicide. The story is narrated by the Lisbon’s neighbourhood boys who were in infatuation with the Lisbon girls.

Even though the climax was revealed in the first line, the author made me to read the full book at one go. The book was rich in its description. Jeffrey brought the transformation of Lisbon’s house after Cecilia’s death live before my eyes.

The book is the collection of the things which the nearby people know about Lisbon girls. This also contains the views of various experts about this suicide pact. This book made me to think deeply about the reason which forces the person to suicide. In the case of Lisbon girls I think they were trying to free themselves from this world to live a new life in some other world which they alone can see.

On the whole the book is dark. 

Two for the Dough

First Line : I knew Ranger was beside me because I could see his earring gleaming in the moonlight. 

‘Two for the Dough’ by Janet Evanovich is a detective novel. Stephanie Plum is a bounty hunter. Vinnie employs Plum to find Kenny Mancuso who disappeared after getting the bail. Morelli(cop), cousin of Kenny is also looking for him while working in a case to find some missing guns and ammo from a military base. Plum and Morelli decides to work together. After sometime she gets another work from Spiro (Undertaker) to find his 24 missing caskets. Plum gets dead threats and some gifts from Kenny regularly. The rest of the story tells how Plum and Morelli resolve the mystery in this case.

The story had a slow start. First I thought that Kenny was hiding himself from someone who is a threat to him. I thought someone have stepped into the shoes of Kenny and playing the game but to my surprise he suddenly shows up to Plum. Then the author slowly enlightens us the attributes of Kenny and how dangerous he is. And then onwards the author made me to expect what Kenny will do next and who will become his next victim.

I should mention about Grandma Manzur character. This is the most interesting character in this novel. She also plays an important role in the story to find the culprit. On the whole the novel is interesting.

The God of Small Things

First Line : May in Ayemenem is a hot, brooding month.

The God of small things by Arundhati Roy is a well crafted heart breaking story. This tells about the life of two egg twins Estha and Rahel and their mother Ammu. The consequences they face by breaking the love laws. The laws that lay down who should be loved, and how.

This novel is a non linear narrative type. The novel had a very good story but the main plus point of this novel is not the story but how she tells the story. The conversation between the two egg twins are so realistic. She had unveiled the caste problem existing in certain parts of our country. Roy’s description was witty in many places and she had adopted her own style. She has the power to stir our emotions through her writing. Roy made me to live with Estha and Rahel for those four days.

This is one of the best novel I have ever read. This novel made me to wet my eyes. It is simply a magnum opus.

The Avenger : Time Raiders

First Line : The dead woman sighed.

The Avenger:Time Raiders by P.C.Cast is a novel based on time travel. Alex is a women with a special gift of speaking to dead people. Professor Carswell want to use Alex for a time travel mission. The mission is simple, Alex should go back to Boudica’s period(60 AD), get the medallion in Boudica’s torque and bring it to Carswell. This medallion is necessary to save the future generation.

Alex goes back to the past as per plan but she falls in love with Caradoc whom she used to see in her dreams in normal life. She wants to live with Caradoc but at the same time she don’t want to betray the people of her time.

This is the first novel which I read about time travel. P.C.Cast made it quite interesting. This novel had thrill, fantasy, romance and action. The novel had so many twist and turns. Till the end I didn’t have a clue of how Alex will accomplish the mission and what will happen to her love life?. Especially the plot which Alex uses to escape from Suetonis is very good. This is the very good sign for this kind of novels. I liked this novel a lot.

The Trouble with Magic

First Line : I don't know what it was that made me abandon my usual path to work on that particular October Tuesday.

The trouble with magic by Madelyn Alt is a mystery novel. In this story Maggie joins an an antique shop which is owned by Felicity Dow, a witch. Isabella was murdered on Maggie’s first day of work. Stony Hill cops considered felicity as the main suspect. But Maggie’s instinct convinces her that Felicity could not be the murderer. Is Maggie’s instinct right?

The title “The trouble with Magic” made me to read this novel. I expected a fantasy treat but I was greatly disappointed. In the whole book they didn’t use any supernatural powers for their rescue. Felicity was hooked in a murder case at the beginning of the novel but nearly half the book is over before Maggie begin the investigation. Madelyn tells a lot about magic and super natural powers in the first half when it had nothing to do in the second half.

The good thing about Madelyn is the way she tells the story eventhough there is nothing to tell. Her description is interesting. I don’t know to which genre this novel belongs. I saw this novel under fantasy list in a blog but it has no fantasy stuff. According to me this is a crime novel by an amateur crime writer.

Message in a bottle

I recently read Nicholas Sparks’s ‘Message in a bottle’. In this novel, the columnist Theresa Osborn finds a bottle in a beach. The bottle has a letter written by Garrett to Catherine. On reading the letter, tears rolls down from her eyes. She wants to find the man who is in love with his wife, who was taken away from him.

With the help of Deanna, Theresa finds Garrett. Theresa and Garrett are falling in love. But is it possible for Garrett to get over Catherine completely? Can they get into a long term relationship? How will Garrett react if he knows that Theresa came in search of him only after finding his letters to Catherine?

The novel starts well. Bottle in beach with letter, then a letter from her reader and again a letter from a local magazine all written by Garrett. These things not only increases Theresa’s curiosity but also our curiosity to know about Garrett. The initial meetings of Garrett and Theresa is interesting to read. But once they have fallen in love, everything changes.

After falling in love she visits Garrett or he visits Theresa and they do the same thing. The only difference which Spark shows is the place. The novel sags a little in these chapters. Garrett who is in deep love with Catherine falls for Theresa on seeing her. I think, Theresa being the heroine of the novel is the only reason for this.

Eventhough the life of Garrett and Catherine comes scarcely in the novel they are interesting. Every character in the novel wets their eyes on reading Garrett’s letter but I feel nothing like that. At the same time Garrett’s last letter made me feel sad. On the whole this is an average novel.

Anything for you, ma’am

Tejas, an IITian falls in love with Shreya. Shreya is in Chennai, 2000 Km away from Tejas.The novel tells how Tejas goes all the way to see his lady love and what are all the hindrances he faces.

Raheja had given an excellent flow to the novel.I liked it a lot since it is a feel good story. The tag line “an IITian’s love story” made me to think that this is about the love between two in IIT. So I thought that this story will revolve around IIT campus and will be a pastiche of Five point someone. But it barely tells about Tejas campus life and more about his journey to Chennai.

The book is non linear narrative type. The story begins with Tejas rushing to book tickets from Delhi to Pune and then from Pune to Chennai with false identity. Then the author goes back to the past to explain the reason for going to Chennai, then comes to the present to show the problems he encounters and then to past to show how they fall in love and then to present. The book is rich with humour content, especially the first meeting between Shreya and Tejas made me to roll down and laugh. Tejas gets so many problems but he is lucky enough to get someone like America return cousin, Shreya’s friend’s friend, Dad’s friend and the list goes on, to slove the problem.

Eventhough the chapter about DISCO committee takes us back to Chetan Bhagat’s work, the good thing is that he didn’t take it to next chapter. Some may think that the novel is too cinematic but to me there is nothing wrong if the novel is cinematic. So I highly recommend this novel to all fun loving people.

Murder Justified?

“It is a common experience that when the younger sister commits something unusual and in this case it was an inter-caste, intercommunity marriage out of [a] secret love affair, then in society it is the elder brother who justifiably or otherwise is held responsible for not stopping such [an] affair.

If he became the victim of his wrong but genuine caste considerations, it would not justify the death sentence... The vicious grip of the caste, community, religion, though totally unjustified, is a stark reality.”

On reading this if you think that these are the words of some jobless persons who strongly support racism, then you are wrong. This is a Supreme Court judgement in a honour killing case. Is this correct?. If so then why is government encouraging inter caste marriage?. Is Supreme Court justifying Honour killing?. I cannot find any difference between planned murder and honour killing.

CUSTOMER FIRST

‘Customer first’, ‘We cannot pronounce Success without U’ these are some of the phrases used by enterprises to attract customers.
Recently my Uncle purchased AC and some other household items in a well known ‘XXXXXX & Co’ in our city. He made the settlements and came to his home. The things reached his home the next day and he was shocked to see that the AC was not the model which he ordered. He went back to the shop and asked them to change the AC. But there was not even a single person to listen to him. They were busy with the next customer. Only now I realised how customer is first to them.