Books about Fiction

A book that keeps you thinking after you finish it. Is there life outside our planet? Have they been in contact with us? Have they included any markers that would lead us to them? Are we alone?

Tags: science fiction

One of the most spell-binding books I have ever read. Taking a subject that everyone can relate to, the teenage years of uncertainty, angst and rebelliousness, Salinger draws a incredibly vivid picture by describing a few event-filled days in the life of the teenage protagonist, Holden Caulfield. The writing is sharp and brilliant.

I suspect that adult readers and teenage readers may interpret the book differently. The younger you are, the more idealistic you are. You are less compromising and more disposed to make rash judgments. Idealism co-exists with cynicism and self-righteousness. All these traits exist in Caulfield's behavior and, if that is what you are looking for, he is your hero. But if you are an older person, you have made your peace with the real world - less idealism, more pragmatism. You empathize with the tortured soul of Caulfield, but you want him to come to terms with reality, a redemption that the novel only partly bestows upon him.

The mental journey that the book takes you on is strange. At times, you feel exhilarated. Sometimes, you are saddened and left shaking your head. You wait for a conventional end, but it is not forthcoming. This is a book that takes a strong grip on you and simply doesn't let go.

Tags: fiction

This actually comprises the 3 books: Foundation, Foundation and Empire, and Second Foundation. This is the story of a universe where two Foundations are established in anticipation of and to cover from barbarism due to the downfall of the galactic empire.

Tags: science fiction fantasy

This tale of an old fisherman using his wits to fight against the big creatures of the sea is one of Hemingway's best works. It is a novella, but despite its length, the drama is intense. The fisherman first fights to catch a large fish, one large enough to drag his skiff, and then later to protect his catch against the sharks. As you read, you can truly feel the emotions of the fisherman as he uses all his tricks and feeble weapons to survive.

The book's beginning and end are both weak areas in a generally strong narrative. If you have seen Tom Hanks' "The Castaway", you will perhaps see the similarity. A strong, compelling core book-ended by unnecessary introductions and epilogue. Hemingway could have perhaps used a different story technique to avoid them and instead devote the entire passage of time in the book to the old man's quest in the sea.

Tags: fiction drama

"To Kill a Mockingbird" is a delight to read. It tells the story of racial injustice in an Alabama town during the Great Depression. The narrator is a 6-year tomboyish girl who reveres her father, Atticus Finch, who serves as the book's hero waging an unwinnable battle against prejudice and racism.

The book's appeal comes from its unique perspective - that of a child trying to make sense of an adult world and slowly seeing her sibling shed his childhood. It has great warmth and character. No other book respects its hero as much, portraying him in an entirely positive and saintly light.

That being said, today some passages of the book may still grate on readers. Although the book is sympathetic to blacks, it has perhaps one too many use of the N-word and is somewhat condescending to blacks. I suppose this is a nature of the times when the book was written: People were more charitable to the idea of giving equal legal rights to blacks, but not ready to consider them as equals.

Tags: fiction, classic

It was a huge disappointment re-reading Hemingway's "A Farewell to Arms" again. The first time I read it was when I was a teenager in college and the tragic, touching love story felt so bittersweet. Today, the book seems so bland and banal. The different threads of the story (the war and the romance) seem disjointed. It is like someone lecturing on how they decided to prepare a particular dish and making everyone wait for hours. By then, everyone has lost their appetite.

Hemingway would later do the same in "The Old Man and the Sea", but then fortunately, he had the sense to keep the digressions to a minimum. In this book, the story does not define its center properly. Is it about the meaninglessness of war or the nostalgia of lost love? Because either of those story lines are compromised by the other. The protagonist escapes from the war because he is in love. Or does he find love more alluring because of the dreadful war? The brutality of the battlefield is never displayed in stark terms, unlike a book like "Catch 22". The love story, for the most part, is reduced to strolls and dinners, and some of the dialogues seem cliched than real. A brutal throwaway comment about Othello is revealing of Hemingway's racism, indicative of the times he lived in.

A bit of saving grace is that the book contains some immensely quotable pieces of writing, such as this:

The world breaks everyone and afterward many are strong in the broken places. But those that will not break it kills. It kills the very good and the very gentle and the very brave impartially. If you are none of these you can be sure it will kill you too but there will be no special hurry.

Tags: fiction romance

The ultimate exercise in literary nonsense, "Alice in Wonderland" is one of the most popular children's works. It is difficult to fault a book that refuses to make any attempt to remain meaningful. But Lewis Caroll perhaps could have pushed the envelope somewhat further than he did.

I suppose appealing to children with a large scholarly work is never going to happen, but many characters remain poorly sketched. Most people don't realize how short a book it is and how quickly Carroll moves from one act to another. It would take other works in different media (drawings, animation) to give more depth to those characters and invade the popular mind.

[Read the public-domain copy of "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" free at the Gutenberg site.]

Tags: fiction fantasy

For those who have seen the movie (that includes me), the book holds little surprise. I didn't like the movie very much and the book didn't do much to improve matters. I suppose the reason is that the plot plays out as a Greek tragedy. We know where the story is headed towards and are passive observers instead of being drawn into the minds of the characters.

When you write a story with a narrator, the narrator changes the perspective of the story. It changes our attitude towards the characters. It also prevents us from understanding the motivations of everyone except the narrator, who has to take guesses at them. And it hides certain events unless the author uses some other mechanism (like newspaper stories or second-information) to reveal that to the reader.

There are excellent novels that have narrators, but "Road to Perdition" is not one of them. It keeps its main character, Michael O'Sullivan, at arm's length when the reader should really be involved with his grief, suffering and anger. The death of Michael's family happens for very clumsy reasons: the crime mob's reasons should have been stronger to take such drastic actions. There is too much action and too little pause for thought and story development. A disappointment.

Tags: comics fiction

I started reading this book because I understood it was about cricket and learnt that President Obama was reading it, so it must be good. Unfortunately, it was a disappointment for a variety of reasons. This is not a function of the author's writing, which is very beautiful prose, but of the plot developments.

First, the author does not use a linear storyline, but instead resorts to a device of flashbacks. This is not a problem in itself, but instead of adding to the mystery, the author reveals what will happen to the main characters in the story. This robs us of any anticipation when reading conversations between the characters making future plans. Maybe mixing up different timelines makes the book seem more complex and stylistic, but it is clearly unnecessary and counter-productive in this novel.

The reviews make it seem that the book was about cricket, but there is not much about actual cricket - just a few passages. Those sections of the novel are well-written and it made me wonder why the author did not pick up that storyline and run with it. Instead playing cricket is one of many different random and contrived incidents in the book. The cover of the book is deceptive in this regard.

Some have compared the book to "The Great Gatsby". I think it is apt because "The Great Gatsby" is also over-rated in my opinion. Death is a convenient method of resolving your plot and it makes the book tragic and more "classic". But it is much more difficult to take a tangled situation and work it through. For example, take "The Bridges of Madison County". It would have been easy to end it with killing off someone. However, the fact that one character makes a tough decision elevates the book.

A novel becomes great when its characters behave rationally and have a mind of their own instead of drifting according to the plot. The characters are never forced to do something. They always have a choice and the plot turns on that. Great stories do not depend on artificial devices. They can be very conventional in design and yet be very powerful. For example, "The Old Man and the Sea" is very simple, straightforward and short, but grabs you and doesn't let go.

Tags: fiction

This is supposed to be Fitzgerald's masterpiece, but I found it less than overwhelming. I guess the main problem is that the central character Gatsby remains too much of an enigma for too long and then the story pulls the rug from under him unnecessarily. His behavior is unrealistic, at least by today's standards, and hence we cannot identify with him or his concerns. We couldn't care less about the vapid narrator Nick Carraway's problems and hence the book lacks a center of gravity.

The shortness of the novel contributes to this problem. There is little time to develop the characters or the relationship between them. Perhaps this was intended to show how materialistic and shallow the characters are. But even if that is the case, there is no counter-point. There are a couple of instances where the narrator tries to introduce a more meaningful point of reference, but those plot points are never pursued. The dynamics between Jay Gatsby, Tom Buchanan and Daisy Buchanan are not explored enough and the background stories are left very vague.

I also have concerns about how accurate in real-life some of the incidents could be. Perhaps this is an indication of how different today's society is from that of the 1920's. But many plot points are rather unbelievable and the characters do not respond or talk like normal human beings in a few conversations. Finally, I hate stories that have "convenient" death(s) that avoids the need for proper resolution of its conflicts. In real life, people have to make choices and live with them. Many novelists prefer the Greek tragedy approach where fate resolves all issues.

Obviously books like these are pretty well written. There are quotable quotations galore. But truly, the emperor has no clothes. "The Great Gatsby" is a second-rate story disguised in fine clothes and helped along by a multitude of critics who somehow managed to find hidden meanings and symbolism in it. The myth of the novel has been so built up that the clear-eyed reader who points out the obvious is snubbed by so-called literary experts.

Tags: fiction drama