Travel With Books!

The   “Funny Thing Is…” , is an ingenious effort, a book of comical essays on daily musings and ramblings. Comical books are mostly at a danger of sounding grotesque and outlandish, but this definitely didn’t go bizarre. It wasn’t an indispensable but definitely a one-time-read! Ellen DeGeneres, has written about stances to be adopted in real life instances. The subtle-nuances in the book, went a tad imperceptible for me, though they are woven with sarcasm, but the chucklings acquired in the first-half of the book, succumbed to ennui, by the second half. Light-hearted folks would love it was a one-time read, but wallflowers and serious-minded, might grapple to enjoy. There are witty insights and light-hearted ribbings, but second half onwards the efforts sounded impetuous, hurried to finish the book! Millennials, born in the generation of ipads, may find it a tad outdated. For instance, they may find citing of tangled and wired phones as obsolete and unrelatable. But 80s populace w...

  " Rebecca " is a strong evocative and an exceptional endearing read filled with vivid world-building, strong characters but a relatively slow-moving plot mixed with gothic and suspense elements.  The protagonist’s name isn’t shared throughout, though she ends up interacting with all the characters in the novel, big or small! Hope it doesn't sound like gaslighting the readers, but I would seriously doubt the sanity of anyone condemning this novel at any level, including the floundering of the plot or the bulkiness of the novel. The cornucopia of the strong idiosyncratic characters, a plethora of atmospheric detailing and a major plot-twist supersedes any of the weaker attributes of the novel .   The novel predominantly revolves around " Manderley ", an English town where the husband of the protagonist resides. Daphne Du Maurier, has doused the book with profuse magic using her magic-wand of atmospheric-laden words, describing Manderley in vividity. ...

Unmitigatedly felt duped with this one!  It is just a replica of "The Four Agreements" with an added principle towards the end. One can directly pick up this one. The 5th added principle is- 5. Be skeptical and listen for the truth. I felt totally cheated !  Very cleverly marketed. I definitely would not have expected this shrewd display of the same material, ostentatiously! Gave 3-stars to "The Four Agreements" but only 2-stars to this one for all the dodging :/ 

The fictitious town of “ Cranford ” is in possession of amazons, dominated by the genteel women comprising of widows and elderly spinsters. The novel is recited by Mary Smiths (which we eventually get to know as the novel progresses). Written as a collection of inter-woven short stories, Cranford is not based on a major-plot but I felt it to be a Victorian-era soap opera belonging to the aristocratic genteel class. This fictional city has an infallible religion of - abiding to the social-hierarchy and contempt for men. But the beauty of the novel is, though initially they speak of indifference towards men but nowhere there is a stern condemnation for men portrayed, rather in subtle gentle ways help towards their family is rendered and their wisdom/instruction is followed.   All the episodes are cited in a satirical and hysterical tenor. Even the poignant episodes ensue into a happy ending. The novel brims with emotions and lessons of friendship and kindness. Even foe...

Just like any other self-help book, it sounds like a cyclic-repetitive dance of words. Don't know if it intentional  or that's how all the self-help books end up sounding due to brimming plagiarism . But this too for me  was juvenile, banal and repetitive . This book is filled with platitudes about how one should go on condemning  the prevailing and existing to set onto the journey of betterment.  I am not against it, but was expecting this book more on S hamanism,  exposition of nature for self-healing and Toltec  wisdom from this erudite who was a surgeon and then turned into a Toltec spiritualist. Author Don Miguel Ruiz was born into a family of Shamans and went onto attending medical school to become a surgeon. His bloodline inspired him to explore more of his ancient ancestral wisdom.  Four Agreements is a synopsis of his findings and ancient wisdom. The concoction of the four agreements is -  1. Be impeccable with your word. 2. Don’t take a...

Being a poet myself, I have forever been in awe of Emily Dickenson, Edgar Allan Poe, Robert Frost, William Wordsworth, just to name a few. Ofcourse, I don't have the audacity to compare the modern day and age poets with these existing constellation of stars, but for me "Milk and Honey"  didn't work at all.  I am not deriding her efforts, but I consider being a poet/author, one holds a certain responsibility towards the readers and above all you, yourself. There are a lot of blank spaces(I didn't feel they were filled with silence at all! but mere contrived spaces ) which could have been filled up with  emotions unexplored but yet felt!  Keeping my poetic soul aside, I wish Rupi Kaur to look into all the reviews, and come up with a better  and inspiring one. 

I very well know that by giving this review, I am throwing myself to all the sharks and whales out there in awe of this book which has inspired a motion series. But I was dejected and confounded on how come we have a series on this unpleasant ordeal?? Not interested to invest my time on explaining about the trial and tribulation that I went through while reading this unpleasant narration. May be my old-school mentality and proclivity for decency found it to be  obnoxiously indignant with "not so-welcome" character-attributes. I am thoroughly confounded how come we have a series on the same?? Hope the series is better than the book(can't muster the courage to watch it post reading the novel)  Not my types at all. FULLSTOP. Please pardon me for the disparaging remarks, but I have to be candid with my review and take on it! 1- star