all things Love

The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy My rating: 5 of 5 stars God of Small Things is my new favorite. I do not recall having been moved this much by anything I read in the recent times. It is story par excellence . Even days after turning over the last page, the reader simply resides in the world created by Roy. The world where Estha, Rahel, Ammu, Velutha, Sophie Mol, Baby Kochamma, Mammachi and Chacho live. In the world of Ayememon, that small town in Kerala where the god of small things reigns, but is meant to be quiet. And where it is the big things that are forced upon people. The world of God of Small Things , is a world of chaos. It is a world of patriarchal norms and how they have controlled the societies, of political quests and how they affect the lay gentry, of social differentiation and how derogatory they can be. It is a family saga set against the back drop of rural India, in a time when events were taking place at a q...

Endless Night by Agatha Christie My rating: 5 of 5 stars Honestly, and I am gonna be very honest with this one, having read Then There Were None and Murder in the Orient Express , I did not think it possible that any of Christie's can surprise me now. I was wrong. Endless Night is a gem. A rarity that one comes across in many a long months. Christie took the title of the book from William Blake's, Auguries of Innocence: Every night and every morn Some to misery are born Every morn and every night Some are born to sweet delight Some are born to sweet delight Some are born to endless night There is subtle interplay between emotions and actions. The story unfolds like a personal journal. Endless Night is written in the first person narrative, unlike most of Christie's other works. The first few chapters narrate the story of how a young cab driver, Michael Rogers, who seems to lack f...

On the recent International Women's Day, I wrote poems for the three women who have shaped me and continue to define who I am. My Mum, my Sis and She.  1. To Ma, who is everything. When she sits there on the couch. Simple. Elegant. 2. To Sis, who is always there. When I meet her after a long time, at her hostel. 3. To Her, who stole my heart. When she looks at me with those passionate eyes.

There you are I can’t say how well, Hope you be doing fine And taking gracefully the good embrace Of mother nature, in the form of altering seasons Which come and go with such amusing suspense. Your Life will be taking a new turn With the year’s fall, seeing the rising Of an untouched beacon for you to earn Hope, Ambition, Luck and what not? Your cares are sure to increase In the midst of all those worldly things But my hearty wish for you is that May you and yours live happily & prosper Forever, ever and forever.

Let this New Year be your guiding light In your endeavours to reach those heights For whom you must have struggled the year last But were unable to get hold of. Make a pledge this year too, To give your best in whatever you do. Set new goals and reach for them With all the might you may ever have. Forget your worries & nightmares Which have intimidated you in the past gone, Transform them into your strengths To do things you perhaps might have wanted once. With these among other wonderful thoughts And an overwhelmingly joyous heart, Let me wish you and your family that This meritorious New Year may never pass. Happy New Year, From, A Friend.

जननी जन्म भूमिश्च स्वर्गादपि गरीयसी Our motherland is more precious than the Heaven. How true these beautiful words are. Giving the most sacred place of all to the motherland, the place of our birth, keeping it even above than the deities. These words carry with them the emotions and sentiments of countless Indian soldiers currently standing guard against the enemy frontiers, protecting this Incredible nation of ours. The lines simultaneously echo the pride and honour of 1.324 Billion people across the world who identify their nationality as Indian. And today, we are all gathered here to celebrate the auspicious occasion of the 69 th Republic Day of this Motherland. India as a Nation and moreover as a Republic, the nation of the People, has come a long way since the days of post-independence immaturity after the partition. In the ensuing 68 years that we have had a privilege of having a written constitution, the longest one in the world, for that matter, we have made subs...

The Story of My Experiments with Truth, An Autobiography by Mahatma Gandhi My rating: 4 of 5 stars Finished it a few moments ago. The reading was quite an adventure and moreover an enlightening experience. Almost all the book is filled with the chapters talking about the Truth. The Ahinsa, as Gandhiji so vividly explains, is so intermingled with Truth that both can be seen to be overspread in the vast canvas of the Gandhiji's Life although as he himself has many a times said that his life is but the a coagulation of his multitudous experiments in Truth. He is seen to so irrevocably administer the golden mantra of Ahinsa in his being. His was a life seldom witnessed in our rather self-occupied world. With his wisdom, his thoughts, his actions and moreover his teachings with his own example led the vast landscape of India and its people to their freedom. Such a legend's (autobiographical) book laying down in detail his various e...