Day 34 : Cape Fear - A Book Review

At least once a year I go to this place in Mumbai where they have sale on used books. They are so cheap you can buy at least a dozen for the same amount that you pay for a McChicken. This is a very very dangerous place for me. Mainly because every time I go there I end up dragging a huge haul of books, which only ends up adding onto my unread pile. I am slowly catching up to them, but damn am I outnumbered here.

This book is one of those book. I mostly picked it up by virtue of name recognition. I'd loved the Scorsese movie. It was a remake of an older movie. It had brilliant performances from both Robert de Niro and Juilette Lewis. And had one of the best last shot of any movie ever. That was pretty much the only reason I picked up this book really. I am very glad that I did.

This book is really a very simple single-minded book about revenge and good guy v/s bad guy. There is a good/pure-white character and there is a bad/pure-dark character. Both of these cannot be more different from each other. And both these character now suddenly find themselves in a in a conflict that would only end with one of them being utterly destroyed.

Characters 

Max Cady - The Pure-Dark - A cold-hearted criminal filled with one hunger only. Only pure rage and thirst for revenge.

Sam Bowden - The Pure-White - A law abiding citizen who many years ago, got Cady imprisoned for rape of a teenage girl.

Carol - Sam's wife

Nancy, Jaime, Bucky - Sam's kids

Plot Summary

Well this going to be the easiest summary of any plot I've ever written. Heck, the introduction above nearly gives most of the details. The gist of it is. Cady spends his thirteen years in jail dreaming up of ways to bring terror into his arch nemesis' life. Sam Bowden leads a life of the straight arrow and tries to deal with this guy legally but law is not especially good at handling someone who has no concept of what really is. Cady is somebody who is so vicious and single-mindedly evil that there is no fear or doubt in him. And with the sheer physical size of him makes it all the more scary.

And that is where I really begin to like the book. The way the author builds the tension in the book. You see, there are hardly a dozen scenes in the book where you are actually in Cady's presence. It is always somebody else' account of his violence. That along with his own pure savagery, every moment that he does come into your pages, you sort get goosebumps yourself. I liked that feeling. It is something that very few writers accomplish in doing. This guy who I'd never heard of made that possible. I have immense respect for that.

And now for the part that I wish could've been better. As much as I liked the simple binary good & bad equation of the book. There are parts where the writer tries to explain why Cady is the way he is. He uses the Bowden for that. Which was pretty seemed very out of place for me. You don't try to rationalize why some violent serial criminal and rapist would try to rape and kill the women of your household. Also, the last few pages. I know I shouldn't be comparing the movie with the book here. But I must say in this one instance I am going to give the upper hand to the movie. The climax was awesome, in the movie. And it sucked, in the book. Period.

Just for Max Cady? An excellent read though.

Day 33 : Harry Potter and the Cursed Child - A Book Review

I have written about my love for Harry Potter here before. So obviously it was apparent I was going to pre-order the new Potter book the moment I got the chance to. And obviously I was not going to be able to put it down until I’d read the whole thing through.

And that’s exactly what I did. Twice.

Harry Potter and The Cursed Child is quite a remarkable book. For most readers it would seem like a fan fiction written by a fan for fans. There aren’t many parts in it that you’d read, and recognize it to be out of Rowling’s books. This is pretty much a different flavour of the Wizarding World than we are accustomed to. The difference is not only because this book is in the format of a script for a play. You will see a stage setting description and positions of the characters. Some of it sure will feel pretty jarring at times. But it is quite toned down, nothing that should scare readers away. This is not the full-of-hearts Harry Potter that you and I grew up with. This is a mature adult book with adult issues. Much like the problems you and I have right now. 

We have all grown up and apparently so have The Trio.

Tread cautiously now Muggles, spoilers ahead.

Known Characters

Hermione Granger-Weasley is now the Minister of Magic. Very dutiful and strict and uber feminist. Loves to throw her weight around, and still loves Ron to bits even when he is being an idiot.

Ron Weasley now runs the Weasley Wizard’s Wheezes. Is still just as loyal and funny. Though has started to put on a slight belly is still everyone’s favourite uncle.

Harry Potter is now the Head of Magical Law Enforcement. Is still just as popular as ever. And is still just as confounded by his celebrity.

Ginny Potter is now as ever my favourite Potter character. And now more than ever really has more of a part to play. Lovely to bits, just lovely.

Professor Minerva McGonagall is now the Headmistress of Hogwarts and oh how I’ve missed her cold-yet-mushy heart.

Draco Malfoy is, well still a Malfoy and everything that goes with it.

New Characters

Harry & Ginny’s children –

James Potter II

Albus Severus Potter

Lilly Luna Potter

Ron & Hermoine’s children –

Rose Granger-Weasley

Hugo Granger-Weasley

Draco & Astoria’s son –

Scorpious Malfoy

Amos Diggory, Cedric Diggory’s father 

Delphi Diggory, Amos’s niece and caregiver

Plot Summary 

The book follows a popular fan theory that Voldemort and his Death Eater’s are not yet given up on their bad ways. People who believe there was an heir somewhere who would come and bring back pure and superior magic into the world. But it has been so long since Harry’s scar has hurt, our friends have actually begun to forget all of it. All was well.

It was Albus’ and Rose’ first year at Hogwarts. They both were just as excited about it and just as nervous on their first ride aboard the Hogwarts Train. Rose was sure this was a deciding moment in their lives. Their parents first met during this ride and they become friends for life and went to on to do big things themselves. This was not a decision to be made lightly. Rose, needless to say, was much like her mother. Albus, meets Scorpious they had a bunch of sweets together. Spoke for a bit and decided they’d be best friends right then and there. Much like Ron and Harry did.

--

This is where I will leave you. There is much more to the plot. Much more.. But this is one book I would want you to read for yourself. 

There are parts that will take you back to that time you read about Snape’s love the first time. 

There are parts that will take you back to a time when you visited Godric Hollow for the first time.

There are parts that will take you back to the time you saw James and Lilly for the first time. And that heartbreaking green light for the first time. 

There are times you might just weep a little. 

There are times when you would laugh out loud with Ron or Scorpious and any nervous joke about Mouldy Voldy. 

Those are the parts that you will read this book again and again and again for. This is a book for you. For the fans. For the Potterheads. For the millions of millennials who have grown up into adults themselves. But still carry a bit of magical world in their hearts.

It is for you I will say now. There is real magic for those who seek it. Always.

Day 32 : Political Absurdity

India, for anybody who is looking from outside right now, is a place which is equal parts inspiring and bad shit craycray. There are a bunch of things that the country is doing great right now. And there are also a bunch of others where we seem to be getting terrible-er at each passing moment.

I am very active in social media (who isn't) from way back when we were all chilling it up in Myspace. I'd carried over a lot of those friends to Facebook and Twitter and Instagram. Many of them I have known only within the confines of some sorta screen. I have seen their graduation speeches, liked their wedding pictures, and congratulated them on their first-borns. I have people in there from countries that I didn't even realize had working internet, one of my first friends was a Kyrgyz grad student who used to say her town did not have working electricity half the day.

But now, as much as I like social media. The world being in the state that it is. The internet is the most scary place you can be in right now. Twitter and Facebook bring the news to you at such a pace that half the time you do not have time enough to think over what any of it means. And the ones supplying you with the headlines have even less time to make any sense of it. They have to publish the flashiest news the fastest to keep the clicks coming. In their haste, missing out on the basic filter of weeding out the bullshit. The actual job they were being paid to do.

When I was a kid, my father used to badger on about how we should read the newspaper daily. Be informed of what is going in the world around you. He put that sort of knowledge in high regards. If you were well read, you probably have already made a good impression with him without even having to say a single word. I barely read anything related to current affairs back then. But now there is no escaping them. Every other post on your newsfeed is related to some random guy's rant over some random politicians' some random policy or comments on something. All of a sudden everyone is a Poli-Sci genius and knows everything about everything.

I am in a bunch of fandom groups and read-a-thon online and off late there are rarely any posts in any of them that has anything related to the themes they are supposed to be about. Almost all of them are against/pro some sort of political agenda. Especially the ones that have even a handful of Americans in them. God, seriously. What the hell is really happening over there. How are they even considering a guy like that to lead their country. Wait a min. We have a PM who was allegedly involved in a communal riot. And another group of politicians who have ruled and looted the country for ages. Then we have this other politician from a divisive party who demands his followers intentionally insult the deities of the other religion to incite violence. Just as an excuse to kill people. Umm. Well atleast it is sure now that this sort of absurdity is not limited to any specific country. Stupidity is spread around quite evenly.

When I look at my real world people. The ones that I know and actually speak with on a daily basis. I don't see this sort of anger or frustration or fear or hatred. We are all just a bunch of normal people with normal people problems. We all realize that we do not really have any control over who becomes the president or prime minister. We all realize that we do not really control who gets to eat what kind of meat, or follow which kind of religion, or fall in love with which gender of people. We realize that all those things are something that is to be considered at an individual level. At a family & friends level.

People have to figure out things on their own. And if you are not directly effected by the outcome of something. You shouldn't give a hoot what happens.

You see, there is a news going around in social media of people being assaulted because they were caught consuming cow meat. Now, before you go on a rant about how it is against religion. Let me point out that, people have been eating cows and pigs and rabbits and frogs and even animal poop, for quite some time. And I don't care one bit about any of them. I love chicken, I love lamb, I love fish. I have never eaten beef just because I am pretty sure if I ever did my Ma wouldn't allow me inside our home. Now why she wouldn't want us to eat cow meat, might be a religious thing. But the reason I do not have it is because I care about things that my family cares about. As simple as that. Your most opinions do not really get shaped from that one post in social media. Eventhough those are the ones that make the most noise and with the most shock factor.

If you suddenly seem to feel frustrated, angry or scared to live in your own country. Just try getting off the internet for a bit. Just get a sense of the people around you and in your community. There is a good chance that you wouldn't find just as many intolerant rants and abhorrent incidents of people randomly assaulting each other. Sure there are bad eggs in the lot. But they are too few of them when compare them with the actual normal people who really are just like you.

They might go with a different sounding name than yours, or pray to the invisible man in the sky in a different way, or even eat or love differently than you do. But you wouldn't see a lot many people being openly disgusted by them or even spewing hate at those different than you. Most often you wouldn't see any of them recognized being any different than you unless they themselves say they are. People are just people. Lame, stupid, naive chunks of meat who by some freak of nature can form intelligible words. Which they somehow ended up using to put each other down by a few tweets.

Is there any actual need to be this hateful. Is there any goal that anyone hopes to achieve by sharing a one hate speech by any politician for all your followers and friends to see. By doing that you are only really adding to the noise. There is already enough of that going around. I am not saying you are not entitled to have an opinion. But if you happen to have any opinion which are the kind that you wouldn't want to discuss among the real world people and have them run away scared from you. You probably should not post them all over the internet either. Just add this one rule into your social media consumption. Maybe that would reduce the frequency of vileness in your posts. The world be thankful to you for that.

The world is not really a scary place. It is us who end up painting it that way. Your world doesn't really revolve around who sits in the high chair in a fancy conference room somewhere. Your world is really built of the people in them. So I guess what I am asking of you here is, don't scare them crapless by your angry rants in social media. Instead try talking to them maybe. Real talk, not sarcastic social-media-comment-speak. Maybe you will find that you don't really have to murder them after all.

Day 31 : Closure

Remember the good old times? When things used to just end.

You woke up. Sleep ended.
You ate. Hunger ended.
You got the highest score. The game ended.

Things always came to a conclusion. Things did not linger indefinitely, hanging there like an axe of inevitability over your neck. You never know when or how things would end. But you know for a fact it is definitely coming.

Nothing you will do will ever come close to making anything last longer than it was supposed to. Still you do not always take efforts to end anything. You keep lingering on with it. Trying to hold on to that moment as long as you can. Lying to yourself this moment is worth holding on to. While you really are just scared of letting go. Afraid of what might come next.

I think that is what makes it more uncomfortable. The unknown. We do not know what next. And it is the not-knowing part that makes eternally clingy monsters/exes. There is no real guide map that takes you from this stop to the next. Life is not Pokemon Go. You do not know where you should be heading to. Or if at all the path you choose leads to that rare precious creature you are looking for. There are a few Squirtle and Weedle jokes I can think of here, I will try and hold off on those for now. If I can.

People expect a bit of grandeur in their lives. They expect the next moment to contain something far more glamorous shinier and than what they have now. Mostly the next moment doesn't. Mostly all you get is the same old moment you were always going to have anyway. Does that really mean that it has any less potential to be just as memorable?

Stability and ordinary has lost its charm. I still love those old-timey pictures. People doing ordinary day things, looking and being their ordinary selves. They extraordinary for us now. Aristotle and Ved Vyas are extraordinary for us now. But I am sure back in their day they did completely ordinary things like we do now. I think they all dug for boogers in their respective ordinary noses.

Being ordinary and doing ordinary things are just fine. What survives is that one extraordinary thing that you leave behind. That one thing is not any one moment that would just happen to be there in your life. A bunch of seemingly inconsequential decisions that you make along the way leads you to that one thing you will be remembered for. Most often you don't know what those are crucial when you actually are making them. But in the end, your life is defined by those decisions.

Don't expect a constant stream of grandeur in your life. Don't cling on to something that has already overstayed its welcome. Learn to let things go. Thank it for giving you a visit and forever cherish its memory. Then open the doors wide and wait for whatever comes next. Welcome whatever it is, as it is.

All the while keep working on that extraordinary masterpiece of yours. The one thing that survives way after you've left this augmented-reality game that you are a pawn of, called life.

Day 30 : Young Adult Fiction

I guess I am too late in the game here. I just discovered YA. Before you start babbling on about how either 1. it is the world's most amazing thing, or 2. how it is the worst thing that as ever happened to the world since hipster suspenders. I'll just say that I agree, with both of those opinions. In the last few weeks I've seen and/or read eight YA movies and/or books. Two I liked, a lot. Three were just bad. Four had a brilliant plot point but lost its way in the end. And then there was this one which was so good that let's just say it could easily have been good book regardless of the genre it was associated with.

Most YA stories are basically any Molly Ringwald movie meets noir french depression saga, with a happy ending. There is a group of young people, usually friends or soon to be friends, they do something wacky or adventurous that hardly any high schoolers really get to do. The people doing these stunts are usually the ones that come under the geeks or dorks in the food chain. Yeah right, a geek did a B&E into a house in the middle of the night and shaved an eyebrow off of a jock's while was asleep. Would YOU do that when you were in high school?

Then there is this some sad drama in the middle of the story. Real heart wrenching stuff. Something that would make even the hard boiled bros to go get the tissues. Most of the time those have something to do with cancer. Don't ask me why.

Then after all that, near the end of the story, the protagonist gets a moment of awakening. He learns or discovers something about his past or future or his true self. He unravels the mysteries of life. He (or she, for the PC crowd) realizes how all that has happened or will happen, is for a reason. He goes all Zen on you. This is sort of my most favorite and most hated part of this genre. I love happy endings. I love how people get to figure out things in their lives and get shit sorted out. But I also am a realist enough to know that real life doesn't have these moments of clarity.

Most of us are just specks of dust floating about in the air. Sometimes we are soaring with the wind. Sometimes we are on a pile of crap behind old Mac's backyard. Not a lot of us can tell that we have our lives sorted out, not when we were in age of  the YA-target-demographic. We barely got enough hair in our armpits or enough courage to talk to the opposite sex, whichever comes first.

That is why I guess we need these stories, I guess. That is why we need any stories, really. They help transport us into a world that is more magical than our own. There is no pessimistic, nihilistic outlook on life in that world. Everything is sweet, and young, and beautiful. Sometimes that is enough.

(Plus, it gets a few young people to read a book for a change.)

Day 29 : The Drawing Of The Three - Book Review

This is book two of the seven part epic fantasy series - DARK TOWER, written by the always-amazing Stephen King.

This book  follows the gunslinger in this pursuit of the all-important Tower. In the previous book we find our hero, Roland Deschain, has finally caught up with the Man in Black and has learnt the secretes of time and space and how The Tower itself is in the center of it all. We learn how 'he who holds the Tower, controls the future/past of the world'. The gunslinger's world has moved on. The things he has loved and cherished is nothing but a distant memory, he is the last of his kind. All he has now is his ka, his destiny, to reach the Tower and defeat the Crimson King. At the very end of his palaver with the Man in Black, the priest tells Roland of the three draws he's been granted. He will have to choose three companions, or ka-tet, that would ride with him during this voyage.

The beginning of the book is quite gritty and dry as any western imaginable. And to add to it quite dark and violent. In the end of which our hero looses three fingers and is poisoned by the venom of huge lobster-like creatures. Now he is weak, thirsty and all he can see for miles is just the dry sand, salty sea and hot sun. Still he drags on, towards the north, for some reason always north. He remembers the palaver with the Man in  Black in the dusty priest's robe. He remembers all of the knowledge he's gained from him. Roland also remembers how even the he wouldn't talk of the Crimson King. How even he seemed nervous to talk about him. All the more reasons for Roland to draw from the three doors that would come his way.

The doors are like a magical windows that opens into another time and somehow always into the same place. New York City. Our hero is tasked with going to their world and draw one person from there to join him on his quest.

~~~

Door #1 - The Prisoner 

When the Man in Black, draws the tarot card for the prisoner, Roland sees a man with a baboon riding on his back. The baboon whips like a slave and the man himself is strong and lanky but nonetheless helpless and chained. When Roland walks through the door, he finds the true prison this man has chained himself to. HEROIN. This man's name is Eddie Dean and he is an addict. The gunslinger walks into his mind, takes control of him. And somehow during the turn of events help each other, him by helping him rescue his equally addict elder brother. And for Roland by getting him the much needed medicine from Eddie's world. In the end, Eddie , the lean and lanky and intelligent addict begins to trust the gunslinger and agrees to join him in his adventure. Just because, he has lost call cause to return to his city, his world. There is nothing waiting for him back there, but another fix, and his own destruction.

Door #2 - The Lady Of Shadows

The second tarot card the Man in Black shows Roland is of a woman. A strong-willed, no nonsense woman who is brave and just and kind in equal measure. When the gunslinger walks into this door and into her mind, he finds himself in a deeper confusion than ever before. When he entered the prisoner's mind, there was shock and confusion and the hunger for another fix. Here too there was confusion and fear, but also a lot of hate. And in measures that did not seem to come from one complete mind. There seemed to two sets of personalities living in this one body. Detta Walker and Odetta Holmes. Alongwith a handicapped body, for the Lady was did not have any legs. She was strong and brave and cruel and smart. But was short two limbs. Roland liked her nonetheless, and decides he cannot proceed in his quest without earning the loyalty of her. And he does earn it in the end, before nearly killing himself.

Door #3 - The Pusher

The final tarot card the Man in Black shows him is of the Reaper. 'Death, but not for you, gunslinger' That is what the priest told him tauntingly. The Crimson King was surely not done with him just yet. When he walks into the third and final door, he returns to the same city New York, only into a more recent time to that of the Lady and of the kid he'd met during the first book - Jake. He loved Jake. He was like a son to him. And this guy behind the third door Jack Mort, a serial killer, the same one that 'pushes' the kid in front of a Cadillac. And also the same one that caused the destruction Lady's mind and loss of her two legs. Jack Mort has by far impacted more to Roland's fledgling ka-tet than anything else thus far. Roland doesn't appreciate that too much.

~~~

At the end of the book. Roland has finally assembled his posse and is now prepared to continue his quest for the Dark Tower. Sure he is short a few fingers, short of resources, short of bullets, is dying of poison spreading up his arm towards his heart. But now, he has the companions he's drawn from the other worlds. He is not alone now after a really long while.

Day 28 : The Awkward Dodge

I am the master of all beginnings.

Getting things started comes easy to me and I excel at facilitating getting more people kicked off at things. But when it comes to having closure on any of them I am a slave to bad timing and sheer procrastination. Nobody likes confrontations or awkward situations. I am no different. I avoid them like the plague. Actually there are times in my life when I have simply swerved away from people for years just to avoid an face-off. Most of the times I have been so successful for so long that I don't even remember why I am avoiding these people. It has become so much of a habit now I still avoid being a hundred meter radius around them like a coward's restraining order.

The reason this has turned out to be a big deal today is cause I am going this thing next weekend. And there is a chance that this person might be dropping by. I remember something weird happening between us. But no matter from what angle I look at it, I still cannot figure out what that thing was. We have no actual history together nor do we have a lot of mutual friends. Well there is one. She used date friend of mine. Who dumped her to get married to another (hotter) girl. Good times.

Um. Is that it? Am I avoiding this girl because one of my friends dumped her to do the dirty (legally) with somebody else? Nah I don't really think that's it. I have been around extended exes a bunch of times. That has never bothered me so far. Most of the time I do enjoy their company. We usually join forces and blast on our mutual acquaintance. More to his/her discomfort. Guys love doing that too, girls.

Anyway. This has been bothering me enough to make a whole post in here about. So clearly there is some merit to it. Until I figure this thing out, I think I am just going to leave this note here to everyone reading -
"If something ill happens to me during the next few weeks. Please let the world know, another innocent humble God-awesome sick-as-Shaft soul bites the dust to the fabled awkward-ian standoff. And do NOT tell me what happens in the latest episode of Game of Thrones. I swear I will freaking HAUNT you from my grave."