After the Neville DeMille story about a Viet veteran returning to Vietnam to unravel a military murder and to chase away the demons of a lifetime and the rather read now and forgotten then kind of stories in the last two months, I thought I'd read something serious, like a travelogue. 
Chose Allen Sealey's Trotter Nama and within the first few pages was assaulted by the disconnect in narration that continued for about 40 pages and stopped reading it and worrying my rat sized brain.
I'd really love to read some good travelogues.

Asimov's Mysteries. Asimov,Isaac. Panthers Books:London. First published in 1968

Asimov's mysteries starting from 1958 with his Singing Bell to his The Billiard Ball are testimony to this brilliant writers ability to see science in the most foresightful way. They are all short stories, each one a gem, as they shine with the resplendence of his imagination.  His first storypredates the first landing on the moon made in 1969. This story set atleast 10 years before that describes the lunar surface so accurately, that one wonders, 'How did he know?' Singing stones brought from the lunar surface described by Dr.Urth, a character as '  ....it was as though a million harps had sounded a mile away...incredibly sweet and pathetic and tumultous at once'..., are brought into a story of murder as an important component in solving the murder. In 'The Talking Stone', spationautical engineers live 70 million miles away from the Earth...hyperatomics, gamma fogged semireflector, silicony- a rock being that speaks the language of humans - Asimov brings a distant possibility right before our eyes.Mass Transference - this forms the theme of his story 'The Dying Night' wherein, Dr.Urth solves the murder of a man at his lab.Pate de Foie Gras pokes knowledgeable fun at science. Here, the goose  lays the golden egg by a process of a live nuclear reactor and is a tongue-in-cheek story meant to laugh at human ability to believe everything as a miracle.The other stories testify to an exclamation a character makes 'Gee, it is nice to be a science fiction writer'. 

RSA Animate - The Secret Powers of Time

Child, Lee. The Visitor . Bantam Dell.New York. 2000

The story of two ex-army women murdered in one of the most ingenious methods Reacher has ever encountered and the list of seven probable victims that he draws up through clever deduction once again takes one on a Reacher trip. Not very heady, but interesting and for once, I vaguely guessed the perp, something that I've never been able to do in the other Reacher books. Does that make this a loosely knit tale? No, on the contrary, one is satisfied that one has been able to think like Reacher...the clues that Reacher has, are there for the reader too. 

So, another Reacher. This one is still battling with his need for freedom and love. I like Reacher because he is constantly battling his urge to be a free man with nothing but a toothbrush in his pocket. He even has just the clothes on his body and when they become dirty, once in three days, he completely discards them and buys what he needs ( he even calculates the cost and finds this a better investment)...I wonder if there are people who love to be free like this, but then I find that this man Reacher, finds the love of his life and has to make a choice. The philosophical musings add to the depth of character...and maybe, because some of us want to be free, Reacher becomes an object of envy. And, for those who want stability and material success, Jodie is the person to look for.

Child, Lee. One Shot . Bantam Dell.New York. 2006.

Child has a racy, stylish writing. You want to emulate him. His sentences are short, rarely complex or compound. They describe vividly but in a terse, compact manner. Colours, sights and sounds come alive. You feel like a camera following the action. Easy to read and visualise. These are his strengths. 
His biggest strength is,  ofcourse,  Reacher. In this book, Reacher takes on a slam-dunk murder case, to find the truth. James Barr, an ex-sniper, discharged from service because he shoots at four American soldiers, is once again accused of murdering five civilians in a pre-meditated murder. The twist in the tale begins when the accused refuses to speak and asks for Reacher. 
Reacher comes to Indiana with the intention of indicting Barr and finds himself drawn into a web of intrigue and doubt. The D.A., his lawyer daughter and Yanni, the ABC reporter join hands with Reacher to save a man, wrongly accused. The villains remain incognito and Reacher goes all out to hunt and kill them mercilessly for their gruesome acts of vengenance. As is the  pattern in most of the books, Reacher himself becomes a suspect during the course of action.
The cool logic, reasoning and calculations of Reacher are intriguing and gripping...they are one reason why the reader keeps going. 
Reacher becomes the stuff of legend - heard about, rarely seen and finally merging with the wind, trees and outback roads of the U.S.
 

Child, Lee. The Hard Way. Bantam Dell.New York. 2006.

A modern sleuth, combining the investigative and analytical skills of  Poirot, the deductive capability of Miss Marple and the brawn of Steven Segall, this man Reacher does indeed have the power to emerge as a character worth keeping in touch to give you hard thrills and puissant enjoyment in seeing murderers, rapists, child molesters, mafia and junta groups  brought to justice.

This story of a kidnap of the wife and daughter of an ex-military, paid to fight intergroup wars in far off African lands, with millions in hard cash and Reacher’s involvement in finding them becomes a battle, the hard way. This is because, Reacher,  for the first time, is stumped at every turn, till he reaches a sleepy English countryside, where everything becomes clearer, but not before he almost gives up, for the first time in his life.

This Reacher, reminds one of the  knightly valour of Launcelot – fighting battles to kill dishonourable knights and rescuing maidens in distress, but he is also someone one can identify from the modern scenario- a no-nonsense, hard-hitting,  invincible, charismatic Superhero in print in recent times.

The story itself is interesting, because just as Reacher thinks he has solved the mystery, he finds a new answer that only leads to another question.

Good read, though not a classic of the Agatha Christie type, because there one can return again and again to savour the various bits and pieces coming together to present a collage of unsurpassable intricacy, whereas in Child, Reacher is the one who remains in mind, not the mystery.

Braithwaite.E.R. To Sir With Love. First published in Great Britain.1959. Coronet Paperback.1988.

Over this week, I made my annual pilgrimage through the pages of this book. It is a classic for any educator, because it is a teacher education manual in print and one can consider it as a tool of reference, if one is beset by difficult classes.

What an amazing story, entirely credible, because haven’t we all had some teacher like this Braithwaite who influenced us at school and helped us grow with dignity and self esteem?

The struggle of this black teacher in a school set in the  tough East End neighbourhood is every teacher’s struggle. These students are systemic of learners who fight against odds at deprived homes and loveless existences to find their own paths in a society that mostly does not care.

The story is well knit – the teachers, each an entity with personal prejudices and ideas, Mr.Fabian, the headmaster, the man who dreams and envisions a great educating system for his wards, Ricardo Braithwaite, a black war veteran and now a teacher by sad turn of events, Gillian, who stands for a miniscule white community beginning to respect the balcks, the students who tackle their poverty and the ugliness of their lives with the dignity that Braithwaite has given them, the Thomases who doubt the efficacy of a system that educates without the cane... ah, each of these combines with the other to form a beautiful collage.

There is enough drama,  passion,  romance, trust, anger, mistrust, to make its pages interesting. What caught my interest was that it was on one side, the story of a teacher finding acceptance and solidarity with a tough batch of East End students and on the other, it was the story of a man who wanted to be accepted as a human being, on his own merit, undeterred by the colour of his skin. Gillian’s love for him and the children’s unreserved acceptance of him redeem this man and help him win his battle of colour.

I may go back to this story, may be next year, but I’d like it to be on the bookshelf of my grandchildren, for whom the Civil Wars and Apartheid Policies may be things of a distant past and I’d like them to remember that people went through such struggles before the  people could enjoy the liberty that they are enjoying now.

Child,Lee. Killing Floor. Bantam Publishers.New York. 1998

This is the first in the Reacher series. 

Having read the books in anywhich order, I find that this is Reacher Primordial...he is raw, brutal, merciless, cold and ruthless. There are hints of the gentleness and romantic streak, so obvious in the later books, and but a tiny peek here. 

The story takes place strangely in two distinct realms...each unconnected till the very end. 

And again, his women are not only alluring, they are gutsy, strong individuals ready to battle it out with criminals in their own court. 

I feel like I am going back in time...there was a time when I read Alistair Macleans with the same intensity and passion. I read through those series and loved each one of them. 

I don't probably love Reacher, but, yes, he and his adventures are interesting enough. I have no complaints.

 

Child,Lee. Tripwire. Bantam Publishers.New York. 2000

Leading a  slow, measured and settled life as a swimming pool digger, but at peace with himself, Reacher is brought into a world that shakes his faith in his intuition and leaves him with a burning desire to clear the name of a Jet fighter of  the Nam war. His love for Jodie is a special part of the story. In fact, the villainous activities Hook Hobie are narrated almost parallel to Reacher's love story. Till the last fifty pages or so, it is as if the 'twain shall never meet' and yet, they do and how! The tight feeling in the gut and the restlessness in the head, caused by Reacher's almost fatal effort to bring Hobie on his knees, are the fuel for the reader. 

There are many instances when Reacher is philosophical in his musings on life. Again, the mystery for me is how  this man becomes a drifter who cares for nothing , not even the shirt on his back.

 I've still not tired of this hero. So, let me keep going. 

Bombeck, Erma. At Wit's End. Fawcett Crest. New York. 1967.

Irrepressibly funny in  every line of her pages on domesticity, motherhood, wifely responsibilities and Committee chairpersonship for County Fairs. Bombeck laughs at herself, as much as she laughs at men, women, children and the society. She sees the sunshine behind every dark cloud and the smiles behind every jibe she takes at herself. This is satire, simple, clean, vibrant and humorous. Readers can also discern the love that shines with a light of its own from a benevolent source, large hearted in its acceptance of human errors and foibles. Her repartees for all her characters, from her littlest one to her husband, double you up with laughter.

Some of her lines:

'What do you mean you're a participle in the school play and you need a costume?'

'Could you please do something diplomatic with Mrs. Reading? She's threatened the refreshment committee with her traditional whiskey balls and rum cookies. You know what a fire hazard they caused last year'.

The key word with growing children is communication. If you are a lip reader of any repute whatsoever, you have no problem. However, if you have to compete with local disc jockeys which feed hourly through their ear plugs, it could get tricky. We have solved this problem by buying time on the local station and reporting personal messages;" We moved last week'. 'Daddy's birthday is in September'. ' Do you still lisp?'

The list goes on. I hope I have the opportunity to read her other books:Family-the Ties that Bind ...and Gag, Aunt Erma's Cope Book, The Grass is always greener over the Septic Tank, If Life is a Bowl of Cherries-What am I doing in the Pits? After a long time, I just smiled and smiled and gurgled in a few places, reminding me of my Wodehouse days. 

I loved this one.

Child,Lee. Echo Burning. Bantam Publishers.New York. 2001

Another Reacher. Two things I noticed about this Reacher.

This Reacher uses a watch unlike the Reacher of 2007 who can intuitively and accurately give the time on the clock.

This Reacher does not pick up an obvious clue given to identify the perpetrator. This makes him a human at the end of it all.

There is still a subtle mellowness about this Reacher...his investigative skills are however sharp and thorough.

He is a thorough gentleman, inspite of his rough ways and tough meanness with criminals, and implicitly  believes his employer, in this case, a Hispanic who hires him to be her bodyguard, to protect her from her wife-basher of a husband.

The story takes one on a rough ride...it seems one is there having solved the mystery and then finds that one is not there, nowhere close to it at all ...

Just recommended Lee Child to my son for the long flights home. That is because, the stories are like a nourishing meal that is a solid mouthful and does not disappear or melt before you can say 'Bread'.

Read with interest the blurb which said that Bill Clinton likes these Reacher books.Well, I like the two I've read so far...

Laurence, Margaret. The Stone Angel . The University of Chicago Press: USA.1993 edition. First published in 1964

Do not go gentle into that good night.

Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Dylan Thomas

Hagar Shipley, the protagonist is ninety years old and is as vivid, interesting and passionate as any young heroine could be. Reared in a small town by a man who wanted to showcase her as an example of his success in life, Hagar longs for freedom from these domestic ties and to be herself. She fights all her life, as a daughter, later as the wife of the untamed Bram, then as the mother of Marvin, the sidelined elder son and John, the much loved younger son who sought his love not from his mother but from Arlene, as the mother-in-law of Doris, the dutiful daughter-in-law, as  the room-mate to the young Wong and as grandmother to Steven.

She finds her peace with some and with some , she remains, ’the holy terror’ till the end. She is ‘the stone angel’, hard as stone, because she hardens up her heart against all overtures of love from those around. But, we see her so tenderly full of compassion and understanding as she comes to terms with her own nature. She constantly tries to understand the complexity of her feelings, the rottenness of her severity and the utter helplessness as she cannot open herself to those around her.

 The only people who see some of that hell raging inside her are the stranger Lee, the nurses in an impassionate and professional way, the young child who sees Hagar on her death bed being so entirely free of inhibitions and truly helpful and caring. Who is this puzzle called Hagar? She is so full of contradictions and torn apart by these all through her life. The tenderness and compassion with which she helps Marvin accept himself just minutes before her death is touching and wrench a dry sob or two. However, there is no sentimentality, she is a real bitch till the end, as she proves to Doris, her daughter-in-law.

Laurence has an evocative style as she moves from Hagar’s past, then to the present and then to the past again.

This story is not just about a powerful character...it is about senility and all its terrible companions. The pity of a life dependent on others, the helplessness caused by physical ailments, the desolation of being abandoned by one’s children, the shift from a state of forgetfulness to loss of memory, the childlike love for freedom from the fetters of old age, the desire for dignity in the uncouthness of old age... all are so touchingly dealt that the book demands the reader to be lost in this world of Hagar till she dies. There is an ineffable sadness as one realises that old age has its revenge on all of us...one can resist it and fight with spirit as Hagar does, or yield to the beauty of life while one lives, something  Hagar fails to do. The choice is ours to make.

.Lee Child. Bad Luck and Trouble. Bantam Dell.New York. 2007

How do writers think of such excruciatingly carefully plotted tales set in unfamiliar contexts, such as secret FBI actions, ex-army groups, spies within spy rings etc?

I assume that these must be close to real settings, or else they cannot sound so genuine. Well then, an ex-army gang gathers to avenge the killings of some members of this closely knit group with its own distinct call : You do not mess with the secret investigators.

With the precision of a surgeon, Child’s character Reacher and his friends Neagley, O’Donell and Dixon work together to trace the sequence of events and are riveting in their accuracy, insight and sharp thinking. Each action of theirs is a mystery till the eventuality becomes clear and we breathe out a ‘Aha, so that was it!’.

The story of revenge is intricate, complex and mysterious. At the same time, if one thought these were characteristics of old world tales of revenge, rest assured, this is one story of the present, cool, hip and of the eyebrow arching kind.

It’s whetted up my hunger for more of Lee Child’s and Reacher...I’m told this is one of the eleven military thrillers. I come, Child, just give me time to read Margaret Laurence’s ‘The Stone Angel’, probably as far removed from your kind of tale in its literary richness and storyline. But Reacher , you bet I shall be back for more of you.

one night @ the call center. Chetan Bhagat. New Delhi. Rupa Publishers. 2005

What was all the noise about this second book of Bhagat, back then in 2005? I mean, yes, I’m reading this in 2010, almost five years after its publication. But, does it merit all the attention that it received from the reading world. Granted, it is written in an easy, typically Indian-literate lingo of the youth; is not complicated; is not taxing on the brain. By the same yardstick, it is not intense, not passionate, lacks depth and the storyline is what one can easily predict in a movie. There is the typical Indian romance of movies like Vinnaithaandi Varuvaya and the books of writers like Ramani Chandran in Tamil and the Barbara Cartlands of the past. What is missing is the lyrical beauty of romance and at the end of the tale, it is neither a dare all, bare all kind of story about call centres, nor a heart warming tale of love and heartache. Even the climax is predictable. Mr.Bhagat must have been aiming for the studio lights and cameras when he thought up his plot. Not a great and memorable read, but then, it is not boring either...

Morning, Noon and Night. Sidney Sheldon

Sheldon is a perfect crime fiction writer, as he explores the grey areas in the lives of his fictional billionaires, empire builders and their families. Henry Stafford, a billionaire, hated by his sons and daughter for his cruelty, vindictive sadism and coldness, dies in a yacht accident leaving behind billions for his children. What seems like a repeat of  The Testament by Grisham,  starts unravelling in the most interesting way, as one puzzle after another gets solved. It comes as a shock when one finds unpleasant and hardhitting truths about the family one after another. Human foibles and weaknesses are revealed with no regard for the sensitivity of the reader. Each truth is a punch, a sharp undercut that knocks you out for a while. The moment one is up, another lands to hit you again. 

The story is like a ball of strings all wound around, with little bits of them sticking out to help you unravel the ball. Each little bit is unwound and then tidily put away. Sheldon does this so well, that in a masterly way, he helps us see human greed, lust and bitterness in all their bare ugliness. 

It does not tax the senses like more serious didactic books do; however, if one were simple minded, not too serious, and looking for a relaxing read to unwind from the day's hardwork, then this is one for you.

De Mille, Neville. Word of Honour. Grafton Books. London. 1985

War stories are personally a fascinating genre for me…as my eyes see the destruction, loss, grief and the pain of it all, reinforced by images of war shown in movies like Pearl Harbour, Flags of Our Fathers, Guns of Navrone, Eagle's Nest and The Pianist, I am able to follow the intricacies of war actions.

I am amazed by the scenes that De Mille lays out…the plot is unravelled from the perimeter and moves in with a punch to the centre of it all. Tyson, a Nam war veteran is caught up with his past and is to be court martialled for a war action in which hundreds of Vietnamese civilians are killed by deliberate shooting by his platoon. He refuses to save his skin, because of the word of honour that he has given to the platoon. What happened there to lead to that dishonourable pact for which Tyson holds himself responsible is the crux of the story and till the last few pages one does not really know the why of it, though we all understand Tyson is a man of honour.

The code of honour of the army and the valour of men like Tyson make this story immensely readable. De Mille makes no bones about the US army’s shameful war on Vietnam, but even in that shameful act, there is a certain dignity as evidenced by men like Tyson. The strong bond of love that he shares with Marcy and David, his family and with Corva, his lawyer, also a war veteran, is something to be savoured, so that at the end of it all, there is a pleasant feeling of having read a heart warming story of human spirit to stand by one’s word.

Grisham, John. The Partner

This would make one good movie.

A carefully crafted story of a lawyer, a partner who takes away ninety million payback money which his firm has hidden from him, gets a woman lawyer to stash it away, is caught by the gang, rescued by the FBI, made a prisoner, but walks away from it all, with a cleverly crafted legal escape. If you think there are too many twists in the tale to be handled by the reader, wait till you get to the last two pages. The shock is subtly imparted, but the senses reel from the powerful blow. Loved the final twist and all.

Racy, taut , impeccably plotted and filled with unexpected twists, the book made interesting reading.

And, just as you were wondering if it was all that easy to do what the hero does, Grisham deals the final blow. There is justice after all...you get what you sow.