The Cruelest Month (Chief Inspector Armand Gamache #3)

Author – Louise Penny
Genre – Detective, Mystery, 
Source - Kindle
Rating - 5
Read - February 2016

And this is what we have been waiting for. Perfect. 

Previous Armand Gamache mysteries:
Still Life ;
A Fatal Grace .

The Daughter of Time (Alan Grant #5)

Author – Josephine Tey

Genre – Detective, Crime, History

Source - Kindle

Rating - 5

Read - January 2016

What do you do when you find that a book you have not heard about at all is in the top (or nearabouts) in all of the lists of greatest detective / mystery books of all-time? You read it, of course.

So I did. 

The basic premise is fairly straightforward - Alan Grant, of the Scotland Yard, has had a broken leg. While recuperating, he is bored with the same old people, the same old food, the same old books et al. So he immerses himself in a historical mystery, of the 'Princes in the Tower' - and Richard III. Grant is not a historian by any stretch of the imagination - but he educated himself of the case, progressing from school books to quasi-historical tales, to proper historic tomes - and in the meantime, becomes friendly with a researcher, who does a good bit of the heavy lifting in terms of fact-checking. And the mystery unfolds.

It's nothing like anything I have read earlier. Thoroughly loved it. Completely worthy of all the adulation. 

And thank God for those best-of lists.

Nayaker Prabesh o Prasthan

নায়কের প্রবেশ ও প্রস্থান 
Author – Mati Nandi

Genre – Fiction, Bengali

Source - Print

Rating - 5

Read - December 2015

This is an extraordinary piece of work. Remember that piece in 'Interpreter of Maladies', the first one? A Temporary Matter? Of how a quasi-estranged couple speak with each other in the middle of a week-long power-failure? This story, by Mati Nandi, reminded me of that. This is a story of how an entire small lane in Kolkata changes, or just comes to terms with itself, while a celebrity steps in, and then steps out of a building in that lane. This is quite extraordinary storytelling. Needs translation.

Inverting The Pyramid

Author – Jonathan Wilson

Genre – Football, Sports, History, Journalism

Source - Print

Rating - 5

Read - September 2015

There are some books for which the one-minute book review is insufficient - not because you are full of things to say and you cannot do it concisely (that is YOUR problem, reviewer), but because there are so many things to write about. 

There are so many things to write about in this book. To the commoner, Cricket is the game of detailed tactics, and football is the game of hit and run. They cannot be further from the truth. Cricket is essentially a game of skill. Football is essentially the game of strategy. And this strategy, which took the last hundred years to develop, is detailed in this book - in crisp, clear, precise, journalistic language and quite phenomenal depth of research. @jonawils is quite a special football journalist, as any regular reader of The Blizzard and The Guardian (and even ESPNCricinfo) will attest - and this will, I think, remain his pièce de résistance.

And you, readers of this blog, know that I sometimes recommend sports books to non-sports fans. This is not one of those books. But if you are a lover of the beautiful game, you have to have this book.

The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency

Author - Alexander McCall Smith
Genre - Detective, Africa, Humour, Mystery
Source - Audiobook
Rating - 5
Read - June 2015

So this is an absolutely excellent book. I'd stand on a rooftop, but you have all read it anyway. You haven't? What are you waiting for, then? 
There are three books that I recommend, interchangeably, to the intelligent occasional-reader or non-fiction-reader, who wants to start reading fiction. They are 'The curious incident of the dog in the night time', 'High fidelity', and 'The Guernsey literary and potato peel pie society'. This, then, shall be my fourth.

Last Chance To See

Author : Douglas Adams

Genre: Travel, Humor, Nature, Non - fiction

Rating: 5

Source: Print

Read on: April 2015

Motherhood and Apple pie. Puppies. The Godfather. Anurag Kashyap. Ronaldinho. Rahul Dravid. The curious incident of the dog in the night time. Douglas Adams.

The untouchables. The beyond-criticisms.

In all honesty, Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy was something that I never did warm up to. It's something that I never finished, even. The first book, a little bit of the second... And that was it. I just never got the fuss. About the way-larger-than-cult following. And about Douglas Adams.

Now I do. This book changes it. There's a lot of humor, a lot of warmth, and a lot of heart - this is a real treasure. Suhas, my friend, had been quietly pestering me for a long time to read this. And now I have. And now I know why. I am happier for the experience, and wiser, and better even. 

Red Harvest

Author - Dashiell Hammett
Genre - Detective, Thriller, Hardboiled, Classic
Source: Audiobook
Rated: 5/5
Read: March-April 2015

Hammett is a very different kind of brilliant than Chandler. Not for him the plebian godliness of Chandler and his stark, perfect prose. Hammett is made for action, and for action scenes. And the man-with-no-name protagonist, oftentimes referred to as the Continental Op, is rough-hewn, brutal and just keeps to business. And business is good. Very good. 
You are missing out on a lot of brilliance if you are not reading hardboiled.

The Big Sleep

Author: Raymond Chandler

Genre: Detective, Thriller, Hardboiled, Classic

Source: Audiobook

Rated: 5/5

Read: Jan-March 2015

Chandler’s writing is like a slap of crisp, hot breeze on the face, late on a tiring summer’s day – clean, brutal, uncompromising, and unforgettable. Clean, more than anything else. Sparse. Hard. And enough.

You know that this is genre fiction. And while reading it (and I have read only one Chandler earlier), you know that this is literature that is defeating the genre it is part of. You know that this is a classic. You are mesmerized. You are pulled. You carry on. You are carried on.

Raymond Chandler is the writer I want to write like.

Ruaha

Author: Buddhadeb Guha
Genre: Thriller, Young readers, Wildlife, Shikaar
Source: eBook
Rated: 5/5
Read: March 2015

Later

The Silkworm

Author - Robert Galbraith (J K Rowling)

Genre - Fiction, Thriller, Detective, Cormoran Strike #2

Source - Audiobook

Rating - 5

September 2014

Dated review:
JKR is a genius. That's all.
If you are a lover of detective fiction, you would not miss this.Go on, what are you waiting for?

Tenth of December

Author - George Saunders

Genre - Fiction, Short Stories

Source - Print

Rating - 5

September 2014

George Saunders is a genius. No, a Genius. With a capital G. I wish I can write short stories with such a macabre twist, with such an evil forbearing and such a light touch. This man is a genius. A Genius.

সেই সময় (Those Days)

Author - Sunil Gangopadhyay

Genre - Historical Fiction, Bengali

Source - Print

Rating - 5

June 2014

A monster of a book. Very strong writing. Te history comes alive. I hope this is as good in English translation as in Bengali, though (I read the original) - this is about more than anything about the rise of the Bengali people and the Bengali language.
Do tell me, friends, if the translation works.

Gone Girl

Author : Gillian Flynn

Genre: Thriller, Mystery

Source - Audiobook

Rating - 5

April 14

Shudder. A delicious, twisted, evil, satan of a book. Unreliable, lying, attractive, detestable, addictive narrators; the most realistic take on a crumbled marriage I've read in recent times; twists and double twists and triple twists and then --- just as we were slowly moving towards some kind of an expected conclusion, a whoosh-what-the-f**k-was-that howitzer of an ending. I hated, HATED the ending. Perfect ending. Hated it. Loved it.

Wolf Hall

Author - Hilary Mantel

Genre - History, Politics, Non-Fiction

Source - Audiobook

Rating - 5

December 2013

This is an incredible achievement. Really one of the books where even while reading it you know that this is a piece of high art. Hilary Mantel is a genius. How many book have you encountered where in the middle of an exciting passage of events you suddenly stop to marvel at a piece of sparkling prose? And you are never over-burdened by the literariness of the piece (something that, I must agree, happens to me often), the book, all 24+ hours of it in Audible, flows through. I am not the Booker-prize-reader kind, in fact, I am the exact opposite. This however was brilliant. Will have to start on the next part in a few days.

India After Gandhi

Author - Ramachandra Guha

Genre - History, Politics, Society, Non-fiction

Source - Print

Rating - 5

November 2013

Re-read. This should be re-read once every year. Masterful. A page-turner, it reads like a thriller. Even on the second read.

A Short History of Nearly Everything

Author – Bill Bryson

Genre – Science, Popular Science, Non-fiction, Humour, History, Physics, Geology, Paleontology, Anthropology

Source - Audiobook

Rating - 5

August 2013

I have been having great luck with books in recent times. Or maybe I am easy to please. But really, this book here is a definite read-this-now. The dexterity is not in the physics, the geology and paleontology and anthropology, a fair bit of which (gloat gloat) I was to an extent in the know of, but in the presentation. Bryson is an awesome storyteller, and he weaves these superb, fun, and exceedingly funny stories around the mysteries of nature and creation and the men and women who solved these mysteries for us – this is the perfect book to read beforehand if you are planning to babysit a particularly inquisitive nephew or niece. 

The Cuckoo's Calling

Author - Robert Galbraith

Genre - Detective, Mystery, Thriller

Source - Audiobook

Rating - 5

August 2013

I am a fanboy, so let me get done with the gushing first. JKR is such a legend! Love her! 
Ok, let's talk about the book now. Ms. Rowling has an incredible ability of putting word after word, and making you look forward to the next word. A natural-born story-teller to compare with the very best. Even while reading the Potter novels, I had always thought that mystery would be her natural habitat, she is so brilliant and ingenuous at plot and storytelling. And this here is a proof. Does it hurtle through like, say, a Lee Child novel? Nope, the story builds up gradually -- this is a classic detection novel, the thrill is secondary to the detection -- but it is still effective, you can still not put the book down. I couldn't. 
Cormoran Strike and Robin Ellacott are both such interesting characters, that I'd very much like this book to be Cormoran Strike #1. And okay then, let's have the acid test for all private-eye books --- Could I guess the killer? Nope. Not till the very end I couldn't. 

Un Lun Dun

Author - China Miéville

Genre - Fantasy, YA, Coming-of-age, Message-fiction, Parallel-world

Source - Audiobook

Rating - 5

July 2013

Amazing, amazing! Put Harry Potter and Neverwhere together, mix it together, and then turn the whole concept around. You get Un Lun Dun. 
So you know that I am a bit of a Miéville fan. And I read YA fiction often. Put those together, and the expectation was high. The expectation was met, to say the least.
Just to add: like the best of message fiction, the messages come in to the reader subconsciously, never becoming even a slight bit preachy; and never interfering with the story. Pollution. Using lower countries as dumping ground for waste. The experience of a subcontinental-origin person in London. And the biggest hit for me was the sublime turnaround of the sidekick. The Neville Longbottoms of the world rise up to take their rightful position in this book, and how!

The Broken Ear

Author - Hergé

Genre - Comics, Graphic Novel, 

Source - Print 

Rating - 5

July 2013

This has to be the most violent and action-packed of all Tintin stories. And my favourite. And the first Tintin I'd ever read. Love it!

Prisoners of the Sun

Author - Hergé

Genre - Comics, Graphic Novel, 

Source - Print 

Rating - 5

July 2013

There is always great value in revisiting Tintin. And in my opinion this is the best series of his.