The long way home...

She woke up with a sudden disturbing thought in her head. Barely able to sleep the night, she got up from her bed and walked towards the bathroom. It still wasn't 'morning' yet. She could still feel the pain in her legs as she tried to walk. Tears streaming down her face, head in agony, she closed her eyes and clenched her teeth - a foolish attempt at stopping the pain flowing through her organs, through her body. 

Surrounded by dilapidated walls, adorned with dripping water and moss, the stench of her house had become her perfume. When she opened her eyes in front of a broken, vintage mirror - she could finally see herself - broken in places - with voices of turmoil and an entity screaming for absolution. An entity that was not 'her'. She looked away, gasped and made a faint attempt at twisting her hair into a knot. Standing there, alone - and now lonely - flashes of bright memories started filling her brown eyes. She tried to escape them, she tried to escape what she had done, but she could not. That's when her fingers reached for her face - trying to discern the shape of her fresh bruises - marks gifted to her because of what she had done. She tried controlling it all, inside of her, until she couldn't contain the turmoil any more. She punched what used to be an otherwise beautiful mirror in its prime, and walked away.

Her feet were covered with dry muck. Cuts and bruises embellished her entire body. Somewhere one could even see thin streams of blood flowing down to the ground. She walked towards the shower and subjected herself to a semi-powerful force of water. The burning sensation from the cuts when the water hit them - made her dizzy. She almost kept losing her balance every now and then. The entity inside of her felt the 'burn' too. And since the entity resided in her, her innards burnt as well. When the cuts could produce no more burning sensations, she gave up and walked out of the bathroom. 

What was she doing? Was she willing to take that much pain? Did she have any idea how painful it would be for her before she committed the crime? But the deed was done. One can't undo what has been done.

With puffy eyes and the colour 'red' being associated from head-to-toe on her physical self, she crashed back on to her bed. Now even the bed felt like a bed of rock with no comfort whatsoever. As she lay there, still as a boulder, cold as a ghost, she could not avoid thinking about what she had done. She could not stop thinking about the entity inside of her. She closed her barely open eyes, and drifted silently into watching the 'movie' that replayed in her mind from previous night.

It was all happy. The past. Then it became unhappy - the present. No matter what she did, things always fell back. She frantically tried, desperately even, but her brain was fried. Emotions were over-stretched. Feelings were brutally bruised. State was close to demolition. The last straw kept breaking, and when that wasn't enough - one more last straw kept breaking. Apparently, there was an almost in-exhaustive stock of last straws. Maybe to her it wasn't about the last straws. What was it about then? She once knew it. But now no more. Her body was infused with guilt, pain and remorse - she would take back her words, her actions - not all - but some of them anyway. Until there came a time, when the entity and 'she' couldn't take it any more. Their thinking, their words, their communication - all were on two different tangents. They wanted to make it work - but no matter what they did, all they got was pain from each other. They will never understand each other. How did they understand each other at first then?

The entity experienced fresh wounds every time. She did too. Because the entity was in pain. Because at times - it was her fault. She didn't mean to not understand. But she couldn't understand his words. A lot was broken. A lot was tattered and bruised. And the streak of turmoil continued. Until she realised - she had sucked out the very life out of the entity. And last night was the final dose. The final inch of life was left to be absorbed. And so it happened. She sucked and sucked the life - and now - the entity resides inside of her. The marks were the entry point - some fresh ones and some more than a year old.

She opened her eyes as she felt tears fall perennially. She could hear him scream under his breath to be let out - but she couldn't. It's not that she wanted this. But that was the natural process. It happened - and she couldn't stop it. She felt helpless. She touched her tears to wipe them out; only to find that they weren't tears. The fresh red fluid kept flowing from her eyes, and some of it had already started coagulating from being exposed for too long without being disturbed. She knew what was to come. The feeling was strong. A faint smile started filling her bruised and cut face - what otherwise was called a 'beautiful face' by the entity. She could feel her breath going faint. It was only a matter of seconds before her lungs started collapsing and paleness substituting the reddish hue. In those final moments, there wasn't much she could do. But what she could do, was think about all the precious moments that were a gift to her. The laughter, the chuckles, the Voice, the care, the affection, the Love... It wasn't a peaceful death, but the transition was subdued by the memories. And with one final gasp of air, the entity left her lifeless body only to hold hands in this final time. To depart the world... Together. To be with each other... Forever...

Salvation of a Saint - Blogadda Book Review

Salvation of a Saint is a yet another thriller by the bestseller Japanese author Keigo Higashino. His choice of titles is ‘interesting’. His first novel – Devotion of Suspect X – was unimaginably one of the best thriller novels I have ever come across and hence, expectations from this book were on similar lines.

The cover page is ok. The girl isn’t pretty or anywhere close to ‘angel’-like or the likes of a ‘saint’.

The story revolves around the murder of Yoshitaka Mashiba – a wealthy businessman. While he’s dead and gone, all fingers point at his wife Ayane Mashiba, since she’s got the motive – an unfaithful husband cheating on Ayane with her apprentice Hiromi Wakayama. Not just that, she’s also pregnant. And the whole deal with Yoshitaka was to be with someone who can give him a child – and if his current girlfriend/wife can’t do so, he dumps them and moves on to the ones who can. So well, the motive’s surely strong for Ayane. But the thing is – Ayane was a 1000 miles away at her parents’ place. No conclusive leads to track, no sign of how the murder was committed. All detective Kusanagi, junior detective Utsumi and an old friend/physicist Yukawa (more like a Japanese Sherlock nicknamed Detective Galileo in the book) had was arsenic acid in the coffee that Yoshitaka was drinking and a water filter mystery – plus the fact that Kusanagi couldn’t think straight because he was falling for Ayane. But through continuous investigations and what appeared to be a dead-end case and a perfect crime, the mystery was finally solved.

While the thriller picked up pace from the beginning, it fell flat in between. The investigations, the interrogations, the cross-questionings and all that jazz was a bit far too over-stretched in between. It all just appeared to be running round and round in the loop with similar iterations every now and then. And the climax was a major disappointment. To know that the killer was the same person most of the characters in the book were doubting since the beginning, took away the ‘thrill’ of it all. There wasn’t much fun and I kept losing interest even though it’s an easy and smooth read. The only spark towards the end of the book was to find out that the scheme and the preparations to kill the victim had been plotted a year ago from the day of the actual murder.

Language is simple and gripping. There was a need for some more emotions in the book because it just felt like a bland one. This novel failed to deliver the same or more level of satisfaction that one would derive and expect after reading a Higashino novel. There weren’t any twists and turns to throw the reader off the trail of the killer and confuse them with who the exact killer is until the very end. So overall, it’s an easy read but not really up to the mark. I was really looking forward to reading this book and was excited only to be disappointed in the end.

This review is a part of the biggest Book Review Program for Indian Bloggers. Participate now to get free books!

Tantra - Blogadda Book Review

Tantra by Adi – honestly, it could do a little bit better with a different title for a book with stories of supernatural nature, mumbo-jumbos, black magic and the ilk. The story revolves around a female protagonist (imagine Kate Beckinsale from the Underworld series – with 50% of that charisma and raw amateurish attitude in a salwar Kameez and in Delhi!) called Anu Aggrawal who’s a vampire slayer (or guardian as she and her kind are called in the book) in NYC. She relocates herself to Delhi in search of her lover’s killer. During this search, she stumbles upon matters much graver and darker than just the vampires (Yes, vampires in Delhi and India too for that matter!). The book details Anu’s journey through various tribulations and trepidations – from dealing with ‘dekhan-dikhai’ events for arranged marriage (in the midst of trying to save the world!) to uncovering and practicing various mantras to summon weapons of destruction for that ultimate enemy-slaughter combined with the ‘tantra’ or the ‘black magic’ and the spiritual secrets along the way! In this quest, she’s aided by various characters – some of them are her fellow colleagues aka vampire slayers/guardians, the vampire head himself (this had to happen eventually if they were to fight another enemy of a different type altogether), a professor and a real high-level priest. This book, from what I gather is the first in the series, hence some mysteries are left un-deciphered in this book for obvious reasons.

The cover page, quite like the title, could have done better than putting up such a gimmicky graphical representation of the plot – which sadly did not justify the quality of the plot and the plot itself (which is pretty nice). Depicting the protagonist in such a funny manner only made me take her a little less seriously throughout the book because I couldn’t get the damn yellowy-tee-with-black-skirts/pants/stockings?!-girl out from my head (and the yellow and black combi till date reminds me of only cabs in Mumbai)! And with the bulging-eye-trying-really-hard-to-scare evil on the left and the moonish skull on the right with the girl below fail to show any harmony and appear like three separate images placed on a landscape!

The nuances of lives, emotions, practicality, spirituality, black magic and vampires have been illustrated quite well in the book. While the plot is nice too and the quality of introducing twists and turns in the book is interesting too, the publishing house did a really poor job at proofreading the book. There’s ‘scared’ instead of ‘sacred’, ‘cwith’ instead of ‘with’ and many such typos time and again which really take away from the pleasure of reading the book smoothly.

There are a few things that are difficult to imagine – like a Kate Beckinsale type vampire slayer in Delhi in a salwar Kameez! Honestly? What’s the logic in her wearing a salwar kameez when she’s from NYC and could be much better off and accustomed to western wear like denims and tees? Wouldn’t that have been more comfortable in getting on with the day-to-day action instead of jumping around and fighting in a salwar kameez?! The entire action-heroine image dissolves in the sweetness of the salwar kameez! Well, let’s hope Adi might change her attire to something more 'relatable' in the following sequels.

Overall, it was a nice book and the story is some-what gripping too, I liked the subtle but powerful climax which was visually appealing as well (if one would imagine). I hope the sequels don’t really indianise the essence of this book and the plot since the book, in parts, reminded me of the way Ashwin Sanghi’s Chanakya’s Chant was (interesting and engrossing) – rich in history but sophisticated in story.

This review is a part of the biggest Book Review Program for Indian Bloggers. Participate now to get free books!

Chilli, Chicks & Heart Attacks - Blogadda Book Review

‘Chilli, Chicks & Heart Attacks’. An absurd title and would make not much sense initially whatsoever. Though the Chilli bit still doesn’t make sense, but well, a book can’t be a 100% awesome, right? The highlight of this book was it being filled with slapstick humour, puns and startling insight – well those were the claims made by the author. My sole purpose was to find out if that was true! And indeed it almost was.

Starting with the cover page, I think the author Sanjaya Senanayake approved quite a literal version of the title. You see chilli, a half chick (I’m still amazed – why would you select such a picture to depict a ‘chick’?) and a stethoscope against an ochre yellow background. Too typical, too clichéd, too boring and who uses ochre yellow with such images? More so, because the book inside is so much better but I think the value of it only gets overthrown by such an opposing cover page. Also, there’s a discrepancy between the lingering title on the cover page and the inside page. The cover page says ‘The misadventures of an intern by Dr. Manjula Mendis’ and the inside page says ‘The misadventures of an intern, Dr. Manjula Mendis’ – the latter quite logically makes sense.

Moving on, the plot for the novel revolves around the protagonist Dr. Manjula Mendis (I was confused earlier if it was a ‘he’ or a ‘she’ because Manjula also is a name for girls!) and his trials and tribulations in his first year of internship. He’s got 6 other interns and a ‘heroine’ to complement him in this story. And this novel is actually in a diary format – the personal diary of a long-gone famous doctor woven into a story form with anecdotes and mysteries and lots of medical jargons! While there are interesting twists and turns and the way it’s written proves to be a breath of fresh air amidst every tom, dick and harry story published every day. Though there are a lot of medical terms that I couldn’t relate to because I’m unaware of all those, I still enjoyed reading the book for its pure writing style and a series of literally ‘misadventures’ and the romantic aspirations and the ‘horny’ angle and the various innumerous subtle emotions woven in conjunction with various people throughout the book. The language is semi-simple and quite apt for people who are not kids :p.

However, there are just a few things I think hampered the otherwise almost-brilliant novel. Since there was no mention about this being an almost 100 year old story set in the year 2009, when I first read the ‘message from the ‘editors’’ dated 11^th March, 2101 – I thought it was a typo. As I began reading the book, I wasn’t sure what to make of it and then there were nuggets of info in brackets and italics signed by the Editors – which eventually did lend a hand in making the reader feel as if it were an authentic account of Dr. Mendis’ life – but it took quite a while to deduce that. Secondly, if it’s a diary format i.e. instead of a new chapter, there is a new date and it claims to be a personal diary – there wouldn’t be ‘dialogues’ and such detailed descriptions all throughout – that’s not how one writes a diary – so I thought that the diary format – while being a nice concept did get a bit lost (so says the girl who loves ‘Diary of Anne Frank’ :”>). Another thing is that the entire novel appears to be based in an alternate reality or an alternate Utopia – because quite honestly, some of the things in the book are quite absurd like a doctor being directly or indirectly responsible for two deaths and not have a remorse – more so when the doctor is the ‘hero’. Aren’t heroes supposed to be emotional with a moral police in them lol? Also, it’s absurd to see so many happy endings slapping themselves in the book one after the other – it’s just not practical. And at the end, when the author is describing a ring – he says the centerpiece is a solitaire 3.5 cm wide?! Seriously?! How would you even keep it on your finger! Your finger would just weight down or might even come off (okay, a bit exaggeration there; but so says the girl who’s familiar with diamonds). Seriously, limits for ‘happy endings’ lol.

Keeping these flaws aside, I think this book really deserves to be read by those who enjoy humour and a carefree life and adore reading a quick, witty and sarcastically humorous book. This is one of those few books that have actually managed to become one of my favourite books (and that means a lot lol!!!). Happy Reading!

This review is a part of the biggest Book Review Program for Indian Bloggers. Participate now to get free books!