The Hobbit - An Unexpected Journey

Ah, the anticipation takes form at last! We were finally in the theater at Prasad's iMax, nice and snug. 3D glasses - check. Popcorn & Cola - doublecheck. Excitement - "oh yeah!" check.

First things first, I've read The Hobbit - There and Back Again, so I know how it all ends. But it just made me all the more eager to watch it all on the big screen.

The story is one that is universally known - Bilbo Baggins, a hobbit from Bag End, is content with his peaceful life when one fine day the wizard Gandalf comes knocking at his door, and leads him into a fantastic adventure with 12 dwarves. The modest party of 14 crosses hell and high water to reach the lonely mountain and to defeat Smaug the dragon. A while later a terrific battle between 5 armies ensues, some good people are lost, many bad people are lost, and finally the book ends on a happy note.

This movie however, ends somewhere on the way between the path to the lonely mountain and Bilbo's home. It is just Part I of The Hobbit movie trilogy, after all. Peter Jackson needs to go as slow as possible to be able to fit that tiny book into three 3-hour movies. I was skeptical about how he would achieve that feat without expanding unimportant sub-plots, but he did it all beautifully. Granted, some scenes in the movie are absent from the book altogether, but hey, it's middle earth. I enjoyed my ears off :D

Oh, and yeah, our old friend Gollum makes a brief but terrifying appearance. In the span of a mere 5-10 minutes he made more of an impression on me than all the orcs, goblins, and wargs put together. Live long, Gollum! Also, this is where the infamous ring makes its first appearance - slipping from Gollum's fingers and ingratiating itself with Bilbo Baggins, paving the path for Sauron the Dark Lord to rise again.

Martin Freeman IS the Hobbit, and it is impossible to imagine anyone else in the role. Nothing to say about Gandalf, really. And the dwarves are exceptionally cast, with both their bravery and comic timing portrayed impeccably.

Overall, an amazing movie, and an absolute must-watch. As if it could be anything else :-)

And as a footnote, I cannot resist adding these immortal lines -

Three Rings for the Elven-kings under the sky,
Seven for the Dwarf-lords in their halls of stone,
Nine for Mortal Men doomed to die,
One for the Dark Lord on his dark throne,
In the Land of Mordor where the Shadows lie.

One ring to rule them all, one ring to find them,
One ring to bring them all and in the darkness bind them
In the Land of Mordor where the Shadows lie.

                                                      - From The Lord of The Rings

Cracked on Nicholas Sparks

I admit there was a time when I almost took Nicholas Sparks seriously - I had just finished reading Erich Segal's Love Story, and naturally turned to The Notebook. Never got to reading it though.

Cracked.com has this amazing article on Nicholas Sparks, and his formula for a successful novel / movie.
I have included a short part of it here -

Please oh please, read the full article. Will make your day.

The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy

I have never read science fiction before; I'm not familiar with the genre except for the odd super-hero movie now and then.

List of characters -

Arthur Dent. The unwitting earthman saved by Ford Prefect when Planet Earth is destroyed to make way for a new hyperspace bypass expressway.

Ford Prefect. One of Arthur's closest friends. He is a researcher from a faraway planet in the vicinity of Betelgeuse, and he is aware of the impending disaster to planet Earth. He was commissioned to Planet Earth to research material for the book, The Hitchhiker's Guide to The Galaxy.

Marvin, the paranoid android. An uncontrollably depressed robot, he can make ferocious machines commit suicide simply by making them listen to his woes.

Zaphod Beeblebrox. The two-headed President of the Galaxy, inventor of the Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster (a drink), thief of the spaceship Heart of Gold, only known survivor of the Total Perspective Vortex, and what else... yes, seven time winner of "Worst Dressed Sentient Being in the Known Universe". Try beating that.

Trillian. Ex-Earthling. Arthur tried picking her up at a party once, but lost her to a cool dude. He is later revealed to be Zaphod Beeblebrox, and that Trillian had decided to pack stuff and go away with him because she found Earth really boring.

Slartibartfast. An architect on the planet Magrathea who designs planets for rich space-people. Kind of like a landscape artist, you might say. Oh, and he designed the Earth. Even received an award for the stunning coastline of Norway. Yes, the Earth was tailored to suit certain requirements.

The Hitchhiker's Guide to The Galaxy. A fictional electronic book that features prominently in the actual novel of the same name. Provides quirky insights into various situations. For example, when Arthur and Ford hitch a ride in the Vogon ship, the entry on Vogons reads, "Here's what to do if you want to get a lift from a Vogon: forget it."

The Story

The story is pretty much simple and straightforward. Earth has just been demolished into nothingness and Arthur Dent and Ford Prefect are forced to hike a ride with the Vogon airship that was the cause of said destruction. People whose only job in life is blowing up planets cannot be sweetness and light; our hitchhikers are unceremoniously thrown into space by the Vogon captain, but not before giving them a dose of Vogon poetry (considered the third worst in the world; people have died just listening to it.)

I cannot resist sharing Prostetnic Vogon Jeltz's heart wrenching poem with y'all - read, and weep/laugh/pull hair.

"Oh freddled gruntbuggly/thy micturations are to me/As plurdled gabbleblotchits on a lurgid bee.

Groop I implore thee, my foonting turlingdromes. And hooptiously drangle me with crinkly bindlewurdles,

Or I will rend thee in the gobberwarts with my blurglecruncheon, see if I don't!"

Ford and Arthur are tied and made to listen to this goose-bump inducing verse; while Ford writhes in agony, Arthur is sufficiently in charge of his senses to praise Jeltz once he is done in the bleak hope that they might be spared. No such luck.

Elsewhere in the Galaxy, the two-headed President Zaphod is on his way to a spaceship unveiling. Right there, on the spot, he decides to steal it. The ship is the Heart of Gold, and due to its improbability drive lands at the exact spot where Arthur and Ford are stranded, thus saving their lives. This is where we're introduced to Marvin - the chronically depressed robot.

All of them then continue their journey through space, and finally land on a desolate planet, Magrathea. The people of Magrathea once upon a time (millions of years ago) were engaged in designing customized planets for the rich uns of the galaxy; then the recession came, and they just decided to sleep through it. Here we learn quite a handful from their architect Slartibartfast about what the Earth actually was, why two tiny rats want Arthur's brain, and yes, why exactly the Earth was destroyed.

Amidst all the hullabaloo the four of them - Arthur, Ford, Zaphod, and Trillian manage to make it back to the ship after being unwittingly saved by Marvin's depression (the battleship committed suicide after listening to Marvin's woes).

They then decide to go somewhere for lunch. The Restaurant at The End of The Universe.

My Take

You often come across books that drag for the first 50-odd pages - make you so sleepy you want to fling them against the wall, and just when you're about to give up, suddenly pick up pace. We have an exception of sorts here. The Hitchhiker's Guide is a feisty little bonanza that hooks you from the foreword itself. The book is wittiness at its best. Not the snicker-once-and-you're-done sorts, this is the ROFL kind of humor, the one that makes your tummy ache.

I used to read this in the local train, and I admit I got a lot of disconcerted stares - people probably thought I was loony or something, the way I snorted so many times. And get this - Douglas Adams wrote this book in his twenties! Makes the rest of us twenty-somethings go green, doesn't it!

Absolute must-read.

Animal Farm

In his essay Why I Write, George Orwell speaks about his love for writing -

"I wanted to write enormous naturalistic novels with unhappy endings...."

Animal Farm might not be enormous, but it is definitely unhappy. When I first heard of it and decided to read it, all I knew about it was that it was a book about animals on a farm who could talk like people.

List of characters worth a mention -

Major, an elderly pig. He inspires the rebellion and sets down rules for harmonious living. However, he dies of old age soon after the rebellion.

Snowball the pig. He is one of the leaders after the Major dies, but is driven out of the farm by Napoleon's dogs.

Napoleon the pig. Uncontested leader after Major and Snowball. Responsible for the downfall of the farm. I hate this pig more than I ever hated any other pig.

Squealer the pig. Majorly responsible for spreading good words about Napoleon and suppressing feelings of dissent among the animals. I hate him more than Napoleon.

Boxer the horse. Accepts everything without question and works like a dog, only to be sent to the slaughterhouse when he's old.

Then there are the dogs who are feared by everyone and act as Napoleon's guards. The hens, who rebel briefly against Napoleon and are squashed. The cows, meek and defenseless; the pigeons, who act as messengers and try to get animals from other farms to rebel as well.

The story in a nutshell - It all starts with rebellion and the ousting of Mr. Jones and his wife, the owners of Manor Farm (renamed Animal Farm). The animals assume control of the farm under the leadership of the boar, Major. He lays a few ground rules for a peaceful existence that the animals refer to as the Seven Commandments.

Things work out great for the animals initially; ecstatic that they're not working for humans anymore, they work harder than ever and produce harvests the farm's never seen before. Slowly, it is noticed that the pigs rarely work but are almost always supervising or ordering the other animals about. This is put down to their superior intelligence and the animals accept the turn of events without complaint.

With the old boar Major now dead, the leadership falls into the hands of two pigs, Napoleon and Snowball. Snowball is always full of intellectual ideas for the farm and how it could be bettered; Napoleon's only job is to undermine Snowball's ideas. One fine day Snowball is chased away by Napoleon's ferocious dogs and never seen again.

As the years fly by, Napoleon becomes supreme leader and dictator and the Seven Commandments initially written by Major are now altered to suit the pigs. Napoleon's descendants are now the rulers, not allowed to mingle with the other animals, the lower classes. The pigs' supremacy is now absolute, and they even start walking on their hind legs, just like humans.

My take on Animal Farm - The book is a political allegory on the then situation in the Soviet Union; and I felt George Orwell was able to put forth the details of Stalin's rule beautifully. Accepted, the novel is depressing; but then so was Stalin's government.

The only thing that disappointed me was the manner the novel ended. I expected the animals to fight against the injustice that was meted out to them; however, they mutely accept their fate, their memories of good old days dimming day by day; they just have no idea that if they wished, their lives could be better. Maybe in some distant future Napoleon might have faced rebellion, but Orwell ended the novel before it could.

Nevertheless, the book is a must-read and a must-have in any library.

PS: You can also read George Orwell's essay, Why I Write. I loved it.

Sam the Sudden- A Wodehouse Novel

As is the case with all Wodehouse books, Sam the Sudden is full of delightful misadventures that miraculously come together and make everything right at the end. I like to rate his books based on how hard I laughed while reading them, and this one's a clear winner, people. It's consistent, got a little bit of mystery in it, and promises you at least one giggle per page.



The Story - Sam Shotter is an adorable and whacky young man who's been given the boot from his uncle's import- export business in New York and shipped off to London to work at the Mammoth Publishing Company. A few interesting twists of fate lead him to the house of Miss Kay Derrick, the girl whose photograph Sam has been in love with. He decides to woo her, and becomes her neighbour by leasing the haunted house next door, "Mon Repos".

Contrary to what everyone thinks, Mon Repos isn't haunted - the nighttime noises are the handiwork of a bunch of small time crooks who are searching for stolen treasure that has been buried inside Mon Repos. Now that the house is finally occupied, how will the crooks continue searching for it? Some plan needs to be devised to get access to the house, isn't it! Throw in a pompous Lord Tilbury with all his meddling, fake detectives who're in love with their waxed moustaches, Amy the ferocious-looking but completely harmless dog, Hash and Claire's rocky love story, small time crooks Soapy and Dolly Molloy, and what you get is absolute delight packed in some 100 odd pages. Hard to believe how everything can be set right in so less space, but Wodehouse manages to do it fine.

This book marks the birth of some recurring characters - Chimp Twist, Percy Pilbeam, Soapy Molloy, and then we have Lord Tilbury of Mammoth Publishing House (this one's his second appearance).

Sam the Sudden made me smile when I was down in the dumps, and that's saying something. Makes for a nice weekend read. Go for it.

An excerpt from Swami and Friends

Every once in a while you come across a book that strikes a chord, that is simply impossible to let go without being affected. This is one of those masterpieces. Swami and Friends by RK Narayan doesn't need any introductions, does it? I felt like sharing this particular excerpt from the book with you people - it has never failed to make me smile.

Swaminathan sat in his father's room in a chair, with a slate in his hand and pencil ready. Father held the arithmetic book open and dictated: "Rama has ten mangoes with which he wants to earn fifteen annas. Krishna wants only four mangoes. How much will Krishna have to pay?"

Swaminathan gazed and gazed at this sum, and every time he read it, it seemed to acquire a new meaning. He had the feeling of having stepped into a fearful maze. His mouth began to water at the thought of mangoes. He wondered what made Rama fix fifteen annas for ten mangoes. What kind of a man was Rama? Probably he was like Shankar. Somehow one couldn't help feeling that he must have been like Shankar, with his ten mangoes and his iron determination to get fifteen annas. If Rama was like Shankar, Krishna must have been like the Pea. Here Swaminathan felt an unaccountable sympathy for Krishna.

'Have you done the sum?' father asked, looking over the newspaper he was reading.

'Father, will you tell me if the mangoes were ripe?'

Father regarded him for a while and smothering a smile remarked: 'Do the sum first. I will tell you whether the fruits were ripe or not, afterwards.'

Swaminathan felt utterly helpless. If only father would tell him whether Rama was trying to sell ripe fruits or unripe ones! Of what avail would it be to tell him afterwards? He felt strongly that the answer to this question contained the key to the whole problem. It would be scandalous to expect fifteen annas for ten unripe mangoes. But even if he did, it wouldn't be unlike Rama, whom Swaminathan was steadily beginning to hate and invest with the darkest qualities.

'Father, I cannot do the sum,' Swaminathan said, pushing away the slate.

'What is the matter with you? You can't solve a simple problem in Simple Proportion?'

‘We are not taught this kind of thing in our school.'

'Get the slate here. I will make you give the answer now.'

Swaminathan waited with interest for the miracle to happen. Father studied the sum for a second and asked: 'What is the price of ten mangoes?' Swaminathan looked over the sum to find out which part of the sum contained an answer to this question. 'I don't know.'

'You seem to be an extraordinary idiot. Now read the sum. Come on. How much does Rama expect for ten mangoes?'

'Fifteen annas of course,' Swaminathan thought, but how could that be its price, just price? It was very well for Rama to expect it in his avarice. But was it the right price? And then there was the obscure point whether the mangoes were ripe or not. If they were ripe, fifteen annas might not be an improbable price. If only he could get more light on this point!

‘How much does Rama want for his mangoes?'
'Fifteen annas,' replied Swaminathan without conviction.'Very good. How many mangoes does Krishna want?'
'Four.'
'What is the price of four?'

Father seemed to delight in torturing him. How could he know? How could he know what that fool Krishna would pay?

'Look here, boy. I have half a mind to thrash you. What have you in your head? Ten mangoes cost fifteen annas. What is the price of one? Come on. If you don't say it—' His hand took Swaminathan's ear and gently twisted it. Swaminathan could not open his mouth because he could not decide whether the solution lay in the realm of addition, subtraction, multiplication, or division. The longer he hesitated, the more violent the twist was becoming. In the end when father was waiting with a scowl for an answer, he received only a squeal from his son.

'I am not going to leave you till you tell me how much a single mango costs at fifteen annas for ten.'

What was the matter with father? Swaminathan kept blinking. Where was the urgency to know its price? Anyway, if father wanted so badly to know, instead of harassing him, let him go to the market and find it out.

The whole brood of Ramas and Krishnas, with their endless transactions with odd quantities of mangoes and fractions of money, were getting disgusting.

Father admitted defeat by declaring: 'One mango costs fifteen over ten annas. Simplify it.'

Here he was being led to the most hideous regions of arithmetic, Fractions. 'Give me the slate, father. I will find it out.' He worked and found at the end of fifteen minutes: 'The price of one mango is three over two annas.' He expected to be contradicted any moment. But father said: 'Very good, simplify it further.' It was plain sailing after that.

Swaminathan announced at the end of half an hour's agony: 'Krishna must pay six annas,' and burst into tears.

You can buy this awesome book from Flipkart, or you can read the ebook here on Scribd.

Trysts with Wodehouse

How exactly do you go about reviewing a Wodehouse novel? No, no, let alone writing a review, how would you even begin to write a summary of the book?! I didn't realize I had such a hard task ahead of me when one day I breezily decided to write about Wodehouse books, one after the other. I started out with Sam The Sudden, my latest read; but days turned to weeks and there I was, staring at the screen, wondering where to begin.



Plots, and sub-plots (and even more mini-plots if that was possible) are all crammed into every book, and, just when you're thinking, hell, no way is all this going to come together and make for a smooth ending, you find yourself staring at the last page wondering how everything could turn out so right.

Gosh, what I wouldn't give to live just one day of my life in Blandings Castle! Perhaps, if I got lucky, I might even get to see the Empress of Blandings in all her fat glory. For those of you that have not been introduced to this lady yet - she's the prize pig of Lord Emsworth, three times winner in the Fat Pigs class at the Shropshire Agriculture Show, hehe.

Wodehouse doesn't need Harry Potter-esque magic in his books to take us all to wonderland - purely out of comic genius he's created a perfect world, a world where summer never ends, a world full of happy endings, a world where Jeeves, Psmith and Lord Emsworth are real. A world of never ending, magical delight.

Let me know people, if you have any personal Wodehouse favorites! Always excited to talk to another fan! As for me, I'll go back to my Sam the Sudden review and try and get to finish it. So long, right ho!

The Girl Who Kicked The Hornets' Nest

The third and final book of the Millennium Saga begins on a fairly dark note - Lisbeth Salander is battling death with a bullet lodged inside her head; not more than two rooms away is Zala (in the hospital with an axe stuck in his head by Miss Salander) screaming bloody revenge.

Yeah, that's Lisbeth for you! Funny how this scrawny, devil-may-care, bisexual-and-proud-of-it, outrageous delinquent rouses the gentlest, protective, shaking-your-head-with-a-grin feeling.

Lisbeth is awaiting trial for three murders - and it is obviously up to Mikael Blomkvist to prove her innocence.  With Lisbeth locked away in the hospital, and also not on talking terms with him (she refers to him as Kalle Bastard Blomkvist), this might easily be the toughest task he's ever encountered. As he delves deeper into the seemingly simple case, he comes up with startling revelations - the sinster plot goes all the way into the very heart of the Swedish Secret Service, with consequences that might topple the government.

I guess what sets these novels apart from others of their genre are their approach towards women; these books do have women targeted as the weaker sex, but they also show how they spring back with vigor; they show that today's women are independent, strong, completely capable of taking on the world, come what may. Also that it's mighty foolish to meddle with them - as Bjurman the Advocate found out, in a very painful, and life-altering way (Thanks to Lisbeth, obviously ;-)). Women in these books have strong characters, and not one single girl in the trilogy has been portrayed as a damsel-in-distress.

Men need not feel left out here - Mikael Blomkvist is quite the hero, let me assure you! Book lover or not, these three novels are a must read for everyone.

Beg, borrow, or steal - but get your hands on these beauties. They are totally, totally worth it.

The Girl Who Played With Fire

Sequels usually discourage me; however, I had an unbearable itch to get my hands on this book even before I was done with the first one.

If reading the first book was like that whiff of fresh air just before the rain, this one felt like riding the eye of the storm.

Mikael Blomkvist and Lisbeth Salander are back -  albeit not on talking terms with each other - Lisbeth is named as the prime suspect in a series of gory murders and Mikael takes it upon himself to prove to the world that she's innocent.



They say the most complex whodunits have a really simple answer. An answer so simple, you wonder why you didn't see through it rightaway. The entire mystery whirlpools around a man named Zala, a man no one has seen, no one has heard of, and yet somehow his name is linked to a plethora of damning crimes.

Lisbeth Salander is as impossible as ever; from being a fugitive from law, to being shot in the head and buried alive, Salander does it all. I wonder what it is about this scrawny, crazy, rude, and headstrong girl that makes one want to protect her, though she is hell-bent on alienating everyone on earth.

There are quite a few new characters introduced - off the top of my head, Inspector Bublanski, Inspector Modig, Faste, Peter Teleborian, Bjorck, and so many other characters I cannot remember all their names. Unlike other books where these characters are sidelined and the main character is given prime importance, Steig Larsson makes sure all of them get their due.

And, there is Mikael, of course - one more addition to my dreamboy wishlist ;-) Mind you, he is not your run-of-the-mill action hero with a Greek God physique. Fiftyish, greying hair, bespectacled playboy suits him the best, if ever there was one such.

People, this book is un-putdownable right from the start. I promptly purchased Book 03 online, and completed this one by staying up all night.

Stay tuned for the third book of the series, The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet's Nest. Coming soon.

The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo

It was with mixed feelings that I picked up this book at Landmark... And boy, did I take the right decision! Folks, I finally completed the first book of the Millennium Trilogy. And all I can say is, I can't wait to ravage the next one! Set at a breakneck pace, this compulsive whodunit really did it for me;-) I spent a couple of sleepless nights over it, itching to get to the end and find out who did it, after all.

Mikael Blomkvist is a disgraced financial journalist who has been summoned to a small village in the back of beyond, to meet a 80-year old former industrial giant. He is entrusted with the strangest investigation he might ever have come across - to find out who in the family murdered his beloved grand-niece Harriet, about 40-odd years earlier. What seems like an impossible quest soon turns out to be one hell of a ride - Mikael finds out bits and pieces of the puzzle, and unearths alarming, and spine-chilling facts about the family that make the monster Frankenstein look like a saint.

I had reached that point in the story where I began to believe that Blomkvist was the protagonist, the hero, blah blah, when Lisbeth Salander made her presence known. The full force of Lisbeth Salander's character hits you with within five minutes of her entrance; trying to actually describe her is an exercise in futility.  The most unconventional heroine I've ever come across, Lisbeth's entrance marks the point in the novel that makes it un-put-downable, and the story begins to race. Riveting is the word how the book can be described; this one is a must-read for all suspense and thriller buffs.

I don't want to reveal too much of the story here, so people, take me at my word - if you haven't already, then go out and get it. This one's a keeper. The girl, the dragon tattoo, and of course, the book. ;-)