Book : A Fine Balance by Rohiton Mistry

Had read this one in June 2006 and I can still swear by it. One of the best fiction I have come read.The reason am putting it is also cos am reading another one of Mistry's book.



Just finished reading "A Fine Balance" by Rohiton Mistry. One of the best pieces of fiction I have ever read. The characters are alive,all around you. It is set in time of emergency and the four strangers who are together through the trying times. Entertainment is what it offers as it helps you step in another era and world.. Though the ending is tragic but that doesn't make the endeavour of reading worthless. In fact it makes it all the more worthwhile. The book starts and end dramatically and yet almost real and believable way. High on my recommendation list.

My quote from this one:
"After all, our lives are but a sequence of accidents – a clankingchain of chance events. A string of choices - casual or deliberate – which add up to that one big calamity we call life"

Book : Family Matters - Rohiton Mistry

Pg 221.

"Everyone underestimates their own life. Funny thing is, in the end, all our stories - your life, my life, they are the same. In fact, no matter where you go in the world, there is only one important story: of youth, and loss, and yearning for redemption. So we tell the same story, over and over. Just the details are different."

Pg 347.

"What folly made young people, even those in their middle age, think they were immortal? How much better, their lives, if they could remember the end. Carrying your death with you everyday would make it hard to waste time on unkindness and anger and bitterness, on anything petty. That was the secret : remembering your dying time, in order to keep the stupid and ugly out of your living time."

The two quotes above sum up what Family Matters is about. It's an ordinary story of love , happiness , sorrow and wealth. It is the story of Nariman's death and his life.The book reminded me of some ways of the Death of Vishnu. The common element between the two books is the element of Mumbai and death. Both the protagonists in the books are lying on their deathbed as the vague images of their life move in front of them. The background in the book is the romanticized images of Mumbai. The difference between the two is that while Family Matters revolves around Nariman's Family , there is no family at all so to say for Vishnu.

It's far less complicated than A fine Balanace by Rohiton Mistry but still as engaging and interesting. There are the dark elements to the entire book and it is depressing nevertheless but one thing that I love about Mistry's book , is that there is no end. It has a very slice of life feel to it and that is where the reader, I guess, connects to him. It does challenge love , religion and wealth all three together.

Jal , Coomy , Edul , Roxana , Yezda , Jehangir , Murad, Vikram and of course Nariman , all characters are so well defined, flesh and blood as the cliche goes and so humane that its hard not to relate. I particularly loved the scene when Nariman is about to die and violin is played by Daisy aunty.

It is not the most entertaining book , far from it, but nevertheless it is engaging and interesting! I would surely recommend this one but a word of caution about the depressing setting. Memoirs from a man on deathbed suffering from Parkinson's and in capable of ablutions is not essentially pleasant. But so is life, not always pleasant!

Book : Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini

As it turns out, Kiterunner is on the best sellers list but that was not the reason why I picked it. I was given this one by a dear friend and with high recommendation so I thought it was worth a read. and it wasnt disappointing.

The distant father son relationship, the changes in setting after almost half the book has passed by and the ending , all have elements of beauty and surprise. It is bleak and in a way hopeful, but nevertheless engaging all through.

Its only a coinicidence that strikes me now that I reviewed this book on 11th Sept. The book is about Afgahnistan and about the many Afghanistanis who have left their native land only to survive and for no ther reason.

Read it you are fond of heartwrenching tragedies.

It's a good read for sure.

Book: the best a man can get - John O' farell

....the best a man can get.....
This is the story of an advertising professional - into creative - Michael Adams is a composer of ad jingles. So it doesn't surprise that the name of the book has also been derived from the tag line of a brand. But the similarity ends there.

Watch the ad. It says - "You know that feeling, Every guy has had it. You are unbeatable , Unstoppable....... the best a man can get". On the contrary the protagonist of the book is quite the opposite. He is only getting towards his worst. He leads a double life, has no sense of direction living from one lie to another; then he decides enough is enough! The story is hilarious till that point in time.

But like a bollywood cinema script, after the realisation, he does change and change for better. There are many a twist and turn in the book to keep one glued to it. But somehow the end disappointed me . It was "....they lived happily ever after...." kind of ending. I expected more or may be less. I prefer books that are left open ended. Somehow I feel life is like that - with open ended loose ends - nothing comes to a conclusive end - the end is always gradual or at time there is none.

What I loved were some of the author's insights and instances he created like:

- The casual almost callous life of bachelor's sharing a flat.(Have been through it!)
- The fact that most people spend 8 hrs in office not essentially working but because its mandatory to do so and effectively work for not more than 2-3 hrs/day.
- Life is difficult.Kids are boring. Marriages suck after a while.
- You have to work towards making everything else in your life work.

The one final quote from the book. It isn't one of my favorite quotes.It is one from his moment of realisation and the turning point in the book.
Pg 262
".....Dawn was breaking over the common and I suddenly felt I had got it. I understood how all this worked; the riddle was solved in my head.You have to just spend time with the people you love. You don't try to change them, you don't get annoyed because they don't behave how you want them to behave, you put up with boredom or tantrums or repetition and you just spend time with them......just pass time with them and then everyone is happy, even you in the end."

Read it for the hilarious events, twists and turns and the dark humor over a lazy summer weekend! But if its literary genius you are looking for then avoid it.

Book/ Theatre : William Darymple's City of Djinns

I had read this book long time back. I had almost forgotten it.I had read it in Mumbai and had enjoyed it - visiting the by lanes of my native city vicariously - by lanes that I didn't even know existed - The New Delhi of the immigrant Punjabis vs. the Old Delhi of the Muslims and Hindus.I did remember it in bits and pieces.It did come back to me when I crossed the odd historical monuments that Darymple so passionately discovers through the book and so aptly metions arise out of nowhere reminding us of the history that has been lost and yet exists in its physical remnants. He moves back in time from 1989 to the era of Mahabharata. It was a book I enjoyed and I have to thank my colleauge who lent it to me in Mumbai. But that was then, almost 2 years back.

I heard a couple of weeks back that City of Djinns was being staged in Delhi. I was dying to watch a play (Missing what I did in Mumbai) and City of Djinns - there was no way I was going to miss it. Ask me now if it was worth it - I would say DEFINITELY!

Its a challenge to convert a book that records history into a play but it was done magnificently at the Mati Ghar theatre at IGNCA, Janpath. The play was performed outdoors , in the open , where you could smell and feel delhi. It made me proud in a way to be a part of the experience, to be witnessing what i had read 2 years ago come back to me in the three hours of that performance - page by page. I had wondered before seeing it, how would they ever be able to do it! It was a mammoth task to say the least but they did it and did it well and credit goes to the young director - Rudradeep Chakrabarti. He has done a commendable job.

Tom Alter, Zohra Segal and Shivardhan Trivedi - were just great in the play. Tom Alter performed almost continuously from start to end. It does require some effort to be there across 8-10 different sets and keep moving from one to the other without a break.

The sufi music , the bursting crackers of Diwali ,the victims of 1984 riots ,the taxistand of Balwinder , the cock fight (Kukkad Fat) of the old city, the Luytens Delhi ,the remnants of the Mughal Era, and the excavations of the Mahabharata - it all came alive in the three hours that passed by on a saturday evening that I will surely remember for a long time to come!

I can write and write more but my words will not to justice so just catch it if you can, its an experience.Its on till the 26th of April.

Book : The Color of Love - Priti Nair

This is an interesting piece of fiction. It could be very well be titled as "Practical step by step guide to PR and Media Lies". That's what the story is all about.

Its about a painter at heart turned lawyer trying to break free of cobweb of lies that she builds around herself as the story progresses.It is inspiring to the extent that it does motivate you at some level to believe in yourself and just take the plunge. Somewhere I felt some shades of the alchemist's universal conspiracy theory in action and at others the media ritual theory of participative media.

So here is a woman who fools everyone and lies to the entire universe to be true to herself.

Media plays an important role in the build up. She creates a fictional character to live her life through the surrogate.What does media do?It makes fiction turn real so everyone knows about FORUKI - the fictional character.Media is news hungry , believes all you say ,investigates life and above all has the power to make or break lives.That's the power of media.

So whats with the color of love? Its a fun read. I don't know whether to call it Chic-lit or something else. But if you enjoy comedy of errors - this one is for you. Though it's not a must read.

Book: Shantaram

Shantaram. The book I took longest to read. If it were some other book I would have given it up in so much time, but I couldn't. It was because it was Shantaram. The book I read each day to walk vicariously with the author through the lanes and by lanes of Mumbai. I have lived in Mumbai for 4 years and the city just grows on you. I know it and I can vouch for it. If you love that city despite its pace and dirt you will love this book too.




There are various parts of the book that I really love.

On Love : Pg 372 :
I never believed in love at first sight until it happened to me. Then when it did happen, it was as if every atom in my body had been changed, somehow : as if I had become charged with heat and light. I was different , forever, just for the sight of her. And the love that opened in my heart seemed to drag the rest of my life behind it , from that moment onward. I heard her sound in every lovely sound the wind wrapped around me.I saw her face in every in brilliant mirrored flares of memory, everyday.

On Man and Money: Pg 804
You can't reason with a man who has no sense of money and its....its value. Its the one thing all civilised men have in common, don't you agree? If money doesn't mean anything there is no civilisation. There is nothing.

On Life : Pg 871
Every Life , every love , every action and feeling and thought has its reason and significance: its beginning and the part it plays in the end. Sometimes, we do see. Sometimes, we see the past so clearly, and read the legend of its parts with such acuity, that every stitch of time reveals its purpose, and a kind of message is enfolded in it.

There are many such moments in the book but the thing that stands out most are the characters . Lin and Karla , Prabhaker , Ulla and Khader Bhai , each one of them is so flesh and blood that you want the book to never end.