Boredom

'Ashvamedha' by Aparna Sinha is another meaningful addition to the fine tradition of contemporary Indian writing. It represents a worthy effort to give a spin off to an age-old tale of power-seeking. This is the story of Ashwin Jamwal, an honest IAS officer. His honesty and his dream to bring a change leads to him transferring to other cities. He then realizes that he would have to think of innovative measures to do good. He succeeds in his technique until he gets screwed to an extent that he has to resign. He then joins Politics and becomes quite successful. Instances of dirty politics and corruption are spilled over in the book. The story kicks off at an alarmingly fast pace and is laced with twists in regular intervals to keep the reader engaged. Somewhere midway amidst all the subplots which made sense eventually the pace of the story slackened only to pick up pace again towards the end. The biggest USP of this book is gotta be the topsy-turvy turns it provides in multitude...

There was a time during my academic pursuits when I had to present an argument for the sake of my grades that Global Warming was a hoax and Al Gore, its biggest promoter, was nothing more than a crook.......Now some years later, my conviction about Al Gore is still strong (based on facts) but Global Warming, no it isn't a hoax anymore. Every year we hear that this year is gonna be the warmest and I feel shit.....It's as much true a fact that Sun rises in the east and I now know that my professor wasn't going to give a shit what global warming was, sitting in a well air-conditioned room. It was a test for checking out our debating skills and although I won that day comprehensively, I now feel like a person who is deceiving none but himself....... On 21st October, Leonardo Di Caprio, a prominent environmentalist, an UN representative and goodwill ambassador and actor par excellence, released a documentary titled 'Before the Flood' in association with National Geogr...

'Roots' is a maiden effort at writing a book by Mr. Rahul Bhatt and he has made an utterly convincing debut. In the preceding 9 months of my book-reviewing career, I have come across 7 debut efforts and among them all, Mr. Bhatt's work stands tall. A book so enriching in plotting its stories and developing its characters that you will ultimately start feeling a part of it. This is a genuine effort at writing a standard novel where the author doesn't let the readers go off the hook even when they finish his work in multiple outings and every time you start picking up on this book, it makes sure it owns you. It's a voluminous book that demands the attention of readers and through it's sheer engrossing narrative and depth, weave magical spells on you. In the center of this book is the life-stories of Nakua Panditjee and Sarita/Rashmi. Panditjee has his roots in Tehri of old which is as most of us now is under Tehri Lake when the construction of a dam was announce...

There is a sort of peculiar goofiness interspersed with innocence and environmental serenity that makes South Korean film 'very special'. 'The Way Home' was my first South Korean filming experience and it mesmerized me with its simplicity. Later on, I passed it on to several of my friends and they all loved it. Then there were some rom-coms and dramatic affairs from some of the most prominent Korean auteurs and they were quite different from usual Asian and Hollywood genre films in their treatment of story and characters. More so, I found out that like me, there are several aficionado of South Korean films and they were all near by.....Very surprising indeed. A day before yesterday, I stumbled across a home entertainment guide for October 2016 on rogereberts.com and it listed 'The Wailing', a South Korean metaphysical thriller cum horror flick among its most praised picks. I watched it yesterday as soon as I got the chance and the experience was 'overwhelm...

I would like to start this review by saying that if you are going to buy this book simply on the basis of it's cover and blurb, you would be grossly mistaken. They are ambiguous, non-appealing and meaningless at best. There is no way they both would give you an idea how good this book is content-wise. Two beautiful successful ladies in their late 20s headline the plot and they each have got a scarred past. One of them, Rihana, the more vivacious and extrovert among the two, is a successful painter and she seeks solace in 'men' and her often-went-wrong 'sexual misadventures'. Her roommate, Zara, is more intelligent among the two and has been at the wrong end of a 'false' marriage with a gay man. Zara is a businesswoman and makes all her decision in life with aplomb. They both complement each other completely but are also unaware of each other's fateful 'past'. Their maid, Nandini, her daughter Gudiya and her abusive husband 'Harish' are a...

At last year's book fair, I rounded exactly 191 shops to purchase a copy of Maxim Gorky's masterpiece 'Mother'. It was the very first book of my 18 purchases that i started to read. Almost 6 months down the line and it isn't finished yet....reason a simple one....it represents a hero of working class in a feudalistic environment led by Russian Tsars and thus basically champions the idea of socialism. Socialism is what I come to believe of is nothing but a shameless form of capitalism....I would call it thus, pseudo-capitalism...example is China and I wouldn't say much to gain your approval. I am writing this piece to celebrate the literary style of Maxim Gorky though. He was the most celebrated author of 20th century which boasted of pioneers such as G.B.Shaw, Antole France, Ibsen and not to leave the Russians, all of them a domineering force themselves, Tolstoy, Pushkin, Turgnev, Dostoyevsky and Gogol among many but Gorky eclipsed everyone of them with his sh...

Continuing from my last post about 'Birdman', I want to add that this is the film that resembled the most with Rajat Kapoor's critically acclaimed film, 'Aankhon Dekhi' from Bollywood in terms of its depiction of 'Super-Realism'. In Birdman, Micheal Keaton tries to commit suicide on-stage out of sheer frustration for not being able to fulfill a promising acting prophecy whereas in Aankhon Dekhi, Sanjay Mishra does the exact opposite and in order to know the death up-close, he jumps from a cliff. Micheal Keaton hurts his nose instead and gets rave review for his 'super-real' performance. Sanjay Mishra, I believe, dies in Aankhon Dekhi (The ending of it is anybody's guess). Now talking about cast and crew of Birdman, Micheal Keaton headlines the roll credit while Naomi Watts, Zach Galifiankis, Edward Norton, Amy Ryan and Emma Stone play supporting cast. Micheal Keaton who lastly reminded us of his supreme acting talent back in 1989 with Tim Burto...