My 2024 in books (goodreads)

This was my Goodreads review of the year 2024. A new year, an eagerly awaited one, most likely more eagerly awaited than any so far. Not that it was easy. But it was good. A character building one 😉, like my PhD. It was a good re-start, a difficult midway, and a rather tired but good ending with lessons learnt which had started being implemented. The restart wanted to have the character of this picture. But of course, sea sailing cannot and must not be so smooth, or demanded to be so.

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(Sometime towards the end of 2024 or the beginning of 2025)
Writing this "review" is a self-reflective process. I just want to have some free time, a couple of hours, with no intentions, no aims, and reflect; reflect and then write how my year was in books, a year I tried to let my false pride not be hurt if my heart leapt at a good thin(!) book.. but those are hard to scavenge for. So, (am) starting it now, and will keep adding to it, perhaps tomorrow(🤞), perhaps next weekend, or the one after, ... who knows(!), because otherwise it will never get done. And I know very well in my heart and in my mind (although heart just pumps blood and etc.,), that I will deeply enjoy and absolutely relish thinking about my past year in books and how my own perspectives matured during that time of a whole year regarding my own reading habits, and life, in general.
...
coming soon, my dear void ❤️, coming soon 🤞
...
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Accompanied by cheesecake and coffee. I made it! ☃️😍🥰

This was the year of audiobooks and short stories for me. As I started a new position as a post-doc, my expectations from my yearly readings were low. Probably because my usual work also involves reading, though of a different kind, more intense and purposeful perhaps. On weekdays, especially, I find it hard to read even the books I really want to and have been looking forward to read for ages. So, the first "audiobook" whose entry I added on goodreads was an audio-adaptation of 'Debi Choudhurani' by Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay (my some kind of great-great-ish grandpa, and I, along with many proud members of my family, are woefully ignorant about his works, and most of us will remain so forever!). These audio adaptations, done under the famous 'Sunday Suspense' series, are done by Radio Mirchi, an Indian Bengali radio channel, which has a cult following. I don't know if they "qualify" as audiobooks as per goodreads' definition but in absence of a good audible-level curated and famed platform for Bangla, this has impacted our society a great deal. I remember the mark it left on us since 'Chander pahar' came out. So, to answer no one's question, yes, I think all those adaptations ARE very-very worthy audiobooks.

My 2023 and the start of 2024 weren't that great. I finally gave up on trying to control my neurodivergence and, somewhat associated with my neurodivergence, and somewhat due-to-other-reasons, controlling depression just-and-just based on talking therapy (CBT). CBT was a great leap of progress from trying to do it all by myself, starting late 2020. I, finally, after being implored by my therapist and psychiatrist, and NOT-AT-ALL by many people, started medications. It did wonders. I still had a lOOOoooOOOoooOOOng strings of unfinished, half-read, quarter-read, 23.456% read, 52.31% read books, but in general I felt happier and more positive, and as the year progressed, these good impacts became clearer. The second book was a book that my dear little book club wanted to read. It was 'Leonard and Hungry Paul'. At first I though it would be too "woke" for me. It wasn't. It resonated. Leonard and hungry Paul were simple, unremarkable and, from a like-to-another-set-of-likes - two definitely neurodivergent protagonists minding their own business, and not exactly fitting but still managing somehow in a world ill-designed for them. Absolutely loved it. A warm, slow bed-side read for happy sleep-times knowing that there are similar beings out there, some recognised, some not, somewhat recognised, somewhat not,
and their stories appeal to "normal" people too (I although I gave 'Normal People' a very mixed reaction), although (another!) what even is "normal"? 🤔

I finally finished Nora Ephron's set of essays. She used to feel bad about her neck! I can understand that. And as big a fan that I am of her films, I became one of her essays and her wit too. Her more controversial book is on the charts this year, let's see how that appeals to me and if it does, or will it come across as spiteful, as some people say it is. The woman usually makes a lot of sense, in a manner of speaking that is.

I read Kafka for the first time, his story of 'the Hunger artist', and now could finally understand who and what Sigrid always raved about, and she read him in German. I resorted to my Nancy Drew's and Sunday Suspense audiobooks, which I resorted to most of the times, every once-, rather, many ones-in a while during difficult spells throughout the past year. I read many filling kiddie books to increase my goodreads number (how shameful! but I am hugging and loving my anxiety these days in imperfect manners!) and discovered Amelia Bedelia, wooo! People say she was neurodivergent too! What's happening!?

I also read my first Philip Pullman, 'Lyra's Oxford'. The book had appealed to me since I live in Oxford these days, and walk everyday the street beside the one he write most about i.e., 'Turl street'. I went to Turl street, now-a-days between an amazing Italian restaurant 'Gusto' (there are many Gustos though, we were once fooled) and All Saints' Church, and tried to imagine the architecture, the nature of the spires that he put down on his paper. His writing style isn't something I took an immediate fancy to, (maybe I have become too old for that?) but the charm of Oxford in his writings makes my everyday life more beautiful. It makes me feel fortunate and thankful. I attended a book launch where he was a speaker. It was not a book of his, but most people had come to see him. Not surprising. he signed my copy, asked my name and said if he can use my name for one of the characters in his books!!! whOAAA!!! How wonderful! One of those instances in life that you don't forget. But I didn't give him the note with my name written down on it, and I am worried he might forget it. Or worse, he couldn't actually pronounce it and was just being polite! Or worse-er, what if he remembers and it is a villain? Or, fAAAr worse-er-er, a character not much needed killed-off rather soon as a plot element! Ah, okay, okay! Let me not get too much ahead of myself and just be happy that he heard my name, and gave it the most wonderful compliment. I find it often very difficult to make people pronounce my name correctly. I think after being in the UK for so long, even I have forgotten how to pronounce my own name when I introduce myself sometimes. I say what the British do. Woah, unreversed-unreversed-so-not-reversed colonialism! Even in India, outside Bengal it was so, and I used to adapt a pronunciation more suitable to people there. In the UK, I have done the same, but keep reminding my closest friends from time to time though, although less often than I ought to! 😉

I read the much hyped 'Lessons in Chemistry'. I understood why it became famous and what I liked and disliked in it. In a way, the book is for patience-less people like me, courtesy its pace, but it lacked a depth that I had expected from it. Also, a story about a woman in science, is a concept I absolutely love, that it became so famous is even better news, but I wish it had more maturity in its plot and lines. 🫣

I also heard 'The Testament of Mary', and fell in painful love with Meryl Streep all over again. I loved her voice, her emotional orations as Mary, so much that it is difficult to comment on the writing. I cannot separate her voice and her ability to emote through her voice from the writing and its quality. Downing of this realisation and critical perspective is something that my favourite audible books, which are always autobiographies, could never provide. I also finished Michelle Obama's 'Becoming' on my third try (I think). It was whitewashed (the irony!) for sure, but you cannot take away from the part of her life that she has chosen to show. It is worth a hear (or an ear or a listen, or WTF!). There were moments, even with my cynicism, when I had tears in my eyes.

In autumn 🍁, I became part of the goodreads short-story club. Oh, what a wonderful online book club. I didn't know what I was missing! I discovered Lord Dunsany there. Being a fantasy writer some generations removed, I had thought his stories would be predictable (dated will not be the right word here). Many were not. What an amazing surprise. I read some stories, got to know about writers like Alex Comfort, whom I never would have read by myself and all added something to my life. A BIG hug for the club. 💞❤️

This year I tried to not feel guilty that some of my entries were short reads, or basically short stories, or kid's books, and only with their help did I manage to finish my reading challenge. It was an even bigger challenge not to feel guilty. Then I remembered the words of wise reminder from my friend Matt that I read for pleasure and knowledge, for my own gain and happiness, not to prove a point or finish a challenge. Easier said than done, but I tried, and progressively succeeded. As long as the read adds to your life, it is a countable book for a "challenge".

Overall, the volume was less this year. That, as I mentioned above, was in itself a personal challenge to overcome - that associated guilt! But now as I look back from the other side of the year, it was a good year of reading and growth and happiness through reading. Maybe without the heavy burden of expectations, and finally being able to be away for good from the video medium (which I count as perhaps 2024's greatest victory, yaya! 💃💃💃) which has been my worst addiction, nothing less, making me progressively unhappy, and with the practice from 2024, maybe I will be able to be less anxious and read more enjoyably in 2025. Let's see!🤞 I am hopeful. ❤️

Happy reading, my dearest void (not that I am ghost, and progressively less like Ben)! 🙃

A quick short review of 'The Woman in Black' by Susan Hill

The book is one of the few relatively modern engaging horror novels. It is not a psychological thriller, but being written from the point of view of the protagonist gives it a flavour if being so, and I really liked that about the book.

The plot isn't a GRRM styled one in terms of excruciating details and intricate plotlines but I didn't miss the presence of that element. Perhaps it could also have been written as a short story, though I liked the length of the book. It is not grotesque but delivers the senses of fear through the perceptive senses of a rational, and I would say brave human being and relates simple but powerful descriptions of the natural occurrences, though mostly unrelated in logic but in the essence of fear with the supernatural occurrences, I would argue. But as you reach the end of the book, you do understand the enormous danger in the subtleties of fear with a heartbreaking consequence and end which I was literally dreading. Why that had to happen!?

The book is not completely unsympathetic to the perpetrator of the horrors. She had a terribly distressed and sad life, and there is an understanding of that pain. But understanding doesn't mean forgiveness or an open clearance to mad revenge and injustice. (On a completely different note, when I try to understand the workings of faith and religion this is the thing that I can never make understand both the parties- the ardent religious people and the hardcore atheists. Why, I wonder? May be there should be a little bit more patience in both the logical and illogical beings of the earth.)

I liked Susan Hill's style and perhaps would read more of her now.

I give this book 3.5 stars.

Happy reading! :)

P. S. I think I am quite liberal in my ratings and try to accept first and then inspect if that makes any sense! :P

Musings on 'The Ice Dragon by G. R. R. Martin

A sweet little story, but a little different ending would have satisfied me more. I was expecting the ice dragon to return to her someday, healed, from the lands of always winter.

She became a summer child! Why couldn't she be a laughing and crying(perhaps) winter child? Is it all metaphors or is it real? Well, the song of ice and fire seems more real than this story of little Adara and her loving, faithful Ice dragon.

I was wondering if she liked winter and the ice dragon more because it was the time her father hugged her?
 Was it all because of the absence of any apparent love and care in summer, and it all returned when the shock of loss or fear jolted her senses and brought her back to her emotions? Her feelings which were always deeply buried within her unknowingly from her fourth year when she had heard that conversation between uncle Hal and father and which now the fear of loss had finally let out on the surface?

Guess we will never know but will keep wondering...

That's the beauty of a short story, isn't it?

I give this story three and a half stars... :D

Dear void, happy reading! :)

Thoughts on 'Born a Crime' by Trevor Noah

You can tell that this book is not written by a professional writer but by a BRILLIANT SPEAKER. (Am I being dramatic? Not the first time.) It is AMAZING and you MUST read it. You can tell that the writer as a really honest descriptor. I love his perspective. It perhaps helps when you think critically without bias and find amusing some of the most horrible and saddest things that have ever happened in the course of the world history. Apartheid! From a child's point of view, and then an adult's.

This time was barely two or three decades removed from now in the past, and today when we talk so much about the human rights violation on the internet, as here now, somewhere these things are still happening in one form or another. Some of the times I was reading I was amused and chuckling here and there (Hail the great comedian!) but suddenly my eyes would tear up and the sadness remained. But still, I am not depressed. The best part of the perspective of Trevor Noah who indeed was born a crime is that in spite of the tragedies shaped up his life and which he writes (or in my head, speaks) of, he still had fun and you are still hopeful about the future.

Below I quote some of the most touching lines which sometimes stand on their own (for being wise or in other words plain T-shirt material :P), and my feelings on them (not that they matter! But perhaps they do too! :/ )

Born a crime by Trevor Noah

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“... It’s you and me against the world. ...”
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“... I chose to have you because I wanted something to love and something that would love me unconditionally in return. ...”
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The bond that Trevor and his mom share with each other is endearing. He was there because his mother wanted someone to call her own, just her own. Beautiful, and strangely sad with the hint of a tinge of a smile, isn't it? I am amazed by the personality of his mother. What an amazing woman!
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“... Why do all this? Why show him the world when he’s never going to leave the ghetto?” “Because,” she would say, “even if he never leaves the ghetto, he will know that the ghetto is not the world. If that is all I accomplish, I’ve done enough. ...”

... But I was blessed with another trait I inherited from my mother: her ability to forget the pain in life. I remember the thing that caused the trauma, but I don’t hold on to the trauma. I never let the memory of something painful prevent me from trying something new. ...

... Being chosen is the greatest gift you can give to another human being. ...

... It taught me that it is easier to be an insider as an outsider than to be an outsider as an insider. ... try being a black person who immerses himself in white culture while still living in the black community. Try being a white person who adopts the trappings of black culture while still living in the white community. ...
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I want to ask Trevor Noah about Teddy. What happened to him? What is he doing now? Where is he now? How did that incident affect him and Trevor's friendship - best friendship - with him?
(My goodness! Is it the story of his school or the story of a black market smuggling business!?)
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... In society, we do horrible things to one another because we don’t see the person it affects. We don’t see their face. We don’t see them as people. ...
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(What an amazing book! The truths of life, his observations- they make me cry and laugh with joy!)
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... I chose to live in that world, but I wasn’t from that world. If anything, I was an imposter. Day to day I was in it as much as everyone else, but the difference was that in the back of my mind I knew I had other options. I could leave. They couldn’t. ...
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(It is amusing and funny, but heartbreaking at the same time. But the good thing is that it doesn't leave you with a sense of hopelessness.)
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... Because there were some black parents who’d actually do that, not pay their kid’s bail, not hire their kid a lawyer—the ultimate tough love. But it doesn’t always work, because you’re giving the kid tough love when maybe he just needs love. You’re trying to teach him a lesson, and now that lesson is the rest of his life. ...

... But I remember standing there watching my mom, flabbergasted, horrified that these cops wouldn’t help her. That’s when I realized the police were not who I thought they were. They were men first, and police second. ...

... It is so easy, from the outside, to put the blame on the woman and say, “You just need to leave.” It’s not like my home was the only home where there was domestic abuse. It’s what I grew up around. I saw it in the streets of Soweto, on TV, in movies. Where does a woman go in a society where that is the norm? When the police won’t help her? When her own family won’t help her? Where does a woman go when she leaves one man who hits her and is just as likely to wind up with another man who hits her, maybe even worse than the first? Where does a woman go when she’s single with three kids and she lives in a society that makes her a pariah for being a manless woman? Where she’s seen as a whore for doing that? Where does she go? What does she do? ...

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(And the gold!)
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Trevor Noah with his mom
Courtesy: Sowetan Live

... People say all the time that they’d do anything for the people they love. But would you really? Would you do anything? Would you give everything? I don’t know that a child knows that kind of selfless love. A mother, yes. A mother will clutch her children and jump from a moving car to keep them from harm. She will do it without thinking. But I don’t think the child knows how to do that, not instinctively. It’s something the child has to learn. ...

For my mother. My first fan. Thank you for making me a man.
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His narrative had made me understand an aspect of apartheid which my history books failed to teach me. I know it was slavery and racism of the 20th century, but I didn't still know what it actually was and was capable of. Hailing from a developing country myself, some instances are too familiar and so are some imprints of a fair-skinned rule even almost a century after freedom, and the inherent racism that we accept even though we were the victims.

I LOVED this book, and would recommend everyone to read it, even the not-so-voracious readers! It's frankness and the ability to try to keep moving forward provides you with not only a much-desired understanding somewhere but also gives you hope and a lot of chuckling smirks (that make you wise, eh!? :P )!

I give this book FULL FIVE STARS! :D

Happy reading! :)

A solitary sunset...

There comes a moment in your life in which you understand how alone you are. There is practically no one for you. Parents will always be there, but being a generation apart sometimes they fail to understand and some other times you don't want to burden them with the anchors that are pulling you down. You have many "best friends" whom you tag or wish on friendship day or even call a sibling based on your "connection", but who are basically for photographical preservation and will always have a small excuse for not answering back when you need them the most. The person who thought you loved, basically was a figment of imagination impersonated by another soul so unlike the one you loved, and deceived by your own dreams; or one who just deserted you. The loves, friendships you thought were there, were actually never that deep, and in your own standards never existed thus. At night, when you can't sleep and are having scary live dreams about various possibilities, it is at most a pen and a paper that can come to your rescue. Friendless. Loveless. You are now so low and flat on your back that you can't even look down upon yourself in pity. What do you do then? 

In this fast, urban, independent life that we have made for ourselves there are so many of us who have felt like this some one time, at least, in their life. Being intelligent people, we have found our ways out. Some dive into chasms of work that keeps this feeling of abandonement and of hurt at bay. Some become vagabonds, struck with a false sense of wanderlust, trying to get away from the memory of those unrealised, haunting dreams they perhaps can never escape from until confronted and won over and even winning seems a loss, and painful then. Some poor souls are even drowned. And though some do emerge out again, stronger, and perhaps more detached to initiate that effect from the world outside, many don't. Even those who manage to overcome, some do find happiness again whereas for many others the definitons change. Now they are no longer seeking what they once were. Even if the institutions remain the same, destinations change. And perhaps that is necessary too. Isn't it, my dear void? Can you reassure me?

I have seen so many stories unfolding like that. It used to make me so sad how pain can change people. But when it happened to me I wasn't exactly unwelcoming. Change is perhaps necessary too. That is the difference between being a child and an adult - to be welcoming for such a change. We always have to pay a price for everything, even for a small amount of air we catch in our lungs. Sometimes we loose things which were once our heart and soul. We had our faults, our own book of errata and some really hurtful injustices. But they were out of our control or may be of the person we are trying to blame. And life doesn't stop, change doesn't stop. Either we move on with the flow, or be buried under the shifting sands of the desert. Which one we choose, is our intelligence and some hormones controlling a phenomenon we call our 'wish'.

In this ever changing world, everything is so strange, so difficult, yet so beautiful. I love the ocean. It is deep. It's silent roar on a full moon makes me wonder about life, makes me cry. Why is everything as it is? Why not more? Why not less? When you have lost a thing, you aspire to find it again in its depths, not knowing ever if you will or if your search will ever end. I was standing at this sunset whose photo you see, laughed as the waves greeted me - friendly and caressing; but as they receded I felt the sand beneath my feet leaving the shore. I was loosing my balance and my own earth. Should I go and search in vain for the lost in the ocean? 

I didn't. Fear or wisdom? Loneliness or solitude? I did not know, I do not yet. I just sat at the bank, drained the noises out and looked at the sunset, the hauntingly beautiful sunset.

A lone diner

Sitting alone
in ABCOS Food Plaza
I wonder
how blissful
is solitude!

A woman
in aquamarine
a mother-
middle-aged,
a wife;
Her years
of domesticity
settled
and pleasantly ripe.

I am awkward
as she
is joined
by family
and friends-
all together
happier
and fairer,
while I
write these
self-consoling lines
in ABCOS Food Plaza
:a wannabe loner.

Solitude here
-a choice?

Then there are
four gentlemen.
While collar,
blackberry
and sherry;
politics, office(?)
school system,
rainy days
and
sewer maintenance!

While sitting
in a quiet corner
I wonder
again...
Solitude here
-a choice?
Will I ever
share
a world,
a home
they agnize?

I'll go back
from ABCOS Food Plaza.
But where?
Whom
will I ask
to dine
with me?
(at least once
every day...)