Challenge: 50 Books discussion

Done: 9/50


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1. The Way of Shadows (★★★, 10 Feb '13)



Azoth is a guild rat, something akin to a homeless, street urchin. His life is marked by hopelessness and thievery. Like most of the others in the guild, Azoth lives under the foot of the Rat, guild leader, more of a bully than anything else.
But Azoth has dreams of a life different from the one he lives with his friends, Jarl and Doll-Girl. He wants to lead a life without fear, a life in which he isn't beaten into submission by the Rat, a life in which he has more than a stale piece of bread to share with the mute Doll-Girl.
It is this dream of a life that makes him yearn to be an apprentice of Durzo Blint. But Blint is no ordinary man. He isn't an ordinary assassin either. He is a wetboy, an assassin of the highest order. Being his apprentice would certainly mean a future for Azoth, a future he wouldn't have a shot at being a part of the guild. But it would also means giving up whatever little he has, becoming a hardened criminal, burying his emotions and sentiments forever, but most of all changing his identity and becoming an entirely new person.
As Azoth struggles to become someone else entirely there are many truths, many a magical elements for him to discover but most of all he has to choose between forging a future for himself and forgoing his past.
An interesting start to a series that I'm sure holds more intrigue in the succeeding books. While not entirely full of unexpected twists, it is quite a nice read. The author could have made use of better vocabulary, read wetboy to mean a dangerous assassin, well... that doesn't quite convey the tone the character is supposed to convey. On the contrary, every time you read the word it makes you giggle just a bit. Well, as a girl, I'm allowed to have that reaction.
Still, despite a couple of hiccups, a recommended read for all those fantasy and series lovers.

2. City of Women (★★★★, 22 Feb '13)



In a world torn apart by war, where husbands, sons and fathers march off to
the front-line in the service of the nation, sometimes to return wounded
and sometimes never to return at all, what is a woman to do? That is the
central question that David Gillham addresses in his book, City of Women.

Sigrid is just a regular hausfrau, a housewife, whose husband has been
called to the front to fight a war that the German broadcasts claim, is
almost won. Cooped up in an apartment, with a mother-in-law who constantly
bickers and blames Sigrid for just about everything, the only solace Sigrid
finds are in the hours spent as a typist at work or when she spends her
time at the theatre, not really paying attention to the film being screened
but instead having an extra-marital affair, and all the excitement in
entails, in the back row of the theatre.

It is on one such day when Sigrid is by herself in the theatre, that a
young girl suddenly seats herself beside Sigrid and begs her to say that
the she has been with Sigrid in the theatre since the beginning of the
show. And when men from the Gestapo walk into the hall, checking
identification papers, Sigrid must make a choice… What is she to do?

It is this answer that plummets her into an alternate life that she’ll
begin to live, by maintaining the façade of a good hausfrau but really
rebelling against all that is ugly in the world. She will learn that none
of the relationships are really the way they seem to be; for betrayals are
found in the company of the best of friends and lovers while friendship and
rescue comes from the most unexpected places. She is after all in a city of
women, a place left with little to look forward if you aren’t fighting
back.

There were a number of moments that I liked in the book. While it wasn’t
wholly unpredictable, given its setting, the narrative is strong and makes
the book a fast read. At times I didn’t like Sigrid or Erica, the young
girl Sigrid takes to mothering, but given that I like the premise of the
story and to see Holocaust from the POV of a German, it made for a 4 star
read.

Recommended to those looking for some World War II or Holocaust fiction.

3. Falling Man (★, 03 Mar '13)



I made it through this book but barely. The story set on September 11, the day of WTC attacks, and the days and years after, outlines the effects that the single day had on the lives of people who live with the burden of having survived that day.

A very promising premise but the story falls through like a dead weight. The characters are flat, the storyline fractured; in a span of two pages the author skips from one scene to another and then yet another one. At times I had to struggle to understand which characters the pronouns were referring to.

Keith is the survivor that day, having walked through the rubble and emerging from smoke and ash with a briefcase in his hand. Then follows a short fling with the woman to whom the briefcase belonged. Then there is Lianne, Keith’s wife, who struggles to come to terms with the feelings that the day has instilled in her heart. Finally there is Justin, the couple’s son, who scans the skies for more planes that may be coming in.

But none of these characters have any traits worth remembering. Their stories are disjointed. Perhaps that was the intention of the author; to convey chaos, confusion, dejection and despair, but such narrative never finds much favor with me and I couldn’t wait to put down this book so that I could read something else, anything else.

I have read White Noise by Don DeLillo before, and I remember enjoying the post-modern take on things. But this book was a disappointment. A major disappointment.

Would I recommend it to anyone? No. There are definitely other books vying for your attention. Choose one of them instead.

4. Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (★★★★★, 14 Mar '13)




Review

The Harry Potter Series is, without a doubt, my favorite series. I only began reading it as an adult and since the first time I read it, I have become a die-hard fan, returning to these books every year.

In the first installment of the series, we meet Harry Potter, a boy of eleven who seems just as ordinary as any other boy his age. He lives with his cousin Dudley, Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon. The Dursley family has little love for their Potter nephew, often ignoring him, giving him little and treating him like he doesn’t exist. Harry is content to be out of their way and stay out of trouble but he misses his parents an awful lot. His parents had died when he was just a year old and that’s how he came to live with his mother’s sister. But he doesn’t know much about them as questions are forbidden in the Dursley household and Aunt Petunia didn’t share much love with her sister to begin with. For Harry there is a constant nagging ache of being an orphan. Sometimes he wishes and almost feels like a distant relation is coming to seek him.

What Harry doesn’t know is at exactly the stroke of midnight on his 11th birthday, he will discover something truly amazing about himself: that he is a wizard and his parents were a witch and wizard too.

This revelation will come with many more surprises: the truth about his parent’s death, of why Harry wasn’t told he was a wizard and how there is an entire school called Hogwarts that trains young witches and wizards. When Harry reaches Hogwarts he discovers that almost every person already knows his name: he is famous, or rather has been famous since the night his parents died.

It was a dark wizard, Voldemort, who wrecked havoc in people’s lives years ago and killed many good and innocent people. None survived this evil lord, except Harry. And that makes Harry famous. But Voldemort is far from gone. His powers diminished, his form weakened, he lies in wait to seek revenge. And it is in his first year at Hogwarts that Harry will discover just how much danger he is in.

Harry will come to discover a lot of things about his life he didn’t know could exist: Friendship in the forms of Ron and Hermione, rivalry in the form of Draco Malfoy, affection in the form of Hagrid and hatred in the form of Professor Snape.

At Hogwarts, Harry will discover his strengths and his weaknesses. He will discover what lurks in the Forbidden Forest and what secrets are hidden in the third floor corridor. He will discover why the wizarding bank, Gringotts, was broken into and why someone was trying to curse him while he was playing his first ever Quidditch match.

With all its ups and downs Hogwarts will be the first true home Harry has had. And with Hogwarts, Rowling has created a world for me which is the very best of fantasy.

5. The Autobiography of Henry VIII: With Notes by His Fool, Will Somers (★★★★, 14 Mar '13)




Review:

Henry VIII is one of the most fascinating characters I’ve come across in my reading experience. His life is full of instances which makes the reader hungry for more.

In this book, Margaret George writes from the perspective of Henry himself. Henry is most notoriously known for his flirtations and the marriages resulting from them. He was married a total of six times at a time when divorce was frowned upon.
Henry made a historic break, separating the Church of England from Rome. He had many neighbors who, depending on which way the politics brewed in Europe, became his allies or turned foes.

As the second son of King Henry VII, Henry is destined to support his elder brother, Arthur, as England’s heir and devote his own life to religion and priesthood. But the sudden death of his brother makes him the next in line to the throne and his life changes dramatically overnight.

He must now be trained in the arts of politics and warfare, he must learn to formulate laws and policies and must earn the respect and loyalty of his people. It is in the bid to maintain political connections with Spain that Henry marries his brother’s wife, Katherine of Aragon, a maid, yet untouched by a man. His love for his wife grows over the years. But their marriage eventually heads towards a split. Katherine has been able to birth only one daughter, Mary, who is still living, while all the other children have died either before or after birth. Leaving no male heir for England is what constantly nags Henry and he begins to question whether he has sinned against God and is being punished for it.

Henry faces a dilemma, of whether his marriage to his brother’s wife is true and legitimate, whether his wife was truly a virgin when she came to his bed. From these doubts emerges a long drawn battle with his wife, his councilors and even the Pope. When Henry falls in love with Anne Boleyn, the Pope begins to see his dilemma as nothing but an excuse to get rid of his wife and feed the greed of the ambitious Boleyns.
Henry, getting much encouragement from the Protestant-leaning factions, separates himself from the Roman Church and establishes the Church of England with himself being its Supreme Head. This rages a religious was of sorts but earns Henry the right to cast away Katherine and marry Anne.

Anne Boleyn, in her new-found power, surrounds herself with young musicians and artists, friends and family: people who favored her rise to the Queen's throne. But it eventually leads to her downfall. Having giving birth to only a girl, Elizabeth, Henry has no hesitation in sentencing his wife to execution when charges of treason and adultery are leveled against her.

On the very day of Anne’s execution, Henry marries his third wife Jane, a lady at court, previously in Anne Boleyn’s service. Jane, not as ambitious as Anne, appealed to Henry with her simplistic and country ways. Even later, after all the other marriages, Henry would consider Jane to be his first true wife and the only wife he really loved and missed. Jane dies during childbirth leaving behind a son, Edward, the heir Henry had been longing for a long time.

With Jane gone, Henry is once again an eligible bachelor. This time, the Reformist leaning Thomas Cromwell, Henry’s trusted advisor, seeks a marriage alliance for him, winning him Anne of Cleves as his bride. Having beheld Anne only in a portrait, Henry is full of excitement in seeing her in person for the first time. But as he looks upon her face his only thought is that he is married to an ugly, pockmarked creature. Henry cannot have such a bride and soon their marriage is annulled.

Henry for the last time fall prey to his lust, when he sees Catherine Howard, a cousin of Anne Boleyn, and decides that she is the woman he is meant to be with. But their marriage too ends up with Catherine getting executed for exactly the same reasons as her cousin, Anne Boleyn.

Five wives, two princesses and a price later, Henry finally decides to swear off women. He never wants to bed or wed another one. But his resolve is weakened when he comes upon Katherine Parr, a widow at court, who is spiritual and religious. She appeals to an altogether different side of Henry: his spiritual self. Having reached his middle years all Henry longs for now is company, the company of a woman, with no lust to distract or betray him.

His sixth and final marriage is mostly peaceful. By now Henry has come to realize that his end is near and must now come to terms with what his life has been and what he has created for his kingdom in his capacity as a king. In the end all he wants to do is die a man.

Brilliantly researched, Margaret George doesn’t let in a single dull moment, which is saying something, as this edition of mine was a 900 pager. Absolutely beautiful writing style. Can’t wait to get hold of some more Margaret George books!

6. The Good Earth (★★★★, 18 Mar '13)




The Good Earth was a surprisingly good read. I've been watching this book being featured on several recommended lists but somehow I didn't warm up to the idea of reading about a story set in rural China. I couldn't have been more mistaken with the idea of it not being appealing.

Although it takes place in a rural setting and is a simple story of a peasant and his life, this is hardly a light book. It is the best of what a family saga can offer: the struggles of a poor peasant as he toils away at a land that in turn floods and then faces severe drought. It is the tale of the ultimate sacrifice by a woman, one so dedicated to her husband and his love for land that she leaves the fields for a couple of hours to give birth and comes back with a hoe right after.

In this story Wang Lung is not the hero. Nor is he a villain. He is just a man. A man with the same emotions of love and lust as any other. And when he gives up his loyal wife O-Lan for another, your heart breaks for this woman who has been nothing but the best wife she could be. But Wang Lung is not evil. He suffers in his wife's ailment and is lost once she's gone.

Through his dedication, his land reaps him harvests of the kind that allows him to prosper and Wang Lung is in time a rich man. His wealth is famed and there is no dearth of any kind in his household. But his children are a generation removed from the land. They do not regard it in the same manner as their father. And it is this disregard that eventually shall herald their downfall.

The book is full of scenes that will make you stop and visualize the intensity of the moment. The love of Wang Lung for his fool of a daughter who is not quite right in the head and the night when she's left outdoors for he forgets to bring her in, or of O-Lan and her kids begging in the streets, of the old father-in-law weeping at the sight of his bedridden daughter-in-law or of Wang Lung trying to endlessly drug his uncle and his wife to avoid their interference.

The Good Earth is a classic. It may be set in China in the 1930s, a time and place far removed from today, but its relevance is hardly lost. Highly recommended!

7. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets by J.K. Rowling (★★★★★, 22 Mar '13)




Review
It is the summer with the Dursley's back at Privet Drive after his first year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, when Harry Potter meets Dobby. Dobby is a house-elf, a lowly servant, who comes to meet Harry and warn him of a grave danger that is about to unfold at Hogwarts that year, which is why Harry must not go to back to school. But Harry refuses to listen to the elf as Hogwarts is the only place that makes him feel at home. So Dobby, in a bid to save Harry's life, keeps getting in his way often putting him in harm's way instead.

As Harry finds himself with his friend Ron at the King's Cross station, barricaded from entering platform 9 3/4, in a state of panic, the two attempt to reach Hogwarts in Mr. Weasley's flying car. Their grand entry at Hogwarts is hardly met with a warm welcome as the two find themselves facing detention.

It is during this detention that Harry begins to hear voices that no one else can hear. Soon, there are attacks on the students being made by some invisible monster. A legend crops up, of a Chamber of Secrets. One of the founders of the school, Salazaar Slytherin is believed to have constructed this Chamber at school and left in its bowels a monster that would purge the school of Muggle borns. Only the heir of Slytherin can unleash this monster and it had been done once before, fifty years ago leaving a Muggle girl dead. After all these years, the heir is back again.

Harry's courage is once more put to the test as he finds out why he can hear voices that no one else can, that he has an ability that is extremely rare in the magical world and that the legend of the Chamber of Secrets is not a legend after all.

With his two best friends Ron and Hermione, Harry will have to face this monster and once more come face to face with his enemy of past, present and future - Lord Voldemort.

Many mysteries, many discoveries... the second book in the series is just as interesting as the first one. Reading it again for the millionth time doesn't make it any less entertaining.

8.Fall of Giants by Ken Follett (★★★, 18 Apr '13)



Fall of Giants is one epic novel. Set mostly in Wales and Russia with some action taking place in America, France and Germany, Ken Follett's 900 pager is set during Wold War I. Five families come together throughout the war years, sometime as friends and sometimes as enemies.

The story begins with Billy William's induction to the mine pit. The Williams family are Welsh miners. The daughter of the family, Ethel is a housemaid at the Fitzherbert's, an aristocratic family. Ethel gets involved in a romance with the Earl which is soon to lead to a scandal. The Earl's sister, Maud, is a rebel, a supporter of women suffrage. Her destiny is entwined with that of her German friend, Walter. Gus Dewar, an American, is a friend of both Walter's and Fitzherbert's. His life is connected with those of two Russian brothers, Grigory and Lev Peshkov.

In this novel of immense proportions, there is often a conflict, conflict of interests, conflict of choices and conflict of friends having to fight each other behind enemy lines. There were parts that made me want to keep reliving some scenes. Maud and Walter share a beautiful love story, one which they must keep secret from all and have to contend with separation for they belong to two different warring nations. But their love for each other stands the test of time which makes their story a remarkable one.

The one character I detested above the rest was Earl Fitzherbert. His passion turned hollow, his war experience made him a bitter man and he identified with the war faction. His treatment of Ethel only made me want to see him hurt and torn apart in the end.

Ken Follett chose a daunting talks when he decided to pen down this book. The story of the war, the politics behind it, it's ramifications and most of all the individual experiences, none of it could have been written in a shorter book. So the author has very intelligently carved out the stories by revolving them around the five families.

My problem however was that it was too lengthy for my liking. There were parts the book could have done without. I couldn't understand at times what purpose was a prolonged description serving. There were paragraphs I skimmed through and the last 100 pages my patience was all but gone. I simply flipped through to get to the end just so that I could move on to another book. That for me doesn't mean a happy ending. Thus the average rating.

Still, for fans of historical fiction, who aren't shy of big books and who can digest large chunks of the book in a single session, this novel wouldn't disappoint. In fact you might end up enjoying it very much.

9. The Surgeon (★★★, 24 Apr '13)



The man she shot to death is back stalking her. Catherine Cordell, a surgeon in Boston lives her days on her feet as she attends to one trauma patient after another. In the face of wounds and bodily damage, she plays like a star performer, fixing people, bringing them back from the edge of death.

But behind this calm and composed woman is a haunting past. A past in which a serial killer, known to torture, mutilate and kill women, had terrorized Catherine, before being shot to death by her. Now, two years later, he seems to have come back from the dead. He is killing other women in exactly the same way but his main prize appears to be Cordell.

Detectives Jane Rizzoli and Thomas Moore of the Boston Police Department are on the hunt for this killer who has wrecked havoc in their city. But with Moore getting involved with Catherine and Rizzoli acting as the stung victim of jealousy, can the two remain objective?

An interesting, quick mystery read. While the climax isn’t exactly didn’t-see-it-coming or unexpected, it still makes for a good suspense title. Recommended to fans of the genre.