Private India – Book Review

Title – Private India
Author – Ashwin Sanghi and James Patterson
Publications – Random House

From the blurb – In Mumbai, seemingly unconnected people are dying, strangled in a chilling ritual and with strange objects carefully arranged with thr corpses.
For Santosh Wagh, head of Private India. the mumbai branch of World’s finest investigation agency, its a race against time to stop the killer striking again. In a city of over thriteen million, he’d have his work cut out at best of times, but this case has him betting Mumbai’s biggest gang lord and a godman who isn’t all he seems.
And then he discovers there may be an even greater danger facing Private India. Hidden in the shadow is someone who couldn’t destroy the whole organisation-along with thousands of innocent Mumbai citizens

Every day seemingly un-connected women are getting murdered in their own houses by same method. Killer is leaving yellow scarf and items like half coin, lotus in hands of victims.
First murder is of Doctor Kanya Jaiyen from Bangkok who is on personal trip to India and staying in top most hotel of Mumbai, still no security could prevent her murder.
Bhawana Choski, afternoon mirror gossip column talk to Bangkok doctor couple of times on the day of her murder and next day she also found murdered in her own house strangled with yellow scarf in exactly same way.

Who will be next women and why ony women. With such perfect murder with no evidence left, it seems quite tough case to crack for Private India. Is there a man behind all those who hate women or a woman can feel so much hatred toward her own species. Hari PAdhi, Nisha and Mubeen team of Private India is on their toes always to solvethis murder mystery and to save next murderer.Among all this chaos Santosh’s own past keep haunting him and he has to get answer for his own life as well.

My take on book – Having read and liked Ashwin Sanghi’s previous two books – Chankya Chant and Krishna Key, I was geniuly interested in this new book and was really happy to get review copy from blogadda. Reading this huge book in 7 day was days task a big task​keeping in mind my busy schedule and I am glad that I spent my time with this book. It was so interesting with lot of twist and tales that you really want to finish it in on go. Whosoover Whoevernk can be murder get herself murder next day.the next dayever, don’tpect too much of mytha myth mythological influenceis one as his previous work. May be its James Paterson’s influence 🙂
I havent read any of his book but I now want to read him as well.

On the other hand I wonder how these two author start writing the story together with so many different characters all tied together at end with common story. Do they startiting the end first and connect the dots backward or its other way around 🙂

Rating 4/5

This review is part of Blogadda bookreview program.

No Man’s Land – Book Review

From the blurb –

”Land – you cant burn it like money;you cant melt it like gold. You can only buy it, sell it,snatch it, grab it. Title change, government change, but the land stays where it is- unmoved sterile. That is its beauty. But somewhere deep down, men want to grab its immortality and slip it into their horribly insecure lives. They never can, but they never will stop trying”

No Man’s land is written by Nilesh Shrivastava and published by Fingerprint publisher.

This book doesn’t seem interesting to me from the blurb however I have read some really good reviews about it so when got a chance to get review copy from blogadda ..I just grabbed it 🙂 Surprisingly I was completely hooked to it till end. It quite different from routine stuff we got from lot of Indian authors about college and love life.

No Man’s land is story spread across 3 generations. Agastya’s father run a small paint shop in busy city of Delhi. Its doing moderately well and they are quite satisfied with income.
When time came for Agastya to join family business, he was not quite happy with the scale of business. With the help of distant cousin Shashwat who works for his father, agastya started expanding the business and took it new scales. Agastya has a inclination toward her neighbor Shailja who is 8yr elder to him. Their love couldn’t last long and Shailja got married to somebody else.

In due course of time Agastya got married to Shubangi on his father’s proposal.
Some unfortunate incidents bring his sister and brother in law to their house and Agastya started loosing control over business.

Some more twist and turns take Agastya to farm land at sirca village, Gurgaon. A really big piece of land which now he want to give to his two sons, one legitimate and other one illegitimate both of whom are interested in land for different reasons. But is it that easy to divide the land.

My take on book – Its really literary masterpiece from Indian author. Quite different from regular run of the mill love stories and college life. Characters are very well developed and story seems so real as if is happening to next door neighbour. I like it more because of Delhi and Gurgaon setting also as I stay in Gurgaon ;-). I specifically liked the character of shahwat who is doing his work with full dedication throughout his life without expecting anything in return. Ending did disappointed me as it was quite filmy type not real. It seems as if auther is in hurry of completing the book and just ended it in a very casual way.

Overall nice read and I do recommend it to all of you.. Do read it 🙂

Author – Nilesh Shrivastav holds degree in Computer engineering and currently working in financial sector from fourteen years. He lives with his wife and son in Delhi.

My Rating – 4.5/5

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English Bytes – Book Review

Title – English Bytes
Author – Manish Gupta
Publisher – Penguin (2012)
Price – Rs 250/-

Though studied in English medium school, my love for language started only after joining corporate job as we were suppose to speak with ppl across the globe. When author contacted me for review, from blurb I thought it would be just like any other self help book and I never prefer reading them..To my surprise this book is unique in its narration and promise you a hearty laugh while learning nuances of English.

Author started book with his personal journey of convent education where English was rarely used and he got himself into difficult situation during his engineering days. He has explained in a story form different ways which helped him in mastering the language skill like first he started watching English movies and started speaking with his close buddies in English only. This technique can help you but to become perfect in English you need to be in company of those who are expert so that you can make them your benchmark .
Another such technique is use of mnemonic.

My Take on book – Though it comes in genre of self help book, you will never feel it while reading. ITs so interesting and engrossing that you may tend to like this as any other fiction book around. . It has something for everybody. If you want to learn English, this is excellent book and if you are pro then also its useful to brush up your skill. There are lot of words which we don’t use in our day to day conversations. Author has used humorous anecdote to start describing a situation and then has explained all possible difficult word associated with that scenario.
Lot of time while reading book we come to a point where a particular word is not clear and we hardly take trouble to open dictionary. The best thing in this books is Author’s footnote with detailed explanation of difficult word make it quite easy read and as claimed by author in blurb –
You will add 1000 word to your dictionary..It may help you to love the English language little more 🙂

Those who are sitting for GRE/GMAT/CAT will get huge benefit from this book.

About Author – Manish Gupta is a banking professional. When not crunching numbers he is busy engaging with and examining the vagaries and idiosyncrasies of the English language. He also likes trivia, travelling, adventure sports, delving into human psychology, and giving professorial discourses to colleagues, family and friends, and practically anyone who can give him a patient hearing

Love is Vodka – Book Review

Author – Amit Shankar
Publisher – Vitasta Publishing (2013)
Price – Rs 195/-

Moon ..lovechild of famous senior editor of news channel Payal Malick and French dimplomat is cute crazy tall confused teen working as intern at advertisement agency. She is just like girl next door of her age, bored of her current BF and looking for true love and in between try and taste different forms of love. She is not happy with her BF Ash and find solace in her hot and hunky colleague Akash. Akash with his charismatic charm and poetic language stole moon’s heart and they spend lot of time eating and roaming in delhi. Sudden revelation about Akash’s past in a party take moon and akash on different paths.
And heartbroken Moon got attracted to her Ma’s boyfriend “Devil”. In addition to her Ma’s BF , devil is also moon’s boss at adverstising agency. He gave prestigious modeling assignment to Moon and took her heart away with a smile.
She also has a sweet relationship with her biological father and keep in touch with him through phones/webchat. He loves to send gifts online to moon.

Moon is also in touch with chat buddy Nikhil, who is seriously in love with bright and bubbly moon. She keep on coming in and out of love with different man and is confused abt true meaning of love or does true love really exist. Finally she got her true calling at end and she started doing things which give her real satisfaction and meaning to life.

My take on story – First and foremost..I love the protagonist name – Moon. She is very relatable character and author has described the teenage feeling quite well. She is using all form of social media and loves likes and comments on her FB page.She is confused about her feeling and doesn’t mind changing BF frequently if she is not happy with current one. We live life only once so it shouldn’t be to fulfill society and your parent’s expectation. Its your life and you should live it to fullest for your own sake.

I also loved the fact that women is ready to accept her own feeling and emerged as strong character. Author being a male has done excellent job in portraying female character with all her emotion and complex feelings. Comparison between vodka and love is quite interesting and has been portrayed number of times in book. Its typical metro read.

Certain lines I liked from book

I assumed myself to be different from other girls, in reality I was stupid, dumb vulnerable as any other girl

If love is all about freedom and honest expression then how can one associate it with loyalty?

Also some of title of chapter are quite interesting like –
Life is too short, Be different Be weird
Don’t be where you are tolerated, be there where you are celebrated
Don’t pretend, you live only once

My Rating – 4/5
After a long time I finished book in just two sitting 🙂 And now I am going to check author’s earlier two books.

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

Epic Love Stories – Book Review

Title
Ganga and Shantanu – A love story written on water

Satyavati and Shantanu – A love story made possible by a son’s sacrifice

Author – Ashok.K.Banker
Publication – Westland
Price – 599/ – Set of 5 Books , 125/- per book

I never feel interested in reading mythology..never felt its my cup of tea. Read a lot abt Ashok Banker’s Ramayana series..some very good reviews from my blogger frens still never get courage to actually get hold of one of his book. Now when blogadda announce that his new series is up for review..i immediately applied and also got selected to review two books ( Ganga and Shantanu And Satyavati and Shantanu ).

Was surprised to see such a short book. Its only 75 pages.
Ganga and Shantanu
Mahabhisha king of ikshwaku clan went to pay homage to lord brahma. Ganga queen of all rivers on earth also came to pray her homage to lord brahma.Typical love at first sight scene from bollywood happen and he fall in love with beautiful Ganga. Lord brahma felt offended by these lovebrids and gave curse to live one mortal life on earth. Same time 8 Vasu also went to a trip and steal the holy cow on persuasion of wife of duoy. They also got curse to spend one year of mortal life on earth and duoy has to spend one fulllifetime in mortal form. Mahabhisha took birth in form of King Shantanu and got married to human form of goddess Ganga and story continues with love lust and betrayal by ganga. Ganga is dutiful wife but has to sarcifice her children year after year. Bound by his vow to not question Ganga, Shantanu never asked any question but couldnt stop himself when ganga gave birth to their 8th child. Ganga gave answer to all his question but left him afterwards.

.

Satyavati and Shantanu

Second book ( Satyavati and shantanu) starts when shantanu return to his capital found a tall young man waiting for him. This man was his son Devarata who later on become a great king of Hastinapur. Shantanu still misses ganga and during one of his hunting trip met fisherman daugther Satyavati on ferri ride and lost his heart. He want to marry satyavati but got down by demand from her father ( fisherman king panchmani) of giving throne of hastinapur to son of Satyavati instead of his elder son devarata. Devarata got to know about this and took two vows to get back his father’s love. He later got famous as Bhisma after taking these vows.

My take on book ;-> First thing – While reading book TV stars who portrayed these character were coming to my mind 🙂

We have read the Mahabharta stories from our elder during lazy afternoon after school hours..but this is fresh take on old stories with modern-day outlook and language. However there is a lot of lust involved in language that you keep on wondering is this true love or just body desire of God and Goddess. I wish author has added some of his creative take on old stories. We know these stories by heart and just adding physical attraction touch doesnt make it an intersting read.

Other Title from the Series ->
Satyavati and Shantanu
Amba and Bhishma
Devayani, Sharmishtha and Yayati

About Author -> Ashok Kumar Banker is internationally acclaimed epic reteller whose work is published in 56 countries.His writing is used as a teaching aid in management and educational courses worldwide. His e-book venture akbebooks.com is India’s first best-selling e-bookstore and e-publisher. Ashok is 48 years old and lives with his family in Mumbai.

My Rating – 3.5/5

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

RIP – Book Review

Title: RIP ( Resurgent Indian Patriots )
Price: INR 200/-
Publisher: Westland
Author : Mukul Deva ( http://www.mukuldeva.com/)
Pages – 286

This is the Firth thriller by Indian author which i really really liked. Colonel Krishna Athawale (Retd.) with his 6 member “K -Team” is on mission to kill corrupt politicians and induce fear in remaining one.This team is called K team as all team member’s name start with K ( Remind me of Ekta Kapoor’s K mania 🙂 ) K team is bold band of people who are taking on corruption riddled establishment in thier own way.They first perfectly executed killing of 3 near and dear ones of politician with injection and later on by shooting from very far roof top which only an army officer can do. The most scared person by RIP warning is Home-Minister Karunakaran. He want to kill all RIP team members so that their dirty secrets dont come out and appointed his personal commando Raghav Bhagat in addition to officially assigned cop CBI Head Vinod Bedi to get rid of RIP.

Vinod and Raghav both are trying to stop RIP but will they succeed in their mission or not. K team members are normal indian national who has family to feed. Will their desire to make India shine on world’s map by removing corruption will make their families suffer… I m so tempted to write more but that will spoil the reader’s surprise/joy in reading hte book.

There is also romantic angel in book but it has lil to do with main story line. Author has kept name of all character name very close to real life politicians. Indeed a very bold step… you can quickly know which politician author is talking about in real life and he has also used real life scams like 2G and bofors also about lokpal bill

My take on book -> Author is from army background and it’s clearly evident in the to the point description of weapons and shooting method. I really felt from the heart that this book should turn into reality and we get some commandos who shoot all corrupt politicians and youngster get a chance to lead our nation.
India will be dream country to live in then 🙂

Perfect thriller, true page turner and one that leaves desperate feeling in your mind that wish somehow this turn into reality in our country. Wish some RIP

I like following lines from book – He knew there would be a way. There always is. One just have to look hard enough.

About Author -> Mukul Deva is alumnus of National Defence academy Pune and worked 15years with Indian army. His experience with army is clearly visible in book. Currently he is entrepreneur, motivational speaker and executive business and creativity coach.He says in his Author’s Note –

“This book was born out of an extreme sense of anger and shame. Anger at the appalling, naked greed so shamelessly displayed by the Indian political class. And shame that they happen to be fellow-Indians

My Rating – 4/5
This review is part of blogadda book review programme. participate to get free books.

No.1 Ladies Detective Agency

 

Title – The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency

Author –  Alexander McCall Smith

Price –  Rs 389 – Flipkart

Precious Ramotswe lost her mother at young age of 3 and her father’s cousin took care of her in initial year.  During early years Mma Ramotswe is brilliant student and extremely honest. She also won state prize for drawing. After having failed marriage , she returned to her hometown to stay with her father. Her father runs a cattle farm with more than 200 cattle and expect Mma ramatswo to take over business after he is gone. Though Ramotswe is not at all interested in cattle business and sell everything after her father’s demise.

With lot of money in her hand , she started her dream business : Ladies detective agency at Gaborone, capital of Botswana.. ..agency which is run by women but work for both men and women and then started her journey as a detective working on some hilarious, some extermely honest and some really intriguing cases.

I loved the case in which one Indian father want to get information about her 16yr old daughter boyfriend. Mma Ramotswe followed daughter for couple of days and also inspected her and concluded that she doesn’t have boyfriend and she is just creating illusion for her father to get him worried as she is fed up with her constant questioning nature….Mma feel pity for young lady and convinced her father to give some freedom to daughter ….at the end we found that tis was not case 🙂

Then there is another story of doctor , sometime he is best and other time it seems he is too naive to work on patients, another story revolves around husband who got missing in holy water. There is another beautiful story of duplicate dad and story with subtle humour

My take on book :->

If I have to review the book in one word , I would have said “innocent”. There is impalpable innocent in all the residents of Botswana. I like the way author has described the people and surrounding of Botswana. It gives  you insight into lives and times of Africans. It gives  you real literary pleasure unlike typical page turner murder mystery. This book shows there is still honesty alive in some part of world and there are true pleasure hidden in most simple things

Rating 5/5

There are several other books in this series and I m brought all of them now 🙂  . this book also turned into TV series – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_No._1_Ladies%27_Detective_Agency_(TV_series)

Chankaya Chant’s – A Book Review

                                                                                    

Title:           Chankaya’s Chant

Author:       Ashwin Sanghi

Price:          INR 190/-

Publication: Hachette India

 

Story is set between 2 era, one is present world and other in 340 BC around 2300 years back in the times of Chandragupta and his guru Chankaya.Chapter 1 talk about Chankaya and chapter 2 talk about his modern version of chankaya “Gangasagar” and same trend continues throughout the book. Its like similar situation or their similar way of handling situation is describen in alternating chapters. Much like we saw in movie ” Rang de Basanti” where the story revolves between freedom fighters and modern version of youngster fighting for present problems of India.

 

Gangasagar Misra’s father died when he was quite young and for the sake of his family he started working with wily businessman – Agarwalji. He learnt rule of business, politics from his employer. To serve the country and to save our nation form politicians gangasagar jumps first into state politics and then into center politics.

 

Later he met with oxford graduated girl Chandini gupta who become her protege and like a kingmaker gangasagar helped her in becoming primeminister of India. Story revolved around tacts and techniques through which he manipulate situation and people around him to achieve bigger goal of Unified India

 

 

Ancient story deals with Chankaya who also lost his father early in life and partly to take revenge from his enemies and partly for unified Bharat …..helped Chandragupta in becoming ruler of Bharat.

 

End is revealed in prologue itself but its the path taken which keep you hookd to book.

 

My Verdict  : I neverpreferred reading historic genre…this is my first ever book politics/history based book and I m happy to say that i m not disappointed. The best thing i like abt books is author has done lot of ground work. Its extremely well reserached book.Twisting the facts, gossip, blackmail and removing of obstacles are all part and parcel of dirty politics and are very well depicted here.  Book shows the politics is not only about pulling each other’s hair  but involve much more  and requires understanding of  a lot of varied fields.  Present date story gives hintes about present day  happenings  around us  and gets the reader wear thie r thinking caps. Overall interesting  book. Story moves very fast and at no point you feel bored. Author has proven the point that basic of politics remain same though era has changed . Lot of information is still basis of ruling the country/state .  Stage is changed , characters are different ……tactics and stratergies nevertheles remain same in every era..

 

Author has interweeved past and present in perfect way and never let you feel confused between two different stories.

 

 

My rating 4/5

 

This review is part of <a href=”Book Reviews Program at  BlogAdda.com“>Blogadda book review programme. To get review copy of book you just need to show your interst by mentioning your user id in book promotion post. Do let me know your views in case get your hands on this amazing book.

 

 

Memory Keeper’s Daughter – Post 2

                                                                       

Author: Kim Edwards
Price: 299/-
Publication: Penguin Books Flipkart

This book will make you cry and can even depress you at some time. Story starts in 1964 when Doctor Henry took her wife Norah to hospital who deliver twins with the help of  nurse. While his wife was sleeping and didn’t realize that she has given birth to twins, Dr Henry found out that her daughter is suffering from down syndrome. He instantly remember his childhood where his sister died after 12yrs of struggle due to down syndrome. He remembered how his childhood was different from normal kids because of his sick sister and his parents who have to give all their attention to sick sister.

He decided at that moment only to send his daughter to special hospital who take care of these kids. He handed over his daughter to nurse Caroline and tell his wife that their daughter died immediately after birth.

Caroline didn’t like the place where Dr Henry sent her for handing over their daughter and decided to raise the kid on her own. On the other hand Norah felt too depressed after knowing that her daughter is no more and she couldn’t even see her..Her depression grew day by day.. Now Dr Henry is suffering from guilt of leaving her daughter abandoned, Norah feel sad about death of her daughter and their son feel unwanted in life of his parent.

What will happen to daughter who doesn’t know who her real parents are…will doctor ever be able to tell his wife about their daughter ?

ITs quite slow at some time but I suggest to read this as its full of emotions and remind us how joy and sorrow are interconnected. This books reminds us that we always try to protect our loved ones from suffering but what they want us is true sharing rather than just good times.

My rating – 4/5

Love Life and All that Jazz…

Author:     Ahmed Faiyaz

Publisher:  Sanbun

Price:        Rs. 150/- (available for 99/- at Flipkart)

Love, life & all that jazz is story of 4 frens Tanveer , Sameer, Vicky and Tania and their respective partners. Story started when their college ends and spans over 5-6 yrs.

Sameer and Tania and college buddies and seeing each other from long .however their sweet and very strong relationship faces major hiccups when Sameer decided to go to UK for further studies and later decided to work their only.

Tania is interior decorator and in sameer’s absence fell for her business partner Ankur but Is Ankur really worth of tania..

Vicky is typical rich dad spoilt son who is supporting her model fren Naina and is in madly love with naina.however naina’s new publicity and her dreams of getting big into modeling by doing exposure make vicky feel bad…..but something happen which changes vicky’s attitude toward life.

Tanveer who is from small town and poor family is always burdened from his parents expectation and also center of all jokes by his frens..he fell in luv with his parsi housemate and Tanaj and later got confused to choose between parents or luv life..

What I like about this books is relationship seems real and like today’s youth don’t break after breakups or other family problems ..rather they get up and find a solution for problem. There is lot of positivity in book and frenship between 4 protagonist which makes it fun read….however very predictable happy ending.

Thing which i dont like is it has dates in beginning of each chapter and sometime story progress one year and i need to go back to previous chapter and look for date to understand it .

It no literary masterpiece or not even near to that but good read when you are travelling or for lazy afternoon 🙂  I finished it in two stretches..

My Rating :- 3/5