Book review

I am not sure why I enjoy Nicholas Sparks. All of his books are written in such a way that they are sure to become movies (and they usually do). They are very easy to read, the characters are very likeable, and the story always ends up sad. Someone always dies.

Whenever I want to read something light and somewhat mindless, his books come to my help. It gives me my quick fix for reading a book at night. I’d recommend this book if you are stuck on an airplane or in a rut to read something fast and enjoyable.

 

 

This book caught my attention because of its references to Islam and controversy.  I’ve had enough of the DaVinci Code and Catholics with their secrets so I thought this might be a good change of pace religion bashing.

The Patriot did not disappoint.  The book is clearly written for the paranoid person.  Clearly the author works for FOXNews or has some affiliations with them.  The story revolves around a rumor that prophet Mohamed had a revelation before he was killed.  This revelation did not make it into the Koran.  This revelation is feared and protected by a handful of Muslims including the King of Saudi Arabia.

If you don’t know why this is important… Any revelation in the holy book could potentially over rule any other contradicting revelation.  Koran is full of contradicting messages so the rule in the book is, you always take the most recent revelation and go with it.

So this revelation is the topic of this book.  Thomas Jefferson (our 3rd pres) knew about it, the current pres knows about it and everyone wants to get their hands on it.

I could not put this book down.  It is as good as Angels and Demons if not better.

This book caught my attention because of its references to Islam and controversy.  I’ve had enough of the DaVinci Code and Catholics with their secrets so I thought this might be a good change of pace religion bashing.

The Patriot did not disappoint.  The book is clearly written for the paranoid person.  Clearly the author works for FOXNews or has some affiliations with them.  The story revolves around a rumor that prophet Mohamed had a revelation before he was killed.  This revelation did not make it into the Koran.  This revelation is feared and protected by a handful of Muslims including the King of Saudi Arabia.

If you don’t know why this is important… Any revelation in the holy book could potentially over rule any other contradicting revelation.  Koran is full of contradicting messages so the rule in the book is, you always take the most recent revelation and go with it.

The secret revelation is the topic of this book.  Thomas Jefferson (our 3rd pres) knew about it, the current pres knows about it and everyone wants to get their hands on it.

I could not put this book down.  It is as good as Angels and Demons if not better.

I’ve been running and semi-training for a marathon so I thought I’d read something about running. This book looked very interesting. It is a book about a man who decides to run a marathon and looks for a tribe of Indians in Mexico who are known to be the world’s fastest and most superhuman runners. I’ll let you know if I like it.

This was not what I had thought it was going to be at all. The 2 previous Coben books I just read was about a character named Myron Bolitar and it was fun. This book was a departure from the Bolitar series.

I still enjoyed it and at the end, it was a better book than the 2 previous ones below. This book is not an easy read (or it wasn’t for me) because it has a lot of hard to read pages about lost children who are prostitutes on the streets. Their plight is detailed and some of it made me feel sick to my stomach. The fact that there are people out there who will pay a kid for sex is something I can’t comprehend but… that’s a blog for some other time and place.
There are a lot of evil characters in this book and that is what makes it an interesting read. Several interwoven plots come together at the end in a bizarre fashion to make the last few chapters full of twists and turns.

This is a book about the Siege of Leningrad and the story of 2 prisoners who are given a chance to save their lives if they can find 2 dozen eggs for a wedding cake.

That was enough of an introduction for me to get this book.

Listening to…

One of the few bands whose CDs I always get.  This one is as good as their last one “American Idiot”

Since I enjoyed my first book by Coben, I thought I’d try another one.  I am not usually into characters in book series.  For some reason books with the same characters make the book have a less literary value for me.  However, his books are very easy to follow on CDs.  Makes my 30 minute commute very easy.

Never read a Harlen Coben book before.  The plot looked interesting and I thought I’d try a new author for a change.  The audio version is done very well.  The guy who is reading the book does a fantastic job doing a french accent where most of the book takes place.

The wife said this is a good book so I started reading it.  At about page 60 I asked her “Are you sure this is good ’cause so far I can’t get into it” to which her reply was to keep reading it.  I’ll give it some more time before I give up.

Finally finished this book after almost a month.  It was OK.  I don’t think I’ll remember what it was about in 6 months.

This is yet another chick-lit from the wife’s side of the bed that made it to my side.  I have not bought a book lately so I keep browsing through her books.  This one looked semi-promising since it has some detective-like themes.  And the wife said I’d enjoy it and she usually knows what I’d like and dislike.

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I read this book the first time years ago when I was in college.  The first time I finished it, I did not care for it.  It left me feeling dumb.  I could not follow the story and did not have the patience to follow the clues in it.

I read it for the second time a few years later… In Turkish.  This time I got even more frustrated because it made me realize how much I’d forgotten my natie language.

I am going to listen to it this time in the car.  I am hoping that this time, I’ll give it the attention it deserves.  I love Umberto Eco.  He is THE ORIGINAL and the master of  mystery, thriller, suspense, catholic church conspiracy, voodoo, masons, knights of templar etc.  The DaVinci Code author Dan Brown is an Umberto Eco want-to-be.

But the writing is so esotoric and convoluted (for my brain) that reading an Eco novel is a labor of love.   But I compare it to a well prepared 5 course meal.  ”The DaVinci Code” is an excellent hamburger.  Foucault’s Pendulum is an Italian feast with a fantastic dessert at the end.

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The Professor and the Madman: A Tale of Murder, Insanity, and the Making of the Oxford English Dictionary

I hate books with a long title. A title should not be a synopsis of a book. I won’t judge this book by its title since it was recommended by an intelligent friend.

The story is that of Dr. Minor – an American Civil War surgeon – who went mad amid the horrors of “The Wilderness.” Pursued by his nightly demons, he later wound up in grim South London where he shot dead a totally innocent man. Sent to Broadmoor – a sprawling lunatic asylum near London – he became one of the most valuable contributors to the compilation of the magisterial Oxford English Dictionary.

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I was desperate for a book again. I need to buy new books to read but that’s no effortless task for me. It takes me a while and a lot of research to commit to a book. I can’t simply walk up to a bookstand and pick up a book to read. I have to find out if it has had good reviews, or I have to have a referral from a friend I like.

So I asked the wife if she has any good books she’s read on her night stand. “Daddy’s little girl” she said. The title screamed chick-lit. The last book I tried to listen to was a dick-lit so I was not sure I could commit to such a book. What’s a dick-lit you ask? I was not sure either but I downloaded an audio book that looked interesting. Half way into the first CD, I found myself listening to 2 dudes talking about their feelings… My first reaction was “huh, this is odd”. Then the dudes started to kiss passionately right around when I was making a left turn.

I am not homophobic by any measure. At 6:45 in the morning while driving to work, I was not ready for a steamy description of 2 dudes getting it on. After avoiding collusion with the minivan in the next lane, I turned off the dick-lit and switched to ESPN radio.

Back to “Daddy’s Little Girl”… The wife said don’t let the cover of the book fool you, it’s a good mystery book. She has good taste in books so I took a leap of faith and started reading it.

It’s actually not bad.

It’s the story of a sister whose older sister is murdered when they were little girls. The guy who kills the sister is caught, sent to prison and 20+ years passes.

Ellie the little sister becomes a reporter in Atlanta and returns to her home town to see the release of her sister’s murderer. She is convinced that the murderer should not be freed. The question is, is she being misled the whole time.

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I am listening to this book right now.  I am not sure if I am going to make it all the way through.  I did enjoy the first few chapters on the history of  the European money market and how the Jews became the principal lenders of money.  This chapter alone made me realize-yet again-how religion shaped the money markets in our history.

A little verse in the Bible allowed the Jews to lend money to others with interest while Christians could not.

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The Shadow of the Wind

The shadow of the wind was not an easy book for me. I listened to it in the car on during my commute to work. There are a lot of people in this book that jump around from page to page. I had a hell of a time keeping up with it.

The story is one that I enjoyed. It’s complex, mysterious and reminded me of the “Name of the Rose” by Eco. It’s about a young boy whose father runs a used bookstore in Barcelona. One day the father takes his son to the cemetery of forgotten books. “You mustn’t tell anyone what you are about to see today”. They go around old streets winding through doors and finally stop by an old door. Reminds of “Harry Potter”… They go in. This place is stacked with books of all ages and kinds. Daniel’s father tells him that it’s tradition to choose a book the first time. Daniel’s choice of the book is the story.

I need to actually buy this book now and read it. I have a feeling I’ve missed a good chunk of the story while listening to it in the car. This is definitely not the kind of book one should hear. It needs to be read slowly.

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Outliers is a fantastic book! I enjoyed Gladwell’s 2 previous books “Blink” and “Tipping Point” but this book was better. It’s a book about why some people make it big and others don’t. As usual, Gladwell uses many numbers and stats to make his point. I personally don’t give much credit to statistics because numbers are always flexible. I can make any of his numbers to represent many things.

What I like about this book is that, generally speaking, it makes sense. He is right on target when it comes to American schools. He is right on target when it comes to cultural differences and how some people do not question authority.

I’ve worked with Indian contractors many times in the past. I’ve had the same issues Gladwell talks about with my Indian co-workers as Gladwell explains about the Columbian Pilots. I find his analogies in the cultural differences right on target.

This book reads fast. It’s a perfect audio book for the car.

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I first saw this book @ a Starbucks and I figured if Starbucks is advertising it’s either a) a good read or b) one of those corporate deals where a publisher paid enough money to get it on the display.

I’ve never thought I’d like a book like this; a book written by a dog’s voice. Sure, I am a dog lover, and who does not like a good dog story? I am ¼ way into this story and I already love it. I’ve been listening to it in my car on the way to work and home and this morning I actually waited in the car in the parking lot for the end of the chapter.

It’s the story of a mutt called Enzo. Enzo knows that when he dies, he is coming back as a human. Not all dogs get to do that, just special ones. Enzo is one of them.

I’ll update this part of the blog once I am done.

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For some reason, we read a lot about the Holocaust in our house. The wife owns a ton of books about it, my son has read quite a few young adult stories about it. I myself have read no less than half a dozen books in recent memory about the subject, and every time I read about it, it disturbs me.

The reader is another Holocaust book.

But, there is something else about this book that made me think about something else. The sex between a 15 year old boy and a grown woman is not frowned upon. I suppose this is because the underage person involved is a boy and the grown up is a woman. I guess that makes it OK? I did not get hung up on that too much since I knew this was just a part of the story.

The story is between a generation that actually witnessed and committed the horrific crimes and the generation that followed these acts. It’s a twisted love story between these 2 generations. There is no profound twist of events in this story. I always look for a twist of some sort in a story like this. I kept telling myself, maybe there is a reason for all this. Maybe she is hiding something much more profound.

It’s still a good read. “The boy in the striped pajamas” was a better book.

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I don’t know what to think of this book yet. I just started reading it and I have big hopes for it. I hope it does not disappoint me. It’s written by a Brit journalist and a former nun.

Update:  This book was a huge dissapointment.

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You have not read this book?

Run, don’t walk, and grab this book.  Malcolm Gladwell is one of my favorite non-fiction writers.  His other book “Blink” is also a must read but more about this book…

Before reading this book, I read another one called “Freakonomics” which is very similar to “The Tipping Point” (just a humble opinion). In the Freakonomics the author tries to tie the crime rate drop to the roe v wade abortion decision. His explanation of how the drop in unwanted babies caused a drop (20 years later) in the crime rate in NY. Even to a liberal guy like me, this was out there. Numbers were presented to prove this point.

In the “Tipping Point” the author tackles this stupid idea as if to prove a point. Gladwell explains the drop in crime rate to a new policy called “No broken windows”. This new policy had a simple idea. Most crimes happen in neighborhoods that are run down and look dirty. Same policy was applied to Subway trains. The city cleaned up itself and crime rates dropped. I am paraphrasing greatly here but the idea was most crimes are crimes of opportunity and bad neighborhoods are easy targets. Gladwell I think correctly gives credit to the drop in crime to the then Mayor of NY City for his “Broken Windows” policy.

Grab this book and read it. It’s fantastic. After you finish it, then you must read his other book “Blink” It’s about how we make split second decisions (gut decisions) that are usually right on target.

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This book is about the history of cryptography and it does NOT at all read like a history book. It’s actually one of the best non-fiction books that kept me interested all the way to the end. This is perhaps I am a computer geek or maybe the fact that I worked for one of the best artificial intelligence professors in the country when I was getting my engineering degree in computer science. I wrote my first encryption algorithm in college and I’ve been fascinated by the topic since that day. We don’t realize how important cryptography is in our lives and this book tries to explain that. It starts with the Egyptian’s and ends with quantum cryptography. The best part of this book is the author’s explanation of the German WWII Enigma machine. I already knew a little bit about the Enigma machine from movies and small parts in articles but the detailed yet easy to understand chapter on this topic is fantastic. Just the part on the effort at Bletchley Park and the work on the Enigma machine is enough to buy this book.

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This is an OK book.  I listened to it in the car mostly and read it @ home.  I was hoping for a change in my selection and going for a legal thriller with a “twist-at-the-end” kind of a story.  I did not find it in this book.  There is no big twists at the end however it was still an OK read.  I did learn what a “Brass Verdict” is though.

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I’ve always been fascinated by religion. I find some belief systems fascinating, in the sense that I sometimes wonder if people simply don’t think with their brains. I used to drive my mom crazy with some of the questions I’d ask her about Islam:

Me 7 years old – “You mean he put 20,000 species of beetles in one boat mom?”

My Mom – Be quiet, or he will strike you blind where you stand

Me 7 years old – Huh? It’s not even cloudy.

Believe me, some of the stuff I learned about Islam puzzles me too but that’s another blog.

One of these religions that I find interesting is the Mormons. I have nothing against any religion as long as their belief system does not hurt anyone. I could not care less what someone follows or worships. However, I cannot comprehend how anyone can read the history of the Mormon church, their leader Joseph Smith, and how he founded the church and still follow its teachings.

This book is an excellent read. I could not put it down. The book is not an anti-Mormon diatribe/rant. It starts out as a crime book; some may call it a true crime book. It starts with the murders of people by a man who was acting on the orders of God. This is nothing new, right? How many times have we heard that?

But the book goes deeper into the Mormon Church and its history. I was amazed to read about the book of Mormons and how it talks about the 2 tribes (the dark skinned and the light skinned) and more of the amazing crap that is in the Mormon book. The story of how the golden plates still amazes me.

The golden plates became The Book of Mormon, the bedrock of LDS scripture. It tells the story of Jesus and the Israelites in North America! (I kid you not!)

To a non-Mormon liberal like me, the story is fascinating for its hidden message of racism. Six hundred years before the birth of Christ, Lehi left Jerusalem for the Americas. His two sons, Nephi and Laman, split the Hebrew tribe into two warring factions and the Lamanites were cursed by God with dark skin as punishment for their disobedience.

After his resurrection, Jesus visited North America to share the gospel with these tribes, uniting them for 400 years, until the Lamanites rebelled and slaughtered all the Nephites (except Mormon, whose son, Moroni, returned to tell Smith of the existence of the golden plates).

The Lamanites, now the dark-skinned American Indians, forgot their Jewish heritage and this, according to Mormonism, is why European settlers found no white people when they arrived in the New World a thousand years later.

Now, I am no Biblical scholar. I know my Quran history a little. It’s the same story in the Jewish belief too. All 3 books are very similar, more similar than most people would admit. After all we are all sons of Abraham all 3 of them say. But I think the Mormon story is so out there with their North American Jesus visit that I had to read the chapter twice.

Anyone who ever wondered about the Mormon faith must read this book. It’s controversial, I imagine the Mormons don’t like it. You will understand many things behind the Mormon religion that is right beneath the surface of their modern day church. Polygamy is only a small part of this book. I’ve always found polygamy fascinating as well. What kind of man would want to have more than one wife nagging him? I joke but the real story behind polygamy is the rule of obedience in the Mormon Church.

You must read this book.

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Now that I am done with the chick flick (I was desperate!), I’ve picked up something more cerebral. This is a famous book by a Brazilian author. It’s one of those books people either love or hate. I tried not to read very many reviews of this book, I wanted to figure it out on my own.

Again, it’s a very short book and people claim to have read it in one sitting. I can’t read more than 20 pages in one sitting anymore. My brain shuts off after 45 minutes of reading @ 10:30 PM. Every night I have to re-read the last 2-3 pages the next day to figure out what I missed the previous night.

Must be nice to be able to sit and read a book all day though.

(Edited)

Finally finished it.  This book reminded me of “life of pi” in many ways.  The book ends very suddenly and caught me by surprise.  I enjoyed it.

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Chick Flick.

Before all the wise ass comments… I was desperate and the wife told me it was a good book, so I thought I’d give it a try. I had enjoyed Sparks’ previous book “The Notebook” so I did not judge the book by its cover. I read some of the reviews on Amazon.com and thought I’d give it a shot.

However, this part of the blog is not about the book, rather; it’s about why some people can read this book in 2 hours while it took me a frigging week. Many of the reviews said “yeah, I read it in a few hours” and some even said “I read it in a couple of hours”. The book is very short and I thought I could probably read it quickly as well.

It took me more than 2 hours. It took me more than a few hours. I am not a speed reader but I don’t see how someone can read it in 2 hours. There are 2 explanations for this. People will exaggerate their reading skills to make themselves smarter or I am just plain slow.

I’d like to think that I am somewhat a smart foreigner. There is no frigging way tons of people read this book in 2 hours. Why would someone lie like that? Does it make them feel smarter than the average reader? Do they do it to feel superior or maybe this book is beneath them?

Back to the review. It’s definitely a chick book and I liked it as much as the “The Notebook” .

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I first read this book last year with Aydin. It’s one of the best books I’ve read with the kids (if not the best). It’s truly a masterpiece. It is a mixture of great narrative, illustration, and movie like flow. It’s the story of a 12 year old boy who lives inside the walls/tunnels of Paris train station in the late 1890s. His job is to make sure all the clocks in the train station run perfectly well. One day he discovers an automaton, a man like robot made up of gears much like a clock. He is obsessed with getting this robot fixed just like his father (deceased) tried to.

Half of the book is written narrative and the other half (all mixed together) is beautiful pencil illustrations. Aydin and I loved this book. It was  mysterious all the way to the end. When you see this book on a shelf, it looks intimidating @ 533 pages. But one can easily read it in 2-3 days and feels like a silent movie: It has a very cinematic feeling.

If you have a kid, you must read this with her/him.