Ove, Wonder and Murakami over the Weekend

I highly recommend the book 'A man called Ove'. It's about a man who outwardly appears rough and tough but has a heart of gold as seen by his interactions with his neighbours and even the cat. He's the kind of man from our father's and grandfather's generation. You don't see men like that these days. There's of course a lot more to this story than i'm letting on but i dont want to give away too much of the story. JUST READ IT to feel all warm and fuzzy inside!

WONDER
'Wonder' by R.J.Palacio is about a little boy with a facial anomaly that causes people to stare at him. He is home-schooled until class 5, then introduced to regular school. The book takes us through the perspective of August( the boy), his sister, and friends who surround him-- how he navigates school, bullying, and not only coming to terms with being 'different' but also recognizing his own worth. Friendship and the need to be kind forms the crux of this wonderful story and I'd recommend to everyone.

MURAKAMI'S 'HEAR THE WIND SING'
I'm a huge Murakami fan but his first novel, 'Hear the wind sing' was a bit of a disappointment. The unnamed narrator spoke about his previous three girlfriends, how one of them committed suicide, how he met up with his friend 'The Rat' , about the writer who inspired him and other conversations centered in J's bar. This is the first of the Rat trilogy and frankly I'm not exactly waiting with bated breath to read the other two.

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My Book Review of 'Bitch Goddess for Dummies'

Recently, I attended a zoom session on chick lit by the Chennai Lockdown Literary Festival (CLLF). In the session, one of the speakers was Maya Sharma Sriram. I was so impressed with the way she conducted the session and answered the questions that I decided to pick up her chick lit novel, ‘Bitch Goddess for Dummies’ brought out by Rupa Publications in 2012. And I was not disappointed. I’m not sure if I was biased toward the book by the personality I had seen on zoom or not, but I quite enjoy chick lit and have read several chick lit novels in my thirties. So the novel is about a 27-year-old woman Mira Iyer who decides to transform her personality from good girl to ‘bitch goddess’ to deal with the people in her life. Her mom who is constantly trying to fix her up with some eligible guy so that she can get married and Sanya, the real office bitch who is always cosying up to their bosses and vying for a promotion, are just two of the people in her life causing her angst. So it’s go...

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Blogging with a Purpose - Theme Post

I’ve loved books since I was a child. I vaguely recall the 'Ladybird' series of books that I read as a child, but the first novel I remember reading was ‘The Mystery of the Burnt Cottage’ by Enid Blyton that my mom brought home for me to read from the library when I was in Class 4. I then finished the children’s books section in library after library in my neighbourhood. Reading has served me well since I now work as an editor. Reading was what filled my hours as a child and kept loneliness at bay. Reading is what helped me find myself at age 40 when I got back to the habit after several years of reading sporadically. I now average about 25 books a year that I track on Goodreads . I’ve had the opportunity to interact with quite a few authors online and offline. My cause for the Blogchatter #BloggingWithAPurpose campaign is "promoting authors." There is a popular joke in the publishing industry these days that there are more authors than readers. Authors a...

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