26, 27 & 28. The Hunger Games, Catching Fire and Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins

 



Trilogies.......
There are some trilogies like the "Lord of the Rings" which create magic with every chapter and every verse and keep pulling you deeper and deeper into them as you go on reading, some like the "Girl with the dragon tattoo" series which are absolute thrillers and keeps you on your toes. Then there are some hideous ones like the fifty shades of grey which makes you wonder what was the point of even writing such a book.
But then comes some refreshingly good, beautifully crafted ones like "The Hunger Games" which is almost like breath of fresh scented air and you feel like you are in love again.

"The Hunger Games" starts in a post-apocalyptic world where the countries as we know now no longer exist and in its place are 12 districts with one capitol as a leader for all the districts. Everyone the districts are at the mercy of the people and president of capitol. The capitol in order to establish its supremacy and absolute control over the districts, conducts an annual game called "The Hunger Games" where two children (between 12 and 18 years of age) chosen from every district are sent to fight to death. Only one person can emerge as a victor at the end.

So, when Katniss's 12 year old sister gets chosen, Katniss in order to save her little sister volunteers herself for the hunger games knowing that it will bring upon certain death. But does that happen? How can she survive everyone when the only thing she is good at is using bow and arrows. As Katniss evades death which comes so close to her every time, she becomes more and more popular. What does she do to survive ? Providing entertainment to the cruel mindset of people who take pleasure in children getting killed, how does Katniss finally exact her revenge ?

Along her path to the victory she comes across love and has to chose between two people who both love her immensely and would not even hesitate to sacrifice their lives for her. Who does she choose at the end ?

This is a story about Katniss Everdeen, about how she overcomes all the odds and horrors thrown upon her right from a very young age, about how she becomes the face of a massive rebellion against the capitol, about how she helps those rebels conquer over the evil, about the love that blossoms in her life, and above all about her extreme survivor's instinct which is the only thing that helps her every time in staying alive.

Warning: Do not attempt to read the first book without knowing where your next one is going to come from. Because the first two books end in a cliff hanger and you will be scratching your heads until you can get your hands on the next one.

I rate this book 8.5/10. It would have scored a perfect 10 had it not been for some sequences which almost feel like are being repeated.

23. The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Steig Larsson

I Must be one of the very last people to read this book. In spite of the book garnering so much success and worldwide fame, it somehow never captured my eye. I blame it partially on an absurd title which sounds so very cheesy. I just did not feel like picking it up and feel disappointed at the end.
But when I heard that Hollywood is making a movie out of it, I had to read the book, after all I thought, when I survived through “Twilight”, I can survive any nuclear bomb.

In spite of carrying such cynicism forward when I started this book, I was pleasantly surprised page after page. The book is not one of those fast paced action thrillers, but in spite of that it will grab and hold your attention throughout. This story almost spreads into your soul like a infection and lingers there even after a many weeks have gone by after completing it.

Coming to the story itself, It starts with two parallel stories, one is that of Mikael Blomkvist, a charming journalist, who is portrayed as some kind of a magnet to any woman who lies eyes on him. The other is that of Lisbeth Salander who is a very quiet and the biggest introvert you could ever meet. She is portrayed as someone whose mental condition is almost along the lines of Asperger’s Syndrome. But as you often find with people who are suffering from a kind of autism, she possesses a brilliant and an intelligent mind.

She is one of those quirky kind of an individual who prefers to express herself through tattoos which cover almost her entire body and has countless piercings. Well, there’s so much to describe about her, but doing that would almost give away half of the story.

The plot from there continues as to what happens in Blomkvist’s and Salander’s life individually. The extreme lows they go through in their life and how they try getting back up and face these challenges. All this sounds like an emotional roller coaster, and it is anything but that.

The author could have easily slipped up here and added 100 other pages of how they deal with their emotional nightmares, but he brilliantly twists the plot and it becomes much more interesting.

And when these two quiet forces(Blomkvist and Salander)meet in the second half, it just creates magic and together their sheer brilliance brings down some of the biggest evils there is.

Henry Vangner hires Blomkvist to find the killer of his niece who was murdered 40 years ago. Blomkvist with the help of Salander tries to uncover the truth behind this murder which no one could solve in the past 40 years. Even these kind of absurdities are actually overcome by the overall story.

It just goes to show the power of writing that by the end, we emotionally connect and fall in love with the character Lisbeth Salander who throughout the book comes across as one who does not have any emotions and is almost rude and keeps her distance from everyone around.
If you are not blown away after reading this book, well !! must say something wrong with your mental status !!

22. Something Fresh by P.G. Wodehouse

-         Blandings has impostors the way other houses have mice.

A quote from the book, which in one line summarizes the plot without the need to discuss it any further.

Two young neighbours and writers Ashe Marson and Joan Valentine for various reasons want to steal a Scarab (An Ancient Egyptian Artifact) belonging to an American absent minded millionaire, Lord Emsworth. Do they succeed and how does it affect their relationship? Meanwhile, Freddie Threepwood, engaged to the millionaire’s daughter, whose life is threatened when he is blackmailed with some incriminating letters which he doesn’t want to be revealed to his fiancée.

All this is written in Wodehouse’s own comical style, forming a brilliant book.

A quote of Wodehouse which I have wanted to post for long now

   “I believe there are two ways of writing novels. One is mine, making a sort of musical comedy without music and ignoring real life altogether; the other is going right deep down into life and not caring a damn “

So, true and only those ardent Wodehouse fans will know that he isnt’t everyone’s cup of tea and once you get used to that English tea you will never want anything else !!

21. Temple by Matthew Reilly

 Bought this book as it was recommended to me by a friend (Thanks Ashok) and also my past experiences with the author’s books were pleasant enough to trust him again.

As expected, I found this was a perfect plot for a Hollywood MI series movie. If you have never seen how a script or a screenplay for a movie would be, Reilly’s book might be the place to start.  This one definitely seems to have been written with Producers and Movie agents in mind.

Apart from all that, the book was indeed very good with a galore of action finding an unlikeliest hero in a university Professor for languages, William Race.

Race is called in to translate a 16^th century transcript written in Incan Language, a task which seems simple enough at beginning. But he gets pulled into all action which involves the Army and Navy of U.S and also some extreme terrorist organizations that are all behind an age old treasure.

Everyone reaches a very old temple in Peru, Southern America in search of Incan Treasure hidden in an ancient temple. Only when they try force opening the door of the temple they realize that "Some Doors are meant to remain unopened ". They are faced with some fantastic beasts which are guarding the temple treasure.

How the U.S team gets past them and the terrorists group who have already reached there and get hold of the treasure forms the main plot.

As if this wasn’t enough there are some locals who have been living there for centuries and also fiercely protecting their treasures.

All this action is pleasantly compensated with a few romantic scenes thrown in.

This entire Drama is unfolded in a brilliant way and told in a very gripping tale.

It’s definitely worth a read. Would rate it 8.5 out of 10

19 & 20. Ice Station and Area 7 by Matthew Reilly

Going to write only one review for both the books as I didn't find anything different in them even though the author tried really hard for that.

Ice station is based on a research centre in Antarctica.

Area 7 is based on a research centre in the deserts of Utah.

Other than that I found zilch.

Both has got a team of marines reconnaissance unit (The same unit as this is a second in the series) In both the books the main theme is that the good people(the marines) are trapped inside the centre with the bad people and are trying to save their asses.

And in both the books there's a time bomb ticking over their heads !

There's just too much of running around. Too much of description of the vehicles in which they are trying to escape and just too much of action going on.

In the midst of all this the main plot of the books just disappears because we are only thinking as to who would get killed next.

Both the books involve scientists who are on the verge of a huge discovery and become the reason to attract all this attention. The Marines unit are the one who try protect them and their discoveries and thus begins all this cat and mouse chases.

Oh! I found one more difference amongst the books. In Ice Station the hero of the book goes deep underwater in the frozen sea to escape briefly from his enemies and in Area 7 he actually goes into the space (yeah you read that right!!)

he actually gets into a space shuttle and it travels above the earth and he ends up in the outer space for a brief amount of time.

Whew !!

18. In Her Shoes by Jennifer Weiner

This is a story about 2 sisters Rose and Maggie who have absolutely nothing in common except for their shoe sizes.

Elder sister Rose has everything going on for her with a high profile lawyer job, a good looking boyfriend, lots of money. She also has loads of designer shoes but never wears them as she is insecure about her weight and just stacks it up in her closet.

The younger sister is a good looking and good for nothing kind. She has dyslexia and lack of confidence in herself and has difficulties finding a job. She stays mostly on her father and step mother's money and at times with her sister.

This goes on until one day Rose comes home and finds Maggie in bed with her boyfriend which leads to big altercation between them and she throws Maggie out of her house.

The younger sister now finds herself on street with nowhere to go when she finds a letter from her grandmother in Florida amongst her old stuff. And so she goes to stay with her grandmother.

The rest of the story is about how the sisters find their true characters and how they really need each other in their lives and how they make amends with each other and their past.

This is truly an endearing and a heart warming story and anyone who has a sister can actually connect with this one even more.

And also for people who are really lazy to read a book they can see the movie which was made with the same title starring Toni Collette and Cameron Diaz as the Elder and Younger sisters.

17. Doomsday Conspiracy by Sidney Sheldon

I only have 2 questions to the author..

A) Are you kidding me?

and

B) Are you frikkin kidding me ??

This is the story line.

An alien spacecraft crashes on some fields of Switzerland. A tourist bus going through that area stops and 11 people witness the event.
The NSA eliminates all of these witnesses one by one in the name of National Security and the man responsible for this bloody trail finds himself running for life at the end.
Does he escape or not forms the second half of the book.

The fact that none of these tourists managed to get a single picture of the event and the only one who does get few pics ends up dead in a fire at his home along with all the pictures sounds far fetched.
And get this, the aliens supposedly come to earth to warn the officials of all major countries that we should stop polluting the atmosphere and close all industries else they would wage a war against us.

The whole concept sounds ridiculous but it does manage to get one point across. Global Warming. It's definitely a nice thought that other aliens care more about the place where we live in than us humans can ever.

16. Play Dirty by Sandra Brown

It's a story about an American football player, Griff Burkett, who is at the top of his game but gets involved in gambling, gathers up such huge debts that his only option to work them off is to get into a match fixing deal with some bookies.

But he gets caught red handed and is sent to prison for serving a sentence.

He thinks his problem should end there but well, it doesn't. Even after he is released he is stalked by someone who is very keen on putting him behind bars for an unsolved murder. He gets involved in a secret affair with a very rich businessman's wife and gets trapped in a huge web of betrayal.

The story continues with how he redeems himself of all the accusations and if at all he lives to see another day.

The way Sandra Brown has written the novel is very unique. The mysteries are hidden beneath one another. And these layers start opening up only at the very end.

I didn't find the book to be a "thriller" as its categorized to be, I think it should come under the category of "Late Bloomers". Up until midway I did not even know what was happening.

So, if you find yourself yawning up until half way through the book, I guess its a pretty normal reaction.

15. Evil Under the Sun by Agatha Christie

Was getting bored of reading long and intense novels for some time now. So, chose this quick read by Agatha Christie.

I don't think much of a review is needed here. Anyone who is familiar with her work especially the Hercule Poirot series can guess pretty much what it's about.

A seaside resort, with many guests having a good time and in the middle of a day a murder happens. Hercule Poirot along with the local police try to find the murderer who is definitely one among the guests at the resort.

What makes her novels so interesting is that she lays down the clues as and when the police find them. So, it keeps us guessing and glued to the book.

14. Lottery by Patricia Wood

Very reminiscent of the movie Forrest Gump.

To be stupid one must have an IQ of 75 or less but Perry L. Crandall has an IQ of 76 and this winner of Orange Prize for fiction book is all about him and how he survives in this ever greedy world.

Perry's world revolves around his grandmother. Before she passes away she teaches Perry all the essential things in life, how to be organized, how to play lottery and especially whom to trust and who not to.

But as luck has it he suddenly wins a million dollars in lottery and that's when the story picks up the pace. All his relatives swoop in on him and try to get his winnings.

Does Perry give in to the nagging of his cousins or his few trusted friends come to his rescue ? That forms the rest of the book.

Its an immensely light and a delightful read. Enjoyed every page of it. I am rating this one 7.5 out of 10 .

11, 12 & 13. Seven Ancient Wonders, The Six Sacred Stones and The Five Greatest Warriors by Matthew Reilly

These 3 books are in a series, so I am writing this blog as one.

The author has tried his hand to bring out a trilogy hoping to recreate the magic of Lord of The Rings(He says so himself in an interview). Well, it doesn't come anywhere close to the legendary take of LOTR by Tolkien but it it is surprisingly very captivating with lots of action packed scenes.

It is also a perfect script for an Indiana Jones movie as the story delves into ancient myths and lores, finding hidden treasures hidden by the ancient civilization (the humankind that existed before ours) and contains some pretty bad and ruthless villains.

The main theme of the book is to save the world from the eventual destruction (apocalypse) much like the movie 2012 and Knowing. But here the reason given for the Apocalypse is that at a particular date and time an equal and opposite energy to that of Sun will cross our Solar System and thus destroy everything.

The Ancient Civilization is supposed to have built a machine which when reconstructed would eventually negate this opposite force and thus save our whole solar system. This is what the team of 7-8 people lead by the hero Jack West Jr. set out to do. They start by trying to find the seven ancient wonders of the world in the first book and in the next 2 books they try finding six pillars which are essential to reconstructing this machine that is to save the world.

I know, reading these couple of line would sound very very absurd, even I thought so at first. But the way in which the author (Matthew Reilly) has written the whole thing is fantastic, to say the least.

The book takes you through many interesting and weird locations. The Great Pyramid of Giza, Stonehenge, Easter Island of Chile, Hanging gardens of Babylon, Cape of Good Hope, A Tribe from the Congo Republic in Africa. Well, its nothing short of a roller coaster journey.

In between you find many traces of the Dan Brown’s book Da Vinci Code. Again here, the author himself admits that this book is his favourite. The Author also compares many of the Egyptian Mythologies to Christianity. One particular thing that really caught me was that the Egyptian Sun God is referred to as Amun-Ra. The Amun here can also be pronounced as Amen (as every Christian prayer ends).

All in all, if you like Ancient Myths and legends, Action thrillers, Indiana Jones movies this would be a good recommendation.

I would rate this entire series as 8 out of 10.

8. Cocktail Time by P.G. Wodehouse

A classic Wodehouse, with loads of characters, a perfect setting in a countryside and an all confusing scenario.
The Earl of Ickenham is the one who never turns away from someone else's problems and that too when the problem involves his Godson's wedding, he does his best to solve it. And then enters, his old friend who is acting as a butler because he is in love with his master's sister, Phoebe. And Phoebe's son who is blackmailing his own Uncle with a letter.
Confused, well then now enters an American Con Artist and his wife, who also get wind of the blackmailing and try their hands at getting hold of that letter. What do you think will happen ?

Wodehouse is always a classic, and this one is a perfect read on a sunny afternoon, sitting outdoors. Which I couldn't do because I haven't seen the sun for quite some time now. Reading his books always transports me to the old countryside England that has always drawn me towards this country.
The words and the language which he uses makes me love England even more. Now, if only I could find someone who still talks like that.

7. 2 States by Chetan Bhagat

2 states by Chetan Bhagat is a story about an Indian couple who are in love and wants to get married. The book's back cover summarizes the whole plot.
Around the world : Boy loves girl, girl loves boy and they get married.
in India there are a few more steps: Boy loves girl, girl loves boy, boy's parents have to love girl, girl's parents have to love boy, boy's parents and girl's parents should love each other.
That's the plot in a nutshell. About how Punjabi boy and a Tamilian girl fall in love with each other and how they convince their parents for their marriage.
There were many sarcasms involving Tamilian Brahmins and their way of life, and being one did find it little bid bad, but the author actually compromised for it by making equal fun of Punjabis and managed to wade through that thin line. Though the story and the outcome is very much predictable, the author's way of handling it is very interesting and funny.
At the end, it felt like I had just watched a light hearted comedy movie.

I would rate it 7/10 .

6. Total Control by David Baldacci

A typical Baldacci Action paced thriller. Not up to his standard mark though. I liked his Camel Club series much more.
The book starts with a cute couple, Jason and Sidney Archer, who are very much in love, and they have an adorable baby daughter. Suddenly, the husband is killed in a fiery plane crash, and Sidney's life is shattered. Jason is thought to be behind the plane crash, and an FBI team starts following Sidney everywhere. Not just the FBI there are some other people too who are stalking her because they need something from her house.
And Sidney starts discovering the truth little by little and then starts running for her life not knowing whom to trust.

The first half introduces soooo many characters that you really fail to make any kind of connection but as the book progresses the plot becomes much clear and it becomes hard to put down.
And Sidney' sob story about how she misses her husband and the in detail explanation of her crying, fainting, crying, looking at her daughter, crying, looking at her family pictures and some more crying is worse than a Hindi soap serial.
I actually had to flip a few pages whenever the author started about how miserable Sidney is feeling or how her eyes were becoming dry from crying. Who really cares?

If you can go past all this, the book is not all bad.
I rate it 5.5/10

5. Vagabond by Bernard Cornwell

This is the sequel to the previous book I read, The Archer's tale.
And just like the previous one, this too was a wonderful book. I think I learnt a lot about the initial stages of 100 years war than I did in my history classes at school.

After the Battle of Crecy, which ends in the last book, Thomas continues his journey for on the quest of Holy Grail. He meets his cousin on his way who also is in search of the Grail and will stop at nothing. The battles between Scotland and England at York, and the Battle of Calais are mentioned in this book.

Alright then. I think it will be sometime before I manage to read anything else for a while now. My Husband as usual, lost his woollen cap again ( this is the 5th one he managed to lose) so, I have started knitting one for him now.
Until then, Good reading everybody.

4. The Archer's Tale by Bernard Cornwell.

First of all I had never heard of this author. Gopal's manager gave him this book to read (Did he actually think Gopal will read any book!!! After so many struggles from my part, which included me yelling and carrying the book behind him all the time, I could make him read only Da Vinci Code so far)

and well, that was how I ended up with it. I was very apprehensive about starting it, as it was set in 1300's and it was historical fiction and I usually don't read such genre of books. But I was pleasantly surprised. The book was very captivating and entertaining. The details were very good and elaborate.

A brutal raid on the coastal village, Hookton leaves only one survivor, Thomas and he tries taking revenge on the man responsible for this by joining England's army. But apart from this, destiny has one more task for him, the search of the Holy Grail. And in the process he meets many interesting people.

Apart from this fictitious story the places, names and the wars between England and France mentioned here are all true and happened almost exactly as it was explained.

Though its kinda time consuming... definitely not one of those fast paced action thrillers... it's a real good read.

This book also goes by the name "Harlequin"

I already want to read the next in the series, Vagabond.

3. Between the Assassinations by Aravind Adiga

The book started out really good and the author was able to maintain the good pace throughout..

It's actually a string of many short stories happening in the same small city of Kittur (a fictitious city)

The characters described are very precise and you get connected to them very well. There is no unnecessary long explanations, leaving a little bit to the reader's imagination and at the end they all bring out the essential flavour to understand the actual workings of any average person in a city of India.

Its a very short read (the book being just 350 pages). So, if anyone is looking for a good book to pass time, this is an excellent recommendation.

Although I must say it's very different from his previous book The White Tiger. Both the books basically deal with the stark contrast between rich and poor this one is slightly sprinkled with humour whereas white tiger was a very dark one.

In many reviews people seem to like white tiger much more than this one, but I couldn't agree on that.

This book is refreshing but White tiger is depressing .

lol...

2. Twilight - Stephenie Meyer

After hearing about the huge success of the movie "Twilight", I thought the book must be really good..

Though the book was very captivating, basically a love story between teenagers, the plot around which it was written sounded very absurd and ridiculous. No real good explanations of whether the main character Edward was a vampire or a werewolf or a what till the end.

Only in the last 100 pages or so it becomes clear that he indeed is a vampire.

Though, there is a scene where Bella searches the net about Vampires, the author never really confirms the fact that Edward is one.

And there is also a scene where the entire Vampire family plays Baseball.. God !! I just could not stand it.

Now I understand why the movie was such a big hit. ROBERT PATTINSON...

I am planning next to see the movie and hope it is a little different and much better than the book.

After reading Twilight Iam really cringing to read the next in line New Moon. I don't think I am even gonna bother and just return it back to the library.

1. Lost Symbol By Dan Brown.

Almost a month is over and I havent even finished one single book so far.

Blaming it on the vacation I had when I went back to India for a couple of weeks.

Updating on 27th Jan: Finished the book... Did not expect this ending... Was really mesmerized... The way Brown talks about God being within the man... and the man still searching and probing in the darkness looking for a force above him.....
How did we ignore all the signs in all of our culutres and religions....
I am really looking ahead for the apocalypse to happen.. so that a new age starts...

(the book is actually about tht... if you have seen 2012 you wud understand)

All this new light on life was shed only on the last 50 pages or so... I think its better if you just turn to the last 50 pages and read them.. apart from that the whole book wasn't very good. Dan Brown's previous four books were so good that your mind simply refuses to believe this book can be so pale in front of them. No gripping story lines whatsoever.

I learnt a few very good facts about Washington D.C.. thats all...