Animal's People

Book Title : Animal's People
Author : Indra Sinha
Year Published : 2007
Date I Read : 20 july 2012
My Rating : 04/10

Animal's people is set in the aftermath of Bhopal Tragedy. It is an incident that brings tears to my heart. If you want to read about the tragedy - pick up 'Five Minutes Past Midnight in Bhopal'. It is a heart breaking book about everything that went wrong on that day and the days before.

Anyways, coming to this book. I felt it was a sick book. The protagonist was a crippled guy with very low character. Full of foul language and not a least bit moving.

The Matchbreaker

Book Title : The Matchbreaker
Author : Chris Manby
Year Published : 2006
Date I Read : 8 May 2012
My Rating : 4/10

Theme


A spoilt rich girl on a mission to break up her fathers wedding

What I thought about the book

A quick read. No brainer book. I would not have been so disappointed had it not been for the fact that the protagonist seems to be missing the obvious fact as to who the guy she is dating is. That kind of forms the flow of the story. As we know (having  heard it been told to her) about it, it is quite irritating.

Was my filler after I finished Pigeon English. Can't read 2 sad books back to back.

Challenges
Linking this to letter M for A to Z by Author Last Name
Linking this to letter M for A to Z by Book Title

The Folded Earth

Book Title         : The Folded Earth
Author               : Anuradha Roy
Year Published  : 2011
Date I Read      : 26 Feb 2012
My Rating         : 4/10

I was part of an Indian book reading club when we were in US and when I saw that this was the title they were reading I immediately asked my dad to pick this up. Reason -  I misread the title of the author as Arundhathi Roy. She is the author of the book - God of Small Things which won Booker Prize. She has not written a work of fiction since and I thought this was it. :-(

Later I realized that this was a different author. But I decided to give it a read since I have spent Rs.350 on the book. I really hated the book.

The book starts with the story of Maya who comes to live in Himalayas to find peace with herself after the death of her husband in the mountains during a hiking expedition. She helps a mountain girl Charu and lives in the house of a local Diwan Sahib. The book goes on to describe the life of Charu and her love life, her grandmother. We also see the life of Diwan Sahib. In the mean time Maya gets friendly with Diwan Sahib's nephew.

The book did not do it for me. It did not seem to have a direction. The narrative was boring. The worst part for me was how she crammed some story line in the last 20 pages to make up for the story missed in the first 300 pages.

Challenges

Linking this to letter F for A to Z by Title

Linking this to letter R for A to Z by Author Last Name

Linking this to #5 for South Asian Books

Burial at Sea

Book Title         : Burial at Sea
Author               : Kushwanth Singh
Year Published  : 2004
Date I Read      : 10 Jan 2012
My Rating         : 4/10

Theme

The story revolves around the main character Victor Jai Bhagwan, starting from his childhood leading on to his adult life. The setting is in pre and post independence India. Jai Bhagwan and his daughter Bharati resemble Nehru and Indira Gandhi.

What I thought about it

I saw this book in the library. I have read Train to Pakistan by Kushwant Singh a long time ago and really enjoyed reading it. That inspired me to pick this book up.

The book starts off ok and was an easy read. It describes Victor's childhood, his foreign education, come back to India etc. You will keep wondering where the story is leading to. Half way thru, the author seems to have forgotten what he was doing and starts describing Tantric Sex of Victor and Maa Durgeshwari, not to forget the seducing of his daughter Bharati by some yoga master. At some point I felt like I was reading some porno book, and that too written very bad. Save yourself and give it a pass.

Related links

Kushwant Singh in Wikipedia
Burial at Sea in Amazon.co.uk

Challenges

Linking this to letter B for A to Z by Title
Linking this to #1 for South Asian Books