Cats & Japanese literature. A treat to all the feline lovers. Imagine you went into a grocery store and brought home a packet of a new flavour of instant noodles not like your usual taste. You decide to cook them one particular morning. From the look of it seems like a usual dish, but the smell really draws you in. One by one, slowly and … Continue reading The Traveling Cat Chronicles by Hiro Arikawa ★★★★★
Holocaust is a sensitive subject. It takes courage to pen down and even read such stories. Brutality beyond imagination. I have read The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank in high school and even today I can’t get myself to read it again. I’m sure there are many more books written on the Holocaust reminding ourselves of the heinous crimes the human race … Continue reading The Tattooist of Auschwitz by Heather Morris: Book Review
I’m a Christie fan if you know me at all. The setting of her books has no similarities with each other. Every time a new mystery, a new murder. After reading Poirot stories, this book is a refreshment as we don’t have Poirot unfolding the mystery instead this is an open and shut case with no investigation needed. And There Were None is a story … Continue reading And There Were None by Agatha Christie ★★★★
Ove is a 59 year old man who is disappointed about everything around him. He has taken upon himself to make sure everybody sticks to the rules because if he doesn’t monitor the situations around him everyday like a hawk then things would awkwardly go wrong. He had been the same cranky, principled, uncompromising person who is pretty much devoid of emotions until he met … Continue reading A Man Called Ove by Fredrik Backman: A tale of loss, a tale of life ★★★★★
It is a collection of seven short stories with a similar sense of eerie, alienation, vulnerability, and loneliness of the male characters dealing with either grief, unrequited love, betrayal, or something completely peculiar. This book is translated from original Japanese by Philip Gabriel and Ted Goossen. Cats, Jazz, and Murakami with the usual surrealism are the elements that one can expect from this book. You … Continue reading Men Without Women: Cats, Music and Murakami
A convenience store is a retail store generally opened for long hours containing grocery and household supplies. Keiko Furukura is a 36-year-old working in Hiromachi Station Smile Mart. She is indifferent and sometimes behaves oddly in the presence of humans. She likes being a convenience store woman. She has been working at this dead-end job since she was 18 years old. Neither does she have … Continue reading Convenience Store Woman by Sayaka Murata: ★★★.5
The entire narrative is about its characters and their progression over the years. It is an unlikely love story which can tear you apart but can fill your heart with warmth. The novel is gripping in the beginning but plummets down in the middle. It talks about issues like depression and people transcending it. A twisted tale of two people falling in love over and … Continue reading Normal People by Sally Rooney: An unusual love theme ★★★
You know you are reading a Murakami when you feel you are lost in the world of a pensive mood nostalgic enough to make you emotional, melancholic and composed. Being a regular Murakami reader I have noticed that he has a distinct style when it comes to writing. Even though the elements are very much traceable from his previous narratives yet while reading one might … Continue reading South of the Border, West of the Sun by Haruki Murakami ★★★
Title: Wheels of Wish Author: Bhibhu Datta Rout Genre: Mystery Rating: 3/5 ★★★☆☆ A combination of variegated knowledge systems including history, biology and mythological, ‘Wheels of Wishes” turns out to be one of the most enriching and engaging reads. The novel focus on three parallel stories following three separate timelines. While Shashank Chaudhary is charged with the heinous crime of sexual assault of Roohani, this … Continue reading Wheels of Wish | An amalgamation of mystery and mythology
Rating: 3/5 ★★★☆☆ One of the towering female writers of India, Divakaruni’s texts have always proved their merit in determining the ultimate question of female emancipation from the regulating forces of patriarchy by providing a narrative space for the feminist voices to flourish. This book is a collection of eleven short stories where the female protagonists coming from diverse strata of the society embarks on … Continue reading Arranged Marriage by Chitra Banerjee
