Review: Pakistan: Between Mosque and Military

Pakistan: Between Mosque and Military by Husain Haqqani
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Hooter: A detailed Op-Ed by a former Pakistani ambassador on the history of Pakistan through the lens of military and religion.

Whether you call it confirmational bias or not, Husain Haqqani does provide an interesting insight that resonates with the direction Pakistani leadership has taken since 1947 and as he goes through the political history in the swings between military and civil power centres - the focus on the Pakistani ideology based on the tripod of a common external enemy being India, the one single thread of religion that binds the diverse country and removes the emphasis on regional ethnicities and the ability to leverage foreign funding adds color to the decisions primarily military leadership have undertaken over decades to keep them as kingmakers and power centres internally and in the region. Whilst contrasting personalities have donned the mantle, the way they fall back to this one central theme in changing geo-political scenarios start making sense to some of the current decisions that one also sees.

Husain does a good job of introducing the various main leads in this story, their compulsions and their relationships with the other players and the environment that leads to the various decisions they take. Fundamentally he highlights that military as succour of all of Pakistan's issues and the final word on everything has been a motivating factor in leveraging religion - the only common cause identified when the country was being created anew from the British India and how to balance out other power centres, religion was used to hedge the risk and became a slippery slope that now the country's leadership finds tough to get out of as new power centres have been created that refuse to be held down.

There are lot of facts and timelines in play that gives one a reasonably good history lesson on the journey Pakistan has undergone primarily under military leadership with spurts of military backed civilian leadership upto the time of Musharaf all the way from Ayub Khan and the relationship with India and USA throughout.

Overall, a fine read for someone trying to get a sense of Pakistan's political history and its bearing on their foreign policy.

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Review: Project Hail Mary

Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Hooter: A sole astronaut light years away from Earth figuring out how to save humanity

In a wonderful mix of humor, science, wit and physics and inter stellar friendships, this makes for a great read as Grace Ryland wakes up from an induced coma in the middle of space all alone on a spaceship hurtling towards nowhere as he pieces back from selective amnesia his purpose and way forward. After figuring the past and present, his interactions with an alien as they learn to find a common tongue and work towards a common goal around astrophage and how it is killing their respective suns - the whole natural flow of discovery and the scientific mindset being applied to problem solving makes this for an interesting read with the right amount of science, biology and history in the mix along with ample science fiction. Along the lines of his other book the Martian, Project Heil Mary is a colorful read as it races between the dimensions of the past, present and forseeable future.

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Review: Brave New World

Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Hooter: A sci fi about a dystopian future where the quest of happiness could lead to our downfall

Written in 1931, the book doesn't go too amiss with the foundations of the future in a mind numbing society where we are literally batches of humans literally farmed to perfection who live in a world of instant gratification and pleasure seeking (hmm sounds relatively familiar). The normal moral code of promiscuity, drugs would catch you offguard in today's world and if you lean by today's codes, you'd be what they call a savage in Huxley's book. As people lose individualism, pursuit of intellectual brilliance and ambition for being content and happy are about not shifting the inertia or changing the status quo. There is no drama in the storyline just like the life in the brave new world so did take some dredging through but introduces to new concepts of a dystopia which has been monopolised by George Orwell in common circles.

Neil Postman summarises this book best :

"What Orwell feared were those who would ban books. What Huxley feared was that there would be no reason to ban a book, for there would be no one who wanted to read one."

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Review: Tomb of Sand

Tomb of Sand by Geetanjali Shree
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Hooter: A widow decides to take back her life in the era of the partition

This translation breaks a lot of norms of storytelling in the structure and the premise chugging along slowly like a train passing a busy junction before it speeds up in the unknowns through the life of a protagonist who has given up on life as a widow before she gets going on living life like never before - making her seemingly progressive daughter feel conservative. Cutting across taboos, borders and norms, the book is a delightful read during a terrible phase of human life in the Indian subcontinent.

A lot of witty one-liners that you'd expect from your society's granny who has nothing and no one to fear is the vibe you get through the book. There are a multitude of cultural nuances that the author and hence the translator take on providing a unique perspective of partition era for women and their thoughts around the same.

The book takes a while, quite some while to get going but bears fruit to the patience shown and no wonder an award winning book for the same reason.

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Review: The Three-Body Problem

The Three-Body Problem by Liu Cixin
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Hooter: An interplay between thereotical physics and its application in the backdrop of the Chinese Cultural Revolution

Liu takes in a very imaginative approach of juxtaposing Chinese Cultural Revolution, thereotical physics and its application into a science fiction potboiler that transcends multiple planes. After the witch-hunt of the educated and scientifically accomplished, Ye Wenjie has a scarred past. She grabs the opportunity to work in a secretive army installation even if it means never stepping back to the regular world. Solving for solar flare ups impacting transmissions seems to be her regular pre-occupation.

As the author puts the pieces together of a game called the three body problem that seems to be getting all the intellectuals hooked into this immersive experience, the secretive Chinese Government opening up to international support on a common case and all of this playing into science that has an explaination. Leaving all the spoilers out in this review, the science behind this science fiction plays a prominent role and makes for interesting reading as it tries to extrapolate that into the real world and all the mysticism ties back to the same. A mix of historical and science fiction makes for an interesting read as one delves into more philosophical questions about us as a race and the role we play.

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Review: War of Lanka

War of Lanka by Amish Tripathi
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Hooter: The epic battle of Ramayana in Amish Tripathi's style

Amish Tripathi was a phenomenon when he first released his Shiva trilogy - a unique perspective into mythology, making the Gods more real as he tried researching into these and adding a prism of logic whilst making the stories more relatable for the newer generations. Now that formula is been made common place through all his series including this one. The War of Lanka is the focal point of the previous three parallel stories in the Ram Chandra series - all coming together.

He does the same as he introduces the various characters and stories that lead to the run up to the battle and the final victory - no surprises there as he retells this epic in his inimitable style. The writing gets repetitive, he tiptoes around character depth of all the main protagonists not wanting to antagonise the wider readership I guess leaving all the main characters in 2D whilst he takes liberties with the others where probability of controversy would be less.

If I had to summarise the book, I'd use Amish's favourite phrase in the book - "O Lord Rudra! Have Mercy!" Have lost count the number of times that phrase is uttered. If this is your first tryst with Amish's style, you'll love it but if you have been following his series, there isnt anything to new to expect and there is now a sense of comfort and familiarity with what to expect. That said I love how his research continues to make mythologies more real and relatable. For example, the attempt that explaining how to build the bridge between Lanka and the mainland using local corals and wooden palisades and similarly a lot more epic incidents including the Pushpak viman. Though the colloq. use of bro and dudes amongst the Gods seemed a bit too out of place.

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Review: In Their Shoes

In Their Shoes by Sandip Khade
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Hooter: A thriller with a twist - an interweb of where reality starts and fiction ends.

A single tragic incident plays a focal point of introducing every character and how they are related to atleast one other character in that tragic incident. With that as the singularity, we slowly peel back to the stories of each character and their sordid backgrounds. There is darkness in everyone's lives, just different degrees of black as they deal with moving on or not. The book is a Virar fast as you zoom through each chapter (POV) in literally a couple of pages before you switch over making it an overall breezy read but can get complicated as you jump all over trying to recollect why does X know Y and did Z know X till it all conveniently fits in towards the end.

I didn't need a back panel bio to figure the author has an engineering mindset (also a degree) for the logical precision with which he builds this interconnected web of stories and jumps around like a russian roulette game to each character's POV.

The mechanics of this storyline are efficient but that is also the concern for it. I remain a viewer on this fast paced drama with swinging POVs rather than rooting for any of the characters - except maybe Niyati for she barely gets a chance to speak except through her diary. Everyone else is black and white but I know the author could have explored the greys in them further to help the audience emotionally relate with one of the many characters dotted in this. Whilst I as a reader wanted a slowly cooked noodles potboiler, I guess there are others who love instant gratification in the form of Nestle's Maggi and they'd be satisfied with this one.

Disclaimer: Received this book in exchange for a honest review from the author.

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Review: Those Magnificent Women and their Flying Machines: ISRO’S Mission to Mars

Those Magnificent Women and their Flying Machines: ISRO’S Mission to Mars by Minnie Vaid
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Hooter: Collection of profiles and interviews of some of the senior women in ISRO especially around the MOM mission.

Whilst the bulk of the book focuses on the key women involved with Mars Orbiter Mission, the author compiles interviews and conversations with numerous other senior women in ISRO who have been making a difference. There is very little in written literature on Indian women in the Sciences and this book does justice to highlighting a few of them. From their anecdotes of solving a specific challenge, the family support system, balancing home and work and the slow and steady march towards gender equity in ISRO , the women provide a very relatable backgrounds to a number of Indian women across different white collar industries and their lifestyles and ambitions often working perpendicular to each other.

That said, the book does get repetitive after a while since the book is organised by the different profiles who may have similar stories but in different domains of ISRO from the few women in the spotlight to many more behind the scenes. The book also tries to throw light on how in the pursuit of space, ISRO has been solving a lot of terra challenges that impact the common man - in the farms and in the cities.

Some of the household names such as Dr. Ritu Karidhal, Dr. M. Vanitha, Dr. TK Anuradha and Dr. Nandini Harinath and their journeys from simple homes in towns and villages to where no man has gone before make for inspiring stories.

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Review: The Bangalore Detectives Club

The Bangalore Detectives Club by Harini Nagendra
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Hooter: A murder mystery set in 1920s Bengaluru part of the Mysore state

In the backdrop of whispers of civil disobedience in the quest of freedom, Harini sets up the environment of 1920s Bangalore at the juncture of British colonialism and a newly awakening India. Leveraging her expertise in Indian history specifically around Bengaluru , she does delve into the social, geographical and political context of those times. Kaveri as the protagonist has to deal with the social construct of the times whilst she yearns for more - something as simple as finishing off her studies so she can work outside her home - a concept we seemingly find alien as society opens up slow and steady to celebrate the individual - irrespective of their background.

Though those are the frills because the main storyline is supposed to be a whodunnit where an infamous pimp is murdered in the lawns of a prestigious Century club that allows non-whites. The character development seems a lighter touch and you go through the drills of a murder mystery to land up with the eventual suspect with a lot of clues just simply landing into the hands of our detective who is steps ahead of the sympathetic police. With contemporaries like Sujata Massey, this becomes a tough comparison where the character development has been deeper, the BDC makes for a light reading- probably better suited for young adult fiction audiences.

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Review: Mythos: The Greek Myths Retold

Mythos: The Greek Myths Retold by Stephen Fry
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Hooter: Retelling of Greek Mythology in Stephen Fry's style

When is an audiobook better than a book - here is an example. I loved my 5th grade Greek history textbook but if we had complementary audiobooks like this, I am sure my class at Ibn Seena Sharjah would have pushed our history scores a notch higher. Stephen Fry with his dry wit and humor takes us through the varied stories of Greek Mythology - happy endings, tragic endings (more of these) and adds a breath of life to all the characters we have heard of in varying forms but ironically makes them human.

From the famous Zeus in his good naturedness, mischief and roving eye mode to Prometheus wanting to give fire to his creation of mankind , the Titans sitting uneasy to stories of unrequited love, Midas gold , jealousy and the whole mix. Each story is pretty much stand alone with repeating characters and makes it an easy audiobook listen over a duration.


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Review: Coromandel: A Personal History of South India

Coromandel: A Personal History of South India by Charles Allen
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Hooter: The author's walk down history lane of aspects of Southern Indian that intrigued him

Wanted to put that out up front that this isn't a comprehensive history of Southern India but aspects that intrigued the author. That said, he has done reasonable research in those areas and provides a picture from his outsider's perspective of the setup.

From the detailed overview of the Nairs and Cholamandalam to the heavy Buddhist and Jain influences all over before hinduism replaced them makes for fascinating shift in culture and also the origins of varying concepts in today's era. Along with those, there are so many aspects missing that you couldn't call this a lesson in history and overpowering subjective narration that he continues to add often revelling in things that could stir up a storm.

Take this as a fact book on some of the unexplored and ignore the rest.

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Review: Women Who Run With The Wolves: Contacting the Power of the Wild Woman

Women Who Run With The Wolves: Contacting the Power of the Wild Woman by Clarissa Pinkola Estés
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Hooter: Identifying themes of women empowerment through folklores

While the concept of breaking the man created concept of woman and leveraging the definition of a wild woman because wild is untethered to any constructs - man made or otherwise is a fresh perspective along with the examples from folklore and native tales from across the world to drive her point across, the writing style does get very tedious and it was a struggle for me to trod through the book. The concepts of believing in yourself, not doubting your gut instinct. Also whilst you'd hope for deep dive into those tales, the focus is on the author's psychological analysis that would give Freud some competition and makes for heavy reading.

Bluebeard was an interesting story along with the Little match girl that stood out along with the conclusions drawn. I'd read the book for the folklore and if they had edited out all the psychoanalysis bits.

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Review: The Kenneth Anderson Omnibus: Volume 1: Tales from the Indian Jungle, Man-Eaters and Jungle Killers, The Call of the Man-Eater

The Kenneth Anderson Omnibus: Volume 1: Tales from the Indian Jungle, Man-Eaters and Jungle Killers, The Call of the Man-Eater by Kenneth Anderson
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Hooter: A collection of shikari stories based in South and Central India primarily

Kenneth Anderson born in Hyderabad in the 1900s - an author and a hunter - shares a collection of stories of his brush with wildlife across the years in the jungles of South India. I got to know of the book from the fact that the IT concrete jungle of Bellandur was infamous for man eating tiger roaming the jungles of Bellandur in Kenneth's time.

The stories follow a similar pattern of him hunting the hunted and the cat and human games they play - but what adds color is the set up to each story is very different and also paints a unique color to life in India in those days from his perspective - a relatively privileged individual thanks to his colonial roots whilst living amongst the common villagers in far and out places in rural South India refering to terms and jargon which are slowly getting erased from our day to day lives. Whilst the protagonist animal usually never makes it past the book , the author does add vivid color and imagery to the wildlife in the book and does try to morally justify atleast to himself why he had to take on that particular "man-eater".


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Review: The World for Sale: Money, Power and the Traders Who Barter the Earth’s Resources

The World for Sale: Money, Power and the Traders Who Barter the Earth’s Resources by Javier Blas
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Hooter: An investigative journalism piece on how Commodity traders run the world economy

Most of the players are unheard of for the laymen and this book does a great job at bringing them to the fore and how they actually play an impact on the entire geopolitical set up purely based on economics and have been denting a lot of world sanctions and their impact but running around the rule book and helping regimes all over - filling in the gap as and when required. No doubt as market participants there is a positive to it with the wonderful example of oil prices during the worldwide lockdown as consumption went down by 30% overnight and people were paying to get oil of their hands. That said, there are some wonderful examplss over the years of the power these commodity traders have leveraged , but I felt that's what this book became - a collection of different anecdotes of different folks and there seemed to a repetitive strain to it which got monotonous for me after a while.

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Review: 400 Days

400 Days by Chetan Bhagat
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Hooter: Chetan Bhagat building on his crime thriller genre with a missing teenage girl

Nabbed from under the same roof as an entire joint family, a teenage girl goes missing and a year done there is still no clue to where she is at. The police have given up but our protagonists - a detective duo that Chetan has been focussed onto building into a series with the past few books are on the case. Chetan continues to write in relatable English with simple story arcs that make him a popular read amongst the larger nascent English reading public in India with no pretence.

You could read the book or just wait till another Bollywood director out of ideas converts this into a movie with Alia Bhatt playing the role of Alia, Kunaal Roy Kapur playing Siddharth, Saif Ali Khan playing Manish, Neena Gupta as the mother in law - you get the gist.

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Review: The Supervillain Handbook: The Ultimate How-to Guide to Destruction and Mayhem

The Supervillain Handbook: The Ultimate How-to Guide to Destruction and Mayhem by King Oblivion
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Hooter: A sarcastic beginners guide to super villainy

Did this via Audible so the villain narration voice was the biggest bonus of the entire book. Taking examples from the comics world, the framework to be a supervillain is shared with the illogical reasons highlighted in a matter of fact manner.

From picking your name, your cape (what's a super villain without a cape), picking your origin story, your destruction objective, differentiating from bad people and villains , the need of heroes and villains as a symbiotic relationship.

A non serious fun read. You won't get to learn anything here or will you ? Mwahahaahhah

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Review: Diana: Her True Story in Her Own Words

Diana: Her True Story in Her Own Words by Andrew Morton
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Hooter: The uncovering of a traumatic and torrid life under the facade that beautiful angelic ideal woman princess we all knew.

Under the strict and suffocating world of the institution of the crown, the fact this version of the story is out is a thriller and a story in itself. The story itself is a cherry on that cake. No one can imagine under that glamourous perfect life image she had to project was a life you wouldn't even want to wish for your enemy.

Andrew Morton does a brilliant job in capturing facets of Diana as a human - just another girl wanting to live her dreams but rudely cut short by the world around her. The fact that her true story had to be published as second hand information so as to protect her shows how out of control she was on her own life. All that glitters truly isn't gold fits perfectly for her story.

It has been 25 years since we lost her and the author shares an additional foreword talking about the journey that they went through to push this story out. Talking of her troubled childhood and how Prince Charles provided that escape and hopes of a better life but she never really fitted in to the Crown setup and expectations and slowly lost out in "three was a crowd in our marriage" highlighting the shadow of Camilla all through her courtship, marriage and divorce. For someone who saw so much pain, she tried making the world so much better for the rest through the power of media. Unfortunately it was the same media that obtusely in a way was a cause of her untimely death.

Whilst this is a great view of Diana as another human being and her story being as full of challenges and obstacles as the rest of us - even worse to an extent, the book spends a lot of time on her unhappy marriage which got me bored for a while. Her childhood and her last days are captured well and colorful, the unhappy marriage part drags for too long with the focus on it to a point that it feels repetitive.

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Review: The Lies of Locke Lamora

The Lies of Locke Lamora by Scott Lynch
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Hooter: The adventures of an orphan who steals too much

Teasing between fantasy and medieval Europe, Locke Lamora is based in a time when the less understood was scientifically accounted for as alchemy. An orphan who is too ambitious for small town pickpocketing and always causing a maelstorm behind his actions and ambitions, this book makes for a fun devil-may-care attitude as he jumps from one challenge to another dealing with secret societies and invisible power levers who play the city who he keeps on tripping onto through his con man facades having taken a bunch of underdogs under his wing to pull off from the rich and mighty (Robin Hood distributing wealth to himself). Conscience less or maybe a teeny weeny bit always cooking up plans as he goes along makes for a fun read. I totally can imagine this being converted into a movie probably with a PG-18 rating. There is treachery over treachery and no one is saintly right even the saints themselves.

There is intelligent writing, dark humour, dash of adventure and lack of morals along with a brotherhood that swears allegiance to themselves make for a fantastic read.

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Review: Risk Up Front: Managing Projects in a Complex World

Risk Up Front: Managing Projects in a Complex World by Adam Josephs
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Hooter: Spinning project management across another axis - that of pushing risk up front.

Was introduced to the book part of a workshop by Adam and I'll skip colouring the book review from my experience with the workshop and the author but focus purely on the book. Using research and their own combined experiences across decades of consultancy, the risk up front framework does have some interesting and feasible approaches to project management through concepts like "the cost of being late" being articulated, creating a culture of raising risks and decoupling from solving for them or not having solved them part of the raising. In a way, the gamification (tangential term I know ) of raising risks creates a collaborative cross functional team culture that allows for teams to cover all their bases or be aware of it. I can imagine King Arthur's round table using this concept but we'll stick to modern age technology projects for this conversation. Love how humans are categorised as "optimistic procrastinators" and I thought I was unique. Whilst the book can get a bit dry for general reading, getting a sense of all the concepts shared across another axis of project management get you rethinking on the fundamentals and open up new avenues on how you work towards ensuring successful projects so suggest it as reading material in the arsenal of successful project managers kits.

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Review: Bulls, Bears and Other Beasts

Bulls, Bears and Other Beasts by Santosh Nair
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Hooter: A fictionalised personal view of the history of Stock Markets in India

Whilst the author adds fictional characters to prevent any libel cases against him in narrating the ups and downs of the life of a stock market trader in India, he manages to sequence a lot of major headlines and the ground reality cause and effect of those scenarios from scams around Harshad Mehta and Ketan Parekh to political results like BJP coming to power in '98, '99 and 2014 to UPA winning in 2004 apart from Pokhran test and so on. He also helps provide a lot of color on some of the rules we have today and tracing back to the loopholes they plug. Whilst the book makes it look like the only way you can mint astronomical amounts of money in the stock market is by identifying loopholes and not getting caught , he also provides sound advice to investors - you aren't a good savvy investor or reader of the market unless you can survive atleast till the next bull run and the market does correct itself in the long run.

Overall makes for an interesting history of the stock markets in India from the eyes of someone who was on the ground trying to make sense of it all even though it is through the fictitious Lalaji.

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Review: Buddha, Vol. 3: Devadatta

Buddha, Vol. 3: Devadatta by Osamu Tezuka
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Hooter: A graphic novel representation of the journey of Buddha

Took a while to land my hand on the 3rd volume after having read the first two. Turns out a colleague has the entire collection of 8 volumes. Osamu is a genius in the graphic novel world of Japan and this retelling of a historical event is way out of his comfort zone. That said he makes it a fun read, like you are reading a comic book ( graphic novelists are seeing red with that term) as he tries to incorporate childish humour and pranks in a story that motivates and inspires people around the world.

Siddhartha continues to meet new people on his journey - another monk Dhepa and a little kid monk who can foretell the future thanks to a fortuitous event apart from brigands , jealous kings and lovers. The pace continues to be slow in terms of the storyline and am hoping the longer story arc brings this alive because stand alone, there are a few highs but the storyline seems to get a bit repetitive.

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Review: Will

Will by Will Smith
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Hooter: Why did Will Smith do what he did at the Oscars? The answer lies in this book.

What drives Will? An autobiographical account provides you a background of the rough childhood to rough stardom that awaits him from his perspective. When you are unhappy that you are not rich, not famous or not wanted by the other sex, you still have hope that getting one of them will get the others. When you have them all and are unhappy - what do you do? Will deals with that dilemma too of having it all. I am a big fan of books but this is one book you have to go for the audiobook narrated by Will Smith himself because as a rap artist - that elemnt comes across authentic in this form.

Hard work, opportunities and luck in equal measure but he makes the most of it and indeed iterates the same when he would have dumped a script of himself thinking it was too Hollywood with a ice bagger kid going to win a grammy to being a top grosser Hollywood / International star.

No doubt he is a great performer and he continues that performance with the narration of his story along with painting his vulneribilities to make sure he doesn't come across as a boastful self centred egoist. Going back to what happened at the oscars, I think his fear of being painted a coward in the eyes of the women he loves thanks to childhood trauma could explain those inexplicible actions.


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Review: How the BJP Wins: Inside India s Greatest Election Machine

How the BJP Wins: Inside India s Greatest Election Machine by Prashant Jha
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Hooter: A journalist's POV on the ground specifically around 2017 UP elections

Prashant Jha was on the ground reporting on the 2017 UP elections which set the baseline for 2019 especially after the losses of Bihar and Delhi after high decibel campaigns. Irrespective of their idealogies, the book provides an insight on what is making it work. Professionalism in dealing with politics is probably the summary here - going to the grass roots and creating a scalable and replicatable framework that could be leveraged across the country rejuvenated the grassroots which are the true powerhorses of democracy and not the airconditioned hallways of the power capitals that most media like to pick their soundbytes from. Whilst the ideology warfare ensured middle class and upwards swayed to the tunes of the political parties and broke friendships on, the true power centres of democracy irrespective of religion were getting houses, gas and other last mile government services that made all the high decibel debates purely what they were - all noise no sound. If cinema is the silver screen, politics is the golden screen and BJP has figured how to play it out at the moment. This book doesn't come out with any secret formulae but substantiates the ground realities and introduces a lot of players who define the next generation of this party- folks who are slogging it out in the field today and rising through the ranks like Ram Madhav who ran the entire North East expansion strategy. This book provides an academic insight into the electoral process and the mathematics that goes in defining victory using the BJP rise as its case study focussing on the duality of Modi and Shah who are playing their roles to perfection.

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Review: Unfinished

Unfinished by Priyanka Chopra Jonas
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Hooter: A memoir of her life so far - marrying Nick Jonas as the major life event to wrap things up.

Priyanka Chopra is unabashedly honest about being bold and being the centre of attention focused on highlighting her uniqueness in the crowds or circles she is in. The dusky Miss World to Indian artist in Hollywood, female centric roles in Bollywood and so many more achievements she has carved out through her career so far.

I hadn't really known of how privileged a background she came from but irrespective of that, she worked hard to achieve what she has. An extremely supportive family and extended family that allowed her to push for her dreams without having to worry too much of the consequences allowed her to push harder and harder than most folks who didn't have that safety net.

Whilst the book primarily focuses on her happy moments through her life with the life defining challenges in hindsight, the memoirs do feel airbrushed to paint a generic inspirational memoir - it does provide some unique insights to the life she has grown into and how she handled fame that literally didn't knock at the door and arrived unannounced - a big push being her teenage brother simply wanting his own room in the house.

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Review: Masala Lab : The Science of Indian Cooking

Masala Lab : The Science of Indian Cooking by Krish Ashok
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Hooter: A chemistry lesson on the Indian kitchen

Just as the author suggests - adding science to the art of cooking. The premise is wonderful for a country full of engineers trying to figure out the art of "you'll know how much water you need to knead the atta" and other feel good factors when the ingredients are right. A beginner's perspective to cooking and the scientific reasons behind some of the customs and tricks and hacks that can help improve the taste and/or efficiency of cooking. A geeky approach to cooking with all the chemical and physical reactions at play.

For regular cooks, a lot of the info shared would seem common sense or redundant. For experimental cooks with a nerdy bent of mind - this makes for good reading. Like a pinch of salt to enhance sweetneess and a pinch of salt in a sweet dish to mute overly sweetness, how to fast track pressure cooking though compromising on taste and what needs to be heated how so that the color and nutrients aren't missed out.

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Review: Desperately Seeking Shah Rukh: India's Lonely Young Women and the Search for Intimacy and Independence

Desperately Seeking Shah Rukh: India's Lonely Young Women and the Search for Intimacy and Independence by Shrayana Bhattacharya
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Hooter: A conversation on gender disparity in India across all spectrums

Using Shah Rukh Khan's fandom as a common thread and "clickbaity" version of a title, this is a culmination of fifteen years of research on something as simple as being a woman in India. She cuts across economic strata, age demographics, lifestyles across women who profess their fandom for SRK and how they relate to his persona on screen and off screen along with the movies he has acted in.

Understanding a woman may be a quest a lot of men are supposedly on, this book tries to capture thei aspirations blocked by patriarchy and other social constructs. She does get down to economics of unpaid labour but mixes it up with SRK and Bollywood to make it a lot more palatable to the average reader.

She weaves along the themes of finding love in this country as the aspirations and expectations of newer generations of women change, even if ever so slowly compared to how the world has been changing on the screen and off it. From an airhostess being the first female bread earner in her family to a freelance gig economy worker in the back lanes of India to a government officer - the various cross sections have different challenges and different outlooks but united by the fact that they are gender specific in a lot of cases and the double standards they have to deal with all the time.

The book doesnt try to provide solutions but just shares a story of many a woman and am sure in some form of the other - one character or the other - every Indian woman relates to this journey. A good book to acknowledge the reality. Obviously being a SRK Fan herself, you see a lot of retro fitting of concepts back to SRK movies which can feel jarring but you can give her a free pass there because that is what fandom is all about - more from the heart than the mind.

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Review: Big Billion Startup: The Untold Flipkart Story

Big Billion Startup: The Untold Flipkart Story by Mihir Dalal
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Hooter: The journey of Flipkart from idea to execution

As a documentary on India's first brand name in the internet world - leading the flag for start up ecosytem here a decade before it became a norm, this does a great job at explaining the people and dynamics that played in the ecosystem that Flipkart grew in. Based on conversations, this provides color to the dry facts you'd assume with a documentary of an organisation. It becomes sweeter for me as they talk of hangouts in Koramangala hitting home much closer than I'd have expected hence making for a relatable read. While there is a bias the conversations have in painting individuals involved but you have to take that with a pinch of salt for there is no singular truth when people's memories are jogged down.

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Review: Tamarind City: Where Modern India Began

Tamarind City: Where Modern India Began by Bishwanath Ghosh
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Hooter: An individual's memoir about their experiences in Chennai along with anecdotaral accounts of historical significance.

With snippets and anecdotes covering a multitude of facets that Chennai have to offer - again purely from his experiences rather than a memoir of the city from it's perspective, this makes for an interesting reading to hear the history behind the daily lives and names of folks from Chennai, places and some of the traditions especially around areas and their pasts.

Without being too boisterous or bashful, the author provides some unique insights into the history of Broadway, Fort George, the famous Ratna cafe, the iyer vs iyengar rivalries and the dravidian influences and the tussles and other sub genres of quintessential Chennai. There is a very informal vibe to his writing, like a journal or a blog which makes it for fun reading along with some fascinating tit bits about Singara Chennai.



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Review: Midnight's Children

Midnight's Children by Salman Rushdie
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Hooter: The parallels between the birth of the protagonist and India and how their lives unfold.

Considered a must read in nouveau classic literature, finally got down to this book with an extremely interesting premise of the journey of kids born right at the gong of midnight when India received freedom and how intertwined their lives are. While Salman has a colorful writing style painting the imagery through the decades and setting up the environment really well, I found myself plodding through the storyline not being invested in too many of the characters that came and went in the melee of Saleem Sinai's life. The magical realism gets a bit contrite, a degree of self centredness fits in where the book feels like it is the author loving to hear his own voice than the audience's reactions. But a great capsule into the backdrop of Indian history. The Brass Monkey was my favourite character till she turns into Jamila . There is a wide assortment of interesting characters who make a cameo performance and move on. Probably the book is too elite for me or I just had higher expectations.



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Review: The Secret Keeper of Jaipur

The Secret Keeper of Jaipur by Alka Joshi
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Hooter: Second book in the trilogy of the henna artist and her supporting crew 12 years into the future in the 1960s

Still a period drama in an essence, this time it focuses on Malik - the cute boy grown into a fine young man as he deals with the life and coming of age. Alka continues to paint a womderful caricature of all the characters involved across locations and took me a while to get familiar with names of the past and how they had grown up. Whilst there is a move forward in their stories and how they have grown and changed over time as you'd expect humans to, it did get a bit tricky for me to re-evaluate the picture I had created for all the folks from my previous reading. The plot seemed relatively bland compared to the first one and not sure if this is the curse of trilogy that I always see with books and movies - the second one is usually sub consciouly written as a bridge to the third one and just remains that. This book felt the same.

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Review: A Little History of Economics

A Little History of Economics by Niall Kishtainy
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Hooter: A beginner friendly walk through the history of economics

Not trying to drown oneself in the intellectual nitty gritties of economics, Niall tries to provide a layman perspective to the evolution of economics over the years and the major players in those times - also adding the prevalent conditions to why it probably made sense then in terms of the theories we consider outdated today. He manages to add a breezy element to reading and learning about economics. He makes Adamn Smith, Fourier, Keynes, Amartya Sen a lot more human and their award winning concepts a lot more relatable. This level of simplicity comes from the mastery of the subject he seems to have.

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Review: "What Do You Care What Other People Think?": Further Adventures of a Curious Character

"What Do You Care What Other People Think?": Further Adventures of a Curious Character by Richard P. Feynman
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Hooter: A serious follow up to his first book sharing anecdotes on his life expecially the probe on the Challenger failure

Richard Feynman has always been a curious character right from my school days when I landed my hands on his "Surely you must be joking Mr Feynman" - a Sheldon Cooper in real life to an extent when you talk about IQ and higher EQ than Sheldon for sure. The way he shares his perspectives on various aspects of life and his interactions with the world at large make for interesting reading with the candour he affords to show. Really disheartening to hear of his first love but how he continues to trudge along through life. The inside look into the whole process of a presidential probe on one of the biggest scientific disasters of that time gives unique insights to the process and the thoughts behind it. As a Feynman fanboy, this was a good read into one of the scientific luminaries of the 20th Century.

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Review: Homo Deus: A History of Tomorrow

Homo Deus: A History of Tomorrow by Yuval Noah Harari
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Hooter: A reality check into the current state of affairs of humanity with an eye into the future

Yuval had blown everyone away with his style of writing and research into his book Sapiens. Building on that he continues into the present with an eye towards the future on how dataism would be the religion of the future. Since everything is a hypothesis into the future by extrapolating the past, the research oriented engaging style that Yuval has continues to shine but isn't as hard hitting because they are all possibilities. Maybe 20 years from now, in hindsight we'd be like wow! what a visionary who thought up of this future a few decades ago. He does bring about the dichotomy of religion and science, animals being sentient beings , books reading you whilst you read them, separating our intelligence from our conscience and a lot more thought provoking scenarios and studies which make for a good read and get us to question ourselves.



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Review: Blood and Oil: Mohammed bin Salman's Ruthless Quest for Global Power

Blood and Oil: Mohammed bin Salman's Ruthless Quest for Global Power by Bradley Hope
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Hooter: An Investigative Journalists' POV into the rise of MBS and his vision for Saudi Arabia

Piecing together through candid interviews, researching through documents - these two journalists have pieced together a fast paced thrilling behind the scenes look of the rise of MBS as he navigates the political web of Saudi Arabia and the interlinked geo political world to achieve his vision for himself and his nation. Building up from a background of the political ecosystem that he landed up in and how major pieces around the world play in for him or against him, you get a sense that politcal dramas like Game of Thrones often don't have to go too far from reality to garner inspiration. The petrodollars, religious sentiments across the spectrum, the new restless demographics, the urge to create a legacy - the authors try to cover a lot of aspects that made it to the public domain - Khashoggi, the Ritz Jail, Davos in the desert, NEOM, Trump's visit, Qatar blockade and numerous other interlinked events in the region and what was at stake behind the scenes. The interviews I think help build a softer aspect of the personality that MBS is against the cold hard dry facts of the events and the actions that were taken making for an intriguing political thriller whose story has just begun - as we know his legacy is probably yet to be written.

There hasn't been much literature I have accessed about the Middle Eastern political ecosystem and I feel this has been a good read to get a sense of it specifically from MBS point of view and Saudi's Vision 2030.

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Review: Valmiki's Women

Valmiki's Women by Anand Neelakantan
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Anand takes on different threads of Ramayana from the perspectives of some of the women characters who in the popular versions get a very small but pivotal black and white role defining the course of the entire storyline. He tries to play out back stories and shares the narrative from their journey. This obviously adds a fresh perspective to the stories that we have linearly heard and imbibed into our thought process. Take for example Manthara who triggers the 14 year vanvaas for Rama , Shantha - his sister who only yearned for a father's love from Dashrath but always was overshadowed in his quest for a son, Tataka - a demoness he kills , Meenakshi and the concept of Bhoomija.

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Review: The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness

The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness by Eric Jorgenson
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Hooter: A compilation of Angel Investor Naval Ravikant's tweets and insights on wealth creation and personal happiness.

For starters, wealth and happiness are two sections in this book and not intertwined incase someone thought the same based on the title. That said because it is a compilation and not a self written book, the biggest plus this book has it goes away from "My perspective of the world is awesome hence I am successful and you should see how I did well through that perspective" complex that a lot of self help books do down with. Instead here it is a series of statements and insights that Naval made through his tweets / tweetstorms and the background to why in a concise manner. This book is packed a with truckload of ideas so I am sure to refer back to it time and again to see if there are ideas I can leverage for the challenges I face at that point in time versus having stored all that info in my head.

Couple of major takeaways start off with "learn to love to read" and don't read purely because it is cool to do or a chore because that is where information seemingly is available. Breadth is important but depth is even more. So focus on one, build depth, move on to next and build depth and so on.
Money is not wealth is another key takeaway.

Another big plus is the author is giving away the ebook for free so easily distribution channels for anyone who is interested. Let me know if you need a copy too.



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Review: The Last Queen

The Last Queen by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Hooter: A historical fiction account of Rani Jindan - the Queen Regent of Punjab before the British takeover

Pulling out stories of Indian history that mainstream had forgotten is what I'd give Chitra Banerjee credits for picking up the life of Rani Jindan and sharing the Indian freedom struggle from a woman protagonist's perspective which pokes holes into the hero complex versions we end up reading.

The journey was from a young girl - a kennel keeper's daughter to the Queen regent is a rags to riches story we always have a soft corner for but the challenges that come in between seemed very plain and could be considered as fodder for a soap opera to pick up on. Challenges come as easily as they go and I feel there is a lot of caricatures or better phrase it as single dimensional side cast that are thrown in for the plot line to move on. Makes for a good one time read but nothing that captures your imagination. Full marks on the research and maybe that is where most of the focus remained at.

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Review: The Silk Roads: A New History of the World

The Silk Roads: A New History of the World by Peter Frankopan
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Hooter: A brief historical narrative on the empires and nations specifically from a trading perspective and hence the silk roads - not specifically the traditional Silk Route alone.

How the whole world is inter related and political decisions in one corner and one era ring true through the decades and centuries is what this book focuses on. From ancient trade routes and visits in Eurasia upto China to American policy in the Middle East - the book cuts across a lot of centuries and geo-political scenarios often correlating obtuse events through a subtle underlying thread. There is a very obvious Westerner's perspective to world history but interestingly does try to not whitewash imperial and colonialism related tragedies a large part of the world has had to face over the centuries a lot of it driven from Europe in the recent past.

The book tries to capture a lot of events through the years and does a decent job at tying that chronological order focused through the lens of primarily trade and commerce and the quest for making money as a trade off to demolishing cultures and civilizations.

I have a feeling I'll be wanting to redo this as there was a lot of information packed into this that makes for heavy reading. But to the perspective of how much data it has packed in, the author does a great job at ensuring it isn't completely dry.

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