Hello there! 🙂
I have reached Europe for the second part of my course, which I’ll be doing here in Berlin. I spent a day exploring Istanbul in Turkey as my flight had a stopover there. Istanbul was on my wishlist since a long time and I can’t begin to tell you all how beautiful is that! Of course, there’s going to be a post about it but my pictures have not done justice to the beauty or, more importantly, the spirit of Istanbul.
This post, however, is about 5 books that I read in 2015 and I thought that I’ll combine the book opinions in one post just because I am lagging so much in my planned posts, it’s too difficult to manage 😦 . So, here you go:
- Brahman ki Beti: I am a huge fan of Sharatchandra’s story writing and I am deeply in love with how his women characters are always so strong and way ahead of their times, almost all of us have seen them in the movie Devdas, if not read. Brahman ki Beti was another good read, on the similar lines though. However, I am a fan of that work of his, so I thoroughly loved it. Nothing out of the regular Sharatchandra work though!
- Angels & Demons: Here’s the thing – If you haven’t read this one, go read it RIGHT NOW. I’ll really say no more because this book is beyond captivating. I think many Dan Brown lovers will say so about all his books but this is the only one that I have read, so I don’t know. If I had to suggest a book to a non-reader to get him to read, this would probably be that one. 🙂 Only issue is that its a long one.
- Durgeshnandini: It was an okay read. I didn’t relish it all that much, maybe towards the end I got into it more. After I finished reading this, I realized its probably considered a classic, a classic love story. Maybe one can read to find whether they liked it more than I did.
- Our Moon has Blood Clots: It’s a memoir of a Kashmiri migrant, on how he felt when they had to let go of their motherland, for no fault of theirs. I have read a lot of such things of the India-Pakistan partition but this was my first time reading a Kashmiri forced migration story. It was gut wrenching to say the least, and felt straight from the heart. I also should mention that I still feel more deeply when I am reading about the other partition that I just mentioned, I don’t know how this bias has come into my being. Anyway, I whole heartedly recommend this one!
- The Lives of Others: This Man Booker Prize nomination was on my to-be-read list since a long time because I felt like it resonates well with my taste of family drama or social kind of novels. It was exactly that, with the main idea being the Naxalite movement in West Bengal and around. Basically, the story of one family over generations and how Naxalism affected them. It felt very close to home because it seemed like this can happen to anybody. I liked it pretty much but I am not sure if there was anything out of the ordinary. I mean if you are interested in a fictional story that deals with Naxalism, then its pretty darn good but you will also have to go through loads of pages of family drama, which I like, but I’m not sure if everyone would.
That’s pretty much it. I am sorry I am posting a Friday’s List post on a Saturday, but I was dead tired yesterday when I started writing it yesterday. Having moved to a new country and that too as a student, I would like to pat myself for writing this post on the second day itself, but I really didn’t want this post to be delayed any longer.
Hope you enjoy it! 🙂 😀
Life of Srish 
Hello there in Berlin 😀 🙂 That’s so cool 😛
n totally agree with u on 2
Aah! Eagerly waiting for your Istanbul post! And more pictures from Berlin!
Angels and Demons is my fav Dan Brown book. And then the Da Vinci Code. Not so much of the rest. And I particularly found the Inferno quite boring, a fun fact, it is based in Istanbul with the Basilica Cistern being a big focal point.
Well…I am reading you post after months…and i notice that your reading is way too biased towards bong writers! Of the 5, I shamefully admit, I have read only no.2 and no. 5 is gathering dust 😛 If you liked reading about the naxalite story…try some non-fiction…”The Red Sun”…it will give you a very good idea about the movement and where it went wrong…
I was pleasantly surprised to find hindi books here. It is a shame that I am not reading more of hindi literature. Such gems we have! I remember reading Premchand while in school. Nirmala was part of the syllabus but I think I will understand his books better now. I read ‘Curfewed Night’ by Basharat Peer and thought of reading ‘Our Moon…’ but didn’t. I am also fascinated by Parititions. For our generation, and also because nobody in my family was directly affected, it seems so unreal, and yet it happened just 70 odd years back. I recently also bought Urvashi Butalia’s ‘The Other Side of Silence’. Had read so much about it.
Thank you so much for visiting, inspiring book blogger! 😀 somehow I have read Hindi books since childhood, even though it’s a little unexpected for ppl of my generation. Although after coming here in Germany, I feel so sad about the fact that how other cultures embrace their languages unlike us. I have barely seen anybody in public transport reading English books, it’s German mostly! You should give ‘Our Moon..’ a go. You will definitely like it. Since my family was affected by partition, maybe that’s why I like reading India Pakistan partition stories more, as I can relate culturally. 🙂
Hello Reema, if I may butt in, here, those books she read in Hindi are translations, really. 🙂
I feel excited to note you picked up ‘The Other Side of Silence’. I love Urvashi and Anam ‘s (Anam Zakaria) works, I do. There are is another book, Schizophrene, by Bhanu Kapil (oh, this women, her poetry and her academic work are such a pleasure to read) that is a favourite with me! 🙂 Try it sometime, too, maybe.
And please do let me know how you liked ‘The other sides of silence’.
*there is another book
**oh, this woman
wow ! you take away my heart ! great post. I love to read very much. Thanks for inspiring me.
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Greetings Srishty,
So glad to see you enjoyed The moon has blood clots and The lives of others. :’)
Do you like Rahul Pandita’s stuff? Have you tried Hello, Bastar? (That guy is a gem of an investigative journalist and a writer and he stayed a long time at Bastar before writing this book. Maybe give it a read, for no time like now with the very incendiary situation there at this very moment. My friends back at Bastar have been forced to leave the forest thanks to military intervention and regular intimidation, etc. It is an undeclared Emergency but more on that later :p I did notice you enjoyed The Lives of Others, after all. )
Oh, and I actually have read all these books. I feel so validated right now xD
I was just going through old posts and found thid comment. Of course, you have read all these books 😀 like a true Bong. I am definitely going to read Hello Bastar soon!!
Yayy, also Curfewed Nights if you want something on Kashmir. Love.