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Tag: Review

Sweet Karam Coffee

I watched the trailer for “Sweet Karam Coffee” and was immediately hooked. So when the show released, naturally I started watching it as soon as I could. The first two episodes in, I was completely taken over by the plot and the music. Over the
next episodes, I experienced something I am struggling to articulate.

I have always been the feminist raring to go even at the slightest chance of injustice. The reason has been my childhood conditioning. Sadly, I have never been able to do anything about it. The story of Kaveri closely resonated with me, having seen my mother go through the injustice of being taken for granted. All the time. It is a long-standing guilt that I am unable to do anything meaningful about it. But watching Kaveri’s character unfold in the show made me realise more than anything that any change can only come from the person themselves. No one else can help someone who is accepting of the situation, however bad it is. To bring out the voice, to stand up for themselves, to let the world know that it’s been a long time and that it’s enough! You can enable them to see why it is wrong and why they need to find their voice but that’s as far as you can go.

If Kaveri’s character taught me the futility of fighting someone else’s battles, Sundari’s character taught me that you are never too old to go after what you want or who you used to be. If that matters to you! She had treasured that wild side of her for so long without losing the essence of it. That is something! It’s a shame that she was not “allowed” to embrace who she truly was all those years both by her world and herself. In the end, I felt that the creators have tried too hard to avoid the cliche and place a plot twist with Sundari that it left me a bit confused. But after processing her story timeline and how things could have been back then, I could understand it better. Her steady character arc was mostly predictable for me yet I still enjoyed it very much as it is something of a fantasy, something I am yet to witness in my real life and people in it.

The Nivi character was a very familiar one for me, understandably. Having enjoyed most of the privileges she has, there’s nothing new. I just feel that she stands on the shoulders of giants to have those privileges. Even her problems are privileged problems when compared to what Kaveri and Sundari have gone through but significant, nevertheless, in order to keep progressing over generations.

If you see the three women as a linear representation of a single woman over the years, it could feel like we have come far. However, it is not fair to generalise and more importantly, even with the generalisation, it is not enough. There are still miles to go before we can sleep.

Sweet Karam Coffee – Tastefully flavoured, some teachable moments, does not disappoint.

Until later 🙂

Book Review: Private India

What made me to click that sign up button for reviewing Private India was the thrill it promised and I would say it delivered most of it. However, while doing that, the book lost out on a lot of other basics. That being my short review, let me get straight to my take on the book.

privateindia

What kept me reading?

– The plot that was slowly built up keeping the readers’ interest intact. The build up ends in the fitting climax that comes as quite a surprise. Unlike most suspense novels, where you can kind of guess where it is going, this book doesn’t allow you to break it’s suspense.

– The alternate perspective lines, one chapter on the events and one chapter from the killer’s thoughts. This style comes in handy because if you are getting irritated with how a chapter is framed, you need not be irritated for long. The change in scene helps in distracting your mind to something else.

– The entangled mysteries, the sub-plot concept. It keeps you guessing about what the book is about. You frame a story based on the main plot in your mind as you read and then there is another plot line which will give you something to think about. This helps in keeping the question “What’s next?” alive in the reader’s mind.

What made me go “Awww, man, you shouldn’t have done that!” ?

– The main put off for me was the mixed styles. Whether this was due to the fact that the book was authored by two people or something else, I don’t know. Throughout the book, you can clearly feel two people talking to you about the story. The language, the style, the presentation, everything appeared to me in twos as if I was having a bad hangover. It disturbed my imagination as I read the book.

– The thought patterns of Santosh Wagh, one of the leads, as he thinks about the killer’s motive are funny. Yes, funny! Questions like “Why Lara Omprakash was your fifth victim?” and “What are you thinking?” made me feel like I am watching a bad episode of those CID types TV shows.

– The lack of class. For example, the killer’s thoughts. We are nowadays used to classy villains (The expectation keeps in pace given that James Patterson is one of the authors). However, the killer is portrayed as kid who was denied a lollipop, in places where the killer is upset because the police is avoiding revealing details about the murders, thereby taking away his publicity.

– This book could have done better with compressing, removing unnecessary descriptions here and thereby ending up in a 50-100 lesser pages.

I would not say this book is a bad read because it has some very good foundation as plot, holding the readers’ interest, an open ending for it to evolve. But there are certain things that fly around your head like that irritating bee with the buzz that you want to slap off. Especially when the book feels like a bad mocktail which has two things that shouldn’t be mixed.

My final verdict for the readers is you can pick this book for a engaging read on a train journey but not for satisfying a craving for an excellent read. So here’s how my rating goes : 3/5

review

Until later 🙂

P.S: I have not described or even used the character names and behaviours except for making my point because if I give you glimpses of them ahead, I might just deprive you of the thrill/suspense associated.

This review is a part of the biggest Book Review Program for Indian Bloggers. Participate now to get free books!

The Krishna Key – Review

As I had mentioned in my earlier post, of late, I find myself interested in mythology.  That’s the main reason I signed up for this book. Well, over to the review..

Image Courtesy: http://www.infoaboutbooks.com

Ashwin Sanghi has done a good job delivering a gripping book to the audience. Again. Having read his Chanakya’s Chant, I can say that much. This book is of the same genre under which Dan Brown’s books fall. Thriller? Yes. Worth a buy? Yes. Unique? Ummm.. I have to say no. It is just that though a book can be of the same genre with various best-sellers but when it has striking similarities that remind you of some other book at every turn, you tend to lose forget the author’s touch. It happens.

Let me elaborate:

The main characters in The Krishna Key:

1. The protagonist : Ravi Mohan Saini

2. The female counter-part (helping the protagonist as he tries to unmask the antagonist) : Priya

3. The tough police officer who is honest (no doubt there) but mistakes the protagonist due to evidences leading up to him : Radhika Singh

4. Then there is always the CBI 😉 : Sunil Garg

5. Antagonist: Taarak Vakil (His name also has a Dan Brown’s touch. Read the book to know more about this hint :P)

Ravi Mohan is on the run to prove that he is innocent and at the same time to decipher a seemingly-impossible set of clues to uncover a great mythological truth and at the same time to protect it.

Now, answer me? Too many similarities with Da Vinci Code? Yes. That’s what disturbed me the most about this book. Then again, I cannot just blow off Ashwin Sanghi’s effort by saying he has done a Dan Brown toned down to Indian tastes. He has done a great job in weaving the plot so that it keeps up with the pace. The book has twists and turns wherever necessary. Necessary in the sense that which is needed to keep the audience hooked. Nothing in excess and nothing in short.

I loved the way how certain explanations were re-quoted to bring in the emphasis and realization because otherwise, readers tend to miss certain awesome realizations since it has a lot of information to take in.

Also, i should appreciate the efforts of the author who has succeeded in presenting the right form of Indian mythology to the world. We all know that India was the source of knowledge for many unbelievable technologies/findings. But, how much do we really know? How much do we realize? Do we really grasp what a mother lode of knowledge and intellect we had so many years ago? And how that has all forgotten over times and now we sit here calling ourselves a developing country.

I applaud this book in the fact that it succeeds in making the readers scoot over to Google to check facts about our history that we never bothered to know more about. That in itself a big achievement for the book. It has made it’s point. So here is my rating, I would say it is a good book, worth a buy, worth reading more than once, but not one of it’s kind.

Until later 🙂

This review is a part of the Book Reviews Program at BlogAdda.com. Participate now to get free books!

Paiya!!!!!

Ignoring all the warnings about paiya being a crap,I set out for the movie yesterday with my friends.I got what I deserved.I had to search for the story-line in the movie(There was none till the end). Girls can watch it for the hero,places of nature which have been beautifully presented and guys can watch it for the heroine(If you like her :P) and I don’t know what other stuff in the movie will interest guys(Action,maybe???). Talking about action,I was so frustrated that I felt even Dr.Vijay’s flying fights are better. If Dr.Vijay will lift one man with a hand,Karthi here lifts two. 😉  I was left searching for the car to be parked and then some story…. But,alas,the car never stopped and once it did,the movie was over.The songs and their picturisation provided as much comfort to the audience as the  disturbance  caused by Tamanaa.The song “En kaadhal solla thevai illai” did not seem to meet the imaginations of the audience(Could have been better). Other songs were good. With so many logical flaws in the movie,Paiya turned out to be a typical Vijay movie and falls short of expectations. 🙁

This post is more out of frustration and apologies for having given a review.Again,it’s all my opinion.No offense meant to anyone. 🙂