Books you are reading

One book that is in a completely different genre, but one that I will really strongly recommend is The Immortals Of Meluha. Simply put, this book is brilliant, both in terms of concept/imagination, and also in its storytelling. I normally find Indian writing very formulaic, boring, and overrated, but this one book completely makes up for all the other crap I have read. Basically, the author has completely rewritten Indian history, of how things were 5000 years ago. His version is conceptualized so incredibly well that it is almost believable.

Interesting. since I am chasing Indian history as a hobby, it will be nice to read some fiction and put aside the arguments and counter-arguments along with the claims and counter-claims and have some fun reading instead. :)

Cheers
 
One book that is in a completely different genre, but one that I will really strongly recommend is The Immortals Of Meluha. Simply put, this book is brilliant, both in terms of concept/imagination, and also in its storytelling. I normally find Indian writing very formulaic, boring, and overrated, but this one book completely makes up for all the other crap I have read. Basically, the author has completely rewritten Indian history, of how things were 5000 years ago. His version is conceptualized so incredibly well that it is almost believable.

sounds good ! -

much better than fiction!
 
Thanks Asliarun

Have read most of Mario Puzo's books such as Omerta and thoroughly enjoyed them....
Interesting point about John Le Carre as I have The Little Drummer Girl for a long time and have tried to read it a few times but end up moving on to another book as it is difficult to go beyond a few pages...I will try once again and see what the hell is wrong with me or the author...
Will definitely try and get my hands on the books you have mentioned especially The Immortals Of Meluha ....it sounds very interesting....

@thevortex: will check up on the authors and pick up a book of each...thanks for your suggestions...


You may enjoy reading Mario Puzo if you like the mafia/gangster genre.

One author I do not recommend is Tom Clancy.

John Le Carre has written some good spy books, but many of his books are quite difficult to read (at least for me).

Please also try to get hold of Vengeance. This is supposed to be a true story written by an ex-Mossad "hitman". This was also recently made into the movie by Spielberg called Munich.

Another book that you may like is My Life In The Mafia, again a true story written by a senior Mafia guy, one of the rare ones to break his oath of secrecy.

One book that is in a completely different genre, but one that I will really strongly recommend is The Immortals Of Meluha. Simply put, this book is brilliant, both in terms of concept/imagination, and also in its storytelling. I normally find Indian writing very formulaic, boring, and overrated, but this one book completely makes up for all the other crap I have read. Basically, the author has completely rewritten Indian history, of how things were 5000 years ago. His version is conceptualized so incredibly well that it is almost believable.

Edit: You can now buy books online from Landmark. They have free shipping too.
 
Got the books that I wanted to read, and hope to bring them back and read them at leisure:

1.Imperial Life in the Emerald City-Rajeev Chandrasekharan-who is a For Affairs correspondent for Washington Post.It's about how the Americans went into to Iraq post Saddam.

2. An Omnivores Diallam -Michael Pollan

3. Life in The Balance -Thomas Graboys.

Cheers

George
 
wow nice thread indeed....i've got 2 books which im reading simultaneously:
1. The inscrutable americans
2. Arrack in the afternoon
Another book i just finished is six suspects by Vikas Swarup....its a pretty good read...a who dunnit murder mystery.
 
Two books on rather out of the world (literally) topic...

  1. Seth Speaks.............by Jane Roberts
  2. The nature of Personal Reality (A Seth Book) ..........by Jane Roberts
  3. Journeys Out of The Body.........by Robert Monroe

Some 'Seth' Quotes...


You project your own energy out to form the physical world. Therefore, to change your world, it is yourself you must change. You must change what you project.


We are individualized portions of energy, materialized within physical existence, to learn to form ideas from energy, and make them physical (this is idea construction). We project ideas into an object, so that we can deal with it. But the object is the thought, materialized. This physical representation of idea permits us to learn the difference between the "I" who thinks and the thought. Idea construction teaches the "I" what it is, by showing it its own products in a physical manner. We learn by viewing our own creations, in other words. We learn the power and effects of ideas by changing them into physical realities; and we learn responsibility in the use of creative energy...
The entity is the basic self, immortal, nonphysical. It communicates on an energy level with other entities, and has an almost inexhaustible supply of energy at its command. The individual is the portion of the whole self that we manage to express physically.....

The eye projects and focuses the inner image (idea) onto the physical world in the same manner that a motion-picture camera transfers an image onto a screen. The mouth creates words. The ears create sound. The difficulty in understanding this principle is due to the fact that we've taken it for granted that the image and sound already exist for the senses to interpret. Actually the senses are the channels of creation by which idea is projected into material expression.

The basic idea is that the senses are developed, not to permit awareness of an already existing material world, but to create it...

The subconscious is the threshold of idea's emergence into the individual conscious mind. It connects the entity and the individual... The physical body is the material construction of the entity's idea of itself under the properties of matter... Instinct is the minimum ability for idea construction necessary for physical survival... The present is the apparent point of any idea's emergence into physical matter.


You must watch the pictures that you paint with your imagination... ...your environment and the conditions of your life at any given time are the direct result of your own inner expectations. You form physical materializations of these realities within your own mind.
If you imagine dire circumstances, ill health, or desperate loneliness, these will be automatically materialized, for these thoughts themselves bring about the conditions that will give them reality in physical terms. If you would have good health, then you must imagine this as vividly as in fear you imagine the opposite.

You create your own difficulties. This is true for each individual. The inner psychological state is projected outward, gaining physical reality - and this regardless of the nature of the psychological state....The rules apply to everyone. You can use them for your own benefit and change your own conditions once you realize what they are.

True self-knowledge is indispensable for health or vitality. The recognition of the truth about the self simply means that you must first discover what you think about yourself, subconsciously. If it is a good image, build upon it. If it is a poor one, recognize it as only the opinion you have held of yourself and not as an absolute state.

...remember to recognize resentment when he feels it, and then to realize that resentment can be dismissed. The initial recognition must be made, however. Then have him imagine plucking out the resentment by the roots and replacing it with a positive feeling. But he must imagine the plucking-out process.

This is the difference between repression and positive action. In repression the resentment is shoved beneath and ignored. With our method it is recognized, imaginatively plucked out as being undesirable, and replaced by the thought of peace and constructive energy.

End 'Seth' Quotes


SUhas
 
asliarun - if you liked 'Immortals of Meluha', do not miss Samit Basu's trilogy.

The big daddy as far as imagination on such realms is concerned has to be Tolkien. If you have not read the complete Lord of the Rings, I guess its time.
 
thevortex - I am waiting to see your thread announcing 'Selfish Gene' or "Greatest show on earth"

I am yet to pick those up, Ramanujam. As you know, I have gotten myself tangled into audio affairs :). But sometime this year, I am for sure going to be bitten by the book bug and then I will pick these up and come back with my thoughts. In a new thread, as you suggest.
 
asliarun - if you liked 'Immortals of Meluha', do not miss Samit Basu's trilogy.

The big daddy as far as imagination on such realms is concerned has to be Tolkien. If you have not read the complete Lord of the Rings, I guess its time.

Thanks, thevortex. I have read "The Manticore's Secret" and I quite liked it. Yes, I have read LOTR and Hobbit as well :)

One other author that I am deeply impressed with is Ursula K LeGuin. Her books are very "inward looking" - a lot more intellectual and thought provoking than the typical action-packed fantasy genre books. A good example is "A Wizard of Earthsea" which is more about self-discovery than anything else. In fact, this is the reason why I liked Immortals Of Meluha so much. It is not a simplistic book catering to the lowest common denominator. It is instead complex and paradoxical, as real life often is.

Regarding the Selfish Gene, it was one of those books that kept me thinking for a long long time. Definitely a must-read for anyone interested in evolution - it does a really good job of explaining seemingly paradoxical behavior like why we are sometimes altruistic even though we follow the rule of "survival of the fittest". More surprisingly, it even explains why we love our brothers/sisters more than we love our cousins. It took me many a week to finish it though, as it is written almost like a textbook.

Just finished reading The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo. Very very good Swedish thriller. Highly recommend it.. it gets a little slow in the middle but overall, it is superb. It gets quite dark in some parts though! Quite sad that the author died shortly after submitting the manuscript for publication - he couldn't even see the success of his book.
 
Hmm..I am a fan of Ayn Rand. So Selfish gene sounds interesting.

Samit Basu's trilogy was very good to read. Do see if you can get the other two books. Problem is the printing is very poor quality.

As for fantasy fiction, another writer who was hugely impressive recently was Naomi Novik. Her 'Temeraire' series is a rollicking, fun and even sometimes emotionally involving work. Must read for fantasy fans.
 
Some time ago I came across a book titled the "Blaft Anthology Of Tamil Pulp Fiction". This was an English translation of stories written in Tamil and published in magazines such as Ananda Viketan, Kalki and as regular books. Turned out to be interesting reading - something akin to James Hadley Chase and Perry Mason.

A couple of days ago, I picked up the Blaft Anthology of Tamil Pulp Fiction, Vol II. The same racy style of writing with Indian James Bonds, Modesty Blaises etc.

Both these books from Blaft Publications are a real blast.

Read the interesting reviews. In particular http://www.outlookindia.com/article.aspx?237776.

Cheers
 
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A couple at the moment, Norwegian Wood by Haruki Murakami and Blind Man's Bluff. The second is about Submarine espionage and warfare during the cold war.

Murakami is simple and honest, I could not have found such honesty in this simple terms anywhere. This is my first Murakami and I am a most definite fan/follower now.
 
I am reading a book of Richard Carlson Dont Sweat the small Stuff . We are often being worried for the tiny problems of our life. But we should think, that actually it is tiny and it will not harm us as much we think of that. This is the book which shows how to tackle this kind of problems, and author has also gave some examples to make us believe that, we should not sweat the small stuff and all the small stuff.
This book is not a stress management manual. It's 100 short "strategies" for being a more kind, peaceful, and loving person. Lots of the strategies are about reframing/adjusting mental models. The trick with a book like this is actually using the strategies instead of reading them all and forgetting them.
 
At the fag end of 'The Starfish & The Spider' by Ori Brafman and Rod A. Beckstrom. Lots of more books waiting to be read.
 
Harry potter and the Prisoner of Azkeban:lol: Never read it when it came out, now my 10 year old and 9 year old kids have read them and I was literally forced by my younger son to read them. Very enjoyable reads.
Regards
 
"What happened to Netaji" AND "India's biggest cover-up".

both books by Anuj Dhar ...... astounding!!! Whatever Indian history that has been taught post-independence is ALL doctored, manipulated and fake! Feel let down. Eye-openers, both of them.

Some our of "Great Men" need to be stripped of all honours showered on them through the decades!
 
Chaos Monkeys
No Sleep (reddit aug 2016) ebook
The Mirror Thief
Benjamin Frankling- W.Isaacson
 
A beautiful, well-constructed speaker with class-leading soundstage, imaging and bass that is fast, deep, and precise.
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