Author: Books We've Read Admin

“Selection Day” by Aravind Adiga

Books We've Read AdminLeave a comment

selection-day

Selection Day is the new book by Aravind Adiga, who hit a jackpot in 2008 with his debut novel, The White Tiger, which won one of the most prestigious and highly coveted literary awards, the Man Booker Prize, that year. I recall reading The White Tiger when it came out, and while I found it a decent read, I didn’t think it was that spectacular as to win the Booker prize. At the same time, I don’t always find award-winning books as good as they are heralded to be by the critics who are largely responsible for determining which books win awards, and this is something I have come to accept. So it was primarily out of curiosity – and the recommendation of a friend – that I picked up a copy of Selection Day, which has just been published.

Selection Day is unabashedly about cricket, and it tells the story of two brothers who are being groomed by their father to be cricket superstars and make it to the Indian cricket team. The “selection day” of the book’s title refers to that crucial day when tryouts are held among 18-year old cricket aspirants to determine who will make it to the next level – starting with the regional level which is the starting point for anyone aspiring to make it to the state level, and finally, the national level. The protagonist of the story is the younger of the two brothers, Manjunath. For most of their childhood, he was always considered to be second-best to his older brother, Radha Krishna, and it’s something his brother, his father, and he as well take for granted. Things change when he suddenly becomes a better player than his brother, which leads to sibling rivalry, jealousy, and even deep disappointment for his father.

In addition to the cricket obsession that Manju’s father has which has dominated their lives, other aspect of Manju’s personality that gradually become evident, and which the book is focused on, is his possible homosexuality – through his friendship with and growing attraction to Javed, one of his brother’s peers who used to play cricket with them. Javed is like the typical “bad boy” – the rich kid – in contrast to the simple and poor, almost uncouth, Manju. But, of course, this doesn’t eventually work out – that would have been too simplistic. Manju starts going out with girls, but remains a closeted homosexual. While Radha loses his cricketing prowess at about the same time Manju starts shining and makes it through the “selection,” this loss of luster eventually happens to Manju as well and he is replaced in the hearts and minds of the cricketing-obsessed public with a new cricketing “prodigy,” reinforcing the fact that fame and glory are fleeting, ephemeral.

The story in Selection Day, as I have captured it here, seems pretty straightforward, and it could have been the basis for a really good book. But I found Adiga’s telling of this tale so contrived, so difficult to follow, that I have to rate it as one of the worst books I have ever read, or rather, as one of the worst books I have actually finished—most of time, if I don’t find a book engaging after the first few chapters, I don’t bother continuing to read it. In the case of Selection Day, I stuck it out till the end as it had been recommended by a friend and I wanted to give it a shot. I even went back and re-read The White Tiger, hoping it would give me a better perspective on Adiga’s writing. But it didn’t. Adiga’s writing seems to have become much more convoluted since that debut novel, with characters so weird and behaving so strangely that they are hard to relate to, and the liberal use of profanity throughout the book.

That the book is so much about cricket was not a problem for me, as I was as much into the game growing up in India as the rest of that cricket-obsessed nation. It was the entire rest of the book that I couldn’t get.

Selection Day
Author: Aravind Adiga
Publisher: Scribner
Publication Date: January 2017

Contributor: Lachmi Khemlani runs a technology publication in the San Francisco Bay Area.

“Women at War: Subhas Chandra Bose and the Rani of Jhansi Regiment” by Vera Hildebrand

Books We've Read AdminLeave a comment

women-at-war

This is a book about extraordinary women caught up in events most extraordinary. Set in the early 1940s when World War II was raging across the globe, it traces the founding of the INA (Indian National Army) in Singapore, the remarkable role played by Subhas Chandra Bose, and the origin, activities and eventual disbanding of the all-woman Rani of Jhansi Regiment.

The best thing about this book is that it tells us of women we have never heard of before – women of Indian origin born elsewhere, who were nevertheless willing to lay down their lives for the freedom of an unseen motherland. In India, many of us have heard of Captain Lakshmi (Dr. Lakshmi Swaminathan Sehgal, daughter of Ammu Swaminathan and sister of danseuse Mrinalini Sarabhai) but the other names are new to us. Danish researcher and author, Vera Hildebrand, tracked down 22 surviving Ranis in India, Singapore, Malaysia and the United States and recorded their statements. She also interviewed male soldiers of the INA and Japanese co-fighters. She pored over piles of documents and her conclusions are presented in this book. (Interestingly, the Netaji Research Bureau housed in the Bose family home in Kolkata denied access to the voluminous records in their custody, including catalogues.)

On 22nd April 1945, Bose had ordered all INA documents destroyed. British Intelligence had interrogated all INA prisoners and defectors but the original reports seem to have disappeared. Copies made by Colonel Hugh C Toye and shipped to England are surviving. The author managed to view them at the British Library, UK. Five of the Ranis had unpublished memoirs or voluminous diaries – Janaki Thevar Athinahappan, Asha Bharati Sahay Choudhry, Aruna Ganguli Chattopadhya, Eva Jenny Murty Jothi and Dhanam Lakshmi Suppiah Ratnam.

The author critically examines Netaji’s contribution to Indian nationalism and the advancement of women’s equality. The book also mentions several women revolutionaries in India’s freedom struggle, whose names have largely been excluded from history books – Pritilata Waddedar, Kalpana Dutta, Bina Das, Suniti Chowdhury and Shanti Ghosh. Mrs. Lilavati Chaganlal Mehta and her two daughters, Neelam and Rama, were among the first to join the Ranis in Burma. The INA had about 50 Burma-born Ranis. From Malaya, there were many Tamil-speaking estate workers.

On the night of 4th April 1945, a group of 51 Ranis were retreating from their camp in Myanmar to relative safety in Thailand, escorted by Lieutenant Khushal Singh Rawat and led by Ponammah Navarednam and Janaki Bai. Two of these women fell to sniper bullets while on a freight train from Rangoon to Bangkok, and were buried on Burmese territory, somewhere along the railway line. Stella Thomas and Josephine died unhonoured, with no tributes, no memorials, and no customary encomiums. They were probably South Indians recruited from Malaya. While serving in Burma, Janaki Bai lost her father and Labanya Ganguli Chatterji was widowed barely six months after her wedding.

When the war ended, Labanya studied medicine as did Gian Kaur and Gauri Bhattacharya. All of them settled in India. Japan-born Asha Sahay settled in India along with her father, Anand Sahay. Dacca-born Anjuli Bhowmik had been only twelve years old when she joined the regiment along with her fourteen year old sister Shanthi. Manwati Pandey came from a family of Indian nationalists. Post independence she married Dr. K C Arya and settled in Kanpur. She is known as Lt. Manwati Arya and has authored several books including a few on the INA. While travelling from Rangoon to Maymyo in 1944 she had cut her long tresses short as most of the other Ranis did. In 2008 when the author asked her if the girls had regretted giving up their hair, Manwati replied with a hearty laugh, “We were ready to give our heads, so who cared about the hair!”

Overall Assessment: Very interesting.

Women at War: Subhas Chandra Bose and the Rani of Jhansi Regiment
AUTHOR: Vera Hildebrand
PUBLISHER: HarperCollins India
PUBLICATION DATE: December 2016

Contributor: Pushpa Kurup lives in Trivandrum, India and works in the IT sector.

“A Man Called Ove” by Fredrik Backman

Books We've Read AdminLeave a comment

A Man Called Ove.jpg

A Man Called Ove is one of those surprise hits that has spread entirely through word-of-mouth rather than by any kind of critical acclaim. It came to my attention when it was featured in one of the many year-end lists of “must-read” books that came out recently. I also found that it had very favorable reviews on Amazon—four and a half stars with as many as 10,356 reviews at the time of this writing!—which is what even many best-selling and critically acclaimed books do not get. Obviously, there had to be something to it, and once I was able to get a copy of it from the library, I could see what it was.

Set in Sweden and written by a Swedish author—in English—A Man Called Ove tells the heart-warming, even if somewhat predictable, story of an elderly man, Ove, who is a curmudgeon to the extreme and lashes out at everyone around him, but who, by the end of the book, finds some measure of peace, and even happiness, and comes to be loved dearly by those around him. Ove has always been somewhat anti-social and awkward around others, and things come to a head when his wife of 40 years—whom he loved dearly and who was pretty much his main reason for existence—dies of cancer. He has no kids because his wife got into a horrific bus crash shortly after they were married which left her paralyzed from the waist down, and while he continues to go to work after his wife’s death—because that is the kind of person that he is, a stickler for rules and doing what is right—once he gets laid off from his job, he finds no reason to go on living. So he draws up a meticulous plan to kill himself.

However, even the best-laid plans don’t always work, and Ove is thwarted every time he tries to commit suicide by being forced to come to the aid of people around him—his new neighbors, which is a family with a very pregnant mom who is from Iran, a stray cat who literally adopts herself as his, his once-upon-a-time best-friend-turned-enemy who now has Alzheimer’s and might be forced to live in a home, a gay young man disowned by his father who ends up living with him until he is accepted by his family, a random stranger he saves from the train tracks where has gone to actually get under the train himself, and a few others. Along the way, he reluctantly forges bonds with all these people, especially with the Iranian woman’s two little girls. And eventually, of course, as someone who is so needed and loved, Ove’s suicide plans are permanently put to rest. He does die after some years, but of natural causes.

As I said, the story is extremely predictable and you can tell how it will end from a mile off. Also, the writing is quite basic, with none of the literary finesse that would be needed for critics to sit up and take notice. Yet, the book has been such a hit that it is even being made into a movie. I can think of a couple of reasons for the book’s success. Most importantly, it is entirely a “feel-good” story, one that tugs at your heart-strings but which still ends happily rather than tragically. In our current anxiety-filled political climate, we appreciate these kind of heart-warming stories all the more. The fact that it is not highbrow at all means that more people can read it and enjoy it. I personally found it a good, fast read with even a bit of humor thrown in that I appreciated. (It pokes fun at the digital world we live in, with those into technology not capable of performing even basic chores and repairs.) It is not a book you can’t put down, but I did find it enjoyable enough to read it all the way up to the end.

A Man Called Ove
Author: Fredrik Backman
Publisher: Washington Square Press (US Edition)
Publication Date: 2012 in Sweden, 2013 in US

Contributor: Lachmi Khemlani runs a technology publication in the San Francisco Bay Area.

“Precious and Grace” (Book 17 of the No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency Series) by Alexander McCall Smith

Books We've Read AdminLeave a comment

precious-and-grace

A new book in the No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency Series is always an unbridled treat for me. I love the books and have all of them, and unlike the Harry Potter series which I also love, these are still coming! Set in Botswana and narrated by a female protagonist—the indomitable Mma Ramotswe, who is the proprietor of the No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency—the books capture the feel of Africa and the skin of the character so completely, that it’s hard to believe that they are written by a Scottish man. Alexander McCall Smith was born in Africa in what is now known as Zimbabwe, so he is certainly familiar with the place, but still, it takes exceptional talent to be able to immerse the reader in the character and the setting so completely.

Each book in the series—the first of which was published in 2003—has one or two main cases and a few side cases. Unlike typical detective stories that are usually fast-paced and action-packed, the focus in these books is more on the people and their lives, their relationships with each other, and the sights and sounds of Botswana. The stories unfold at a very leisurely pace, and in most of them, there is no “mystery” as such to be solved, but instead, “problems” to be resolved.

In Precious and Grace, the main case is that of a young Canadian woman who was born and spent her early childhood in Botswana, and after many years of living in Canada and a failed relationship, has come to Botswana to rediscover and reconnect with her roots. She approaches the agency to help with this, and by the end of the book, Mma Ramotswe does manage to dig out her past, including where she grew up and the nanny who looked after her. However, it turns that rediscovering the past is not as fulfilling as she had hoped. In the course of this main investigation, Mma Ramotswe also helps Mr. Polopetsi, an occasional assistant at the agency, to get out of a pyramid scheme he has unwittingly been tricked into. There’s also a stray dog that Fanwell, a junior mechanic at the garage next door, rescued that has become very attached to him—there’s the issue of what to do with him. This many not be a “case” in a traditional detective book, but it is very much in line with the human issues that Mma Ramotswe concerns herself with.

Precious and Grace has the usual cast of lovable characters who have been there since the first book: Mma (Precious) Ramotswe, who set up the agency—which is the only ladies detective agency in Botswana—and lives by a “how-to” book by an American detective, from which she quotes liberally; Mma (Grace) Makutski, her prickly assistant, who has kept promoting herself until she is now the co-director of the agency; Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni, Mma Ramotswe’s husband and the owner of the garage next door, who knows cars inside out and probably dreams of engines in his sleep; Charlie, a former apprentice in the garage who is now working in the detective agency, and hasn’t gotten very far in life as he is mostly thinking of girls; Fanwell, who, as mentioned earlier, works in the garage under Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni, and is a little more serious about life than Charlie; and Mma Potokwane, a close friend of Mma Ramotswe who runs an orphan farm and who is famous for serving the best fruit cake to which Mma Ramotswe always helps herself liberally whenever she visits her to talk about her cases and life in general.

Although Precious and Grace is the 17th book in the series, the quality has not flagged a bit, and it is every bit as enjoyable and entertaining as the first book. And this is true of all the books in the series. Not only do they capture the essence of Botswana so completely that you feel you are living and breathing it, but they are also among the most delightfully funny books I have read, with so many laugh-out-loud moments which I can’t but help reading out to those around me. And the humor is always intelligent, always good-natured, and never crass. For instance, in response to a government official (whom Mma Ramotswe has approached for some information) who complains about the many injustices of being a junior staff member, Mma Ramotswe sympathizes with him and then thinks that this would never happen to Mma Makutski. “If you were Mma Makutski, you simply promoted yourself regularly until you ended up as junior co-director, of whatever her current position was— Mma Ramotswe had rather lost track of Mma Makutski stellar ascent.”

The book is sprinkled with such witticisms throughout. Another constant source of humor is the fact that Mma Ramotswe is “traditionally built” and sees this as a source of pride rather than shame. She has no compunction about indulging in food—whether it is stew, or fat cakes (similar to our doughnuts), or the delicious fruit cake that Mma Potokwane (who is also traditionally built) always seems to have on hand at the orphan farm. Also, when it comes to hiring a new housemother for the orphan farm, of all the qualified applicants, Mma Potokwane makes the final selection in favor of the woman who is traditionally built, because she feels that “the most traditionally built lady would be the happiest, and would therefore make the children happy—they would love her and she would have the most acreage, so to say, for them to climb on, and her lap would be big enough for many children to sit on at the same time.” That’s the most compelling justification of being plump that I’ve ever heard of!

It’s a testament to how enjoyable all the books in No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency Series are that I’m always sad to reach the end—I wish they would last forever. It’s not a feeling adults have much of anymore, and I am in awe of a writer who can still make us feel this way.

Precious and Grace (Book 17 of the No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency Series
Author: Alexander McCall Smith
Publisher: Pantheon
Publication Date: October 2016

Contributor: Lachmi Khemlani runs a technology publication in the San Francisco Bay Area.

 

“Little Bee” by Chris Cleave

Books We've Read AdminLeave a comment

little-bee

Little Bee is a highly acclaimed novel that was published several years ago in 2008, but which I came upon only recently. Going through a dry spell lately with books that are able to engage and sustain my interest, I started Little Bee without much hope and was pleasantly surprised to find that it held my attention throughout, and was, in fact, difficult to put down, especially towards the end. The story is extremely compelling and is told in a simple clear-cut manner without any literary flourishes or pretensions. This is exactly the kind of book I like – where the focus is entirely on the story and the writing is simply a means to tell it rather than an end in itself.

And oh, the author is British, and perhaps I am biased, having grown up with mostly British authors in India, but I feel an easier and more immediate affinity with British authors than with American ones. Many of the books that I have really liked (and written about here) in recent months have been from British authors such as Paula Hawkins (The Girl on the Train), Clare Mackintosh (I Let You Go), and Fiona Barton (The Widow), not to mention long-standing favorites such as J.K. Rowling and Agatha Christie. I was not surprised to learn that the author of Little Bee, Chris Cleave, had won the Somerset Maugham book award in 2006, given that Somerset Maugham is one of my favorite authors and I love all his books (including The Razor’s Edge, which I recently re-read).

Getting back to Little Bee, the titular character of the novel is a Nigerian refugee girl who escaped from extreme brutality in her country and travelled to London as a stowaway on a cargo ship, was caught and held at a detention center for two years, and then one day is suddenly let out (with a group of other girls, one of whom has bribed a detention officer to let them go). Even though Little Bee — which is the name she takes on after escaping Nigeria — is no longer imprisoned in the center, she is still an illegal immigrant and therefore not free. Not knowing where to go or what to do, she ends up contacting the only people in England that she knows—Sarah and Andrew, a couple that she met on a beach in Nigeria on that fateful day when she and her sister were trying to escape from the men hunting them down. (The turmoil and killings in Nigeria at that time, in the mid to late 2000s, were related to the oil reserves that had just been discovered there and which were being seized by “the oil men,” who got local thugs to eliminate entire villages where the oil was located by killing all the locals en masse.) Little Bee and her sister appeal to Sarah and Andrew to save them from the men, but eventually, only Little Bee is let go, thanks to a spontaneous, courageous act by Sarah — she hacks off one of her fingers in response to the men’s demand that Andrew give them one of his fingers in exchange for the sisters’ lives. Andrew cannot do this, and the men retaliate by assaulting and killing Little Bee’s sister.

This momentary weakness, all the more stark in contrast to his wife’s courage, continues to haunt Andrew and causes further strain in his relationship with Sarah. When contacted by Little Bee two years later after she is set free from the detention center, the past catches up with him and he commits suicide, leaving Sarah to fend for their four year old boy on her own. Then there’s the arrival of Little Bee, whom Sarah takes in. It brings back for her all the horrific memories of that fateful day at the Nigerian beach, yet at the same time, she finds comfort in her presence, not to mention the fact that Little Bee is very good with Sarah’s son. So what ultimately happens with these two women? Is Little Bee found by the authorities and deported back to Nigeria? Or does she continue to stay with Sarah? Is Sarah able to come to terms with Andrew’s suicide, her guilt at the extramarital affair she has been having, and her feelings of inadequacy and helplessness at not being able to help Little Bee beyond saving her life just that one time? What about all those people whom she was not able to help? What about Little Bee’s sister, who was so brutally assaulted and killed shortly after their encounter at that beach? Can Sarah do something now, or will she continue to be haunted, just like Andrew was?

While I don’t want to give away the ending, I have to say that the book had a very satisfying conclusion – very realistic and believable without being overtly mushy or unbearably depressing. In addition to just telling a story, it makes a very strong statement about refugees, political asylum, detention centers, the contrast between the first world and developing countries, and what even ordinary individuals like us can do. In the current world scenario with the growing refugee crisis, I found the book remarkably prescient. It manages to be tragic and uplifting at the same time, which is quite an achievement.

Little Bee
Author: Chris Cleave
Publisher and Date: Originally published as The Other Hand by Sceptre in August 2008; Reprint edition published by Simon & Schuster in February 2010

Contributor: Lachmi Khemlani runs a technology publication in the San Francisco Bay Area.

“I am a Troll: Inside the Secret World of the BJP’s Digital Army” by Swati Chaturvedi

Books We've Read AdminLeave a comment

troll

Prime Minister Narendra Modi, “the leader of the world’s largest democracy follows and felicitates trolls.” Shocked? Well no, not really. Everyone knows he’s the most Twitter-friendly person on the planet. I’ve no idea whether journalist Swati Chaturvedi is lying or telling the truth, but what she has to say in this book is definitely worth serious consideration. At least some of the information she passes on can be easily verified by a tech savvy person. While many of us do suspect that trolling is not a random harmless activity of stray individuals but a targeted intervention by well organized groups having a definite (often political) agenda, we rarely have evidence to back our beliefs. This book makes an attempt to bring out certain home-truths about trolling, fake news and false propaganda.

Describing internet trolls as “the goons of the online world,” the author goes on to share her own experiences of online stalking and sexual harassment and her disappointment at the inaction of the Delhi Police (which incidentally is controlled by the BJP-led Central Government). Referring to the “use of lies by verified Twitter users to generate communal hatred” she states that, “It’s akin to giving them the equivalent of a megaphone and a primetime TV slot.”

The book is full of revelations. “In a Right to Information petition, the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) said that the PM’s handles, @Narendramodi and @PMO, are run by the PM himself.” Modi follows 1375 people on Twitter, and his own followers number 21.6 million. (The numbers have since risen to 1640 and 26.3 million. I checked!) Of the people he follows, “twenty-six accounts routinely sexually harass, make death threats and abuse politicians from other parties and journalists, with special attention being given to women, minorities and Dalits.” The author names many of them and provides screen-shots of some of their most offensive tweets. Honestly, I wonder how Twitter puts up with the stuff!

Pictures of Burhan Wani’s funeral procession in Kashmir were tweeted by @ggiittiikkaa with the crude comment, “20k attended funeral of terrorist Burhan. Should have dropped a bomb and given permanent Azadi to these 20k pigs.” The author points out that this was retweeted 1184 times and liked 1086 times. Priti Gandhi (@MrsGandhi), self proclaimed ‘huge fan of Nathuram Godse’, who was “thrown out of the BJP when she tweeted a fake endorsement of Mr. Modi by Julian Assange of Wikileaks before the 2014 general election,” is currently a national executive member of the BJP Mahila Morcha. Tinu Jain, who is ‘followed by the PM’, was arrested in Gwalior in September 2106 for running a sex racket.

Every day the BJP’s IT cell sets the tweet agenda for the day. Synchronized tweeting, trending hastags, bots (algorithms acting in social networks to appear as real users), the ‘hit list’ of leading journos – all activities are controlled and coordinated by 11 Ashoka Road, New Delhi. Sadhavi Khosla’s account of the modus operandi is very interesting. The book also profiles a few trolls whom the author met and interviewed. Tweeting and trolling are becoming paid occupations, the evidence suggests. And online hate often results in offline violence.

Ankit Lal, social media chief of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) informed the author that Twitter handles in remote locations in Thailand are regularly tweeting BJP-created Modi hastags. Has the BJP hired a marketing agency in Thailand to do their trolling? Or are they using virtual private networks (VPN) to hide their location and identity? Is their online support base diminishing? Ankit Lal’s report which forms part of the Appendix is worth scrutinizing.

The book attributes Modi’s spectacular 2014 election victory to the effectiveness of his social media campaign. Further, the author notes that the PM, in his 2016 Independence Day speech, lied about the electrification of a village in Uttar Pradesh and used the PMO twitter handle to tweet the speech. Power Minister Piyush Goyal tweeted pictures of Nagla Fatela villagers watching the PM’s speech on TV. The gram panchayat immediately contradicted the claim and maintained that they still had no electricity. The tweets were hastily withdrawn.

The author here is taking a major risk, considering the outpouring of hate messages and violent threats that customarily follow any attempts to malign any of the sacred cows in our political firmament. At the same time, one realizes that what she has exposed is barely the tip of the iceberg. The rest is yet to come – for not all voices can be silenced by online intimidation.

(I did some quick reality checks before publishing this review and found that some of named Twitter handles are definitely interconnected. Their tweets are vitriolic, hate-filled, and illogical, they encapsulate lies and half-truths rather than verified facts, and furiously tweeting and retweeting seems to be the main occupation of the persons involved. And yes, NaMo does follow them!)

Overall Assessment: The author has opened a Pandora’s box.

I am a Troll- Inside the Secret World of the BJP’s Digital Army
AUTHOR: Swati Chaturvedi
PUBLISHER: Juggernaut Books, New Delhi, India
DATE OF PUBLICATION: December 2016

Contributor: Pushpa Kurup lives in Trivandrum, India and works in the IT sector.

“The Widow” by Fiona Barton

Books We've Read AdminLeave a comment

the-widow

Contrary to what you would expect this book to be from its title – a tragedy or at least a drama – The Widow is actually a crime thriller. And a really good one at that – I couldn’t put it down until I had got to the end, to the “bottom of the mystery,” as they would say in our much-beloved Five Find-Outers mystery series by Enid Blyton that we grew up with in India.

Set in England, The Widow is a debut novel by Fiona Barton, who, I wasn’t surprised to learn, is a journalist, given the fluency and quality of the writing. The “widow” in the story is Jean, whose husband has just died in an accident. But there’s an entire back story to their marriage that gradually unfolds in the course of the book. Her husband, Glen, turns out to be a pedophile who may have abducted a two year girl, Bella, from her house. It takes a lot of digging and investigation to hone in on Glen as the probable suspect. The detective in charge of the case is convinced that he is the man. But there is no conclusive proof, and even though Glen is charged and brought to trial, there is not enough evidence to convict him. In the meantime, Jean is obsessed with kids but for a different reason — Glen is infertile so she cannot have kids of her own. Did Glen kidnap Bella? And if so, was Jean complicit in the kidnapping? Did she want Bella to be her child? And was Glen’s death really accidental or did Jean actually cause it? We don’t really get to know the answers to these questions until the end of the book.

The book’s structure adds to the drama. The story unfold over a span of four years, starting from the time of Bella’s kidnapping to a few weeks after Glen’s death. Not only does it keep alternating between different times instead of being chronological – a fairly common literary device adopted in novels these days – it is also narrated from the points of view of a few key people: Jean, the widow; Bob, the detective who becomes very emotionally invested in the case; Dawn, Bella’s mother, who is single and has a few skeletons in the closet of her own; and finally, Kate, a reporter who is the only one able to get through to Jean, past the media circus plaguing her life for four years since Bella disappeared.

Most crime thrillers have almost an obligatory surprise twist towards the end — they lead you down a certain path almost intentionally and then knock you off the sails with a big reveal. And in the most successful books of this genre like Gone Girl, their sheer brilliance make you forget and forgive the fact that they practically cheated into believing something that wasn’t true. The Widow is not like that. There are no surprise plot twists thrown in like a curve ball; yet, it still has a very satisfying conclusion in which you are assured that justice has been done. It’s far from being the next Gone Girl or The Girl on the Train, but I found it a very well written, engrossing, and page turning thriller.

The Widow
Author: Fiona Barton
Publisher: Penguin
Publication Date: February 2016

Contributor: Lachmi Khemlani runs a technology publication in the San Francisco Bay Area.

“Voices from Chernobyl: The Oral History of a Nuclear Disaster” by Svetlana Alexievich

Books We've Read AdminLeave a comment

voices-from-chernobyl

The 1986 nuclear disaster at the Chernobyl nuclear power station in the erstwhile USSR is a horror story we’ve all heard. The site is now in Belarus – a tiny country with a tiny population. The Nazis obliterated 619 villages and their populations during World War II, and the Chernobyl fiasco wiped out 485 villages. Of those who remain 20% are said to be living on contaminated land.

This book by Ukraine born Nobel laureate Svetlana Alexievich traces the events that unfolded during those days of horror and the slow death and disease that transformed the lives of innocent people in the vicinity. The author raises a poignant question, “Why repeat the facts – they cover up our feelings.”

It comes as no surprise that the book is full of heart rending stories. Any sensitive person will have a hard time getting through it. Half way through the book you’re sure to stop and ask yourself: Do we really need nuclear energy, leave alone nuclear weapons?

Here’s a simple narrative: “Tell everyone about my daughter. Write it down. She’s four years old and she can sing, dance, she knows poetry by heart. Her mental development is normal, she isn’t any different from other kids, only her games are different. She doesn’t play “store” or “school” – she plays “hospital”. She gives her dolls shots, takes their temperature, puts them on IV. If a doll dies, she covers it with a white sheet. We’ve been living with her in the hospital for four years, we can’t leave her there alone, and she doesn’t even know that you’re supposed to live at home.”

Nikolai Kalugin, a father says, “I want to bear witness: my daughter died from Chernobyl. And they want us to forget.” He shares a painful memory: “My daughter was six years old. I’m putting her to bed, and she whispers in my ear, ‘Daddy, I want to live. I’m still little.’ And I had thought she didn’t understand anything.”

Anatoly Simanskiy, a journalist says, “Yesterday my father turned eighty. The whole family gathered around the table. I looked at him and thought about how much his life had seen: Gulag, Auschwitz, Chernobyl.”

Vasily Nesterenko, former director of the Institute for Nuclear Energy at the Belorussian Academy of Sciences, shared some real pearls of wisdom: “No they weren’t a gang of criminals. It was more like a conspiracy of ignorance and obedience. The principle of their lives, the one thing the Party machine had taught them was never to stick their necks out.” He had this to add: “The State always came first, and the value of a human life was zero.” And this: “People feared their superiors more than they feared the atom.”

Vladimir Ivanov, a former first secretary of the Satvgorod regional Party committee told the author, “It was the military way of dealing with things. They didn’t know any other way. They didn’t understand that there is really such a thing as physics. There is a chain reaction. And no orders or government resolutions can change that chain reaction. The world is built on physics, not on the ideas of Marx. But what if I’d said that then?” Perhaps he wouldn’t have lived long enough to speak to the author. (This speculation is mine alone!)

A quarter century after the fall of the Soviet Union, as we read these personal testimonies we are left with a feeling of great sadness. But there is a faint thread of humour too, like a rainbow emerging from the dark clouds. An Ukranian woman is selling big red apples at the market, calling them ‘Chernobyl’ apples. Someone advises her to drop the advertisement as no one would buy them if they heard they were from Chernobyl. The woman then says coolly, “They buy them any way. Some need them for their mother-in-law, some for their boss.”

Overall Assessment: The author has done a brilliant job. Steel yourself before you read the book.

Voices from Chernobyl: The Oral History of a Nuclear Disaster
AUTHOR: Svetlana Alexievich (translated from the Russian by Keith Gessen)
PUBLISHER: PICADOR
DATE OF PUBLICATION: 2006

Contributor: Pushpa Kurup lives in Trivandrum, India and works in the IT sector.

“The World in the Evening” by Christopher Isherwood

Books We've Read AdminLeave a comment

the-world-in-the-evening

I have always loved to read fiction, but I have been going through a drought lately when it comes to finding something to read that holds my attention and makes me care about the characters, that makes me lose myself in a book as I always did since I was a kid. Over the holidays, I tried reading several critically acclaimed books that had recently been published including the Booker-prize winning The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead, Swing Time by Zadie Smith, and Here I Am by Jonathan Safran Foer; but I found that I couldn’t care enough about the plot and the characters to stick with them beyond the first chapter. Then, on a trip to New York City, I visited its famous Strand bookstore where, in the course of browsing through the thousands of books it carries, I came across Christopher Isherwood’s The World in the Evening. I have been a fan of  Isherwood’s writing ever since I read his A Meeting by the River several years ago, which I still rate as one of the best books I have ever read. Isherwood was a contemporary of Aldous Huxley and Gerald Heard, and is best known for his The Berlin Stories book, which was adapted into the hit movie, Cabaret, starring Liza Minnelli, as well as for his book, A Single Man, which was also made into a movie starring Colin Firth. Thus, when I came across The World in the Evening, I picked it up immediately, hoping it would bring back some of the enjoyment of fiction that I have always had until now.

I found this true for The World in the Evening, for the most part. Set around the time of the Second World War, the book is centered around the experiences of a young man, Stephen, in his early thirties, including his first marriage when he was in his twenties to a woman who was twelve years older than him, his brief affair with a young man while he was still married to his first wife, and his second marriage (after his first wife dies) to a young, carefree, rather hedonistic woman, which ends disastrously after he finds out that she is having an affair and walks out on her. Most of the book is in the form of reminiscences he has when he is holed up in bed for several weeks after being hit by a truck when visiting his childhood home in rural Pennsylvania, where he comes after walking out on his second wife. He has extended conversations with the people looking after him, which include his adopted aunt who has been like a mother to him (his own died when he was very young); a war refugee from Germany his aunt has taken in, who is uncertain about the fate of her husband as a war captor; and his doctor, who is homosexual and lives with a man whom the conservative community they belong to is determined to view as just a “roommate.” In the course of his conversations with these people, his perusal of his first wife’s letters – she was a famous author – a collection of which he might publish, and the memories triggered by them, we come to know the details of his life, the ups and downs he has gone through, his own feelings about them, and what has motivated him to do what he has done.

What struck me most about this book was how self-introspective it was —Stephen lays bare all his bad behavior, his petty jealousies, his irrational rages, and his many contradictory feelings for us to see. Ultimately, he comes to perceive everything bad that has happened to him as his own fault, caused by how he thinks and acts rather than by bad things happening to him. It is refreshing to come across a story in which the protagonist realizes that it is their own attitude and behavior that is primarily responsible for the trials and tribulations they are experiencing in life. It is also how eventually Stephen is able to resolve his problems, put his demons to rest, and find some measure of peace and acceptance in his life. It seems to be an important lesson for all of us.

Also, given that the book was written in the early 50s, I was amazed by how frank it was about sex and sexuality, both straight and gay. The main character was, for all practical purposes, heterosexual but still has a homosexual fling, showing that the divide between homosexuals and heterosexuals may not as rigid as is commonly believed. In the present day, we would call Stephen’s character bisexual, but at the time the book was written, there was no such concept, and Stephen is not at all conflicted about his fling with a man, despite being clearly attracted to, and married to, women. In fact, the only guilt he feels is in the fact that he is cheating on his wife. The fact that it is with a man is almost inconsequential to him.

The World in the Evening is a great example of the kind of book I like —where the focus is simply on telling the story without resorting to linguistic tricks or stylistic cadences. There are no examples of “beautiful writing” to showcase here. It was a little long-winded at times and did not come anywhere close to the brilliance of A Meeting by the River, but it was eminently readable, engaging and held my attention throughout.

The World in the Evening
Author: Christopher Isherwood
Publication Date: First published 1954 by Methuen Publishing Ltd; Reprint edition published in November 2013 by Farrar, Straus and Giroux (FSG Classics)

Contributor: Lachmi Khemlani runs a technology publication in the San Francisco Bay Area.

“Shores of Knowledge: New World Discoveries and the Scientific Imagination” by Joyce Appleby

Books We've Read AdminLeave a comment

shores-of-knowledge1

Marco Polo, the 13th century traveler, landed in a Genoese prison on his return from the Far East. His cell-mate was a writer and that’s how his story came to be told. ‘The Travels of Marco Polo’ was Columbus’ favourite book. Columbus was Genoese but his sponsors were the King and Queen of Spain. When he returned from the West Indies in 1493 he presented them with six Taino Indians, besides many species of plants and animals. Columbus made three more voyages to the Americas in the next decade, and when Hispaniola ran out of gold, he introduced sugarcane cultivation using forced labour. Religious conversion happened simultaneously. In the meantime the indigenous peoples encountered European induced diseases such as small pox and died in droves.

On Columbus’ second voyage, the Spaniards discovered pineapple on the island of Guadeloupe. Little did they know the ‘Indians’ had imported these plants from Brazil and Uruguay in their ancient canoes!

There are stories within stories. Spaniards invaded Cuba in 1511 and Mexico in 1521. Seven decades after Columbus’ arrival the New World had seven times as many Africans as Europeans. Eventually it was Amerigo Vespucci (a Florentine) whom the great new continents were named after. Unlike others before him Vespucci realized that the spot where he had landed (Brazil) was part of a new continent. His travel accounts published in 1502 won him instant fame. Martin Waldseemuller, a German cartographer, while preparing a new map in 1507 chose the name ‘America’ for the two continents in the western hemisphere. The rest is history.

Balboa discovered the Pacific Ocean, but it was Magellan who named it. John Cabot (a man from Genoa) had explored Greenland, Newfoundland and the east coast of North America under the English flag in 1497-98 but he didn’t get much press. (Cabot’s expedition is believed to be the first by Europeans to mainland North America since the Vikings landed five centuries earlier.)

Hernan Cortez, conqueror of Mexico, wrote about the Spanish occupation of Tenochtitlan and their utter surprise at finding resplendent buildings, stone statues, gold artifacts, frescoes, floating gardens et al. Bartolome de Las Casas (traveler and writer) denounced the cruelty of the conquistadors in his 16th century book “The History of the Indies”. When other European writers mentioned the Aztecs’ human sacrifices and the cannibalism of the Caribs in the Lesser Antilles, Las Casas reminded them of the biblical story where God commanded Abraham to sacrifice his only son.

Ferdinand Magellan did not really circumnavigate the globe but one of his ships did. Magellan was killed in the Philippines and only one of his five ships, the Victoria, returned to Spain in 1522 with 18 survivors and 26 tons of cloves, nutmeg and cinnamon. Magellan was Portuguese but he took Spanish citizenship in order to participate in the exploration.

The book is full of interesting facts that a lover of history and sociology is sure to lap up with immense pleasure. Here are some samples:

  • Jeanne Baré, the first woman to circumnavigate the globe (1766-69), went on Bougainville’s expedition disguised as a man, but on landing in Tahiti was instantly recognized as a woman by the natives.
  • The Aztec jugglers whom Cortez brought to Spain were later sent to Rome to entertain the Pope. That’s when rubber balls had their European debut. Yes, the Aztecs were rubber-tappers!
  • Francis Drake looted the Spanish silver fleet during his 1577-80 circumnavigation of the globe. This enabled Queen Elizabeth to pay off her country’s debt.
  • In Java, Antonio Pigafetta (a writer accompanying Magellan) “learned about the practice of suttee, described by his native interpreter in glowing terms as a ceremony in which a flower-bedecked widow happily accepted her duty to join her husband’s corpse on the funeral pyre.”
  • An island near Borneo “was occupied by Muslims who, though as naked as the other natives, adhered strictly to Muslim rules about diet and hygiene.”
  • “When the Lutheran archbishop of Uppsala, chided him (Carl Linnaeus) for placing humankind among other primates, Linnaeus replied airily that he knew of no way that would follow from the principles of natural history to make a generic difference between humans and simians. Either the archbishop should find one or cease his complaint.” Wow! So much for the Creation myth and the cute tale of Noah’s Ark!
  • “Thomas Jefferson, then the United States foreign minister to France, supposedly brought back the recipe for French fries, which he served over the next decade at the White House.”
  • In 1867 America bought Alaska from Russia. The purchase was described as “Seward’s Folly” after Lincoln’s secretary of state, William Seward who had negotiated the treaty.
  • In 1785 Napoleon Bonaparte, then aged 16, made an effort to join a naval expedition but did not qualify. The two ships carrying 220 men met a tragic end after leaving their last port of call in New South Wales, Australia in January 1788, and were never heard of again.

The story of the potato is a must-read. And that’s not all. Pedro Alvares Cabral, Charles Darwin, Alexander Humboldt, the Medicis of Florence, Adam Smith, Voltaire, Alexander Selkirk, Captain James Cook, and a horde of other stalwarts make guest appearances that are sure to leave the reader absolutely delighted.

Overall assessment: A scholarly masterpiece.

Shores of Knowledge: New World Discoveries and the Scientific Imagination
Author: Joyce Appleby
Publisher: W .W. Norton & Co.
Year of Publication: 2014

Contributor: Pushpa Kurup lives in Trivandrum, India and works in the IT sector.

“Farewell to Manzanar” by Jeanne Wakatsuki Houston and James D. Houston

Books We've Read AdminLeave a comment

farewell-to-manzanar

When the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbour in December 1941 at the climax of World War II, every American of Japanese descent suddenly became suspect. The Franklin Roosevelt government reacted by rounding up all Japanese Americans and carting them off to remote camps, where they were forced to subsist in sub-human conditions. Manzanar was one such camp on the edge of California’s Mojave Desert and in this book a former inmate gives a first person account of her family’s interment in this hellhole. After decades of silent denial, the author relives long forgotten memories and recollects heart-wrenching details to produce this deeply disturbing memoir.

Jeanne’s father (a native of Hiroshima) was interrogated, taken into custody and deported to North Dakota. Ko Wakatsuki had come to Hawaai at the age of 17 in search of work, moved to Idaho and later California, where he married a Japanese girl and had 9 children. His arrest and three year incarceration changed him. He became despondent, alcoholic, abusive, violent and eager to be invisible. In 1945 after the war ended, the family returned to Southern California and in 1952 they moved to San Jose.

Jeanne was seven years old and the youngest of the brood when the tragedy enveloped her family. Manzanar effectively robbed her of the simple joys of childhood. Growing up in this strange new place with minimal facilities, communal toilets and communal kitchens, deeply affected her – and the return to civilization was just as difficult when the camp was disbanded after three years.

Jeanne recounts her father’s behavior during a school visit by her parents: “I was standing at the head of the table shaking the principal’s hand, when papa rose, his face ceremoniously grave, and acknowledged the other parents with his most respectful gesture. He pressed his palms together at his chest and gave them a slow deep Japanese bow from the waist. They received this with a moment of careful, indecisive silence. He was unforgivably a foreigner then, foreign to them, foreign to me, foreign to everyone but Mama, who sat next to him smiling with pleased modesty. Twelve years old at the time, I wanted to scream. I wanted to slide out of sight under the table and dissolve.”

The California born author describes the incredible pain of growing up Japanese in post-war America. “Easy enough as it was to adopt white American values, I still had a Japanese father to frighten my boyfriends and a Japanese face to thwart my social goals.”

Jeanne met James D. Houston while attending San Jose State University and they were married in 1957. Her husband co-authored her autobiographical novel, which was published in 1973 and won many accolades before being adapted into a TV film in 1976. The book has since become a part of many school curricula to inform pupils about the Japanese American experience during WWII. It presents a thought-provoking account of a dark and embarrassing chapter in American history.

Overall Assessment: Must read, especially if you are Japanese American.

Farewell to Manzanar
Authors: Jeanne Wakatsuki Houston and  James D. Houston
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin
Date of Publication: 1973

Contributor: Pushpa Kurup lives in Trivandrum, India and works in the IT sector.

 

“Mafia Queens of Mumbai ” by S. Hussain Zaidi with Jane Borges

Books We've Read AdminLeave a comment

mafia-queens-of-mumbai

There is high drama, there is intrigue, there is gang warfare, there is crime and punishment – and in the midst of it all, in the soft dark under-belly of the Mumbai underworld. there are ‘crime madonnas.’ We in India have heard of the notorious triumvirate that ruled India’s commercial capital then known as Bombay – the Tamilnadu born Haji Mastan, the Chennaiite Varadharajan Mudaliar and the Afghanistan born Karim Lala – until the Emergency intervened to bring about a reversal of their fortunes. When Vardha (as Varadharajan Mudaliar was known) died in Chennai in 1988, Mastan chartered an aircraft to bring his body back to Bombay for a funeral that any king would have envied. Mastan was the darling of Bollywood and we have seen pictures of him with Dilip Kumar, Sunil Dutt, Madhubala and countless others. We have also heard of Dawood Ibrahim, Chota Rajan and other sundry characters, many of whom are absentee ganglords, rather than hands-on local dons. But the names of the women in mafia-land are new to us. Thus this book is an eye-opener in more ways than one. It tells us the mafia is not a male club.

Take Jenabai (Zainab) Chaavalwali, who participated wholeheartedly in the Independence movement and opted to remain in Bombay with her five children in 1947 when her husband Darwesh chose to migrate to Pakistan. In times of acute grain shortage, she acted as a middle-woman between wholesale grain merchants and dealers. Wow! Later she married Iqbal Gandhi but never called herself Mrs. Gandhi. She met Vardha who initiated her into the art of bootlegging in the early sixties. Soon she became rich and famous as Jenabai Daaruwali. Vardha introduced her to Mastan. Dawood Ibrahim was then a teenager and his parents Ibrahim Kaskar and Aamina were close friends of Jenabai. It was Jenabai who intervened to bring about a truce between the Pathan gang and the Ibrahim brothers, Dawood and Sabir, sometime in 1980. The truce was short-lived, but Jenabai herself lived until the ripe old age of 74.

The women in the book are spectacular – and that’s a gross understatement. Kudos to Zaidi for bringing them into the public gaze! Ever heard of Gangubai, the matriarch of Kamatipura? Well she owned a black Bentley and met Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru to lobby for the decriminalization of prostitution. She smoked bidis, drank Ranichaap (whatever that is!), chewed paan and gambled to her heart’s content. And yet, they say she had a heart of gold. She never married but adopted several children.

Did you know that from the early nineties the Mumbai drug trade (vaguely estimated at 1000 crore) was dominated by a female troika – Jyoti Adiramalingam, Mahalaxmi Papamani and Savitri? You won’t find them on Wikipedia. Google their names and you’ll draw a blank. But the authors actually met two of them. Sapna Didi, who tried her best to avenge her husband’s murder by Dawood’s men and lost her life in the attempt and Bollywood starlet Monica Bedi, the love interest of Abu Salem, are also featured in the book, perhaps to attract new-gen readers.

Is the female of the species more deadly than the male? Read the book and find out. Written by India’s best known crime reporter, “Mafia Queens” delivers a lot more than it promises. The style of the master storyteller is unmistakable. Faction and fiction are artfully blended together to present a fascinating experience. “Mastan called for his black Mercedes and walked Jenabai to the car. As the car left Baitul Suroor, the lights in the villa gradually dimmed and faded to black.”

Overall Assessment: Not to be missed.

Mafia Queens of Mumbai: Stories of Women from the Ganglands
Author: S Hussain Zaidi with Jane Borges
Publisher: Tranquebar Press (an imprint of Westland Ltd.)
Date of Publication: 2011

Contributor: Pushpa Kurup lives in Trivandrum, India and works in the IT sector.

“Retire Young, Retire Rich: How to Get Rich Quickly and Stay Rich Forever” by Robert T Kiyosaki with Sharon L Lechter

Books We've Read AdminLeave a comment

retire-young-retire-rich

I read ‘Rich Dad, Poor Dad’ several years ago and I was greatly impressed. It presented a wholly new perspective on the accumulation of wealth. So I had great expectations of Kiyosaki’s ‘How to Get Rich Quickly and Stay Rich Forever’. I was a little disappointed. What’s most annoying is that there are umpteen repetitions. After reading this one, I don’t feel inclined to read the other books in the series.

The author’s focus on financial literacy is probably the most important aspect of the book. It is also a matter that does bear repetition. Some home-truths really need to be repeated – only then do they sink in. Kiyosaki reminds us that, “Saving money is slow. You can become rich by saving money, but the price is time… your lifetime.” He adds that, “Many people today are not in the same professions as their parents…….but when it comes to money, investing, and retirement, they do exactly the same things. When it comes to money, many people are still swinging their parents’ axe.” How true!

I like the way the author explains the principle of leverage making it ever so simple: ‘Doing more with less’. The examples he gives are illuminating. “In the beginning, animals could run faster than humans, but today humans can travel faster and further than animals because they created tools of leverage, such as bicycles, cars, trucks, trains and planes. In the beginning, birds could fly and humans could not. Today, humans fly higher, further and faster than any bird.”

Kiyosaki points out that Bill Gates, Michael Dell, Ted Turner, Henry Ford and Thomas Edison did not finish school. I can’t help wondering what the world would have been like if Edison had concentrated on making money rather than on conducting his experiments. Of the Wright brothers Kiyosaki says, “They are prime examples of people who studied because they wanted to learn and not for grades; they worked hard for free without guarantees, took risks intelligently, and pushed themselves and the world into another reality.” Such examples are bound to inspire and motivate – and they certainly add spice to the core message of this book.

The author also points out some simple facts that every investor ought to know from the start. “Out of ten investments, the odds are two to three will be bad, two to three will be good, and everything in the middle just lies around like a lazy dog.”

Overall Assessment: This book could have been written in 100 pages instead of 550. Then it would have been another masterpiece.

Retire Young, Retire Rich: How to Get Rich Quickly and Stay Rich Forever!
Author: Robert T Kiyosaki with Sharon L Lechter
Publisher: Warner Books
Publication Date:: 2002

Contributor: Pushpa Kurup lives in Trivandrum, India and works in the IT sector.

“The Accidental Universe” by Alan Lightman

Books We've Read AdminLeave a comment

the-accidental-universe

While it is all too easy to get caught up in our everyday lives—the daily grind, the demands, the challenges, the joys, the sorrows—all we need to do to get some sense of perspective is look up at the stars. Not only are we tiny specks on one planet which itself is part of a solar system comprising other planets, that solar system itself is one of millions of such stars in our galaxy, the Milky Way, which itself is one of millions of galaxies in our universe! And as if that is not enough to make us feel completely insignificant, space scientists are now postulating that our universe may actually be one of multiple universes—a “multiverse.” If that is true, the implications are even more staggering, making us even less than insignificant in the larger scheme of things—if such a thing is even possible.

For those who find this “bigger picture” intriguing and fascinating and would like to understand it better, The Accidental Universe is a must-read. Written by Alan Lightman who is both a theoretical physicist and a writer, the book is able to take the concept of space­—the science of which is incredibly complex—and present it in humanistic terms that everyone can relate to. And this is really important for anyone trying to understand their place in the universe without having to devote their lives to becoming space scientists, astronomers, astronauts, or theoretical physicists like Lightman—because any of these professionals could spend their lifetimes doing what they do without pondering on the personal implications of what they are studying, or even if they do, lacking the ability to express it. Who better than a writer to present the complex science of space in a non-scientific way that is accessible to everyone, and most importantly, to still preserve the feeling of awe at the idea of being part of something so mysterious, so magical, so “out of the world”?

Although the title of the book is The Accidental Universe, it is actually a collection of essays on several different aspects of the universe in addition to accidental, such as temporary, spiritual, symmetrical, gargantuan, lawful, and disembodied. Each of these chapters makes for a fascinating read in and of itself, although I found that the first chapter on the “accidental” universe seemed to be the crux of the book, capturing most of the current ideas and discoveries about the universe. It seems to provide an answer to the most fundamental puzzle of our existence, at least of the physical aspect of it, namely: How come? How come there is life­­—of which we are a part—on this planet?

The answer, based on current cosmological discoveries and thought, seems to be that our universe is only one of an enormous number of universes, each of which has different properties and laws; and of all the possible permutations, the universe we live in happens to have the properties to support life as we know it. (Hence, the term “accidental.”) For all we know, any of the other universes has the properties to support an entirely different kind of life. We can only conjecture about this rather than know for certain, as current science has not reached beyond the boundaries of our own universe. And given that even within our own universe, stars are billions of light-years away and that our own life spans are only about a hundred years, it seems impossible to know for certain. In fact, we do not even know for sure whether there is life elsewhere in our own universe apart from on our little tiny planet, although it seems difficult to imagine why there shouldn’t be.

We seem to getting into the realm of science fiction here, but The Accidental Universe makes no such conjectures or predictions about life elsewhere and instead remains firmly rooted in the actual science of what we know. At the same time, the book also veers into topics that would seem more philosophical than scientific. For example, with regard to the fundamental existential question of why we exist, we need to keep in mind that the only reason why this question is raised in the first place is because we are here, in this universe, to ponder it. As Lightman so eloquently puts it, “From the cosmic lottery hat containing zillions of universes, we happened to draw a universe that allowed life. But then again, if we had not drawn such a ticket, we would not be here to ponder the odds.” The idea is a bit of a mind-bender, but the bottom line is that even if we were not here, if the happy accident of our particular universe supporting our life form did not happen, the world comprising these multiverses would still exist. We would not be here to ask what life means, as we would not exist. So should we ask for meaning in life simply because we exist?

It’s a tricky question, as human beings have a deep-rooted need for meaning in their lives. Perhaps by learning more about the universe, ours as well as the many others that might be out there, we might come to realize that the question itself makes no sense and therefore the search for meaning is futile. By a random chance, we exist, so let’s just make the best of it.

The Accidental Universe: The World You Thought You Knew
Author: Alan Lightman
Publisher: Vintage; Reprint edition
Publication Date: October 2014

Contributor: Lachmi Khemlani runs a technology publication in the San Francisco Bay Area.

“The Days of Abandonment” by Elena Ferrante

Books We've Read AdminLeave a comment

the-days-of-abandonment

I wish I hadn’t read this book. It’s about how a woman goes to pieces slowly and painfully after being abandoned by her husband of fifteen years. The opening line sets the stage for what is to follow: One April afternoon, right after lunch, my husband announced that he wanted to leave me. He did it while we were cleaning the table, the children were quarrelling as usual in the next room….”

An all too familiar tale told in excruciating detail by a famous author who has preferred to remain incognito. Her Neapolitan novels are making waves, and that’s what prompted me to pick out this earlier work of hers (or is it ‘his’?). I must confess I’m sorely disappointed. The book begins with a whimper and ends with a whimper. I’m not without empathy for suffering women, but I prefer the strong ones who face life squarely. I can’t help thinking that J K Rowling is a single mother too and look at what she accomplished. I know it isn’t fair to compare, but it’s just that I hate sob stories, and this one really takes the cake.

The book is not without merit though. For women in similar situations, it might strike a familiar chord. A plethora of negative emotions, the sinking of the woman’s spirit into a deep, dark abyss of despair is vividly and convincingly portrayed. That’s why I wish I hadn’t read it.

The author is undoubtedly a master at portraying intense emotions. “After my marriage, I had quit and followed Marc through the world, wherever he was sent by his work as an engineer. New places, new life. And to keep under control the anxieties of change, I had, finally, taught myself to wait patiently until every emotion imploded and could come out in a tone of calm, my voice held back in my throat so that I would not make a spectacle of myself.”

Every sentence weighs heavy upon the heart. Sad, sad, sad – that’s all there is to it.

Overall assessment: Read only if you enjoy wallowing in pain.

The Days of Abandonment
Author: Elena Ferrante (translated from Italian by Ann Goldstein)
Publisher: Europa Editions
Publication Date: 2005 (first published in 2002 in Italy)

Contributor: Pushpa Kurup lives in Trivandrum, India and works in the IT sector.