Grisham, John. The Pelican Brief. Century Limited: UK. 1992

I chose this book from Balas Cellar not because Grisham was new to me. I've liked his 'The Firm' and 'The Client', but because this was made into a movie with Julia Roberts as the lead lady.

Darby, the lawstudent who writes a brief about the death of pelicans in Loiusiana and the possible link to the death of two Supreme Court judges is hounded by unknown killers. Who is dependable? Who is not? Who can she turn to? How does one save oneself from predators on the hunt? Darby on the run is an example of a small fish put into a tank with a shark which survives because of its survival strategies.

The book can be called The Adventures of Darby...so full of action is it. Her smart manoeuvers and quick thinking are a delight to read about. I know that I may not be followed by killers, but if I am, I think Darby will be my hero and role model. And, I think this is precisely where the book scores - its ability to make readers believe that they have the wit and intelligence of Darby and to make them want to be a Darby in times of need.

The shady world of greedy lawyers and greedier wealthy clients with enough clout to influence presidential decisions shocks one. If one tends to disbelieve the law after this, one also tends to believe in the capability of the common man to fight back such huge corporations and conglomerates.

Rating: Three and a half Stars.

Wozencraft, Kim. The Devil's Backbone. New York: St.Martin's Press.2006

The crime thriller follows the insides of Kit's mind, her thoughts, her fantasies, her unrelenting fight against the trauma of sexual abuse, attacks by masked men and the fear of losing her sanity - all these are powerfully presented. Readers begin to get into Kit's existence and find her life unfolding itself before their eyes. It is a complex world of strippers, cops, members of the club, their secret lives and longings. It does not make pretty reading. If one wanted a feel good book then this is not it. The shock keeps piling until the end when one is left with no moreability to take in all this.

Grisham,John. The Appeal. U.K: Arrow Books.2008 ISBN 9780099481768

Two lawyers, the Paytons, give their all - material and legal expertise to represent the case of Jeanette Baker, a victim of chemical contamination from deadly toxic waste dumped by a chemical company at Bowmore.

It is a dreary prospect of science vs. humans,with humans ultimately being sacrificed at the high altars of science and all the money that can be accrued from making use of science.
The defendants are the mighty chemical company backed invisibly by political support. Incredibly, the Paytons win the case with a judge who is sympathetic to the cause of Bowmore.

The case goes on appeal to the Supreme Court on the verge of its elections. The power game as the defendant decides to buy a judge is filled with legal intrigue.

It reminds one of David and Goliath, with just one difference ; David here is the clever and insidious CEO and Goliath is the cause of justice.

Gone Baby Gone. Lehane, Dennis

Lehane, Dennis. Gone Baby Gone. UK: Transworld Publishers. 1999.

Love, compassion and care in a tough cop's life? The story is a blend of these impossible combinations. Patrick and Angie, two private detectives are drawn into a tale of child kidnapping, pedophiles, killers, a hard hitting police department, an aunt and uncle bound by love to discover the truth behind their niece's disappearance and a mother's lovelessness...and, in the midst of all this is the pair's incredibly tender exploration of their own need for fulfillment of their relationship.

The narrative is taut, the dialogues funny, the characters real, chillingly real and the fear for one's own children in this cruel world - frightening.

Rating: Three Stars

Gerritsen, Tess. Harvest.

Gerritsen, Tess. Harvest. London: Transworld Publishers. 1996,2006

Yakov and his friends, underdeveloped, malnourished and sexually battered children from the back streets of Arbatskaya, Russia.

Dr.Abby Di Matteo, a second year surgical student at Bayside, the doctor with a heart.

Nina Voss, with a failing heart and the wife of a rich businessman.

Josh, the fourteen year old, desperately in need of a new heart to start living life once more as a baseball lover.

Vivian, the astute doctor.

Dr. Mark Hodell, the man whom Abby loves.

Katzka, the toughned and seasoned detective on the beat, strangely drawn to Abby.

Scalpels. Organs. Codes. ECGs. Cross matches. Ventricullar fibrillation. Transplant. Organ rejection. Greed. Money in millions.

The bare thread is here.
And, what a tale this turns out to be. Every page is a heart stopper. Every line, a shocker.

Rating: 4 stars

The Negotiator by Frederick Forsyth

Reading a book into several pages and then suddenly recalling that one has already read this book is, I hope, not an entirely new experience for a reader.

The second reading was indeed as good as the first - fast paced, thrilling, fascinating and so credible. That I think is the secret of many a good book - it must sound credible even if one is far removed from the kind of environment or atmosphere given in the story.

The fact that a small towner who has never seen the world beyond her own cities - one or two at the most, can easily be drawn into a complex tale of vicious actions, violent terrorism and political betrayals and manoeuvers is what makes Forsyth so good as a writer.

Quinn is heartbreakingly real...all his efforts seamlessly blend into one's own efforts...his daring moves make him the hero of such adventures...his battle with himself is the battle that many of us fight with ourselves...his redemption is ours too...his clever moves are the stuff that we come to expect from those whose lives are lived in the shadow of CIA or FBI...writers like Forsyth make the U.S. of A the country of unknown heroes whom we all love.

What a story, Mr.Forsyth, what a story!

Magic of a different kind - Salman Rushdie

Rushdie, Salman. The Enchantress of Florence. Jonathan Capre: Great Britain. 2008. ISBN 9780224061636

Post modern writing takes liberties with history and fiction and produces some of the most delightful books. Rushdie's latest novel is pure storytelling. There is magic of fantasy and imagination combined in canny proportions with history. Akbar and his nine gems are real enough. Mogor dell 'Amore and Qara Koz are imaginary, but in Rushdie, fact mingles so well with fiction that the borders finally vanish. One feels like one is looking at hard, real and tangible objects through the shimmering and blurring wave of heat rising from the desert sands.

Akbar as a man, as a sensuous lover, as an administrator, as a cultural enricher, as a father ever in doubt about his devious sons' plots to overthrow him and as a lover of illusory characters - this Akbar is certainly not the stately and dignified Emperor of an Empire. He is of flesh and blood and so comes closer to you than in the pages of history.

Qara Kaz, whose beauty holds men in thrall and her Mirror wield magical power over the lands that they traverse. Is it an enchantment of herbs and beauty or is it the magic of spells and incantantions? Agra and Florence come together in this Queen of Enchantment. Their fates seem intertwined...the advent of foreigners leading to the fall of the Mughal Empire and the rise of the British Empire is implied in the entry of Mogor.

For one who has found Rushdie a little difficult to understand, this book has been absolute magic.

The magic is more in the mind.

Another Cook - another thriller

Cook, Robin. Crisis. London Pan Books. 2006. ISBN 135798642

For all who believe that the Hippocratic Oath is sacrosanct and that doctors are demi-gods, Cook shakes the very foundation of such beliefs.

Dr. Jack Stapleton is SOSed by his sister to help with her doctor husband's indictment in a case of negligence and indifference leading to the death of his hypochondriachal patient. The truth behind the death shatters the idyllic concept of concierge doctors -doctors who personal medical care to hand-picked few patients.

The lives of patients who place implicit trust in their doctors who should, in principle, treat them like royalty, may be in jeopardy from these very trusted doctors. The truth, when it comes, hits you hard.

To add spice to the proceedings is the long term celibate Dr.Jack Stapleton's, the protoganist of many of Cook's stories, engagement to Laurie. To one who has been following the lives of Jack, Laurie, Lou Saldona, Chet and Warren, the question is - what next? Will it be the birth of Jack's children?

Medical mysteries and revelations are not so much a part of this story as is the medico-legal aspect. However, the court room intrigues cannot hold a candle to the Perry Mason court room battles.

The book was O.K. O.K. only.

Queen, Ellery - My new find

Queen, Ellery. The Siamese Twin Mystery: A Problem in Deduction. Victor Gollancz Ltd. Great Britain. 1993
ISBN 0 600 200752

The foreword by J.J.McG in the July 1933 edition of the book makes one wonder if this adventure did really take place. So, was Ellery Queen a real-life detective?
The locale of the story is a lodge set high on a dry mountain plateau; the lower reaches of the mountain are on a ravaging and fast spreading fire. Caught unawares by it, the Queens, father and son, take the only road there in the hope of escape from the fire.

They come to a land of no return, since the road ends at the top of the mountain plateau and the only way out is down the same road. They are forced to tak erefuge in the lodge with the seemingly eccentric and haunting presence of a scientist, his wife, a pair of Siamese twins, a monstrous servant, a silent cook and the beautiful mother of the twins.

Then comes the shock for the reader. One murder follows another. As the fire creeps closer to the lodge and the searing heat becomes unbearable, so does the anticipation of finding who the killer is.

As one guess after another by the reader falls flat, one begins to sweat it out in the heat within the pages of the book and the mind of the reader.
The neat conclusion and denouement is unexpected. The reader is left with the satisfying sense of having been there and seen it all.

There is something of a good musical piece in this - a simple opening, an exploratory middle, the rise and the fall towards the end and the lingering note at the end.

I am happy to have discovered Ellery Queen.

Haller, Richard and Rachael. The 13th Apostle. Harper Collins Publishers. India. 2007. ISBN: 978-0-00-726735-4

What begins as a conspiracy thriller ends quie unexpectedly as a universal message of hope and faith for mankind.

A diary is discovered - it sets off a trail of cybersleuthing. Gill Pearso and Sabbic Karaim decipher a scroll that the diary leads them to. The truth is set in a flashback and the story shuttles between the presetn and the past tracing Yeshua's (Jesus) death and resurrection. Myth and faith are closely interwoven and the faith takes one on the supreme yatra of discovery - the atman in the paramatman.

The message is of faith in goodness notwithstanding one's follies, foibles and frailities.

A stirring read.

Diehl, William. Reign in Hell. Ballantine Books. New York. 1997. ISBN 0-345-39506-9

The book is terrifying, not only because Aaron Stampler, a reminder of Hannibal Lector, Vail's nemesis is back, but because he is back with a religious bang...clothing terrorism in religion.

On the verge of retirement, Vail is caught up in the turmoil of American states being overpowered by religious outfits committing heinous crimes and killing hundreds of innocent citizens.

Witness protection programmes run awry...unacknoweldged soldiers of Nam assemble under a General's mentorship to take vengeance on the world that has not acknowledged them ... and the climax is totally unexpected...if one Aaron Stampler dies, there is always another to take his place.

The only good things happening are Vail surviving an attack and his getting married to Venable from the hospital bed...some consolation in the midst of chaos and hell risen from the depths of a dark and terrible world.

Absolutely chilling reading...strikes a chord with one from the modern times.

Trunk Music

Connelly,Michael.Trunk Music. St.Martin's Press:New York, 1998.

Crime thrillers that take their time to unwind may not be racy or gripping page turners...but they slowly grow one and even if they require days of reading, one keeps on because the unravelling of the mystery becomes as much of a necessity as the clearing of cobwebs in a stacked up garage. You like to see everything sparkling clean at the end of what seemed a chore.

Detective Harry Bosch returns to his job after a brief period of untouchability in his department. The file he is assigned investigates the death of a man found in the trunk of a car parked in the view of thousands of people gathered for a Philharmonic concert at the Bowl in Hollywood. It is a case of 'trunk music' - a 'wise guy saying outta Chicage...when they whack some poor slob'. The connection is not really hard to make and the curiosity begins there for the reader.

Bosch must solve this not just to regain his confidence as a detective, but also his self-esteem and dignity as a human being. He solves the crime with determined perseverance. What I liked about the book is that Bosch comes out as a detective with a heart, who finds in Eleanor Wish, another convicted cop, a woman of substance.

Connelly is brilliant at the tying up of knots of the hundreds of loose ends. Momens of dullness are interspresed with moments of brilliance.

That is one reason why I persisted with the novel.

Jayabalan stories

J.Vasanthan.Fat is Beautiful and other Jayabalan stories. Gokulam, The magazine for children. Bharathan Publications. Chennai. 2003.

Some stories are remembered long after they have been read and enjoyed...sometimes even after decades. Gokulam, a children's magazine was staple reading for children in the 1980s. I bought the magazine for my sons, hoping that they would imbibe a love for reading (the elder did).

I loved reading Gokulam too for the hilarious stories about a King Jayabalan. You smile, you chuckle, you grin and you laugh out loud...there is only one of these options when you read the Jayabalan stories.

The stories are short, don' t have moral endings, don't admonish, don't lecture and don't sermonise. That is the biggest secret of their popularity.

They tell the story of Jayabalan, the 'fat, foolish and very vain' king of Jayabalpore, whose capital has a river called Jayabalaaru and whose coastline is along the sea called Jayabalsaagar. His minister of Defence is Kavasam and in a similar fashion, we have Ayalan, Varisumai, Ganabadi, Arivili, Solmannan, Tholaipesi, Apothikari (what a play on word, this is!) , Boilslau and so on. Each has his own eccentricities and charactersitics. Does an adult reader get the feeling that one has seen or heard these characters somewhere, someplace?

Times when Jayabalan attempts to grow hair on a bald pate, to understand science, to silence a detractor, to learn English, to understand baby talk...all these are so intensely funny that one breezes through the pages without feeling the burdens of life.

The illustrations are by the author and so humourously crafted that they make one smile . I love the single hair sprouting from the kingly pate...

The stories are a joy to read...read them in silence to oneself or read them aloud to an audience of children, they are sheer fun.

Gerritsen, Tess. Body Double. Random House. New York. 2004.

Sometimes, the rush of life catches one on and then long, rambling stories will no longer suffice. One wants a rush of adrenaline in reading...something that will make one sit up and say, 'Aah, now that was interesting'. Body Double was a story of suspense..plenty of unexpected twists and turns...characters too are unexpectedly real...the fears and anxieties are real...Murders may not be the order of the day in one's life as they happen in Dr.Isles' life. But, her search for identity is something that one can relate to well. Her acceptance of what she is, is also something that one can accept without reservation.
The breath is held in suspense many a time and Tess must know that her reader felt that the book was thrilling enough to have at her side through meals, TV shows and soemtimes, once or twice, through cooking.

Is it just that sometimes one chooses the wrong books for reading or that one is not receptive to the stories and characters in the books? In the last four to five weeks, I have read only two books - one, an utterly forgettable book called, "Suspects" written by One-who-need not be - named- cos- it- was-not-noted and another by Chris Ryan.

Both were fragmentary. The former had some steamy scenes interpolated into the story using some psychological dimension. The latter was to have been a gripping tale of an insider turning murderer in one of the Government intellegence agencies. Both failed miserably in holding the reader's (me) interest. I feel it would be better to go back to old and tested stories that are stacked in the cupboards of my house. Might unearth some good ones.

In such distressed times, I turn to two Asterix books bound into a volume that I have. They have never failed to restore my faith in pleasures of reading. Oh, how well imagination flows in these books. Cacophonix's unshaken faith in his musical talents, Obelix's simplicity, Asterix's maturity, the gladiators' games with words than with muscles, Caesar's eccentricities...ah, what a balm for a tested and sore soul. I read these two books which I presented to my sons in 1988 constantly turning to them at the dinner table, at the bed and when I am watching some inane TV show. There is a warning that the books can be touched only by Shyam, Santhosh and Vijay, written in some childish scribble, probably by one of the three. What a treasure this bound volume is for me. for more than one reason.