the papaya factor

Coming Soon: CSN Stores Product Review

2010-08-19T11:15:00.008-05:00

I dont know about you guys, but I've yet to meet a kitchen gadget I didnt like. For the past year or so I've been a big proponent of the minimalist kitchen. This happened through necessity rather than design since we moved from a large-ish single family into an apartment with a shoe-box kitchen.

As I donated three large boxes of kitchen articles from my old kitchen, I tried to get over my heartbreak (and hoarding tendencies) with positive thoughts - why do I need a sandwich maker when I have a frying pan and my own ingenuity and so on and so forth. I've been pretty good at maintaining this position, over the last year the only new article that has entered my kitchen has been my beloved ebelskiver pan.

So, imagine my excitement when the generous people at CSN Stores contacted me to review a product from their site. The website has over 200+ stores and they carry an exhaustive range of products all in one place- from dinnerware, to furniture and shoes, bags and luggage. Of course, I jumped at the opportunity. And once my mouse stalled over the kitchen tools link, I knew the product would have to be a kitchen gadget.

But, I haven't yet narrowed down which one will replace the ghosts of gadgets past in my teeny-tiny kitchen. So, here's the question to you guys to help me figure out if there's something I really need - which is your favorite kitchen gadget?

As of this writing, I would have to say my favorite is my Braun hand blender with whisk and immersion blender attachments. I love it so much I've even given it out as gifts.

Review: Lover Mine

2010-08-05T17:04:00.013-05:00

Rating: 2 / 5

Lover Mine is the 8th book in the Black Dagger Brotherhood Series by JR Ward.

Let's get this out of the way first, shall we. Read this book only if you have read the rest of the series. It could be read standalone, but a lot of the complicated relationships are clearer if you go in order. Series order and reviews can be found here and here. There will be BDB terminology in this review and minor spoilers wrt this book and previous books which will not be explicitly marked.

LM picks up 4 weeks after the events of Lover Avenged. Xhex, the half-sympath assassin, has been kidnapped by Lash, son of the Omega. The Brotherhood, Rehv, John Matthew, Blaylock and Qhuinn are doing their best to find any clues to her disappearance. Something about the manner in which she disappeared and the way that he treated her the last time they were together has caused John Matthew to bond with Xhex and his panic, grief and the need to avenge are unsurpassable.

Meanwhile Xhex is enduring physical and mental abuse at the hands of Lash, who initially saw her only as a hostage, but has since fallen in love with her himself. After 4 weeks of Lash's brutality Xhex has come to several revelations, that she is in love with John Matthew and she kept him at a distance because of the repercussions once JM found she was half-sympath. And that she has finally reached her breaking point, the only reason for her survival is to seek revenge against Lash.

Xhex manages to get herself out of Lash's clutches and re-unite with JM for some bitter-sweet moments together since both know that the time they have is short. Xhex is driven by one purpose, she MUST kill Lash herself and does not envision life after the event, while JM in order to retain any self-respect and self-worth MUST kill Lash himself.

JM has a long, sordid history with Lash and the years spent away from the vampire community where he was different, misunderstood and traumatised have left deep scars in his mental make up. To allow Lash to have abused the female he is bonded to is unthinkable. To allow anyone else, even Xhex, to kill Lash is even more unthinkable. As their personal vendetta against Lash leads to the inevitable showdown, JM and Xhex must examine their hearts to determine what is really important, the destruction of their souls or finding and keeping a soulmate.

I must come clean, I almost, almost didnt write this review because of how disappointing the book was. The only thing pushing me was my OC tendencies since I've reviewed every other book in the series on this blog. Cant break that trend now, can I?

A major part of my disappointment has to do with John Matthew. If you've read my reviews you know I dont care for him at all. But, in LA, I almost thought that I would be able to read his story. Almost. It had to do with this wonderful dynamic that JM and Xhex had going on - she the tough, hard-as-nails sympath assassin, while he was the much more emotionally available, tormented younger guy. I wanted to read that story. The kidnapping in the last book upset me because I had a premonition that everything I was interested in was going to be thrown. And I was right!

Basically this book is a rehash of Lover Awakened where Bella is kidnapped and Zsadist goes crazy trying to find her. Bella and Zsadist worked because their characters were defined to fit the roles they inhabited in their book. In LM Xhex the tough warrior woman is forced into Bella's role while whiny JM gets Zsadist - it really, really didnt work for me. I was excited when Xhex was introduced because there are so few strong women in this series, I hated that for her to get a HEA she had to be emotionally and physically broken down until she seemed a changed person. I'm not saying that any person can undergo what she goes through and still come out strong, her journey probably strikes the right chords for survivors. I think I'm upset that she had to go through an ordeal which required her to be weak and needy just so JM could play the alpha male.

A huge part of my problem with JM is how much telling, not showing, there is going on around him. The first scene in LM introduces him as follows

The one in the middle, however, was trouble. Slightly larger than his buddies, he had dark brown hair that was cut short and a classically handsome face-but his blue eyes were lifeless, with about as much reflection as old asphalt.
A dead man walking. With nothing to lose.

JM is always talked up as being a fierce and extremely dangerous fighter but he really does nothing. His internal monologues are whiny, self-centered & immature and it seemed to me like other people were always picking up after his messes. Even at the climax, after all the angst over how it had to be him taking Lash out all JM does is put himself, stupidly, in danger, so others can save Xhex and bail him out. And while I can see how it might look that he took the higher road, put his own needs aside to allow Xhex her vengeance all I saw was JM being his pathetic, ineffectual self. Right, I'm sure everyone understands exactly how much I liked him so we'll move along now.

As is the case with all the BDB books, the plotline above is only the primary romance. There's ample other action going on in this book. Lash and the Omega have a falling out and Lash soon learns what it means to be daddy's boy no longer. We have a flashback with the Brothers Darius and Tohrment investigating the disappearance of a member of the glymera. And we have a storyline with a paranormal investigations unit in South Carolina (? I dont remember and am too lazy to look it up). None of these worked for me, the lesser parts never do and the minute I started reading the latter storylines I knew exactly how they were going to be resolved so that took away some of the mystery factor for me.

Which brings me to the portions which did work. Namely the triangle between JM's friends Blaylock, Qhuinn and Qhuinn's cousin Saxton. Blay's been in love with Qhuinn forever while Qhuinn just wants to conform to the norm, get married to a woman of worth, after being an outcast all his life. He treats Blay horribly then gets cross-eyed with jealousy when Saxton finally asks Blay out. All the Qhuinn/Blay portions were fantastic, the scenes shifting between them wanting to hurt each other, to intense longing esspecially on Blay's part. All I wanted to do was read about them.

It's a pattern I've been noticing since LE, the secondary romances have all the sizzling romantic tension but when they move into their own story lose all their chemistry. I certainly felt the same way about JM and Xhex in the last book and couldnt wait to read their story. The caveat with Qhuinn and Blay's story is that I'd love to read them get their HEA but as a secondary romance in one of the future books. I'm sure I will not be able to handle another book filled primarily with the teenage angst and urban slang speak that this book had.

Lastly we also get a buildup to the next book which is Payne and Manny's story. Again, I loved Payne when she was introduced - a female Brother? Fantastic!! But LM ends with Payne breaking her spine and it looks like she's going to need intensive therapy/rehabilitation (which is probably where Manny steps in, Manny to those who dont remember was Jane's boss in LU) to get back on her feet. By now you know how I feel that Payne has to be weakened in her own story ... as if the psychological number her mother, the Scribe Virgin, has done on her isnt enough. Also, this will be another romance with a human/vampire love interest and I've yet to see one of those come to a satisfactory conclusion.

And finally, if you are still reading and want to know about the series arc ... what series arc? I felt the storyline was completely stagnant in LM, while simultaneously introducing more characters for potential stories. The problem is that I'm just not interested in these characters, I wanted to read about the Brotherhood and they're all storied out. How about Tohr's story, you say? In the BDB world the men are mated for life. Tohr had his mate in Wellsie who died, so if I read about an upcoming book with Tohr I will be intensely irritated. As it stands, I'm not sure if I'll pick up the next one in the series.

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Series Order

1. Dark Lover
2. Lover Eternal
3. Lover Awakened
4. Lover Revealed
5. Lover Unbound
6. Lover Enshrined
7. Lover Avenged
8. Lover Mine

Slow summer ...

2010-07-26T18:25:00.023-05:00

It's been a long, hot, summer, and my blogging inspiration has hit rock bottom. Today I felt chatty so just wanted to share a couple of updates. First up, food! The two pizza recipes are by Jim Lahey with the no knead bread technique I mentioned a couple of months ago. I'd been dying to try out a few of the recipes in his book (which all look delicious and easy btw) so since I was craving carbs a few weeks ago I decided on pizza. The Pizza Funghi (Mushroom Pizza) is to the left while the Pizza Batata (Sweet Potato Pizza) is below. Both pizzas were fantastic, more like an thin crust of bread with some insanely simple, unique and delicious toppings.

If I had to pick a favorite it's the Funghi while B's is the Batata which was a tad too sweet for me. The next time I make it I think I'll add some potatoes to the topping just to prevent it from getting overly sweet. I also made the entire batch of pizza dough in the recipe, froze it and made them 2 weeks apart and it turned out great. I love it when I can cut time in half by making a bigger batch and then freezing, so I can definitely say that the recipes worked for me on many levels.

What do you guys do for breakfast? I tend to keep it simple with oats and any fruit I have lying around. Once in a while I might get creative with honey & cinnamon. Last weekend, being bored with oats, I decided on making the Dutch Baby (pics below). The recipe I used was Alton Brown's and while it looked spectacular in the oven, it didnt rock my world much. Imagine an eggier, denser pancake ... and I dont much like pancakes. Anyway, we ate it drizzled with agave syrup and some lemon shown below and it was nice. I wish I had made a syrup (blueberries and lemon was the original idea) to pour over it, but I got lazy. It was ok for a taste, but has so much butter & sugar I'm pretty sure I'm never going to be making it again.

I just realised the last time I was at the movies was to watch the immensely disappointing Shutter Island, an entire FIVE months ago. I've been really uninterested with the summer movie fare this year ... but I think it's about to change now. I see a couple of interesting movies coming up, high on my list are Inception and Salt.

Anyway, so there I was trolling along on IMDB and I came across the Hollywood version of The Girl With a Dragon Tattoo. And Daniel Craig is all set to play Mikael Blomkvist!! I dont really know how to take this information, while I love Craig, Blomkvist's character and personality is bland and Craig doesnt fit that description by any means. It will be interesting to watch how he interprets the character ... I cant help but compare with the last Gary Stu character I watched on screen -Robert Langdon/Tom Hanks - and it was such a train wreck. I still shudder when IMDB or Netflix ambushes me with posters of the Dan Brown movies.

I did watch the Swedish version of Dragon Tattoo and loved it, the characters of Blomkvist and Salander played perfectly by actors Michael Nyqvist and Noomi Rapace respectively. I really had no faults to find with the movie. But the sequel, The Girl Who Played with Fire was awful. The book itself is quite rambling in scope, consequently the script suffered and it just comes across as a very confused movie. I hope Hollywood manages to get the Salander character cast right, I really dont see any of the current actresses as edgy enough for the role.

Also, I stumbled across this on IMDB and startled B by letting out a squeal of excitement. It's the page for a version of Diana Gabaldon's Outlander. As some of you might remember, I adore the book which is one of my favorite romance reads. Unfortunately the casting isnt up yet, so I cant obsess over the characters, but I am so excited to see it in development. I do hope it's finally made into a movie. On Ms. Gabaldon's FAQ pages is the question about whether she's working on a script and she replies with 'Right, which 40 pages do you want to see made into a movie?' which is accurate, Outlander is such a dense novel with so many interconnected plots it's going to be extremely difficult to come up with a movie which remains true to the book while also satisfying tons of fans worldwide. But, one lives in hope.

Any other movies I should be keeping an eye out for? And what's on your must watch list this summer?

Edited to add: I cannot believe I did an entire post about movies I'm looking forward to without including The One(Two) Movie That Beats Them All heh ... who else is looking forward to it? And did anyone else think that Harry looked like a hobbit in the last movie??

Wish listin' on such a summer's day ....

2010-06-09T13:13:00.016-05:00

Due to a decided lack of blogging inspiration, I 'm going to share some dresses on my summer lust list. I've recently started to get into dresses because they are so easy. No worrying over coordinating tops and bottoms, just pull one item of clothing and you're done. It's amazing how reaching a particular age can have a liberating effect on one's clothing choices. When I was younger I was so self-conscious- either I was too fat, too short, too shy for a lot of trendy stuff. My mom had to stuff me into leggings the last time they were in style and I actually had the legs to pull them off. I whined the entire day that I had to wear them and never touched them again. Now I have pairs in a wide range of colors and dont worry over much if they suit me or not. The mantra now is to wear what pleases me. Alright, enough of the gyaan, let's look at some pretty clothes.

This dress represents love at first sight. It's the Native American/ Ikat style fabric which has my heart beating pitter-pat. Plus, the silhouette really works well with my figure. The cons- strapless and cotton which no doubt will fade spectacularly. The fading bit is what's keeping me from actually buying it RIGHT AWAY.

As you can see I have an all-abiding love for shirt-dresses. If I had to pick just one it would be the middle dress with my favorite dots, stripes and the vivid lime-green sash. I love everything about it, the contrasting colors, the shape, the length. And so perfect for summer! Just looking at it makes me feel cool and elegant. I'm in love with the other two because of their prints - frogs on the first and a bicycle on the third. So quirky and adorable!! Can a girl have too many shirt-dresses??

And finally the summeriest of them all. I've been in love with this dress ever since I spotted it in a catalog. And it has pockets too, whee!! But, the shapelessness leads me to think it'll look like a gunny sack, albeit a cool one, on me. Decisions, decisions!!

On an unrelated note I just finished reading 'A Conspiracy of Kings', the fourth in Megan Whalen Turner's 'The Queen's Thief' series, reviewed here. What a fabulous book this one is! It's the story of Sophos, the heir of the king of Sounis, referred to as Useless the Younger in the first book. Sophos is kidnapped in the middle of the second book. Sophos is so sweet, unsophisticated and unsure of himself, all the things which Gen isnt. While I was disappointed that it didnt have enough of Gen, Sophos's story is a true coming of age and a very nice entry to the series. As a bonus, the publisher's have the first few chapters of 'The Thief' available for reading for a short period of time. Browse it here. For the record, 'The King of Attolia' is still my favorite in the series :)

Catching up with some movies!

2010-06-03T13:15:00.007-05:00

Right I need to catch up with all your blogs and my own ... the pic above, at Goa, is meant to be both an explanation and an excuse for the month-long absence. As for my vacation- summer heat, mangoes, jackfruit and pani puris, need I say more :) The heat did confuse my body into expanding, I'm hoping the brain freeze I endured in freakishly-cold north Minnesota over the weekend, will fool it into contracting to original specs ... soon.

Here's a round-up of movies I caught on the plane. Since, it wasnt the best of viewing conditions some of my perceptions might be colored by the environment, but I'm pretty certain I wont re-watch any of the following to change my mind.

Invictus
A story of how Nelson Mandela united South Africa by means of the Rugby World Cup. With Morgan Freeman in scene-stealing mode as Nelson Mandela and a sincere Matt Damon as Francois Pienaar, the team captain for SA, this was an enjoyable and uplifting movie.
Rating: 5/ 5

Up in the Air
Ryan Bingham (George Clooney) is the high-flying executive with a job involving him flying 300 days out of the year since he goes around the country firing people. Bingham loves his life since it enables him to live without baggage, read relationships, and without any responsibility and also give him ample opportunity for his obsession with collecting airline miles. Until a young MBA, Natalie Keener, in his company comes up with the idea of firing people online.

Suddenly grounded, Bingham flounders with the meaning of his life suddenly reconnecting with estranged siblings, educating Keener on the value of building relationships and consequently looking for a stable relationship for himself with Alex Goran (an awesome Vera Farmiga) a feminine version of himself. I have mixed feelings about this movie, I was entertained by a lot of the scenes but it was marketed as a romance which it isn't and the underlying thread of relevancy to the current US economic state didn't work with the rest of the plot. Rating: 3/ 5

The Men Who Stare At Goats
Through school and college, I had a friend who was a born cynic. After moments when everyone was happy/elated/victorious he would ask the question that stumped us each time - 'What is the point?'. I think this movie was meant to be a satirical look at war, but it's no Syriana.

Bob Wilton (Ewan MacGregor) is a small-time journalist. After his wife breaks up with him, an effort at proving himself lands him in war-time Iraq. Here he comes across Lyn Cassady (Clooney), and he remembers an interview with a man whom on first count he had dismissed as a flake, who first mentions a new unit of the army researching parapsychology. As Wilton hitches a ride with Cassady into Iraq and familiarizes himself with the New-Age, free-love thinking of the New Earth Army which believes war can be fought using non-violent methods like psychic and paranormal techniques, staring at goats etc he finds himself slowly undergoing an ideological conversion. If the movie is meant as a metaphor, it was too much for my tired brain to comprehend. Taken at face value ... what was the point ????
Rating: 3/ 5

It's Complicated
Jane (Meryl Streep) suffering from Empty Nest Syndrome and finally at a point in her professional and personal life when she thinks she's settling down, suddenly finds herself playing 'the other woman'. The problem is the man she's having an affair with is her ex-husband Jake. Predictable comedy and much confusion ensues when she also starts dating her recently-divorced, shy, architect, Adam.

So, why do the heroines of romantic comedy have to be so flurried, harried and cute? And didnt Streep play the same role for Mamma Mia. Oh well, it's worth a watch but dont expect too much. Steve Martin sleep-walking through the role and a hammy Alec Baldwin make up the boring love interest and juvenile, selfish ex-husband respectively. Rating: 2.5/ 5

The Proposal
Margaret Tate (Sandra Bullock) is a Canadian immigrant with visa problems who is about to be deported and lose her job, so she forces her harassed assistant Andrew Paxton (Ryan Reynolds) to marry her. A weekend of bonding with Paxton and his weird family occurs where the protagonists discover it's actually true love. Unfunny, unromantic, AVOID it. The rating is for the obligatory designer dud sightings (Loboutin, Prada and Hermes) which seem to indicate a successful , powerful professional woman in the movies .... and which I quite shallowly enjoyed.
Rating: 0.5/ 5

Color, color, which color?

2010-04-21T09:58:00.000-05:00

I tried out this great color quiz and apparently, Black is my color ...

Nothing can stand between you and your demand for a calm environment. To be free of conflict and disagreement is the only way to live. In fact, it's this philosophy that probably allows you to be comfortable in conditions that would normally bother others. Your ability to focus is undisputed, and while you enjoy attention, you still have problems understanding how to handle it. No other color out lives by the golden rule as much as you do.

Which is largely accurate, even though that last sentence doesn't make sense to me no matter how I try to read it ...

What your color?

Butter Chicken

2010-04-15T20:37:00.004-05:00

Do you have one recipe that is your fail-safe recipe- the one that you know will work in a pinch when you have guests, or the one that you can make as many variations as you wish and will still please palates? Murg Makhani or Butter Chicken Masala is one of mine.

I know it sounds finicky, but I have this really easy recipe which I've been using for the past 10 years or so and I've never gone wrong with it. I *think* the original recipe is Sanjeev Kapoor's but I've long since lost the slip of paper I copied the recipe out on. The original copy I made was flawed since I distinctly remember no mention of the amount of chicken to be used; as a new cook, at the time it seemed like the end of the world. But whatever I cobbled up was still so tasty that I've reused the recipe time and again.

Couple of reasons why this recipe is such a favorite. It's very quick and easy for starters. Most often the tomato puree I use is from a can (unsweetened, unflavored kind), so the only prep work involves powdering the nuts. Secondly, it uses nuts to thicken the sauce which gives it a wonderfully creamy consistency, so I leave out the cream entirely. Then, I add a small dab of butter and add oil so I get a hint of the flavor of butter. So, basically I feel like this is a healthier version of my favorite dish. And since I've been making it with twists and modifications it never tastes the same twice in a row, but all versions are pretty delicious.

It's also very easy to substitute paneer for a vegetarian Paneer Butter Masala. I just adjust spices accordingly. Since, I dont have the original recipe with me anymore, I will not be including measurements.

From L-R: Mix red chilli powder, salt, black pepper powder, ginger paste, garlic paste, garam masala powder and yogurt together as a marinade for the chicken. I've also added a couple of saffron strands, to give color and richness but I dont think it adds much so you can leave it out. Marinate the chicken (I used 500gms/1lb) with this mix for a couple of hours. (For an equal quantity of paneer, I reduce the marinade by half).

After marinating, bake the chicken in a 350F oven until almost cooked. Then place it under the broiler for a couple of minutes until the marinade is cooked and browned. (I use chicken thighs because other cuts get really dry in the oven, if using chkn breasts you might want to do this on the grill/stovetop). Shred the chicken pieces.
(Paneer should be browned in the broiler/grill.)

In a pan, heat some butter and oil. After the butter melts add powdered almonds and stir until lightly golden. I prefer using powdered cashews because I think the taste is richer, but unfortunately I didnt have any at home ... you can also add roasted and powdered poppy seeds 'khus khus' with cashews to give more depth to the flavor.

Add tomato puree to the roasted almonds above. Also add some tomato ketchup and chilli sauce into the puree. (I know! Trust me, the payoff is great!! This time I used Maggi Masala Chilli Ketchup and Sriracha hot sauce, I generally add any combinations of ketchups and hot sauces I have on hand. The best flavor profile is with plain tomato ketchup and around a 3:1 ratio.) Cook for about 5 minutes.

Stir in the marinated chicken, red chilli powder if required and about a tsp. of kasuri methi (dried fenugreek) leaves (which is the secret to this recipe, don't leave it out). Let simmer for another 5 minutes or till the desired consistency is reached.

Check seasonings- since I didnt add pure ketchup, I added in some sugar along with the salt. Also, you might need to add more of the fenugreek leaves, I've found that if you have a really old batch you will need to add more to really taste the flavor. If you want to make it really decadent, stir in fresh cream at this point. If you add cream, simmer for a few minutes more.

Garnish with chopped coriander leaves. Serve hot with rice/ roti/ naan.

The rice looks different because it is brown basmati, I've come to love the nutty flavor of brown rices and prefer them to the white. Figuring out how to cook it was a pain though and I still haven't got the hang of fluffy, unsticky basmati grains! If you have any tips I'd love to hear them!!

Review: Darkness, Take My Hand

2010-04-01T22:28:00.002-05:00

Rating: 4/ 5

I came across Dennis Lehane's Patrick Kenzie/Angela Gennaro series as one of the recommendations for people who liked the Russ Van Alstyne/ Clare Fergusson mystery series. I've read Lehane's Mystic River before (and liked it) and watched the unfortunate Shutter Island, but I never make assumptions of books on their movie adaptations, being well used to Hollywood's disappointments by now so I was all set to give the series a chance.

The first novel in the series didnt impress me much. In A Drink Before the War, Patrick Kenzie and Angie Gennaro, two private investigators are hired by a politician on what seems to be a simple case of the politician's cleaning service making away with sensitive documents he had hidden in his office. As Patrick and Angie investigate, the case becomes murkier, the stakes are higher and sees them dealing with unsavory criminal elements in Boston.

While I didnt care much for the mystery and gangster-style action elements, it being one of those cases where everything and the kitchen sink is hurled at the protagonists, I liked the style of the novel (the hard-boiled detective elements), the characters of Patrick and Angie who are childhood friends and sometime lovers, and the little coterie of people who help them.

So, I picked up the next one, I usually give the series a chance to develop before giving up on it entirely. And Darkness, take my Hand, the second in the series delivered everything that was promised. The slow buildup to the mystery is very well-plotted and the thriller elements kept me glued to my couch.

In Darkness, psychiatrist Diandra Warren hires the Boston PIs to keep an eye on her son. She thinks that she and her son are under threat after she accepts a patient who turns out to be the girlfriend of an Irish Mafia enforcer, who doesnt want anyone prying into his business. Diandra Warren receives a mysterious photograph of her son which scares her into hiring the team of Kenzie and Gennaro.

Patrick and Angie spend a long time tailing the son Jason, and when they dont find anything threatening, assume that the threat is over. In the meanwhile, a series of gruesome deaths in their old neighborhood have police and the FBI troubled over the absolute brutality of the crimes. In all the cases the MO is the same, the victims were sent photographs weeks before they turn up dead. And so does Jason Warren.

The police think that they have tied the murders with a 20 year old case in the same neighborhood, but the person they arrested for the crimes, Alec Hardiman, is already in prison. The nightmare turns personal when Hardiman asks to speak with Patrick. And suddenly, Patrick finds that all his friends, his lover Grace and her daughter Mae, Angie, everyone he cares for is in danger, by a threat no one understands or is able to comprehend the evil of.

Will keep you turning pages, highly recommended!!

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Series Order

1. A Drink before the War
2. Darkness, Take my Hand
3. Sacred
4. Gone, Baby, Gone
5. Prayers for Rain

Of polka dots and fashion donts!

2010-03-16T19:48:00.000-05:00

Ever since I was little I've been crazy about polka dots. As part of my adoration, I had a dotted play tea set, dotted hair clips, hair bands and ribbons and if an article of clothing had dots on it, I was almost guaranteed to crave it.

It lead to a lot of fashion transgressions in my teens, one which is particularly memorable. Namely a pair of white pants, high-waisted with pleats in the front, ruffles on the elastic waistband with .... orange polka dots all over and a matching polka-dotted fabric belt!!!!

Close your eyes and imagine that for a minute. While everyone collectively shudders at the insane number of fashion blunders in that single sentence, let me assure you those pants looked as bad as they sound. I looked like a diseased white elephant but I wore them with great fondness for a very long time. When I bought them the thinking was that the ruffles were like icing on cake, ummm yes, I loved ruffles too.

A lot of times I look at old pictures and have to scold my mom for letting me out and about looking like a short, plump mess. She did try her best though, so for a long time after the dotted disaster above I was convinced that dots were too young for me and they were completely eradicated from my closet.

If the 'young' thing didn't convince me, mom used to flash me a picture either real or a mental one of the hideousness of the white pants to make me lose all interest in my current dotty craving. She's all kinds of crafty, my mom!

And it's mostly worked for the better part of my adulthood, until a couple of months ago when I came upon the little black and cream number featured in the set below. And, all my dormant polka-dotted fantasies roared back to life. I WANT it, I whined rebelliously though it was my own mental blocked self I had to convince!!!

I was good for a couple months, but couldn't stop thinking about it and in keeping with the theme of the regression of my fashion choices .... it's mine now. Yay! I love it, it's so much fun to wear, the scalloped hem looks adorable and the workmanship is excellent, the lining even has an edging of pretty cream-colored lace. I love thoughtful little details like that.

I styled it as shown in the set below (yes, the cardi has ruffles too but I think this is a more successful pairing than my poor chicken-pox pants), and cannot wait until it's warmer when I wont have to cover my arms or legs and will have cute sandals to pair it with. Will winter never leave?!!

But, to also avoid going over board, I've promised myself that I will only possess ONE polka-dotted item in my closet at a time. This is in addition to my existing rules of owning only one plaid item, no white pants, no wide belts, and only one black item of any kind i.e. dress, sweater, jeans, skirt, kurti, shoe etc (this one's broken already, it only exists to stop me from buying black each time) ... of course when I'm shopping, it's hard to remember them at all. Sigh.

Anyway, moving on from my fashion woes- how about you? Dotty about dots ... or not? Do you have fashion rules for yourself or just wear what pleases you?

Quick 'n easy Quesadillas ...

2010-03-10T07:04:00.001-06:00

They might not be authentic, but these quick-fix versions of the Mexican Quesadilla work really well as a work night dinner.

And there are so many ways to fix these up - here I used a stir-fry of onions, corn, tomatoes, bell peppers and spinach with taco seasoning and lime juice, but our favorite version has to be the onion, red bell pepper, green bell pepper and paneer filling.

I add my taco seasoning mix to most of the stir fries but you can also add cumin powder and red chilli powder for a different flavor. And I use store-bought tortillas. Make sure to brush the sides of the tortillas with a little oil so they get nice and crunchy.

Serve with salsa/ guacamole/ sour cream (or dahi butter)/ refried beans and Mexican rice for a complete Mexican meal in the comfort of home.

A question and an award ...

2010-03-07T17:25:00.007-06:00

My favorite pastime is monitoring the various ways people arrive at my blog. Most often it will be a straight-forward request for one of the series reviews - the Black Dagger Brotherhood is by far the most popular.

But, a couple days earlier, this search landed on my BDB review 'who is • No'one will make an appearance - it is sounds like she will ' ... mystery guest, while I'm pretty sure my review did not provide any answers, I do hope you succeed in finding your elusive dot.

While I'm on the topic of series reviews, what I generally do is review all (or atleast as many as I can) the books in the series in one review. But, if I'm not on top of things and dont write about the books as I read them, I find it difficult to remember and review all the past few books. Which has been the bottleneck for the Nalini Singh series. Does anyone have any preference here - would you rather read about the books one by one or should I keep going on as before?

In other news, Nishita of Nishita's Rants and Raves, a book blog I've been following avidly, was kind enough to give me the following award.

Thank you so much, Nishita. As part of the rules, I have to answer the following questions....

1) Where is your favorite place to read a book?
Warm in bed or a couch, with a heavy blanket or quilt to curl under.

2) Do you snack while reading?
Not really, though if it's cold or rainy I might crave a hot beverage.

3) Are you a book borrower or a book collector?
I'm very selective about the books I buy so my personal library only contains books I can read and re-read countless times. So, most of the time I'm a borrower.

4) What is the best book you've read recently?
The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins

I'm going to pass the award on to
Smita of Books, Life n More
Avdi's Books blog
Bouncing-Bubble
Sraikh at Asaaan

As you know ladies, I love your blogs!!

Mini-Series Review: Lost in Austen

2010-03-03T20:02:00.003-06:00

Rating: 3.5/ 5

I know at least one of my readers is groaning right about now. It seems Jane Austen is mentioned on this blog every couple of months. I cant really help it, Austen's world is like my favorite comfort read/ watch/ food all rolled up into one.

Last month I found myself trolling Netflix for something light to watch when the mini-series 'Lost in Austen' (LiA) popped up in my queue. It was perfect, over 3 hours long I watched it over a period of two weeks, sometimes as little as 10 minutes when I had time to spare. Being familiar with the story did help with not losing continuity but this version does have enough originality to keep the Austen fan involved and satisfied.

Amanda Price (Jemima Rooper), of Hammersmith, London, spends far too much time with her copy of Pride & Prejudice as an escape from her dull job and unromantic boyfriend. Her idea of a perfect night is at home, pouring herself a glass of wine, curling up in her jammies with Darcy's voice and Austen's language running through her head. Her best friend and mom think she's too involved with Darcy, her mom even accusing her of holding all the men she knows to impossible standards.

But, as Amanda explains, she just loves Austen's England so much, the manners, the gentility, the courtship. So, she thinks she's hallucinating when one evening, as she's engaged in her favorite pastime, hearing an intruder in the bathroom, she investigates to find .... Elizabeth Bennett (Gemma Arterton)!

Apparently, Amanda has opened some sort of portal between 21st century England and the Regency period. And the next time Lizzy turns up, it's to push Amanda through the portal, into the attic in Longbourne. The idea being that Lizzy is visiting Amanda's folks in Hammersmith for an extended period while Amanda takes her place in the bosom of the Bennet family.

Amanda's original delight is unbounded. She arrives just as Mrs. Bennet is clamoring away about Netherfield Park being 'let at last' and with drop-jawed awe she exclaims

'We're right at the beginning aren't we??'

Unfortunately, for Miss Price, things arent quite so smooth-sailing after that. The Bennet family, accepts the strangely dressed girl given over to obscure statements 'Jane will marry Bingley, Lizzy will marry Darcy', with, if not enthusiasm, then fondness for Lizzy's sake.

But, as the days go on, Amanda starts forcing events in an effort at keeping things to Austen's timeline, coercing Jane (Morven Christie) into the rain so she can stay over at Netherfield Park, or strong-arming Bingley (Tom Mison) into throwing a ball at his place. But, these people unlike the 2D acquaintances she has lovingly spent countless hours with, have minds of their own and are not so easily maneuvered. And she comes face to face with the most 'disagreeable' form of Darcy (Elliot Cowan) yet, who as Amanda indignantly objects '... is no Colin Firth is he??'

She soon finds that all her well-intentioned meddling is leading to unforeseen consequences and when a disastrous event occurs (Lady Catherine decides to foist a trio of even more objectionable Collins' brothers on the unmarried Bennets for one, and others which I will not spoil) she ceases actively arranging things and decides to just go along for the ride. And funnily enough, things straighten themselves out, if not as Austen intended, then with a guaranteed happy ending for our heroine.

I'm one of those guilty of holding Austen adaptations to high standards. But, in reality, it's not the adaptations that I find outrageous, it's when someone takes liberties with the original itself (*cough* Keira Knightley's P&P). I thought LiA is well-worth the watch for a fantasy adaptation. It is a very romanticized version, not as real as Austen's world, but with that sheen of happy-endings-for-everyone (even poor forgotten Caroline Bingley) that makes up frothy mind-candy. I liked it for that. And all the actors did a great job. The mini-series is also going to be adapted into a movie by 2011.

If I had to find fault with it, I think it's that the film-makers do not push the envelope too much. When Amanda finds herself in the Bennet household, she's dressed in jeans, boots and a leather jacket with her hair untied and in bangs. No one does so much as raise an eyebrow at the unconventional attire or hair style.

Amanda is similarly very ill-prepared for spending time in Regency England for someone who has read about it for so long, she continually finds things surprising or doesn't understand how society behaves.

And it seems so weird for the Bennet family to accept that Lizzy has traveled alone to an unknown location or leaving all her clothes behind. Or to accept a stranger with no luggage of her own. Ahh, quibbles!!

Darcy follows Amanda into 21st century London at one point, and I loved the scene where she comes across his starched self, completely anachronistic in brocade waist-coat and top-hat blinking wide-eyed at all the commotion around him. He greets Amanda with relief, being the devil he knows, 'What is this infernal place, Miss Price?'

The best part of this adaptation, and one which in Amanda's words would have Ms. Austen spinning in her grave is Wickham (Tom Riley). The charmer everyone loves to hate has a great character arc here. In fact, I would have been much happier with this version if they had done away with Austen's original hero and come up with another in his place.

Now, I'm not certain if this desire to subvert the original isn't because I hated Darcy's character here (except in the scene mentioned below) and didnt think he was believable and thought Wickham was gorgeous (ladies, cast your eyes to the left), but, I'm sure that the film-makers were not looking to be too radical, they just wanted soft-focus romance which LiA does provide.

In closing, I have to mention LiA's nod to the original wet shirt scene. Made all the more sweet because LiA's Darcy doesnt know what it is Amanda's after, he agrees to dunk himself in cold water because he wants to please her. Awwwww!!

Of course, as hunky as Mr. Cowan is, no Darcy to my mind has ever compared to the '95 BBC adaptation, so I will leave you with the infamous clip (really, I'm surprised it took so long for Colin Firth to be embedded on this blog) ..... so, enjoy!!

Shutter Island

2010-02-28T18:24:00.005-06:00

So, we watched Shutter Island yesterday. Martin Scorsese, Leonardo DiCaprio, Ben Kingsley, Dennis Lehane's story (of Mystic River, Gone Baby Gone fame) and a psychological thriller ... sounds great, right??? Wrong!

I HAD to post to warn people from spending 10 bucks of their hard-earned money on this big bore. The reviewer at the New York Times accurately described it

http://movies.nytimes.com/2010/02/19/movies/19shutter.html

I just wish I had read it myself before heading out.

And you know what takes the cake! I fell ASLEEP!!!! In the theatre!!! A first for me, even Gamer didnt earn that dubious honor. Actually awfulness I can forgive, not pretentiousness, and this movie was all that ...

So yeah, if you worship at Scorsese's altar, I'd say wait for the DVD. Otherwise, don't say you weren't warned!

School Blues!

2010-02-21T20:13:00.021-06:00

Last night as I was taking an inventory of my closet, I spied a crazy pattern. Crazy because unusually for me, my closet is being slowly taken over by the color blue.

To understand why it's so crazy, you have to understand 15 years of trauma of the dreaded school uniform. Ours was worse than usual, the color being what I not-so-fondly termed as Detergent Blue. Detergent as in the color of all the detergents at the time - Surf, Rin, Robin blue. The primary school frock had the added attraction of being edged with the kind of lace you see on the elastic of cheap undies. Ladies, I'm sure you know what I mean. The school was quite anal about it too, no other lace was allowed.

In high school, the uniform changed to a pinafore (jumper) with tie and belt. In the ugly blue. I know you are thinking it doesnt sound half bad, but try imagining this outfit on a vertically challenged, festively plump, short-torsoed body. I've burned every school picture I could get my hands on and which my parents have not squirrelled away.

And the color used to fade quite spectacularly to a dull dish-water blue by the time the end of the year rolled around. So, you see my aversion to the color. It appears that it took another 15 years for the automatic 'no blue clothing' instinct to be wiped from my mind. And for me to be convinced there are other prettier shades of the color around. Recently, I even bought kurtis in various shades of the color, so the Indian wardrobe doesnt feel left out.

The outfit set below contains some of the clothes presently on my lust list. I own 3 of them already (can anyone guess which?) but the others will soon, soon, soon be mine!!!! Maybe not the colored tights. I love and am instantly attracted to them, but have yet to figure out how to work them into my outfits ....

Similarly, this year my list for shoes contains another banned-due-to-school trend, shoes with buckles. For the longest time, I avoided them because they reminded me of the dreaded Bata black shoes (similar here) which were mandatory. However, this year I find myself hopelessly attracted to and browsing only the mary jane styles. The set below are some of the ones I've been tempted by. I finally sprung for the black and purple trim pair below, I do hope they will look as cute as I think they are, otherwise back to no-buckles for me. Sadface.

And if you thought the blue lusting was limited to clothes, take a peek at the lovelies below.

The last set also contains the blue t-straps, which in theory might have been my ideal shoe, combining my love for all things blue+leather with the mary jane style. Two things against them. They're sold out at the store and being sold for exorbitant prices on ebay, no way will I pay even half of what is being quoted. And they're a bit too cutesy, not really my style. I think. I have not tried them so I cannot make up my mind. Though can anything be too cute?

I just thought it was funny that my fashion choices have taken such a childhood spiral - maybe it proves the fashion cycles bit, but I wonder if it's a deeply buried subconscious anti-ageing instinct. Oh well, this blog is not known for deep introspection (actually it's not known at all :) so we wont go there.

Anyways, what were your school uniforms like? Hideous, cute or not worth remembering?

Review: The Hunger Games

2010-02-09T00:23:00.014-06:00

Rating: 5/ 5

I generally like to review books in a series all at once but I just cannot get this book out of my head.

Marketed as young adult fiction, The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins occurs in post apocalyptic North America. Known as Panem, it is ruled by a Capitol with 13 districts which provide the center with various resources - jewellery, agriculture, coal etc. The districts are poverty ridden, subject to starvation and disease. The 13 districts took part in a rebellion which the Capitol ruthlessly suppressed, and in which the 13th district was completely annihilated. As a reminder to the remaining 12 districts of where their loyalties should lie the Capitol has come up with a yearly punishment for the population - The Hunger Games.

The Hunger Games is a contest for the children from the districts. All children between the ages of 12 - 18 are entered into a lottery, and two names are drawn, two tributes - one boy and one girl from each district. These 24 contestants are then imprisoned in a vast game arena over the course of several weeks, where they must kill each other until the last tribute alive is the victor. The Games are televised live to audiences of the districts and the Capitol and are almost compulsory viewing.

16 year old Katniss Everdeen is of the 12th district- the coal mining district, the poorest and weakest district and the one with only two survivors in the 72 year old history of the Games. As sole provider for her mother and beloved little sister Prim, after her father died 5 years ago, Katniss has been illegally hunting and gathering food in the forests around the District with her friend, 18 year old Gale.

Katniss is extremely protective of her younger sister, and as Prim has turned 12 it will be the first time she's taking part in a reaping day (the day when the tributes are chosen). The lottery for the Games is weighted so that as the children get older they have more entries in their names, and Katniss and Gale are prepared for either of their names to be called out.

But, the name drawn for the girl tribute is Prim. Prim is a gentle soul, who cries when her sister kills animals for food and Katniss knows that Prim has no chance of survival at the Games. As the world threatens to collapse around Katniss she finds herself volunteering in Prim's stead. And another shock, the boy tribute drawn with her is 16 year old Peeta Mellark. Katniss feels she owes a debt to Peeta for a kindness he did for her when her father died, and her pride will not allow her to forget it. And now she must kill him in order to survive.

The tributes are whisked off to the Capitol before the actual Games begin. Here they are assigned a team of stylists and mentors who will help them sell themselves to the sponsors via their pre-game interviews. A rich sponsor has the capability of providing gifts which can help in survival during the Games. All too soon, Katniss finds herself propelled into a terrifying ordeal, a game where there are no rules and the only stakes are life and death. And where she has to be doubly wary of the contradictory Peeta, whose motives she cannot trust.

The Hunger Games starts with an introduction to it's complex world and is fast-paced and action packed through out. I must mention that the level of violence is quite high too. Katniss is a very plucky character, smart and resourceful. As a character she is very well-written, motivated by the love of her sister and by staying alive, she's a survivor in every way. Peeta is the gentler character, albeit strong due to working in his father's bakery. Peeta's own mother thinks that Katniss has a better chance at the Games. But, Peeta has his own agenda and Katniss doesn't know what to make of him.

In middle-school I read William Golding's Lord of the Flies and while I do not remember the story I remember every heart-wrenching emotion I went through. The Hunger Games evoked the same roller coaster of emotions, except while the Lord of the Flies did not have any alleviating emotions I'm happy to say this one does. Well, in a mild way. I know this book strung all my emotions at the diabolical way the Capitol kept the population suppressed by threatening their very hearts, their children.

The author mentions in her blurb that she likes to explore the effects of war and violence on young, impressionable minds and I would say she's succeeded very well. At the very least, it raises questions about morality and conscience- to what extent would you go if your life is at stake? And can you come out of the experience with your humanity intact? Katniss and Peeta's mentor, Haymitch, is an alcoholic and a district laughing stock but very soon Katniss comes to a better understanding of his hidden pain- how does one remain sane watching the children you mentor go to their deaths year after year?

Also, while I was first shocked at the concept of the Games themselves, there are more messages in store for readers. There's political subversion for one. Then, once the children move to the Capitol (whose people are exempt from the Games), the reality-tv like experience the children are put through rang true on so many levels. It's easy to dismiss the people of the Capitol as callous, cruel and self-centered, but I had a few moments of discomfort at one point when I recognized they were just extreme forms of what most of us experience today- namely if something doesnt affect us closely, it doesnt concern us.

Certainly an uncomfortable and unforgettable book. And very well worth the read. The second in the series has better reviews than this one, and while I am anxious to read it I will wait because I can take only so much raw emotional intensity at a time.

------------------------------------------

Series Order
1. The Hunger Games
2. Catching Fire
3. Mockingjay (to be released Aug 2010)

Review: The Clare Fergusson and Russ Van Alstyne Mystery Series

2010-02-02T17:33:00.002-06:00

Rating: 3 / 5

Series Order
1. In the Bleak Midwinter
2. A Fountain Filled with Blood
3. Out of the deep I Cry
4. To Darkness and to Death
5. All Mortal Flesh
6. I Shall Not Want

WARNING: SPOILERS below. I will mark them clearly but be careful if you have not read All Mortal Flesh.

When I started Julia Spencer-Fleming's Russ Van Alstyne/Clare Fergusson mystery series it seemed that on the surface everything included should work for me. At each book's heart there is a decent mystery and some well plotted characterizations. And Ms. Fleming is an absolute master of creating atmosphere.

Set in the fictional town of Millers Kill in upstate New York, the protagonist Reverend Clare Fergusson is an Episcopal priest new to her parish and is still coming to terms with the harsh winters that occur just south of the border. As someone who hates and loathes snow, ice, wind, hail, sleet, I quickly empathized with Clare whose misery is sketched beautifully in the first couple books.

Here's an example of the kind of writing you can expect ..

There are moments in life that are between: between the blow and the pain, between the phone ringing and the answer, between the misstep and the fall. One that comes to everyone is a moment, or three, or five, between sleeping and waking, when the past has not yet been re-created out of memory and the present has made no impression. It is a moment of great mercy; disorienting, like all brushes with grace, but a gift nonetheless.

Russ Van Allstyne is the Chief of Police of Millers Kill and he often finds Clare barging into his investigations out of impulsiveness and a single-minded desire to help- the victim, the accused, it doesn't matter. (As an aside, what is it with fictional heroines named Clare and a misguided sense of responsibility due to their professions, nurse/doctor and priest?).

As soon as they meet in the first book they recognize each other as kindred spirits. Or as is romantically put in one of the later books - the missing part of their souls. Clare was in the army for ten years trained as a helicopter pilot before she got her calling and was ordained. She is also trying to deal with the loss of a beloved younger sister. Russ was in the Military Police until he resigned and returned to the town he grew up in. Because of the nature of his work, past and present, he is a recovering alcoholic, but tries very hard not to bring the brutality of his work home to his family.

I enjoyed that the topics covered in the mysteries are wide and varied. From conservation and it's effect on small business, to gay rights, immunization, sociopathy, religion, adoption, immigration and migrant workers.

Initially I was skeptical about the small town setting. How many crimes can there possibly be? But, what I didn't expect was that the setting gives so much scope for elaborating on the lives of the characters, and I enjoyed this aspect too. Russ and Clare have to be doubly careful of their actions, since something as trivial as having lunch together every Wednesday is much remarked and speculated on.

As I read, it quickly became apparent that there were two problems here. And it isn't the religion which I was wary about, going in. The first, you see the little by-line tacked onto all the titles of these books 'A Clare Fergusson/Russ Van Alstyne mystery' which implies that both Clare and Russ have something to do with solving the mystery at hand. A priest and a cop.

In order to get this scenario to work, Clare should obviously have data about the police investigation and with this plot device Russ comes across looking like an incompetent fool. Because he carries out interrogations with Clare present, or tells Clare details about ongoing investigations, or even discusses suspects with her. Russ would say I've been watching too much Law and Order and he'd be right. Clare also stumbles on the perpetrators (haha more L&O terminology) through a combination of luck, nosiness and by withholding critical information from the police. Anyway, I was willing to let this bit slide, sometimes you just have to have faith in the author's vision and the other good points more than made up for it.

But then we come to the second bigger problem. See, how I slid in that bit about Russ's family before. Family, when I was dying to say wife. Russ is actually happily married for the last 25 years to a beautiful, dynamic woman but over the course of the first book Clare and he fall in love. Now, I love romance in my mystery series and I love the subject of forbidden romance, but I cannot stomach infidelity.

Clare and Russ never let the relationship get physical, she because she is opposed to casual relationships (the priesthood does not require celibacy) and is morally opposed to one with a married man, while he is faithful and does love his wife. As if it makes a difference. I think emotional infidelity is the more difficult of the two to overcome and more of a betrayal to the spouse.

Not having an inkling it was going to occur, I was gobsmacked when this angle turned up in the first book. And what I found more disturbing is that Russ's wife Linda is offline until around the 4th book. We see everything from Clare's or Russ's view, almost making Linda 'the other woman' because as a reader it's obvious you are expected to sympathize a bit with Clare.

~~~~~ SPOILER ALERT ~~~~~~~~~

So, there I was reading each book with a lot of mental cringing, but not able to stop because it's a series and I'm a bit OC after I've started one.

Until the 5th book, 'All Mortal Flesh' where Linda dies. And I was left with a sense of severe disappointment, because at that moment I realized what I actually wanted to read about was something that would get these people out of the mess they were in.

As I mentioned before, Linda's character (the conflict in the first 4 books) never gets her own voice, we are only given impressions from the people around her. Russ tells Clare that his wife doesn't understand him. At social occasions where Russ and Clare are present, she's missing due to a number of reasons, one of them being conveniently that she never goes anywhere where her mother-in-law is also invited. Here's another broad hint to the reader that they shouldn't like the wife too much, since Russ's mother is presented sympathetically and she likes Clare.

Linda has one significant scene in the 4th book and she's offed in the next one. The manner in which she dies is guaranteed to add a source of conflict (guilt) to the protagonists' relationship since the original conflict has been removed.

So, basically Linda's character is just a manipulative plot device and is the reason I was so disappointed by the events of the 5th book. And as I write this I realize how much I disliked both Russ and Clare and the entire infidelity sub-plot. At least this book accomplished one thing, I'm finally done with this series.

~~~~~ END SPOILERS ~~~~~~~~~

I would give the series an overall 3 rating because of the problems I mentioned above. If they do not bother you, then I think it should work for you. If it does, do comment here, I'd love to read a different viewpoint :)

The Guardian Series

2010-01-26T21:29:00.022-06:00

If you havnt yet caught on to the trend in my reviews, I have been on a paranormal romance kick lately. The best part of the paranormal trend in my opinion is the tendency towards book series. And you all know how I feel about those!

A series that I have been enjoying recently is Meljean Brook's Guardian Series. I'm not reviewing them, just wanted to point out a few fun things for readers.

The mythology of this series as far as I can describe (because it is convoluted) is as follows. After Lucifer raised his rebel angels against Heaven, in punishment all the rebels were converted to demons and forced to inhabit Hell. The angels who were on the fence were not spared either, they were converted to nosferatu, blood-drinking monsters who had to shun daylight.

The angels who tried to protect humans against the demons and nosferatu, only ended up being worshipped because of their divinity. This aroused Lucifer's jealousy and he rose against the angels in another battle, in which a human helped to defeat Lucifer. After this battle, Guardians were formed, with powers to protect humans from demons and nosferatu, and since the Guardians were once human themselves, they were able to assimilate into human society much easier than the angels.

The first book Demon Angel is about a Guardian Hugh Castleford and the demon Lilith. I intended this book to be a beach read on my vacation last year, boy how wrong I was. If you've tried reading on vacation you know that the book should be light-hearted, frothy, fluffy, something which you can put down at a moment's notice and pick up hours later without any problems - everything which this book is NOT.

I enjoyed the story immensely, but I felt I missed out so much due to being unable to give it my undivided attention that I did something I've never done before. As soon as I finished the last page, I started re-reading. And so many things I had missed earlier suddenly became clear(er). Demon Angel has an intricate mythology setup, interesting dialogue and a very intriguing heroine. Hugh and Lilith have a courtship spanning 500+ years and they make a great couple when they finally came together.

The second book in the series Demon Moon is about the vampire Colin Ames-Beaumont and techie geek Savitri Murray. Savitri has an Indian mother and an Irish (?I forget) father, has been brought up by her nani and is Hugh's adopted sister. First of all, I have to give a huge cheer for an ethnic character in a mainstream series. And, then I have to say how wonderfully Savi's character is written. With ethnic characters, it's all too easy to stick to stereotypes, Savi transcends all those to become her own person ... and she's fabulous.

And Ms. Brooks gets so many details right I loved reading this book - right from Savi's nani who keeps feeding everyone in times of stress, her nani's hangup that Savi is a college drop out and her insistence that she marry soon, some hilarious arranged marriage ads Savi peruses, Savi's date/ interview with a 'suitable' boy and so on. At a certain point, Colin even asks Savi, who is a Hindu, if she is still able to believe after being immersed in Christian mythology for so long. Just for the level of attention and detail, this book came out tops for me. However, you do have to concentrate. I found myself re-reading pages and paragraphs because I lost the thread so often.

And we come to the third book, Demon Night, which is the story of Guardian Ethan McCabe and Charlie Newcomb. When Ethan first comes onto the scene, the outfit he's wearing and his Wild West introduction had me flashing immediately to my favorite Browncoat, Mal Reynolds (if you havent seen Firefly, read about it here). A resemblance to Mal is enough to make me predisposed to like anybody. And then, he opened his mouth and all I heard was Sawyer. See, I've been on Lost Season 5 marathon in preparation for the last season premiering next week (yay!! hey, even the White House was not unaffected) and I love Sawyer's lazy drawl. Ethan's huge around 6'4" or so he often puts on big and slow facade to throw people off, which reminded me of Munnabhai. I am not a fan of Sanjay Dutt, but I cannot deny the charm.

Anyway, with such a potent combination, I was smitten, reader, Smitten!! And Demon Night, is the first book in this series which gave me what I enjoy so much in romance, the emotional connection and involvement in the characters and their stories. I loved Angel and liked Moon, but the 2 couples were far too intellectual. As far as I am concerned, Night has perfect pacing, wonderful story-telling (I never experienced the difficulty in comprehension as with the first two books) and a heart-warming romance. And if you thought it's all about the romance, the mythology makes leaps and bounds in this book too.

I think the other reason I enjoy the series so much is that the women are all so different. Lilith, probably the oldest woman on earth, is the quintessential action heroine, strong, smart, sexy, manipulative, able to do anything to protect the ones she loves. Savi is a geek, very smart with a quick sense of humor and an innate curiosity. While Charlie is more vulnerable, flawed and needy, but with a core strength that has contributed to her becoming a survivor. The men are no slouches either. And the story arc is extremely complex, I cant wait to find out what's next.

If you think you might like paranormals, check this series out. The series order is as below. I'm only reading the full length novels (in italics), I dont much like reading short stories.

# Hot Spell (Novella, Prequel)
# Demon Angel (Book 1)
# Wild Thing (Novella, Book 1.5)
# Demon Moon (Book 2)
# Demon Night (Book 3)
# First Blood (Book 3.5)
# Demon Bound (Book 4)
# Demon Forged (Book 5)
# Must Love Hellhounds (Book 5.5)
# Demon Blood (Book 6)

I must end with an observation that amuses (and irritates) me. It seems any paranormal romance series gets stuck with tacky covers for the first 2 books. Well, actually the only other series I noticed it on was Nalini Singh's Psy-Changeling Series (I will review this soon, I promise). But, it makes me wonder what the publishers are thinking? In fact, I'm tempted to classify Angel and Moon as fantasy, Night being the conventional romance out of the three I've read so far. But, for a reader like me, if I had not become interested by reviews or by the first book, these covers would have guaranteed that I never picked the books up. Do other readers feel differently?

100 in the New Year!!

2010-01-18T21:54:00.011-06:00

I knew I picked my nick for a reason. In what must be the slowest century in the history of bloglandia, I've hit my hundredth post after 4 years. Not being one for milestones, I didnt think that I would make a separate post out of it. But, sheer lack of inspiration and a compulsion to post something in January has me logged into the dashboard this evening.

Not much has been happening over the past few days. The sheer commercialism of the trailing months of the year always hits me hard and I have to expend enormous amounts of self-control not to give into the retail glut fest occurring all around me. I have slowly been converting myself to online shopping and that hasnt helped at all, since now instead of a single store I have multitudes available literally under my finger tips.

So far, today, I have convinced myself that I did not need a new flat-iron and have to repeat the mantra several times a day that I DO NOT NEED new boots. Every night, I go to bed thrilled with the amount of money I've saved due to sheer impulse control.

I also apply a trick I read on a fashion blog- basically put the item in your cart but sleep on it. If you are still thinking about it a few days later, then buy it since it's obvious that you are going to love the item. I have been religiously following this philosophy, but there's always a spanner in the works somewhere.

I didnt account for high-end items that suddenly become available at prices too good to be true. Of course they sold out in minutes, forget waiting an entire day for them. The ones that got away were the bag and the pair of shoes alongside and I have been scouring ebay hoping they popup sometime. Someone please tell me how ugly they are and how I should not lose sleep over having them in my closet. Please.

Anyway, my experience is that the retail mania slips away over the next few months so I should be more rational and less sale-finger happy in the next post. Which brings me to the question- do you shop online? If so, do you budget your spending or use tricks like the one above? And if items do get away, what do you do- hunt relentlessly for them or count it as money well saved?

Otherwise, we have been having lovely weather for January, this weekend was a warm and toasty 35F. B celebrated by whipping up these delicious, summery (because we love to live in denial) grapefruit juleps from this exhaustive cocktail book.
I thought it was a fitting way to end a post on the new year. And to thank all of you , my readers, for being so encouraging with reading and commenting on this space. I hope to be more regular this year (see how carefully I didnt word it as a resolution). Cheers to you all!

No fuss Bread!!

2009-12-29T20:08:00.017-06:00

For the longest time, I have wanted to bake my own bread. Most bread recipes are pretty daunting, especially the bit about kneading the life out of the dough. I cannot even manage to knead my chapatti dough properly, so I knew I would not be able to do it (the nick is couchpapaya for a reason).

So, when I came across this no knead baguette recipe, I knew I was going to try it out. And, if you missed it, I'll say it again it's NO KNEAD people! The best part about this recipe is it's so so so easy to put together. It took literally 5 minutes for me to assemble the dough last night, a few minutes of prep work today and voila - two perfectly airy, crusty baguettes in time for dinner. I put olives on one as shown on the blog and sprinkled some dry oregano on the tomato one. Delicious!!! I've also frozen half the batch to see if I can make them as needed during the week.

I'm so excited about this bread I'm off to Amazon to buy the book this recipe came from My Bread: The Revolutionary No-Work, No-Knead Method by Jim Lahey. I foresee a lot of pizzas, foccacias and sandwich bread being baked in the PapayaHousehold in the near future. I've never been happier :)

3 fantasy series reviews ...

2009-12-23T21:51:00.014-06:00

This has been the year a lot of my reading misconceptions were shattered. I thought I didn't like reading about vampires, and you all know how that turned out. I thought I couldnt read YA (young adult) fiction, or shape shifter stories but have since found out that a talented writer can hook me onto anything. And so I've decided to never say Never.

And if anyone (all 6 of you who read this blog) was wondering what happened to all the series recommendations posts I promised to write and didnt follow through on, I realized how pointless compiling a list of favorites was. This was because just after I published that post, I started reading the aforementioned shape shifter series which has since muscled out every other to become my favorite romance series - ever! So, in order to prevent more goofs of the same sort I've decided to just do a round-up of current favorites whenever I have a few to discuss. This post lists fantasy series.

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The Queen's Thief Series by Megan Whalen Turner

Series Order
The Thief, The Queen of Attolia, The King of Attolia, A Conspiracy of Kings (to be published 2010)

The Thief is the book that convinced me into adding YA novels to my reading list. I used to think Harry Potter was a one-off, and that I would not be able to relate to YA fiction. I picked this one up because of the attractive covers and without knowing it was YA. It's turned out to be the best impulse buy I ever made.

It's very hard to review this series without giving away major spoilers so I wont try. All I'll say is that the series revolves around the title character of the thief, Eugenides. Eugenides is rash, arrogant, impulsive and cocky, but he's also fiercely loyal, cunning, extremely intelligent and just an awesome character.

The books take place in a fictional region in the Meditteranean with the three countries of Sounis, Eddis and Attolia and there is enough political intrigue to satisfy adult readers. And I loved the romance which develops over the course of the latter books.

Ms. Turner is also responsible for over-turning another of my cherished notions. It's no secret that I love big, fat, meaty books. Here book 3 is the fattest book with 400+ pages of largish font, but I thought that each book was very well told within it's word count

And we have new religions and plenty of divine intervention but I was able to read these just because the subject wasn't delved with in detail. In fact, Ms. Turner has come up with fascinating mythologies for her Gods. Highly recommended!

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The Temeraire Series by Naomi Novik

Series Order
His Majesty's Dragon, Throne of Jade, Black Powder War, Empire of Ivory, Victory of Eagles.

Before I picked this one up, I was inclined to think of dragons in the stereotypical knight-slaying-dragon-and-rescuing-maiden way and didn't think I would ever want to read about them. I bit when I saw this series covered my favorite topic of a historical with fantasy.

This series with a projected 9 books, is set during the Napoleonic Wars. Ms. Novik has created an alternate history where the ground and naval troops are assisted by aerial troops in the form of dragons and their riders. We follow the dragon Temeraire a Chinese Celestial and his Captain, William Lawrence, on their adventures from the thick of war with the French, to China and Africa in the later books.

The writing is good, the relationship between Lawrence and Temeraire almost paternal and very endearing and Ms. Novik has included journal articles, pencil sketches of breeds of dragons, their treatment in society and a whole lot of other fun appendixes to the books.

And if you like to be on the ball wrt films, I just found out that Peter Jackson is going to be converting these to film. I've never been more excited!!!!

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The Sharing Knife Series by Lois McMaster Bujold

Series Order
Beguilement, Legacy, Passage and Horizon

Sharing knife combines my two of my favorite themes - fantasy and forbidden romance. This four book series is about the adventures of a young 'farmer' (in the sharing knife world, people without any ability to manipulate nature around them ie. no magic) girl Fawn and Dag a 'Lakewalker' or the magical sort. Neither of the groups understands or communicates with the other.

Lakewalkers protect the farmers from malices, creatures that drain nature around them and convert the world to a barren landscape. The story starts after a great war between malices and Lakewalkers and the survivors who have slowly started rebuilding their world.

This series has some fascinating character studies about the nature of prejudice intertwined with intricate and well thought out world building. The first two books cover Fawn and Dag's new relationship and discovery of each other. The last two books deal with them becoming a cohesive family unit and influencing the people around them in an effort to get Farmers and Lakewalkers to cohabitate and cooperate. Huh, I've made it sound dry, but it's a truly enjoyable series!!

Do you have an OFF switch?

2009-12-11T23:56:00.005-06:00

I like to read across many genres and many topics, even if I end up coming back to certain tried-and-true favorites. Over the course of my reading I have found that the one thing that is certain to pull me out of any book is when a religious theme is introduced.

I admit it's a personal bias, I'm agnostic and I cannot understand character's motivations when colored by religion. I am uncomfortable with extreme piety. The moment I come across any theological themes, it's like a switch flips in my brain and I cannot get interested in the book anymore.

It's happened to me way too many times recently. I just discovered Jacqueline Carey's Kushiel's Legacy Series. The first book is one of those brilliant starts to any series - with dark fantasy elements, fascinating characters, political intrigue, intriguing world-building- I blazed through the Kushiel's Dart and couldnt wait to get my hands on the next one in the series.

The remaining books made for weary reading, the author is obviously fascinated with Christianity and the mythology and delves deep into ancient Jewish and Christian myths. The Kushiel series has so many sub-plots that I was able to complete reading it, but only because in my initial euphoria I got all 6 books in the two series and they kept taunting me on my bookshelf. I did like it, but if I have to remember what displeased me or bored me about the books then it would have to be the religious discussions.

The next book I read is Laura Kinsale's breathtaking Flowers from the Storm. In Flowers, the Duke of Jerveaulx is a womaniser and prominent mathematician, until a cerebral haemorrhage leaves him with damaged motor skills, unable to speak and with damaged long term memory. Maddy Timms, daughter of a prominent Quaker mathematician, has worked with Jervealux for some mathematical papers and been repulsed by Jerveaulx's lifestyle.

But, when she comes upon Jerveaulx in an insane asylum, she is the only person to recognise that Jerveaulx is not insane, he can recite mathematical formulae and proofs just fine, he's just forgotten how to communicate. And Maddie and Jerveaulx begin a long and arduous journey to recovery and love, lined with legal pitfalls, greedy family members, Jerveaulx's deviousness and Maddy's Quaker beliefs.

The word I used to describe Flowers From the Storm before was breathtaking and I really cannot think of a better one. I think Ms. Kinsale is the best romance novelist there is. Her prose is elegant, the characters are well realized and have Issues (and you guys know how much I love angst) and this book covered such a range of emotions for me that it was impossible to put down.

However, even as engrossed as I was in the story, my biggest problem was with the heroine who is rigidly religious and the choices she makes because of her beliefs. Basically, she puts herself and Jerveaulx through the double-wringer (yesyesyes I needed a box of tissues the whole time I was reading). Jerveaulx isn't a saint either, he manipulates Maddy through the entire book but because her choices are due to her religion I felt that I had less patience with them. If another heroine had made the same choices, just through common sense or even self-preservation, I think I would have understood and tolerated her better.

And I find it's not only established religion either. I think Ms. Carey reinterpreted a lot of the stuff in her books, they are fantasy after all but they are based on existing religions. In Lois McMaster Bujold's Chalion fantasy series, Ms. Bujold invented a new religion for her world of Chalion. And much as I love Ms. Bujold's books, I couldnt get through these. I loved the world-building, it was the issues which put me off.

I just discovered the pattern because I picked up so many similar themed books recently, but I find it troubling. That I should dismiss any topic or even any character because I cannot understand their beliefs or am not interested in the themes being discussed. I should be more tolerant I think. I will probably try and find some more books to read, just to rid myself of my bias ... after a little while. Suggestions would be welcome!

And how about you? Is there any subject which you just cannot bring yourself to read or when introduced kills your appreciation for a book you were enjoying before? Do you feel guilty, or are fine with it?

Pumpkin Flan

2009-11-30T22:10:00.012-06:00

Hope everyone's Thanksgiving was fun! I was on vacation so I refused to do anything strenous, just read about 4 books, ate like a pig and tried out a couple of bookmarked recipes (to facilitate the aforementioned eating).

And for all you people who are sick of pumpkin pies and over-eating during the holidays I give you the perfect holiday dessert - pumpkin flan each serving of which is only a 100 calories. If I have a dessert weakness it's custard in any form, flans, caramel custard, creme brulee, so of course I had to try this out! And it was superb, all the wholesome deliciousness of pumpkins co-mingling with the richness of custard, caramel and a gentle hint of spice. A perfect recipe to flummox your guests with, who'd have thought of pumpkin + flan together huh?!

The pumpkin puree I used wasnt finely pureed so I got a chewier texture than flan generally has, if you dont like that I'd suggest giving the puree a little whirl in the food processor. And since the recipe was such a big hit the first time, I just had to make it again - the second time around I added about 1 tbsp. of orange rind and served with vanilla ice cream. The plates were licked clean, and my guests were truly thankful!

What did you guys do/ eat for Thanksgiving? For the international visitors, how was your weekend? And did anyone score any great Black Friday deals? I'm the worst bargain shopper, I get easily overwhelmed and end up browsing without buying anything. This time, keeping with the tradition, I bought a winter coat at one of those few, few, very few stores without a Black Friday sale. Le sigh.

On biting off more than one can chew!

2009-11-11T15:07:00.008-06:00

Work has been aggravating lately. It's just been little annoyances piling on top of each other until I feel I'm going to tear a piece off the next unfortunate who is going to add to my work load.

To add to my frustrations, I decided to sign up for the NaNoWriMo this month i.e. committing myself to writing a 50,000 word novel in November. The first 2 days went by in a welter of typing. It's the 11th day and according to the schedule I should have written approx 19000 words by the end of today. Instead I have 4700. Four. Fricking. Thousand. And all of them nauseating. It seems every time my characters open their mouths the sound that comes out is mwaaah-wah-wah, I'm boring myself with the story so far. Even the characters names bore me. I proudly put the badge up on my blog the first couple of days but have since taken it down in shame.

As an aside- it doesnt help that I also managed to read two mind-blowingly amazing books by the talented Laura Kinsale. Just comparing her prose next to my driveling garbage makes me want to take a cleaver to my computer- or atleast my story. Bah! I generally tend not to review the books which greatly move me (I only managed the time traveller's wife and I only got it right the second time). Kinsale's books are in that category, so will try to review but cannot promise it, I never manage to get the emotional content right.

Because of all the unneeded frustrations I needed something simple and satisfying to eat today. So, I settled on a grilled crunchy peanut butter, jam and banana sandwich. With a puddle of golden honey drizzled on the bananas (because I use sugar-free jam and I needed to amp up the sweetness).

I have not calmed down yet. But, lunch sure was comforting.

Review: Covet

2009-11-05T21:57:00.003-06:00

Rating: 3 / 5

Covet is the first book in the new Fallen Angels series by JR Ward.

Jim Heron is a loner and drifter. After being discharged from the military he has been wandering around picking up odd jobs to make a living. One of these has landed him in Caldwell, NY, as part of the construction crew on Vincent diPietro's house.

Hanging out with his construction buddies in the Iron Mask, Caldwell's new night club, Jim has an odd encounter with the vulnerable Devina. The oddness is ratcheted up to shock the next day, when she gets out of Vin's car at the construction site- apparently he hooked up with his boss's girlfriend. Startled, Jim loses balance, electrocuting himself and ends up with a new job description.

Because, the Earth is a game board, with the angels and demons playing for people's souls. But, the Creator is now tired of the constant fighting between good and evil and has issued an ultimatum, the final deciding factor will be 7 souls. And the player who will manipulate them is Jim, who is the perfect balance between good and evil and thus acceptable to both teams.

In the afterlife 4 angels approach Jim and charge him with the task of saving 7 souls- if he succeeds evil will be vanquished from the world forever and if he does not, the world ceases to exist passing under the dominion of the demons. On this gameboard, the angels and demons play to win, and are not above putting little bit players to help or hinder Jim as the case maybe.

And as it turns out the first soul he has to save is Vin's, embedded in avarice. Vin comes from a poor background and has a relentless drive towards earning money and surrounding himself with the material trappings of success- cars, furniture, art, complete with the stunningly beautiful model girlfriend, Devina. He doesnt believe in donating his money, wanting some service or return with every dollar he spends. He believes he is happy, but is shocked out of his inertia when he cannot bring himself to propose to Devina.

The revelation comes about when he meets Marie-Terese, a prostitute (with the proverbial heart of gold) at the Iron Mask. Marie-Terese is a single mother who is running from a criminal husband who tried to kidnap her son, is living under an assumed name and doing the only job she thinks she can to pay off the debts she has accumulated. With the demons trying to take over Vin's soul, Vin must look to Marie-Terese, the woman who quietens the greedy beast within him, and Jim for salvation against the evil that threatens to consume him.

Let's get this out of the way- Covet is marketed as a new series and it isnt part of Ward's other series, the Black Dagger Brotherhood. However, to muddy things up a bit, it takes place in the same location as the latter and Trez, Officer de la Cruz and Phury from the BDB have cameos here. Additionally, the style is similar to the BDB, even though the mythology is completely different.

I'm not sure how new readers will relate to this book since there are a few bits that might come across unexplained (the cops carrying out only a rudimentary investigation, for instance) but for me, I was happy enough to return to a much-loved world. And I quite liked the story and the whole angel-demon mythology setup.

As with the other books, there are multiple story-lines. We have Vin and Marie-Terese, the primary romance. A stalker-type fixated on MT (unfortunately this is the track which doesnt work, I had no clue behind his motivation). Four British, croquet loving angels and dog, in an over-the-top, silly track . Jim, and his fallen angel helpers, riding Harleys and wearing leathers :) and Dog (the dogs really, really confuse me). And the demon who has its hooks into Vin.

Interestingly we never see a portion of the climax between the fallen angels and the demons, maybe it's left for the sequel. Only Jim's character really worked for me though, when he's first introduced he's a blank slate, and we pick up bits and pieces of his background as we go along. All the rest are stock Ward characters.

I know it sounds like a lukewarm review, but I did enjoy the book while reading it. I know I'll keep reading since this series has a promising arc and I am still hoping for a read as compelling as the BDB (ummm, ok, gun to my head, like the first 3 books). I do think some of the stories are going to have the demons winning so those should make for some interesting reads. If you are looking for a fun paranormal read, pick this one up . But, if you want to start reading JR Ward, you cannot go wrong with the Black Dagger Brotherhood series.

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I received my copy thanks to a giveaway at Reading, Writing and Ranting.

Why I'll never be a food stylist!

2009-10-31T12:57:00.004-05:00

As the leaves start falling and the temperatures flirt with the single digits, all I want to do in the evenings is cosy up in front of the fireplace, drink hot chocolate and read a good book. Unfortunately hunger pangs rear their demanding heads once in a while, so I need to cook something substantial to eat. This is the time of the year when soups and sandwiches make their appearance regularly in the Papaya household- I love the comforting aromas of a good soup bubbling away on the stove and the sandwiches are to feed the heartier appetites.

This weekend I kick-started our new winter menu with the soup-sandwich combination above. It's a simple pumpkin-potato soup with a parsley pesto thick yogurt (or dahi butter) garnish and the sandwiches are parsley pesto, avocado, tomato & lettuce paninis. The yogurt adds a tanginess and creaminess to the soup while the pesto added a hint of freshness- we thought the flavors blended well together.

The picture isnt quite what I wanted it to be, I wanted 3 distinct colors in the soup. The pumpkin orange, with the green pesto drizzled on top and pristine white yogurt in the center. Of course, the pesto didnt drizzle well and after a couple of tries I gave up and mixed it with the yogurt. Then the yogurt wouldnt arrange itself the way I wanted it to, and of course it wouldnt float. I have a new appreciation for food stylists and for the patience and talent of people with food blogs.

If you want to make paninis at home and dont have a panini press try this simple trick I picked up from Rachel Ray on the Food Network. Place your sandwich in a fry pan/ grill and then use something heavy to press it. I like to use a saucepan filled with water. Presto paninis!! Clean up is a breeze too.

For the pesto: Process parsley leaves, garlic, lemon juice, salt, pepper, almonds, grated parmesan cheese in a food processor adding olive oil until it all combines together.

Happy Halloween everyone!!

Review: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

2009-10-22T19:29:00.021-05:00

(translated by Reg Keeland)

Rating: 4/ 5

Stieg Larsson's posthumously published debut novel is the first in a series of 3 novels in the Millennium series. The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo has been popping up on bestseller lists for a long time now, which is when it went on my TBR list.

The start of the book introduces the mystery of Harriet Vanger, the scion of the Vanger family who disappeared over 40 years ago. Henrik Vanger, her uncle wants to get to the bottom of her disappearance once and for all.

To do this he hires Mikael Blomkvist, an investigative journalist. Blomkvist has been convicted of libel for a story he wrote about financial genius Hans Wennerstrom. Due to the conviction he has to serve a prison sentence and give up his position as publisher of Millennium magazine. Blomkvist is heading towards depression because he believes in his exposé of Wennerstrom, but has no proof.

Vanger approaches Blomkvist dangling a tasty carrot- in return for his investigating Harriet's disappearance, Vanger will give him proof of Wennerstrom's financial fraud. This gives Blomkvist the impetus to agree to solve what he describes as a 'classic closed door mystery', the vanishing taking place during a family reunion on Hedeby island. Blomkvist hires Lisbeth Salander, a brilliant PI to help him, but as their investigation proceeds it quickly becomes apparent that the truth is much darker and more sinister than anyone had imagined.

In addition to being a mystery, this book is also a broad perspective of Sweden, on the financial journalism, on it's social and welfare programs, on the sexual abuse of women in Sweden (presented as little tid-bits before the start of the various sections in the novel) and a family saga. It also contains technological mumbo-jumbo for a complete package of crime in the twenty-first century. In short, it's one of the most engrossing, multi-layered thrillers I've read in a long time. And it was very interesting to read about another setting, most thrillers I read seem to be located in America.

Easily the best part about this book is in the unique title character of Lisbeth Salander. She's brilliant at computers, but is mostly unemotional and uninvolved in her interactions with people. That this genius comes packaged in a tiny, anorexic-looking punk facade with tattoos and piercings confuses everyone she comes across.

Blomkvist is much less complicated. A possible foil for a lot of the women hating in the novel, he is a man who easily loves and is loved by women (this part really made me scoff). Blomkvist becomes the only person who does not expect or demand something from Salander, eventually they come to trust each other laying the groundwork of a formidable team.

I must mention that I think the title of the translated version is misleading, Blomkvist features more in the book though I agree that Salander is the more interesting character. The book's original title in Sweden was 'Men who hate Women'. And the buzz is that the recently released The Girl Who Played with Fire deals with Salander's back story and has Blomkvist and Salander team up again. Cannot wait to read it!!

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Series Order

1. The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
2. The Girl who played with Fire
3. The Girl who kicked the Hornet's Nest - to be released 2009

Hiking the Kalalau trail to Hanakapi'ai Beach: a rainy day perspective

2009-10-16T12:01:00.025-05:00

Kauai, in the second week of October, turned out to be a spur of the moment trip due to an airline fare sale coupled with B's colleague regaling him with stories about hiking and camping on Hawaii's oldest island. We wanted to spend 2 days on the dramatic Na Pali coastline hiking the Kalalau trail which is rated as one of the most difficult backpacking trails in America, and camp overnight on Kauai's beaches.

The first indication that something was about to go wrong was on the evening before we left when I spent a couple of hours researching our trip. Apparently, to camp at Kalalau, you need a permit and it was recommended that people apply for the permit 6 months in advance. At that point there was not much we could have done so we decided to trust in luck.So, the morning after we landed in Kauai, bright-eyed and full of hope we headed to the state department and were told there were no permits for camping until mid-October, but we could get a free day hike permit to Hanakoa. The Kalalau trail is divided into 3 segments - 2 miles from start at Ke'e Beach to Hanakapi'ai Beach, 4 miles next to Hanakoa Valley and then 5 miles to Kalalau Valley. The initial 2 mile segment can be hiked by all, but you need a day hike permit to Hanakoa and a camping permit for Kalalau Beach since it is not recommended to do the full hike (round-trip 22 miles) in a single day.

Severely disappointed we decided to do the Hanakoa hike atleast. Heading to the county department for camping permits we hit another snag. Apparently the Hae'na Beach Park which is a couple miles from Ke'e Beach was closed for undisclosed reasons. This was where we planned to setup camp, deposit our stuff, then walk to the trailhead at Ke'e Beach (since the trailhead is notorious for car break-ins). We settled for camping at the nearby Anini Beach Park, since we were not doing the overnight hike we werent worried about our stuff anymore.

We managed to score a campsite right by the beach at Anini (a gorgeous beach with a calm lagoon edged by a coral breaker and white sand, just dont get here on the weekend), the thrill of which was somewhat marred by families with screaming children (I am tolerant of kids but not when their parents allow them to run around yelling at the top of their lungs in an extremely crowded campsite at 10 in the night) and drunken idiots who insisted on loud talking and playing their boom-boxes well beyond midnight. A special shout-out goes to the other fidiot who imitated a rooster call, very realistically, at 4am. Way to endear yourself to people, folks!

Waking up to a view of the sunrise over a gently rolling Pacific did away with all the illwill of a sleepless night for about a couple of minutes until we went to the washrooms and found that more fidiots had messed up the washrooms, re-routed water from the drinking water fountain (we saw someone taking a shower with this water supply later in the day, while the rest of us went waterless) and B cut his finger when trying to turn off the tap to the secondary outlet. At this point à la Eric Cartman we decided 'Screw this sh1t, we're checking into a hotel' and spent the morning driving around to see if there were restrooms available.

The original plan was to start our hike (round trip 12 miles) at 7 in the morning. Because of all the snafus we didnt get to the trail until 830 am. We could have avoided the restroom hunting, Ke'e beach did have some decent washrooms supplied with water, no soap though, and I didnt see any place for drinking water. Anyway, by the time we reached the trailhead it was raining cats, dogs and bonobos (keep in mind Kauai is tied with Cherrapunji, India -or Mawsyngram now- as the wettest place on earth). We were going to wait the rain out, but when we got there the parking lot was full so we decided to start hiking too.

The Kalalau trail was created back in the 1800s for horses and goats and the high rate of erosion on these cliffs has ensured that the trail hasnt been maintained. Consequently it's an uneven, rocky, muddy, slippery, narrow trail with portions having the rain forest on one side and straight drops hundreds of feet into the ocean on the other. The first two miles are the easiest though.

The first half mile is an uphill climb with beautiful views over Ke'e beach. Also, the trail is edged by the most fascinating flora- saturated with flowers, loads of exotic fruits, berries and forests of sweet-smelling guava trees. The guavas were so ripe they had fallen off and gotten trampled underfoot with the result that the trail smelled of a heady mix of wet soil and fruity guavas. We picked a handful of guavas for a snack for when we reached the beach.

After the first three-quarters of a mile or so we finally held our breath at a mist-covered ethereal glimpse of the famed coastline. All this time the trail was rocky but now it became muddy and at this point, it started raining very hard and we were soon encrusted. My shoes were ruined in a couple of minutes; I must mention that this trail needs a hardy pair of hiking shoes. B and I were prepared even with hiking poles which were a great help, but we were flabbergasted by flip-flops and Crocs on the trail. One adventurous couple were barefoot, something I would have thought twice about with the leptospirosis danger due to feral goat and rat urine in the streams. Everyone seemed in good spirits though.

The last leg just before we got to Hanakapi'ai Beach, and after a dire warning of the number of people who had died on a notchable sign (the count was at 84 when we went, the pic alongside is from Wikipedia, wonder when it was taken :( ), we had to cross a fast-moving river to finally get to the beach. B managed to get across without problems, me the shorty sank hip deep. It ultimately took us 2 hours to get to the beach, with a couple of breaks in between. Because of all the warning signs about the strong currents we decided to avoid getting into the water and just continue to Hanakoa without much delay.

After Hanakapi'ai, the trail immediately becomes an extremely narrow path through shrubs and trees (where little bitty mosquitoes hide out waiting to bite unsuspecting bare legs) and there are a series of switchbacks into various valleys with gorgeous views. About half an hour of this, I slipped at the very edge trying to avoid sinking ankle deep into muddy water (foolish me, there was no earthly way I could have got dirtier) and was only prevented from falling off the trail by doing a series of comical hand rolls forward and backward by which time B grabbed me. After this, I turned B's ears blue with a steady stream of invectives (it's my coping mechanism when I'm scared or angry :( ) for about 15 more minutes, when B asked if I wanted to turn back. I put up a token resistance but then agreed.

As we returned it seemed that we were walking a completely new trail- 3 hours into the hike and it had been raining continuously and heavily. In most places, the trail was completely obscured by water, the little muddy water trickles were now fast-moving streams (see pic alongside) and impromptu waterfalls had sprung up which we had to wade through. The rain let up for some time letting B experiment with different camera angles and exposures, so finally we got back to the trailhead a good 6 hours after we started- completely bedraggled and muddy. We headed back to our hotel for a long, hot soak in the bathtub thanking our stars that the camping idea had been scrapped.

Even though this hike was tough, I totally enjoyed it and would definitely do it again. The only disappointment for both of us was that we didnt make it to any of our milestones. The great advantage with the rainy weather was no sunburn and we didnt get thirsty at all, we carried 2l of water per person and ended up using only about half a liter for the entire hike. We even gave away some of our water to people who had run out just to lighten the load on the way back.

The tantalizing views we had of the coastline (so near yet so far :( ) means that B and I have promised ourselves we'll go back, and all the way to Kalalau Beach. Let's hope the second time's the charm ..... xxx

It must be October!

2009-10-07T21:24:00.009-05:00

I love pumpkins and come October I look forward to using pumpkin in everything - soups, subjis, cookies. I have a limited repertoire though, so I'm always looking for new stuff and I was excited this weekend when i came across a recipe for pumpkin with pasta, something I'd never tried before. Below is a pic, the recipe I used was Mario Batali's Ziti alla Zucca (Ziti with pumpkin).

If you're reeling at the combination, do try it, it's delicious!! I added some walnuts because I like to have some crunch in my pasta.

The only version I HATE is pumpkin pie so this year I'm going to play around with recipes until I come up with an acceptable version for me :) Cant wait! And of course, you will read all about it here.

So, suggestions- any favorite or unusual pumpkin (I mean the red pumpkin here) recipes I should be trying out?

Randomness

2009-10-02T21:40:00.006-05:00

I came across this movie Before the Rains while randomly browsing today. Santosh Sivan, Nandita Das, Rahul Bose, Jennifer Ehle, Bruce Wayne's dad (heh, dont know his name), Kerala in the 1930s .... it looks amazing!! Anyone seen this movie? It's going to the top of my watch list ... and how come it's out on DVD already and I hadn't even heard about it hmpf!

For the Austen fans I came across the writer Juliet Archer whose going to be writing a series of modern versions Austen in the 21st century. The Importance of Being Emma is already published and she's next working on a version of Persuasion. I've been on an Emma jag lately, just finished watching Clueless (lovelovelove this movie) so cannot wait to get my sticky Papaya hands on this book.

And finally, remember all the whining I was doing before - fall's here people! And since I just stumbled across this amazing site called Polyvore I played around (feeling a lot like Silverstone's Cher) to create an outfit from my closet - I picked up the ribbon-trim dress for $15 (original price $90) courtesy some coupons so currently it's the favorite item I possess, next to my impulse leather jacket buy and those 4 inch heels which are killer to wear but look so cute. I just know this outfit is going to get worn time and again this season ....

There's nothing like retail therapy (even if it's from my own closet) to scare away the ennui :) Have a great weekend, folks!!

Ennui

2009-10-01T18:05:00.007-05:00

Some of my most creative meals come about when I'm alone. Most of the time my diet staple is good old Maggi (esp. now that they've introduced the vegetable atta noodles, luuurve them). The day I run out of my Maggi and am too lazy to drive half an hour to the Indian grocery store are the days when my mental acuity is tested to the limit. Which one tempts you?

Take for example, last night. My dinner consisted of Haldiram's aloo bhujia with 2 slices of bread. And if you haven't ever eaten sev with bread, it's crispy, it's crunchy, it's sweet and savory, what's not to like? (Spike I know I laughed at your meals but I was laughing with you all those times).

As I still haven't gone to the grocery store, tonight's meal presents another problem. I've been debating throwing thinly sliced potatoes, red onions, celery and avocado in a skillet with salt and pepper and I doubt it will taste half bad. Actually the only item bothering me is the celery - I hate the stuff. The only reason it entered the house was I was looking for healthy snacks (no scoffing) and was sick of the baby carrots I normally chew on.

In a flash of inspiration (and the result of watching countless shows on food network) I remembered someone mentioning celery and peanut butter is a great snack to get kids to eat their veggies. And if kids can eat it so can I, went the thinking. Well I tried it last night and if that shtuff gets kids to eat their veggies, I'm a size 0. Celery and peanut butter does NOT go together. Unlike bread and bhujia. So, now I have this great hunk of celery in the house and no idea what to do with it. Or atleast I know what to do with it (ref. the potato idea), I'm just not looking forward to eating it. Sigh.

How about you? What are your favorite healthy snacks? Or your favorite quick fix lonely dinner?

Anyways, before I continue to depress myself, let me say that the wonderfully creative avdi presented this award to me sometime ago. Her post giving away the award is inspired. Thanks a lot for thinking of me avdi!

Of this and that ...

2009-09-21T17:11:00.017-05:00

Yeesh .... no posts this month. I could say I was super-busy traveling and while it would be partly true the other reason is I have no writing ideas.

The weather gods have been dithering between summer and fall, so I've been going around wrongly dressed for almost every event- flowy, sleeveless dress and flip-flops on a miserably rainy day, completely covered for a sunny barbecue and so on. I guess it would help to check the weather every morning but that would require a more planned person than me. I wish fall would just get here already!!

I also bought a super-cute faux-leather jacket (similar to the one alongside though in a richer golden-brown color and prettier zipper detailing) in preparation for fall and I cannot wait to debut it. This was a total impulse buy, we were in a new town with some time to kill, spotted our favorite discounted designer store and ended with me buying the jacket and B with 2 pairs of shoes (just the fodder I needed the next time 'someone' points fingers at my shoe addiction :D) ...

Getting the new items to fit into our luggage was a challenge, since we already traveled with over-stuffed bags! I did find a new way of packing, apparently if you roll your clothes you can get a whole lot more stuffed into the same space. I did pity the customs guys if they happened to open those suitcases, items were apt to roll out every which way. Anyway, we got back with nothing missing so all's well on that front.

Anyways, so I decided I'd just do a round up of some events. The first was the food at the Minnesota State Fair- everything fried and preferably on a stick!

- deep-fried candy bar on a stick- -jumbo smoked turkey leg- -pork chop on a stick-

I've spent a lot of time scoffing at the deep fried chocolate thingy on the left but honestly, it's doughnut batter with melted chocolate in the center and sprinkled with sugar. What's not to love? The only sound I could make after eating this started with an m and ended with the same, I'm pretty surprised I actually had the fortitude to take the pic before I gobbled the rest up. The turkey leg was just plain scary!

The next was an end of summer barbecue. I made these delicious bacon-wrapped jalapenos in two batches; one as in the recipe and the other with a spot of honey in the jalapenos for the timid. I grilled them but next time I think I'll use the oven since our grill was very hot and it ended up charring the poor things. But, they were so much fun to eat and disappeared in a couple of minutes. I didn't get many nice pics though, so check out the original recipe to see some absolutely drool-worthy pics.

And lastly, due to the aforementioned writing slump there's been a decided lack of reviews. But, I did start reading a new author Nalini Singh's Psy-Changeling series and have been steam-rolling my way through them. I've read 2 books and the world is just so intriguing, detailed and complicated, I'm loving it. It's based in an alternate reality where there are three races - humans, changelings and the Psy and Ms. Singh goes into the details much more clearly than I can.

I started reading the author after picking up her new series Angels' Blood a few months ago, based in another alternate reality setting with vampires, angels and humans. Do pick both series up if you like paranormal reads, they're rich in world-building, the characters are fascinating and the books are well thought out and well-written.

However, this brings me to something that bugs me with romances and their covers , more specifically the tacky covers even the good books seem to end up with. If I hadn't been intrigued by the author's other series I would never have picked the Psy-Changeling series up solely based on the cover art. I know it's publishers who make the cover decisions so I wonder why they cannot understand that if people are embarrassed to be seen with the book cover they will not buy the book (i'm talking the impulse buys here). Atleast that's how it works in PapayaLand, I wonder if anyone feels differently?

Anyways, that's about all for this rambling post, how was your weekend folks?

Zucchini Kofta curry ....

2009-09-18T21:00:00.010-05:00

... or a desperate attempt to update this blog!

This was made when I had a ton of zucchinis in the house (an enthusiastic farmer's market purchase) and was running out of things to make with them. Since this is not an original recipe I'm not posting it to the food blog, it's made from Smita's delicious recipe for Cabbage with a spicy twist. Because I love the flavors of the original I've been trying various versions of it. The one below is for a zucchini kofta curry.

Clockwise from left: Grated zucchini, turmeric powder, coriander powder, cumin powder, thinly sliced ginger, chopped green chillies, chopped coriander leaves, besan (gram flour)
Mix together, there's no need to add water.

Drop the batter (I used a spoon) into an appe / ebelskiver pan or deep fry them as usual. This wasnt an original idea, it's been borrowed from the amazing food blog world - needless to say I love it and have been using this pan to do all my deep frying in.

While the koftas are frying chop coriander leaves, onions, tomatoes and slit some green chillies.

Spices clockwise from left: slit green chillies, red chillies, bay leaf, clove, cinnamon stick, green cardamom, black cardamom, ajwain (carom) seeds.

In a little oil add all the spices. After a couple of minutes add the onions. Fry till transparent and add turmeric/ chilli powder.

After a few minutes, add ginger and garlic paste.

After another couple of minutes, add the cumin and coriander powders. Fry well.

After the masala is fried (couple of minutes) add the chopped tomatoes (or tomato puree if you dont like lumpy gravies), once they have been fried well add well-beaten yogurt (or for added richness cream can be added but do this as the final step after the one below). Mix well.

Add some water, drop the koftas into the curry and let simmer until desired consistency is reached. Garnish with coriander leaves and serve hot with rice/ chapattis/ parathas.

Chocolate Marie treats ...

2009-08-25T22:19:00.012-05:00

... or Quick 'n easy recipes for the Lazy Papaya!

Summer holidays are almost at an end here. This weekend I was thinking nostalgically of my own short lived, much enjoyed summer holidays and of driving my mom crazy with endless refrains of I'm-bored and Is-there-something-to-eat when I remembered the simple treat mom used to make for us to shove into our gullets the minute we brought up the eating question.

You will need: Digestive (Marie) biscuits and some squares of bitter cooking chocolate (use milk/semi-sweet, whatever you like). Please ignore the interesting looking bottle of alcohol in the background - more on this later.

Melt the chocolate in the microwave (or if you are fussy use the double-boiler method). Spoon a largish blob on one biscuit and then spread all over the surface. Repeat for all. Harden in fridge and enjoy.

What I love most about this treat is it's potential, you can dress it up or down as follows:

The Sophisticated - First, spread a layer of marzipan on the biscuit, then add the layer of chocolate. Or else, spread the chocolate on the biscuit and layer some crushed praline/ sliced strawberries/ raspberries on top.

The Kiddie Version - Spread some peanut butter then spread the layer of chocolate. Thinly slice apples/ bananas and add over the layer of chocolate.

The Simple - Sprinkle powdered sugar/ cocoa over the chocolate covered biscuit.

However, due to my inability to learn from my mistakes I tried to add rum to the microwaved chocolate. It promptly seized and the resulting biscuits looked like they were covered with dog poop.

Hence, the intentional blurry image of what was meant to be the money shot. They taste great though, and since it's just B and me (or I) and our tummies we were all completely satisfied!!

The other fun thing we did last weekend was watch District 9. Produced by Peter Jackson, it's part sci-fi, part political commentary, part action flick and totally amazing!! Do watch if you enjoy the genre.

How was your weekend folks?

Julia and Julia/ Cheeni Kum and the food!

2009-08-19T21:28:00.012-05:00

When the Julie and Julia buzz began making the rounds sometime last month I knew I would watch it. However, my reasons to watch it were because it was a movie about cooking, not because of any familiarity with Julia Child. The only things I knew about her are that were that she is a culinary icon, her cookbook is seminal in publishing and I had watched an episode of hers with Emeril Lagasse way back when on Food Network.
Julie and Julia- the book- is a personal memoir of Julie Powell who decides to cook all the recipes in Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking over the course of a year and maintains a blog about it.

The movie splits Julie's experience with stories from Julia Child's memoir and so we get a charming story of two women separated by time and place who embark on a culinary voyage - Julia because she needs to find something to do after her husband Paul Child is transferred to Paris and Julie because she is an under-achieving, failed writer stuck in a desk job and nearing her 30th birthday and, again, needs to find something to do.

I'm not reviewing the movie, I just want to say it is perfectly charming. Julia Child and Paul Child are played by Meryl Streep and Stanley Tucci respectively and they have an amazing chemistry - during the romantic moments or even when they are sitting quietly together. Julia's portion makes the movie, it's charming and vibrant with Streep's larger than life portrayal of Julia. Julie Powell and her husband are played by Amy Adams and Chris Messina and their portions, while not as vivid as the rest are quietly engaging proving a testament to Ms. Adams charm in front of the camera.

The movie is written and directed by Nora Ephron, so yes it's chick flick territory but largely unlike the regular fare. I guess the difference here is that the couples are already in love, Streep and Tucci especially, and while they have their spats they are still supportive of their spouses. And just in case it wasnt clear already, I loved the movie.

But coming to the point of the post - the food. The food was all that I had expected and more. From the first shots of a perfectly browned fish sputtering in butter sauce which is Julia's first meal in Paris to Julia's famous boeuf bourguignon the food was the unacknowledged star. Needless to say I was drooling and I dont even like stews much. Thank God for my BIG tub of popcorn, I doubt I could have made it through the movie without it.

While there's ample movies with Western food, J&J, the recent Catherine Zeta-Jones starrer, even the highly entertaining show Kitchen Confidential (why do all the shows I love end up getting cancelled??bah!) it's much rarer to see Indian food treated like the star in Bollywood.

So imagine my surprise when the opening shots of Cheeni Kum (the Tabu- Amitabh Bachchan starrer, a May-December romance) showed colorful spices being roasted, onions sizzling in oil, coriander garnishes, all exquisitely framed in a pristine kitchen with chefs in pure-white smocks and caps. The opening sequence was so enthralling, it made me realize that I've rarely seen Indian food presented so beautifully as it is here.

And my enjoyment of the movie was guaranteed once the Hyderabadi zafrani pulao made it's appearance, looking so perfectly saffron tinged I wanted to eat it- RIGHT away! Coming to the movie, Tabu and AB were amazing, AB especially wonderfully eccentric in the scene where he lists the ingredients of the pulao right before being slammed with the knowledge that it was made by Tabu. It's not a perfect movie by any means, melodrama taking over the latter half but I came away with positive thoughts about it all because of the first few scenes.

Watching these two movies recently has just made me realise that it's very rarely I absolutely dislike movies about food or based on food. I loved Chocolat, Like Water for Chocolate, liked No Reservations, even enjoyed Harold and Kumar go to Whitecastle. Sadly, that's all the food movies I've seen.

How about you? Do you have a favorite food movie? And I'd love any recommendations, especially for Bollywood.

However right now, I'm going to go raid the piece of emergency dark chocolate I hide in my cupboard for just such occasions. All this talk of food has made me ravenous!!

Tagged!

2009-08-14T17:55:00.004-05:00

Thanks avdi for tagging me. Like I said, I haven't been feeling like reviewing so atleast I get a post out of this :)

1. Grab the book nearest to you, turn on page 18 and find line 4.
As always on chilly mornings many people had stopped off for something to eat before making their way home.

2. Stretch your left arm out as far as you can & catch air?
My coffee cup

3. What is the last thing you watched on TV?
Starship Troopers

4. Without looking, guess what time it is?
545pm

5. Now look at the clock, what is the actual time?
559pm

6. With the exception of the computer, what can you hear?
Fan whirling away in the august heat

7. When did you last step outside? What were you doing?
Went to ride my bike, found B had put a big, fat lock on it and taken the key with him ... grr...

8. Before you started this Q&As, what did you look at?

On sale now .... am sooo buying them :D

9. What are you wearing?
Cropped pants and a fire engine red shirt

10. When did you last laugh?
This morning as I watched a lady walking her dog in a pram ....

11. What is on the walls of the room you are in?
errr... paint?

12. Seen anything weird lately?
See 10.

13. What do you think of this quiz?
Slightly voyeuristic no?

14. What is the last film you saw?
Starshop Troopers

15. If you became a multimillionaire overnight, what would you buy?
A pair of Manolo's, guilt-free!! Other things will be done with much thought of boring finance mumbo-jumbo.

16. Tell me something about you that I dunno!
I hate to drive.

17. If you could change one thing about the world, regardless of guilt or politics, what would you do?
Hmm I'll go with Avdi's answer ... poverty.

18. Do you like to Dance?
I have two left feet, but yes !

19. Imagine your first child is a girl, what do you call her?
Antara

20. Imagine your first child is a boy, what do you call him?
Neel

21. Would you ever consider living abroad?
haha Yes, India.

22. What do you want GOD to say to you when you reach the pearly gates?
After handing me the welcome drink with an umbrella; bar to the left, dance floor to the right and the beach shuttles leave every hour.

I'm going to tag Bouncing Bubble, Angel's Flight, EISI and Samir!

The Time Traveler's Wife movie trailer ....

2009-08-05T20:33:00.008-05:00

Smita's comments got me thinking about this book again. Anyways, I'm less excited about the movie after watching the trailer, but I think the background music is to blame. And what's with the cheesy special effects for the disappearing!!!

How about you? Planning to watch?

Oh, and if you have not read this book, please do! It's excellent!! A review can be found here, but if you can read the version on That-Other-Site, it's far better than this one.

Review: The Heretic's Daughter

2009-08-03T23:16:00.002-05:00

Rating: 4.5 / 5

I tend to dig out stories of the Salem witch trials, so when I heard about this book I had to read it. The Heretic's Daughter by Kathleen Kent is a richly drawn and captivating tale of a family uniting through love in the midst of a terrifying ordeal.

The book starts as a letter from Sarah Carrier Chapman to her beloved grand-daughter in an attempt to clarify their family's history - a history shrouded with whispers, gossip and most of all fear.

The Carriers, Thomas and Martha, and their children 4 boys and two girls Sarah and Hannah move to Andover from nearby Billerica to escape the small pox which has caused a large number of fatalities in the village. Unknown to them their son Andrew already carries the virus and before long there is a small pox epidemic in Andover, which causes more deaths. The townspeople slowly come to hate the Carriers for bringing the disease in their midst.

Martha Carrier, an outspoken and fearless woman rubs against her neighbors the wrong way with her honesty and Thomas Carrier is feared for the role he played in an English uprising. Since there is already bad blood between the neighbors and the Carriers because they do not submit to the religious beliefs of the village, the Carriers live a solitary life. A property dispute arises between Martha Carrier and her sister's family for the house in Andover.

It is in the middle of all these events that a group of girls in nearby Salem Village accuse people of being witches. Very soon, the fear ripping through the counties of Massachusetts reaches Andover and the Carriers are caught up in it's wake.

The story is told through the eyes of 10 year old Sarah, a prickly child not easily loving perceiving herself as unloved because her mother is a cold, no-nonsense woman. I loved her voice observant with the odd maturity of childhood.

A seeping wound can be bound. Salve can be dabbed to a burn of a swelling bubo. Poison can be drawn with a leech, or a lance. But guilt is a ghost that takes the shape of the body it inhabits and consumes all that is tender within its shell: brain, bowels, and heart. I cannot pluck it out like a splinter of glass or treat it with herbal brews.

Sarah's loss of innocence leads her to the understanding of a parent's love and that it need not always be outwardly manifested.

With the subject and the fate of Martha Carrier being well documented, the beauty of the book lies not in the tension of the final outcome, it's the starkness of the prose and simplicity of a harrowing tale told through a child's eyes; of the events as they might have unfolded during that bleak period of 1692 which makes this story so readable.

This book carries some vivid historical detail from the ordinary chores of a farming family, Puritanical beliefs, to descriptions of the prisons where the 'witches' were kept and the horrifying conditions and torture they have to live through. Ms. Kent has done her research, but the story became additionally compelling for me when I learnt that Martha Carrier is her ancestor.

For me I'm fascinated with the psychology by which entire counties, priests, lawyers and judges came to participate in what is a dark period in American history. The author puts forth some theories, the Puritans having their rigid social patterns, fear-mongering due to disease, religion and Indian raids and finally the much too familiar motives of jealousy, greed and hate accompanied with mass hysteria.

The sole criticism I have is that the history of Thomas Carrier isn't clear. He's widely feared and has occupied a pivotal part in British history and this is the major reason he escapes when most men who supported their wives were also accused. But since I'm unfamiliar with the history I didn't really understand his notoriety or his political beliefs.

However, it doesn't take much away from the story and if you are interested in American history read this book. It's unputdownable.

Review: Lover Avenged

2009-07-29T21:51:00.002-05:00

Rating: 3.5 / 5

Read the reviews for the first 6 books in the series here. WARNING- this review is for people familiar with the BDB it contains a lot of Ward's terminology and might also contain spoilers wrt previous books.

Among the number of search terms associated with the Black Dagger Brotherhood that lead people to this site every week, the question 'What is a sympath?' inevitably makes an appearance. And I thought JR Ward's Lover Avenged, the 7th novel of the BDB series would answer just that.

The focus of this novel is on Rehvenge, half-sympath, leahdyre of the vampire glymera and a powerful drug lord and pimp in Caldwell, New York. Rehvenge's illegal activities serve to pay his blackmailer for keeping the sympath side of his identity a secret thereby protecting his mother, sister and half-sympath employee Xhex.

According to vampire law any sympaths have to be quarantined in a colony in the remote northern areas of the state. The sympath laws are even clearer, ALL half-breeds must die. To keep his sympath urges at bay Rehvenge relies heavily on drugs, which leave his body numb.

On his routine check ups at Havers' hospital he often comes in contact with nurse Ehlena. Ehlena is a fallen member of the glymera and is sole care-giver to her father who is schizophrenic which leaves her with almost no social life. Rehvenge is drawn to this loneliness of hers, a mirror of his own and the two start to build a tentative relationship together.

In the meanwhile, Wrath has been secretly fighting lessers in his free time, and it's not long before he is found out. This severely tries his relationship not only with Beth, who is sorely hurt by his deceit and lack of trust towards herself, Wrath also has his annoyed Brothers to deal with. In addition headaches which have persisted almost all his life become stronger and he loses what little vision he does have. Trapped in his blindness, not being able to fight, having to depend on other people just to get around and marital problems lead to Wrath being scared, not a good emotion for any Brother to wallow in.

But, things are going to get worse for Wrath. A member of the glymera approaches Rehvenge for assassinating the Blind King and a sympath, even a half-breed canNOT be trusted, can they? Read the book to see how Ward resolves the stories - can Wrath and Beth come to terms, will Rehvenge and Ehlena find true love, where the assassination plot leads and what exactly are Lash and the Lessening Society upto?

Wrt the sympath question posed before, I have to say I'm still clueless. All I gathered from this book was that sympaths fed off emotions preferably the sinful ones (and what? no idea), and they have a decided predilection for scorpions and spiders. But, let's just say for the purposes of this book that sympath = ehvil (heh) and leave it at that.

I really liked all the action in this book, first since it plays catch up with the old stories - Wrath and Beth for example. Wrath suddenly accepting his Kingship had always seemed too good to be true so I loved the continuation of his story arc here.

I liked the real-world conundrum the Lessening Society is facing, apparently being humongously evil AND a son of the Omega is not enough in the material world. Lash has to struggle to make money to supply his people with decent weapons, hideouts, bling and sexy cars. He hits upon the perfect solution, getting into the drug business, but that slowly infringes upon Rehvenge's territory and before he knows it the vampires have been clued to his return.

John Matthew, Blaylock and Qhuinn have minor roles but we do spend some time with John Matthew and his love for Xhex. I must say, I didnt like JM ever since he was introduced, first he was all angsty and whiny, though I was able to tolerate him in LE mainly because he seemed to have matured a bit. Well, here he slides down that slippery slope into tiresomeness, nohbuddy luuurves me. He does fit right into the Brotherhood (pre-marriage) though.

What I didnt care much for was the Rehvenge-Ehlena track. Rehv in all the previous books was a hard core character, seemingly conscienceless, filled with self-loathing for himself over the blackmailing bit contrasted with being extremely protective towards his family ... let's go for tormented, yup he's a tormented hero - my favorite kind.

With Ehlena he suddenly becomes a total mushy sap all I-love-yous and I-want-to-serve-yous and sentimental phone convos in a matter of minutes. Not that it wasn't sweet, but it took some time for me to reconcile the amethyst-eyed mohawked drug lord who kills people without compunction with the gooey pillow talk. And that Ehlena, that upright figure in the vampire community accepts him warts (hmm maybe I should be saying barb :) and all.

The h/h feeling they're not good enough for each other is my least favorite theme in romance, and Ehlena and Rehv go quite a few times around this particular bush. The other reason is I didnt care much for Ehlena, she felt like an amalgam of all the earlier heroines Beth, Mary except she can handle her way around a gun. Though I did like the way she dealt with her father's illness, at one point she walks him through a new house so that his fears of intruders are minimised once he sees security cameras around.

I think Ward should move out of finding women for her heroes from the social outcasts. Surely, there's scope for someone from the glymera to have an HEA too.

Phury still being Primale stumped me, in LE he refused the joy of being sole sperm donor to the Chosen. Why does he keep the title? Looks to me just like another way to keep poor Phury away from the house (heh, I like how ever since LE he's forever become poor Phury in my mind) ...

And even though I like Xhex's character (being the sole alpha female in the series) I didnt like the kidnap motif being used again. Additionally, is it just me, or does the war between the lessers and the vampires seems like it's on a never-ending track. Not much happens in this book, the vampires basically doing their own thing and Lash his own until they intersect at the climax and I'd like to see more concrete developments happening with this in the next few books.

And of course, new characters are introduced here and I have the sinking feeling that they might have their own books coming out soon.

Will I keep reading? You bet. I'm hooked onto this series and wasn't much bothered with only a sprinkling of romance because of all the other fun stuff. The thing that might prove a problem for me is the suspicion that there is no concrete story arc for the entire series.

I learnt some new slang though - fidiot (Ward's short form for effing idiot), now where shall I use it first? :D

-------------------
Series Order

1. Dark Lover
2. Lover Eternal
3. Lover Awakened
4. Lover Revealed
5. Lover Unbound
6. Lover Enshrined
7. Lover Avenged
8. Lover Mine - to be released 2010

WHY - part 2!!!!!!

2009-07-27T21:59:00.001-05:00

If you remember my first anguished post was about Pride and Prejudice and Zombies. I did buy the book and even enjoyed it. Though that was because of the novelty of the idea and hey, zombies are kinda cute!!

But, apparently the Jane Austen canon is not to be left in peace. We now have .... wait for it ...

Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters!!!!!

That's IT!! I'm not going to read anymore of these books, much less spend any of my hard earned money on them.

If you want more WTH moments, go to Amazon and type the sense and sensibility title above and take a peek at the second book in the list. The title includes Mr. Darcy and Vampyre ......

Tag time!

2009-07-21T21:32:00.000-05:00

Thank you so much Avdi for the award below

The rules for this tag are as follows:

Link the person who tagged you
The display of award on your blog with these rules
Reply to the questions below
Tag 7 people deserving the award according to you
Come back to BLoGGiSTa iNFo CoRNeR (PLEASE DO NOT CHANGE THIS LINK) at http://bloggistame.blogspot.com/ and leave the URL of your Post in order for you/your Blog to be added to the Master List

My Answers:

The Person who tagged you : Avdi
His/her site’s url: http://thepinkbee.blogspot.com/
Date when you were tagged: 18th July 09
7 people I tag are

Abha
Angel's Flight
magicalsummer
ROFL INDIAN
samir
~udtahaathi~
WhatsInAName

Movie Review: Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince

2009-07-19T17:58:00.000-05:00

Rating: 3.75 / 5

Having had ample experience with the preceeding Harry Potter films and my own reactions to them, this time I was completely prepared. Which means that I did not read the book right before I went to watch, doing this always seems to endanger my blood vessels, and so come Wednesday I was all antsy and excited to watch David Yates' latest version of my favorite fantasy series.

Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince (HBP) starts out very strong. In a brilliant sequence, we see that with Lord Voldemort gaining strength and support, the war in the wizarding world has been brought even to the Muggles, innocents dying as the Death Eaters go on a rampage in London after kidnapping the wizard Olivander from Diagon Alley.

Even Hogwarts, with the greatest wizard as Headmaster, is to be affected. For the first time, the students see Dumbledore and their teachers take strong precautions against the Death Eaters. It seems that Lord Voldemort, with the rout at the Ministry fresh in his mind, has decided to lay low until he can get Dumbledore out of the picture. And, Harry is convinced that this part at Hogwarts is to be played by none other than his bete noire Draco Malfoy with the help of Professor Snape.

As Harry protests Draco's complicity to anyone who can listen (but wont), events at Hogwarts go on as usual. There is Ron's budding romance with classmate Lavender, Quidditch matches, Hermione's bubbling anger at Ron and a newly discovered love interest in Ginny. And at Potions, after finding a used text book singed ominously 'the property of the Half-Blood Prince' it seems that Harry turns into Potioner extraordinaire impessing the new Potions teacher Professor Slughorn (Jim Broadbent, brilliant!).

But, amidst all the confusion of a year at Hogwarts, Dumbledore has not forgotten the war they are fighting and after the lessons learned in the previous year decides to share everything he knows about Voldemort with Harry, ultimately uncovering the secret of how Voldemort was able to survive the curse on that fatal night. Voldemort used a rare magic called a Horcrux to split his soul into 7 parts and spirit them in hidden locations. Dumbledore has been destroying Horcruxes as he finds them - one is the book which Harry destroyed in the Chamber of Secrets and the second is a ring belonging to Voldemort's parents. Dumbledore takes Harry on a mission to unearth a new Horcrux and it is on this night that all the events run together leading to the final showdown at Hogwarts.

HBP is all that the Order of the Phoenix tried to be a year ago and didnt quite come close. It 's dark, grim and much suitable for an older audience than the first few movies targetted. And a very good thing is that the kids have clearly evolved into better actors with age. This movie was the first one where I didnt cringe at the anomaly between the dialogues and the emoting. Even Michael Gambon as Dumbledore getting into the skin of his character this time around and delivering a wonderful performance. And as I swore that this review wouldnt be a litany of -but in the book- I'm quite prepared to ignore all the plot elements missing (though I have to point out the prop FAIL over the ring Horcrux which looked undestroyed) and come out and say that I quite enjoyed it.

If there is any fault it lies in the pacing, the writers and director not quite getting the tension right; Rowling does this so well in her book, we are treated to tantalising glimpses of Voldemort, alongwith the atmosphere of menace at the school with all the attempted assassinations of Dumbledore and Malfoy's creeping all culminating in the final showdown. A showdown which left everyone reading the book stunned and numb and me reading in a haze of tears. Let's just say that the movie doesnt deliver any such climax. Expecting to bawl my eyes out, I was hideously underwhelmed. And I was so irritated with the last scene given to Snape, I wanted Rickman roaring out 'DONT CALL ME A COWARD' to Harry, no such luck (boo, script FAIL?)

Instead we are treated to numerous reels of Ron-won's adolescent hormones, Hermione's angst and Ginny and Harry mooning around each other. Maybe it illustrates that these are teenagers but I would have been happier if a lot of the other material relating to Voldemort (a spooky Hero Fiennes-Tiffin and creepy Frank Dillane, both amazing!) or even Draco (a wonderfully tormented Tom Felton) or the criminally underused Professor Snape (the always brilliant Alan Rickman) were included instead of being slashed away. I do not grudge Rupert Grint his few moments on screen, he is pretty hilarious. As for the climactic battle, probably there was no time, but I'm also tempted to think that the director didn't want another wand battle ala Phoenix. After all, there's only so much you can do with fighting by pointing a stick.

But, the movie finally alienated me with it's final lines. As Harry, Hermione and Ron mull over events of the year, and regret that things which didnt make sense at the time should have been better interpreted, Harry should have been filled with despair over the tragic loss that occurs at the end in this movie. Instead we fade out with the three of them laughing over the image of Harry and Ginny snogging in front of older brother Ron. Life does go on, but, amidst the levity it's obvious that the movie versions of these characters are just transparent shadows of their richly characterized and rendered written counterparts.

And that, dear reader, is just another way of saying watch the movie because it is Harry Potter but read the book for the story that people love - that is if you haven't done so already.

Food tradition and everything is better with cake.

2009-07-17T01:44:00.001-05:00

Growing up we had many food traditions in our family - festivals had specific menus, fasts had their own food items being prepared and on the weekends we ate meat. All of the traditions have very pleasant associations for me, but the ones that really take me back are Sunday lunches. Just thinking of Sunday lunch brings to mind sleeping in, my mom's chicken whistling away in the pressure cooker, dad's vegetable market shopping and endless Sunday morning TV programming. Sunday lunches were the mealtime we most lingered over, we ate meals together every night but the carefreeness of a Sunday always made the time spent together that much more special.

After moving out, I was determined to have certain food traditions of my own. Of course, Sunday mornings aren't the same anymore. I have to clean the house, shop for groceries and then do those endless mounds of laundry which only double in size once one takes a wary eye off them. A huge meal is the last thing I want to spend the time preparing in between all the work. But, lazy as I am, I do have certain food traditions and I hope to expand on these as I grow better with managing my time. The things I do faithfully every year are besan laddoos for Diwali and christmas cake for Christmas.

Christmas reminds me of heading out to my friend Tea's house to be regaled with christmas cake, rose cookies and homemade wine. The cake I bake is Tea's mom's recipe. I love it, the recipe itself is fabulous, but it carries with it a host of fun-filled memories of two immature, giggling teens who thought the world was their oyster.

Last Saturday I woke up with baking on my mind. Not surprising since it is the middle of the year, the time when I start preparations for my cake in December. So, I took 1 cup of mixed dry fruits - raisins, figs, cherries, strawberries and soaked them in a mix of brandy and kirsch. I've experimented with sherry too, but love the brandy-soaked fruits best. This year I added some kirsch, a cherry brandy, to mix it up a bit. The fruits sit in the refrigerator soaking up all the boozy goodness, I just need to top them off from time to time if the level of brandy goes below the fruit line.

It's a little unsatisfying to wake up thinking of warm, freshly baked cake and make preparations for something 6 months hence. So, I baked this Blueberry Coffee Cake later in the day. I think it's a perfect recipe, the butter quantities reduced drastically and substituted with oil and yogurt and the sugar level being very low just sweet enough to curb cravings and no more. And it still makes a wonderfully moist cake, a bit denser than normal but very satisfying with little bursts of blueberries as an added surprise. I forgot to click pictures before I cut into the cake, but here's what was left after the initial raid.

The coffee cake recipe has given me some ideas for modifying the original recipe to create a lower fat, slightly healthier Christmas cake and I'll be posting the recipe come December, when I try it out!

But, that brings me to the question I wanted to ask .... do you have any food traditions you follow/ would love to start in your home? Or do you have a favorite food memory to share?

Book Series Favorites I - Romance

2009-07-12T23:34:00.001-05:00

As the majority of people landing on this site land on one of my series reviews, I thought I'd rehash a post from That Other Site with a list of Book Series Recommendations. I'm going to post per genre and of course I'm starting with romance :)

There are many reasons why I love a good book series- sinking into the familiarity of a well-known world, being able to follow the stories of all the characters I've become attached to and the freedom a series allows authors to completely develop their characters after establishing their world in the first couple of books. With any series, I get very anal about reading them in perfect order but of course many dont require it. I will list those which absolutely require reading in order.

The list below are in descending order of my favorites. The pictures are for the first book of every series. And lastly if you have any other reccos please do mention them! I'm always on the lookout for my next read.

The Black Dagger Brotherhood Series - JR Ward
Probably the newest addition to my list, but when I tell you that 90% of page hits per day are for my review on this series you can see how popular it is. Currently, a 7 book series, the genre is paranormal romance. In Caldwell, New York, there is an elite group of vampires called the Black Dagger Brotherhood, devoted to protecting their race from evil undead vampire slayers the lessers. Each book in the series follows the romances of one of the Brothers. My review linked above goes through the first 6 books in greater detail, but I have to add here about the addicting nature of these books. They're wonderful and that the series shot immediately to the top of my list should also tell you something. Read this in order folks!!

In Death Series - Nora Roberts writing as J.D. Robb
A futuristic romance thriller series we follow the relationship of Lieutenant Eve Dallas and her husband Roarke as a backdrop to Eve's investigations as a homicide detective in New York of the future. While this series has a mix of genres I like to classify it under romance because the characters and their relationships are center stage here with sci-fi and thriller lite elements. That being said Ms. Roberts does not shy away from any gory aspects so readers should be prepared. A very believable and fun future vision, Robert's strengths- very likeable secondary characters, punchy conversations and a dash of romance makes this a very fun read. Roberts is such a prolific writer, that the series reader can rest happy knowing that this is a series with a huge backlist to keep them occupied for months and with no end in sight in the near future. Reading in order is not strictly needed, but the characters relationships do develop over the course of the books and it's recommended.

Outlander Series - Diana Gabaldon
This is a time travel romance and contains the strongest start to a series in this list. Outlander follows time traveller Claire Randall, a nurse at the end of the second world war who is inadvertently hurtled back in time to the Scotland of the 17th century, mistaken for an English spy and meets the love of her life with Scotsman Jamie Fraser. Ms. Gabaldon's strengths are the amounts of historical research she includes in her novels and a shattering of some myths of romance writing. The series picks up the characters once they are well into their forties and Ms. Gabaldon manages to keep things extremely interesting between them. I love the first 2 books, the rest make for interesting reading. I dont think I have done justice to this series with this paltry description, so look out for reviews very soon :) Read in order.

Earth Children series - Jean M. Auel
A prehistoric romance series, the story follows Ayla a Cro-Magnon baby, who has been brought up by a clan of Neanderthals. Auel creates an amazingly rich and varied prehistoric world for her characters and I love the series for it's detail and freshness. The freshness is a little lost with the latter books but the first three are well worth the read. A detailed review can be found linked above. Again, one of those order bound series.

Looking at this list I just realized there's no representation of my favorite romance novel form - the historical romance! I think it's because it's very difficult to keep a series fresh in historicals. Certainly the ones I've read have run into one another after a few books. But, since I cannot NOT mention a few, I'm going to list a couple of reads.

The first is not a series but a list of connected books by the incomparable Georgette Heyer - The Black Moth, These Old Shades (story of Duke of Avon and Leonie), Devil's cub (Vidal, Avon's son and Mary's story) and An Infamous Army (with Vidal's granddaughter and a character from Regency Buck). The relation between The Black Moth and TOS is explained in my reviews linked above.

The second historical recco (I hope it develops into a series, even though there's only one book published so far) is for author Jennifer Haymore's debut A Hint of Wicked. Since it contained one of my favorite romance themes- the love triangle- I knew it would be an interesting read. What raised it above the ordinary for me was the amount of angst in the story and I loooove some good heart-wrenching Angst.

Sophie, the Duchess of Calton, has lost her childhood sweetheart Garrett at the Battle of Waterloo. After seven long years Garrett is declared dead and she marries Tristan, Garrett's cousin, best friend and heir. Sophie and Tristan get over their loss and start building a life together when all of a sudden Garrett returns and he wants everything back, starting with Sophie. But, Sophie is now at a loss since she loves both her husbands but in different ways entirely and cannot choose between them. I was a bit anxious towards the end, because the nature of a love triangle is that one person doesn't get a HEA and the author has created some lovely characters - I was rooting for all of them. But a short teaser for the next book that Ms. Haymore is writing, titled A Touch of Scandal, and set 4 months after the events of the last has me waiting with bated breath for it to be published.

So, that's all folks. The next installment will be for Fantasy with a couple of sci-fi reccos.

Which Austen heroine are you?

2009-07-05T02:42:00.001-05:00

Take the Quiz here!

OMG!!! Persuasion is my favorite Austen (of course, I didnt skew my answers so I would be Anne!!!) and the movie version with Amanda Root and Ciaran Hinds absolutely adorable .... Capt. Wentworth's letter to Anne remains etched in my brain, it's so romantic!

You pierce my soul. I am half agony, half hope. Tell me not that I am too late, that such precious feelings are gone for ever. I offer myself to you again with a heart even more your own than when you almost broke it, eight years and a half ago.

So, which one are you?

Summer temptations!

2009-07-03T21:11:00.000-05:00

Wikipedia says

Cheese curds are the fresh curds of cheese, often cheddar.

Illuminating?? Let's just say that cheese curds taste like cheddar with the gooey stringiness of mozzarella and deep fried cheese curds is the reason this Minnesotan tries to diet the rest of the year round.

Mmmm cheese .....

Though I am trying to control myself from diving head first into the rest of what constitutes Minnesotan summer state fair food - all things on a stick. So you do get the ordinary corn dogs, but you can also get pizzas on a stick, meatballs on a stick, pork chops on a stick, candy bars on a stick (after they've been stuck in batter and fried), twinkies on a stick and even alligators on a stick.

Let's see how long I hold out!!

What summer food are you completely unable to resist??

Review: The Other Queen

2009-07-01T23:12:00.000-05:00

Rating: 3 / 5

The Other Queen by Philippa Gregory is the story of Mary Queen of Scots one of the most romantic historical figures in Tudor history. The tale is told after an uprising by the Scottish lords against Queen Mary and her third husband Lord Bothwell (who plotted the murder of her second husband Herny Stuart, Lord Darnley) and Mary having been forced to abdicate the Scottish throne in favour of her son James I, has fled to her cousin Queen Elizabeth I of England for assistance.

Instead of restoring Mary to the throne of Scotland immediately, Elizabeth I and her steward William Cecil, fearing Mary's popularity with the English public and her claim to England's throne, ask the Earl of Shrewsbury and his newly married wife Bess of Hardwick to serve as her hosts until the court can decide what to do with her.

And so the book follows 3 POV's, Mary Stuart's, George Talbot the Earl of Shrewsbury and Bess, Countess of Shrewsbury, herself much married to improve her lot in life, from being the daughter of a humble farmer to the wife of one of the foremost earls of England.

The three years (1569-1572) which the book covers, go over a few plots to depose Queen Elizabeth - from the Northern uprising, to the Ridolfi plot and the execution for treason of the Duke of Norfolk who is pledged to marry Mary.

But, the more interesting portion of these years in Ms. Gregory's novel is the relationship between the three principals. George falls in love with Mary, while being slowly bankrupted by the cost of hosting her and her court, while his wife Bess can only helplessly watch on. It is these three peoples hopes and disappointments in each other that form the major portion of Ms. Gregory's story until the end with Mary being beheaded after being Shrewsbury's prisoner for 16 years.

Being very interested in Tudor history, I snapped up this book as soon as I saw it. I have not read much about the reign of Elizabeth I and since much of it was new, I was quite entertained.

However, once the three principals have their introductory chapters and we are presented with the central ideas - Mary the sacred and anointed Queen, Bess and her struggles to raise herself from poverty and her love of money and the property she has inherited and George being the man of honor conflicted between Mary and his wife and the Queen who commands his loyalty, I don't think I learned much from having the separate POV's. Mary and Bess are both certainly very interesting characters but I think Ms. Gregory missed the chance of exploring their characters completely.

From Ms. Gregory's account, Queen Mary is a tragically romantic figure. Stunningly beautiful and charming she is able to rally countless men willing to risk their lives in her cause. Mary herself is at the center of most of the plots and while being sly enough to spin various conspiracies, I thought her view that her person was sacred and could never be harmed, just because she was a Queen was remarkably naive. Certainly Tudor England had more than enough examples for her to be wary. Look at Henry the 8th's six wives (Mary's uncle, Elizabeth's father) - one queen discarded until she died of loneliness, two beheaded, one set aside because the king didnt fancy her and one dying in childbirth.

Ms. Gregory's Tudor novels have gained some notoriety because she often propounds theories which are different from other historians. I didnt like The Other Boleyn Girl for the same reasons. But, this time as far as I can make out there are no deviations, Shrewsbury being in love the sole small one, since it is not acknowledged as historical fact. I wonder if that is why the book, while being a good enough read, is sadly flat.

Review: North and South

2009-06-26T22:27:00.000-05:00

Rating: 5 / 5

I'm almost ashamed to say that I have not come across Elizabeth Gaskell before. The only reason I stumbled across her work was because of that wonderful entity-the BBC mini-series. What I watched convinced me I would appreciate the written work.

North and South, the novel, was written by Elizabeth Gaskell in 1855. The title refers to the two regions in England. The North was undergoing an industrial and manufacturing revolution at the time, while the South retained it's agricultural roots, resulting in the vast difference in the two regions - in terms of people, culture, work ethic, dress, even poverty.

It is against this backdrop that we meet Ms. Gaskell's protagonist Margaret Hale, who belongs to the rural South. Margaret has lived most of her life in London with her aunt, sharing in her cousin's lessons and at the age of 18 is to return to live with her parents at Helstone, the sleepy little town where her father is a clergyman. To Margaret, Helstone is idyllic with memories of forests covered with fern carpets, long walks and picturesque cottages and gardens.

After Margaret returns home, she perceives the little things that on her visits before she never really took notice of - her parents' married life is less than perfect, her mother continually expressing dissatisfaction with the small income from the current living and the grief they feel over her brother Frederick. Frederick had been part of a mutiny at sea and cannot return to England for fear of his life.

Mr. Hale soon informs his family that he is giving up his position as a clergyman to be a tutor in a cotton manufacturing town to the north of England- Milton. Mr. Hale's decision is based on principle since he has lost his faith and finds he cannot honestly continue any more, but even his wife as well as friends and family cannot commiserate since he's given up a guaranteed income for poverty.

In Milton, Mr. Hale starts off as tutor to Mr. Thornton, the owner of a prosperous cotton mill. Thornton is the epitome of the self-made man. Left poor after his father's death, he and his mother have scraped, saved and worked hard until he is a well-known name in the manufacturing industry. Thornton is inclined to admire Margaret, but she with the particular class prejudice of the time, despises tradesmen and doesn't think much of him even though her father finds him a most apt and interesting pupil, well read and well spoken.

Margaret's prejudices are peculiar since very soon she meets with Nicholas Higgins and his daughter Bessy, laborers who work at one of the cotton factories and becomes great friends with them. But, I guess this was not so outside the norm, the "ladies" were often kind to people who they perceived of a lower class than them carrying them food and medicine when sick. Their disgust was reserved for the people who profited through trade. In Margaret's view the manufacturers with their buying for cheap and selling for profit and manipulation of the market to create demand were dishonest by virtue of doing so.

Due to fluctuations in the cotton market, the workers in Milton go on a strike demanding more money which the masters refuse to (and cannot) pay and this strike forms one of the cornerstones of the novel. With the aftermath of the strike, the lives of the protagonists and their relationship undergo massive upheavals, Margaret going through one of the most harrowing periods of her life.

But, it is from this period of time that Margaret starts to face up to her prejudices and when Higgins defeated from being out of work and unable to support his family comes up with the notion of moving to the South, since he has heard her praise it so often, she is able to give him a more rational picture than what her initial nostalgia had painted. And it is from this point of time that her pride allows her to face up to the growing respect and love she feels towards Thornton, but whose regard she might have lost forever by an act of secretiveness on her part.

Ms. Gaskell's prose is wonderfully dense, containing passages which ought to be ruminated at leisure. Unfortunately I'm not one of those readers who mark stuff as they read, else I would have added some here. She peppers her novel with realistic characters, even the secondary characters like the proud Mrs. Thornton and Higgins, and the mild Mr. Hale making their impact on the reader.

Margaret is a wonderful character, in the beginning full of youthful idealism and high principles which over the course of the novel are tempered to a better understanding of people. Thornton's character is more straight-forward, an honorable man known for plain speaking, in the beginning he considers himself unaccountable to his workers but Margaret's sympathy towards the workers helps him realize the value of opening a dialogue with them. And over the course of the book we get to know to know his thoughts concerning Margaret. A dialogue of his after he has proposed to Margaret and been rejected will probably stay with me a long time, it's so poignant.

"No one loves me,--no one cares for me, but you, mother."

I guess the only thing I dont like is that the author apparently believes in the school of hard knocks for her characters. Margaret undergoes one such trial by fire. At least I can vouch for North and South having a happy ending, expect some prolonged doom and gloom but it's not unalleviated.

Some of the questions and ideas Ms. Gaskell puts forward as to the relationships between management and laborers, the harsh nature of workers unions, religious faith and atheism were quite progressive for her time, as revealed through the prejudices of some of the characters. In fact, I would say that the novel has a certain symmetry to Pride and Prejudice, but with a lot more social and political commentary.

Fans of Austen and Classic literature will find this novel well worth the read.

As for the mini-series the good folks at BBC do know how to put them together dont they. It doesn't follow the book, but all these anal considerations (I should probably link to my rant over Knightley's P&P to better illustrate the craziness .... but I wont) slunk out the window once I set eyes on John Thornton. I believe I'm finally, finally over Colin Firth's Darcy. It's all about Richard Armitage now.

Sigh.

Review: Drop Dead Gorgeous

2009-06-22T22:32:00.000-05:00

Rating: 4 / 5

I've been on a historical fiction jag and just finished Murder Most Royal by Jean Plaidy. British history especially Henry the 8th and his 6 wives fascinate me and I've read (and watched) many versions of Tudor history. And no one can deny that the political and moral shenanigans of Henry's court make for some intense reading. Tired of all the beheading I wanted a very, very light read and picked Drop Dead Gorgeous by Linda Howard.

All Blair Mallory, survivor of multiple murder attempts, wants is to plan a perfect wedding with cop Wyatt Bloodsworth. Not a big, white wedding because she's already had that version, just a small one with friends and family on the perfect day and date, with the perfect dress, perfect shoes and the perfect cake. Wyatt, tired of her waffling, issues an ultimatum. Organize the wedding in a month or it's off to Vegas to get married. Which in Blair's world is just plain tacky. As she gets into high gear running around to get her shopping done, a near hit and run in a mall alongwith some good old-fashioned stalking cue Blair that she might conceivably have pissed someone else off and things are about to get ugly- dead ugly. And this time Wyatt's not buying it.

First things first, it took me all this time to get around to this book, because I knew it was written in first person and I'm not big on that whole POV. But, what can I say. Ms. Howard's (I should say Blair's) voice had me giggling within minutes of cracking the cover.

Blair is pretty high-maintenace, extremely manipulative and comes across as very shallow. But, she has a great relationship with friends and family and is smart as a businesswoman. And she does need to be a relatively strong personality to deal with Wyatt, an ex-pro-football-player- turned-cop who puts the alpha in alpha male. Her ongoing power struggle in her relationship with Wyatt had me in splits, both fight dirty and fight to win.

If you're lost with the alphaness, here's a scene. Blair is fighting with Wyatt to keep her last name. Obviously he's not backing down. But, a topic that would generally have me spitting mad is defused by Ms. Howard's fabulous brand of crazy; all I did was laugh and keep on laughing.

Not to be towered over, I got to my feet, too, scowling right back at him. Okay, so there's still the ten-inch difference in our heights, but I went on tiptoe and pushed my chin up so we were nose to nose. "Expecting me to change my name while you keep yours is archaic-"

His eyes were narrow, his jaw set, his lips a thin hard line that barely moved as he spit out words as if they were bullets. "In the animal kingdom, the male marks his territory by pissing on it. All I'm asking you to do is change your last name to mine. Take.Your.Pick."

The thing about Ms. Howard's romances are that I've yet to meet one of her cop heroes I didn't like, she writes them all as control freaks, extremely observant, slightly obnoxious, with oodles of sex appeal. Mould meet Wyatt. Cant say much about the good old brain cells though, since it should have been fairly obvious to the highly trained cop that Blair couldn't be lying. Ah well, who cares, I need my share of yumminess in my light reading and Wyatt hit all the required notes.

After the hit and run, the book goes through a slightly dull patch (a couple of pages) where we get to hear every single detail of Blair's day, I wouldnt have been surprised to see her pull out nail clippers at a certain point. But, once the stalker-type is completely established the action picks up pace and remains entertaining ... especially a scene with Blair, a patrol car, overbearing men and handful of notes.

So, finally, the perfect light read and all I can say is that when Ms. Howard is at the top of her game, she's great.

However, the biggest gripe I have is when publishers fail to advertise on their covers that the book is a sequel. I don't think I lost much but to an OC reader like myself, all my enjoyment for this book went out of the window because of the twitch I developed over reading Book 2 first. I overcame it (with difficulty) and do think it's a delightful book but if you are anything like me just get To Die For first.

Updated: Well, I read To Die For and it isnt as good as the sequel. I think Ms. Howard was able to more completely develop Blair's voice and character the second time around making for a funnier, better paced read. It might be a personal preferance too since I like reading about what happens to the characters after much more than I like reading about the courtship leading to the HEA. I'd give TDF 3 points, and I'm pretty sure if I had picked it up first I would never have read DDG.

Black 'n blue frozen yogurt sandwiches .....

2009-06-17T13:36:00.001-05:00

... are what happens after a night spent dreaming of ooey, gooey, cookies!

Them cravings! Some days you just gotta give in ....

Summer, strawberries ..... and yogurt yarns!

2009-06-08T18:10:00.001-05:00

We, i.e. the PapayaFamily with the exception of Mom is a little weird when confronted with milk and milk products of a particular texture and consistency. To be specific, we hate them. To be even more specific, we have been known to suffer from

a) involuntary shudders
b) crawling skin
c) hair-standing-on-back-of-neck-itis, or
d) all of the above
when given milk, dahi(yogurt), malai(cream), basundi, kheer, lassi, <insert any other milk derivative/product here>....

I'm the best of the lot since I can tolerate yogurt in raita form, love cheese (mmmm...paneer) and positively worship ice cream.

I know you're going rrrright, who hates icecream?

Well, the SiblingPapaya cried hysterically, with mouth open, when first introduced to ice cream until mom scraped the offending stuff off his tongue. He still eats ONLY vanilla icecream. Yup, he crazy, but I love his particular craziness. More for me when mom made it at home, you see. Before you get all jealous, can I add that he hates chocolates too. Actually make that EVERYthing sweet. Now, if only B would do the same .....

When I moved abroad and found myself facing row upon row of imaginatively flavoured (pomegranate?? tiramisu??? strawberry cheesecake???) yogurt the only thing I could do was avert my eyes and scuttle past the dairy section as quickly as possible.

But then, the first month at university we had a cross-culture day which was exactly what the name indicates. Some ladies asked me if it was true that Indians ate rice with yogurt. As I replied in the affirmative and noticed the disbelief (and some disgust) in the crowd, I tried to explain to women who had only ever eaten the sweet kind that we didnt bastardize the yogurt with flavours, ie. no strawberry yogurt with rice.

They didnt believe me, in fact the idea of salted yogurt seemed to be more of a turn off and I expect my ill-concealed shudders didnt help?!! I'm really NOT the best person to help people get over their yogurt phobias.

Actually, now that I think of it, besides Marmite, I believe yogurt is one of those food items that delineate people. There's the sweet yogurt lovers and the salted yogurt fans .... and ne'er the twain shall meet (unless you're Indian and have grown up rolling in the stuff).

Even Anthony Bourdain, has a 'not digging it' reaction to the salted kind (chaach, taak, buttermilk, or whatever you may call it) ....

.. forward to around the 8:22 mark.

Anyway, so this Papaya and flavored yogurt remained at cross purposes, until the day my metabolism turned traitor and I had to face the prospect of low-fat icecreams or doing without. And that's when frozen yogurt entered my orbit. Now, the saving grace of frozen yogurt (froyo) is that it looks like ice-cream and most importantly tastes like ice cream so the part of my brain that yells BLECHDOUBLEBLECH is actually silenced.

So, froyo and me have made our peace with each other, I cannot vouch for the other types. As proof-positive the picture below, if you ignore my scooping skills, is of the absolutely fabulous fresh strawberry & blueberry froyo (David Leibovitz's recipe) I made last week!! I'm proud of myself ... a life enhancing experience made all the more profound now that I can have my ice cream and eat it too - without any of the sharper guilt pangs!!

Now, the thing to do is to convert the rest of the nay-sayers. In my excitement, I called up Dad and explained about froyo and that I would make it for him. In the moment of silence that followed, I could hear his Bata slippers squeaking on the floor with his shudders and his brain grinding away as he started thinking up excuses why he couldnt travel anytime soon ..... :(

I know Smita shares the milk-hate .... what about the rest of you? Do you have any food aversions? Do tell ... I promise not to judge!!!

Review: Pride and Prejudice and Zombies

2009-05-29T17:52:00.002-05:00

Rating: 3 / 5

Pride & Prejudice & Zombies by Seth Grahame-Smith is a re-telling of Austen's classic, retaining almost 85% of the original but now with 'ultraviolent zombie mayhem'. I must admit when I first heard of it I was conflicted between excitement (I have a fondness for zombies) and being slightly outraged over what promised to be a bloody massacre of Austen's work. The picture on the cover decided me, as I got delicious chills down my spine from the combination of the lady in innocent-white Regency dress, blood-shot eyes and rotting flesh, I knew I had to read it.

To start with, it's the longest I've ever taken to read P & P (over 3 weeks) even though I laughed a bit over the course of the book. While most of the story is Austen's, Grahame-Smith's voice quickly becomes apparent when it inserts itself into the work. I must mention the hilarious illustrations added through the book, often with zombies, Elizabeth and sharp objects.

And so the premise is that England is stricken with a deadly plague that creates zombies or Unmentionables as they are known. The unmentionables have a fondness for soft, mushy brains and can infect humans with a bite. The militia are sent out to various regions in England to help the local population with the unmentionable menace. The Bennett sisters under the tutelage of Mr. Bennet

The business of Mr. Bennett's life was to keep his daughters alive. The business of Mrs. Bennet's was to get them married.

are a deadly trained team who have vowed to His Majesty to protect Hertfordshire from the plague. Their mother sees ample oppurtunities to get her girls married upon Mr. Bingley (and his battle-hardened friend Mr. Darcy) moving to the neighborhood. However, the Bennett's training under the Chinese masters of the Shaolin earns them the criticism and scorn of the Bingley sisters and Mr. Darcy who have been reared thinking that a "superior" training can be found only under the Japanese masters. Will the Bennett sisters find true love amidst all the violent Katana-wielding, zombie-bashing, ninja-fighting, vomit-strewn pages of this book?

We (and an admiring Mr. Darcy) get the first inkling of the deadliness of the Bennett sisters at the ball where Bingley and Darcy make their appearance and after Darcy has delivered his famous set-down to Elizabeth "She is tolerable, but not handsome enough to tempt me"... Elizabeth instantly desiring to avenge her honour reaches into her ankle boot to remove a dagger with which to slash Darcy's throat when the ballroom is attacked by unmentionables.

As guests fled in every direction, Mr. Bennett's voice cut through the commotion. "Girls! Pentagram of Death!"

Elizabeth immediately joined her four sisters, Jane, Mary, Catherine and Lydia in the center of the dance floor. Each girl produced a dagger from her ankle and stood at the tip of an imaginary five-pointed star. From the center of the room, they began stepping outward in unison - each thrusting a razor-sharp dagger with one hand, the other hand modestly tucked into the small of her back.

The dainty fighting pose made this bit paisa-vasool for me!

Grahame-Smith tends to get raunchy often, inserting scenes, some which have the capacity to hideously rend Ms. Austen's gentle, well-bred world for the reader forever. The following occurs when Lizzy is in Netherfield to help nurse Jane (who has caught a cold from battling zombies in the rain) and the party are gathered in a parlour where Miss Bingley questions Bingley's intention on throwing a ball at Netherfield warning that Darcy would not like one..

"I should like balls infinitely better," she (Miss Bingley) replied, "if they were carried on in a different manner."

"You should like balls infinitely better," said Darcy, "if you knew the first thing about them."

Elizabeth blushed and suppressed a smile-slightly shocked by his flirtation with impropriety, and slightly impressed that he should endeavour to flirt with it at all.

With all the violence here, it's not surprising that the consequences to people in this book are much more explicit than Austen's subtlety. For instance, Charlotte Lucas marries Mr. Collins because she is stricken by the plague and Wickham is rendered paralysed from the neck down as punishment for running away with Lydia while Lydia has to take care of a cripple for the rest of her life.

So, while not perfect (I would have been happier with it as an original work if it contained less of Austen's work), of all the pastiches that seek to take advantage of Ms. Austen's cash cow, I think I have enjoyed this the most. Atleast, it made me laugh.

Just finished reading ....

2009-05-22T09:16:00.001-05:00

.... Khaled Hosseini's 'A Thousand Splendid Suns'. As some of you might recall, I didnt like Kite Runner and it took me all this while to work up to the second book. While I wasnt much into the plot, I thought this was the better effort since I liked that it was set against the Afghanistan political backdrop and we got more of an account of political events this time around. However, the end, pretending that the country was just fine after 9/11 made me stop believing everything he had to say. And, that emotional connection that I require with a book just wasnt there.

The interesting thing I found was Hosseini's account of both Mariam's and Laila's feelings when they donned the burqa, both of them felt surprisingly secure and safe from prying eyes. I wonder if this is truly a woman's POV or something made up, because my instinctive reaction - as a woman- is to scoff wholeheartedly. That Laila who is as modern as an Afghani woman could be, being brought up by a progressive father, encouraged to study and forge her own way would have the same reaction as the more unsophisticated Mariam seems unbelievable to me. And the idea that anyone would willingly embrace the loss of freedom. But, maybe I am not sensitive enough to appreciate what the women have been through and where they are in their head.

Also, the thing that totally bugged me and took me right out of the book is the dialogue. In the beginning it wasn't so obvious, but the language quickly attains the cadence of Americanese "It's the whistling, the damn whistling, I hate more than anything", Rasheed saying 'You think?!' to someone at one point of time.

And what irritated me even more was the interspersing of Farsi thrown around in the book. I've said it before but I'll say it again. It does not work logically, because this is a work written in English, but the context is that the characters are Afghani and conversing entirely in Farsi. So, either they talk in Farsi all the time or they talk in English all the time. How can they talk in English with some random Farsi words thrown in? I might have been forgiving of the second language if there was a glossary of terms at the end, or if the words were entirely contextual.

I wont review since I said everything I wanted to say with the Kite Runner.

Have you guys read it? What did you think?

The Curse of the Pack Rat!

2009-05-12T18:54:00.000-05:00

Whew, we moved, finally!! It turns out that the books were the least of our problems. An overstocked kitchen was the worst. Even after donating away atleast 1 big box plus some little ones we were left with 5 boxes to carry over. To fit into a tiny kitchen, which will become overloaded if I add a handkerchief into one of the drawers.

B: Why do we have 200 glasses and 500 spoons for 2 people????

Harassed Mover (after spending 2 hours on a single cupboard): I feel as if someone underneath keeps pushing pans up as soon as I remove them.

CP (in her head ignoring all the bad vibes): La lala lalala

However, the breaking point came over the shoes and bags. Obviously, with all the high emotion involved, it wasn't the greatest week/ weekend.

So, just a quick not-so-disinterested poll for all you ladies (heck, let's hear from the men too), how many pairs of shoes do you own?? An actual count please, including even the tatty pair you wear only for gardening/ washing the dog. And bags???

Review: A Lady's Secret

2009-05-05T22:24:00.000-05:00

Rating: 3 / 5

In Jo Beverley's A Lady's Secret, Robin, the Earl of Huntersdown, is returning to England from Versailles when he comes across a swearing nun. Convinced that the beauty in nun costume is an adventuress, he offers to provide her an escort looking forward to some amusement over a long journey.

Petra D'Averio or Sister Immaculata, aforementioned nun, is at wits' end. Rejected by Milanese society since she is the bastard of an English lord, she has no friends to support her after her mother's death. She needs to find her father before her old lover Count Ludovico, can capture her. After meeting carefree and rakish Robin she's unsure if she's leaping from the frying pan into the fire. But, she accepts Robin's help and the rest is a sort of comedy of errors on the journey with villainous Italians, murderous peasants, a papillon dog and a hero and heroine whose secrets are revealed over the course of the journey.

The book was likable and entertaining enough that I didnt stop reading. It has some humorous moments, fun banter between the principals and a clever spin on an old nursery rhyme (Who Killed Cock Robin). But, I'm a bit tired of all the stereotypical contrivances of this genre. And I'm sick of rakes who spend the entire book lusting after the heroine or pages full of sexual innuendo only to suffer from instant regret once the deed is done.

The hero, Robin or Cock Robin is one of those beta heroes I think. Much like the crowing cock, he makes grand promises to the heroine to protect her and falls flat. Often. His only saving grace is he is charming. Petra is a good character, she's gutsy and well able to take care of herself. Since, Petra saves herself each time, it beats me why she is in love with Mr. Cocky. And then we have a married villain pursuing Petra across Italy, France and England only to make her his mistress. Illogical, much? Even Petra wonders why.

I've read Ms. Beverly's medieval romances before and they were good reads. If you want to start off with her, I'd say pick those up.

Review: Red Lily (In the Garden trilogy)

2009-05-01T22:37:00.001-05:00

Rating: 3 / 5

Red Lily is the third part of the In the Garden trilogy. Read the reviews for the first and second parts.

It's almost 6 months after the events of Black Rose. Things have settled down enough at the In the Garden nursery for Roz and Mitch to get married too. Hayley Phillips, Roz's poor cousin, many times removed, is feeling irritable and anxious under the June Tennessee sun. And downright hot whenever she comes across Roz's son, Harper. After circling each other for 2 years, Hayley finally makes her move, to find that Harper has been interested all along.

And of course, as with the previous books, the elements of love and passion combine to bring out the ghost's insanity, this time centered on Hayley and Harper. But, the ghost has learned new tricks, she can now possess Hayley, and she soon finds that she likes inhabiting a body ... a lot!! Can the 6 friends work together fast enough, to find Amelia's grave and ensure she gets the burial she deserves, before she seriously injures Harper and Hayley. And, to do that they have to find out what exactly happened at Harper House, way back in 1892.

Meh. That's my feeling after reading this book. When a ghost is more interesting than the primary couple in the romance, that's what you can expect. Just ... meh.

I think my problem was that even after 2 books, Harper and Hayley just weren't all that interesting to me. Hayley is very young, a great character in the other books, energetic and fun, but here she quickly gets overly emotional. The type who if taken to a nice hotel, gabs about being Cinderella and how no one has ever done anything as nice for her before etc etc, entirely too talkative, even for a book. And who says woo-hoo and awesome a lot.

Harper, it's difficult to get a handle on him. He's a loner, preferring his garden to people, but then you have him involved with a steady stream of women and little bits of sophistication like him sipping wine (sexily) when on a date with Hayley thrown in and he seemed too much a mix of all other Roberts heroes - Roarke, Logan etc for me to understand him. Like any young couple, they spend the majority of the book having misunderstandings and fighting, and that part seemed real to me. The way they resolved the misunderstandings, hmmm not so much.

With the trilogies I read before, Roberts made sure to keep the most interesting couple last, I remember the tension between the vampire and the other-world Princess to be so great that I practically inhaled two books to get the third in the Circle trilogy. I understand why they were last here, after having a baby in the first book Hayley obviously needs time to be interested in a relationship. But, while they were good side characters, they don't work so well at center stage. Add in that the final scene with the ghost was pretty cliche, straight out of a lot of horror books/ movies and I was quite disappointed. I always expect more out of Nora.

But, if you take the overall story binding three books together, you realize what a master Roberts is with pacing. The ghost which seems benevolent in the first part, gets truly unhinged and malevolent in the next two and Roberts keeps feeding us information about her along with the main romances without missing a beat. And the thing that I love best about her books, the family aspect, towards the end you truly get how these people have all come together to be one big, extended family. Characters are so well-defined that scenes like Hayley talking about Harper to his mother, which would have seemed eeky, have exactly the right voice.

And you have to admire Roberts ability to tie together all the gardening analogies with the story and character arcs of women from different generations. And her knowledge on the subject, even if I got cross-eyed reading about all the fecund pistils and swollen stamens. Ok, I'll stop now.

So, overall as a trilogy, it's about average. Do yourself a favor and dont read the books back to back. Sometimes the sentence structure and language can seem very repetitive.

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Series Order
1. Blue Dahlia
2. Black Rose
3. Red Lily

Review: Black Rose (In the Garden trilogy)

2009-04-25T19:40:00.001-05:00

Rating: 3.5 / 5

Black Rose is the second part of Nora Roberts' In the Garden trilogy.

At 45, Rosalind Harper, or Roz, the difficult and hard-headed owner of Harper House has come a long way. As a young widow, she raised 3 sons alone, suffered a traumatic second marriage and successfully started the In the Garden nursery which established her as a serious businesswoman in western Tennessee.

Black Rose starts about half a year after the events of Blue Dahlia. Stella and Logan are gearing up to get married and the summer and fall season have seen the ladies busy and with no time to think about the Harper Bride. Anyway, after the last confrontation where the Bride tells them her name is Amelia she seems to have settled down.

Enter Dr. Mitchell Carnegie who has finally wrapped up all his other work and starts to work full time on the Bride mystery. Mitch starts looking through the considerable history of the Harper family, but that doesnt rock the boat as much as his growing fascination with Roz the gardener, Roz the southern belle, Roz the businesswoman, Roz the maternal caregiver ..... Her family's attempts to pair her up with Mitch, who in Hayley's words is "Hello!! Hot!" doesn't pose much of a hardship for Roz either. And Amelia, of course, knows it. Roz and Mitch feel the brunt of Amelia's rage, now tinged with madness, since Amelia knows that they are trying to solve the mystery just that the answers don't seem to be coming fast enough.

After being so overly enthusiastic about Blue Dahlia, I was quite disappointed to find Black Rose to be a much tamer read. There's entirely too much gardening, and I have to admit I skimmed. But there were a couple of things I liked. First, I haven't read many romances with an older couple and this plot element was handled quite well here. Secondly, Mitch is a great character, very believable, flawed but smart and likable. Also, Roberts trademark, the H/H's interactions with their respective children were fun to read about.

My thoughts, it was a decent story, not great and lacking the romance aspect slightly. And some of the dialogue got a bit heavy handed and repetitive.

But, Amelia the ghost has started to anticipate some sort of closure for herself. Now, let's hope Book 3 delivers ....

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Series Order
1. Blue Dahlia
2. Black Rose
3. Red Lily

I love this song!

2009-04-22T14:40:00.000-05:00

The poem is taken from Gitanjali by Tagore ...

Fling out the old, bring in the new - just not yet!

2009-04-21T12:43:00.000-05:00

You know how some people love old books, the mustiness, the fact that other hands have lovingly thumbed through the same pages, the excitement if another reader has left notes in the margins. Yeah, I'm not one of those. For me, crisp white pages, unbroken spines, new book smell and being assured that I will treat them right according to my exacting standards, that's what I love. You can imagine how reluctantly I let people borrow my books. Or how I hate people who never return them.

The sad part is that I own a huge lot of used books. This comes from the time when B and I were students and buying used was the only way both of us could feed our habit.

Now, the good news is that we are moving into a much smaller apartment (yay btw, I cant tell you how sick I am of maintaining the current house) and we realized that we had absolutely no place to cart all the books we currently owned. Which meant that we had to donate quite a few. I'm not sad, this gave me the perfect excuse to remove a lot of deadweight from our library - we have books by Isaac Newton, Neitzsche, even Teach yourself Esperanto for heaven's sake and we havnt even cracked those covers, not to mention the countless books for our courses, work and so on and so forth.

So, I got a big box and was busily sprucing the bookshelves, additionally adding in all of my favorite used fiction, some whose spines had been lovingly taped together after they fell apart in my hands with repeated handling. Until B stopped by to see what I was doing. As I happily explained to him my rationale, getting rid of the old stock so I could buy them again new (see, for fiction, I only buy books I will reread endlessly, so if I was getting rid of something it would have to be replaced) his eyes started bugging at my (supposed) impracticality.

And the argument ended with all my stinky, musty, old books being loaded into the keeper boxes ....

I'm not convinced it was all that impractical anyway. If you start thinking about replacement books at $11 and more, then maybe. But the proportion of pleasure I would have got with shiny, new books would be infinite. Grouse.

What would you do, gentle reader? And do you prefer old books to new?

Review: Blue Dahlia (In the Garden trilogy)

2009-04-19T21:06:00.002-05:00

Rating: 5 / 5

If there's a word that gives me the heebie-jeebies it's 'gardening'. So, it's not that much of a surprise, knowing Ms. Roberts' penchant for research and delving into her subject matter that I stayed well away from her In the Garden trilogy. This weekend a whole lotta I-have-nothing-to-read saw me putting my hands on Book 1 in the trilogy, Blue Dahlia, and all I can think of right now is being at the library the first thing tomorrow so I can grab the next two books in the series.

Tragedy strikes Stella Rothchild when her husband's plane crashes leaving her a young widow with two little boys and depriving her of her best friend and ally. Wanting to get over the past and move closer to her father, she decides to move back to western Tennessee, to a new job as manager of the In the Garden nursery. Roz Harper, the demanding owner, loves her on the spot and has only one requirement - that Stella and her two kids move into her ancestral home, Harper House, so that Stella can be constantly available to deal with the day-to-day problems of the nursery.

Roz's open-hearted kindness towards Stella and her sons paves the way for the start of a promising friendship between the three women who live at Harper House, Stella, Roz and Roz's young relative, Hayley who is soon expecting a new baby. Stella loves being close to her family and soon her efficiency, planning and organisational skills start showing results in the nursery's day-to-day revenue. The only fly in the ointment is Logan Kittridge, Roz's brilliant and expensive landscape designer. And her sons' friendly acceptance of a golden-haired, sad-eyed woman who comes into their bedroom and sings lullabies to them as they sleep. Apparently, Harper House's resident ghost, the Harper Bride has decided to make friends with the boys too.

After Logan and Stella get their initial differences out of the way, realise they are intensely attracted to each other and start to think about actually having a relationship together, they seem to antagonise the ghost. Once friendly, they are now treated to blasts of her disapproval and when Logan almost gets knocked head-over-heels over a balustrade the friends decide that they have to find out who the Bride is and what makes her tick. And perform an exorcism of sorts. With Roz's son Harper helping, they rope in genealogist Dr. Mitchell Carnegie when it appears the Bride will do anything to keep Stella and Logan apart, to the extent of keeping her away from her kids, raising the hackles on Stella's maternal instincts .....

I cant get over how amazing this book is. A perfectly easy read, the relationships are what makes it click. Everyone here works and sounds exactly right. From Stella's father and step mother, to the 6 and 8 year old boys, to the live-in housekeeper, to the primary protagonists.

When Stella is first introduced, the author has her putting a plastic protector over the pages of her recipe book. As my own poor, splattered, recipe books will bear witness, I was thinking that Stella had to be this amazingly organised, super efficient, perfectly planned, crazy (in my book) woman. But, Roberts develops her character without making her irritating to the reader.

Stella has had a very stable, loving relationship with her first marriage. It takes her a couple of years to find her feet and I can imagine that she deals with having two absolutely mischievous little boys and holding a job by being as regimented as possible. Having a ditz for her mother is what probably gave her the start though. Stella's planned efficiency suffers a serious roadblock when she encounters chaotic, messy Logan and the sparks fly when they come together. I loved that Stella's first marriage was a very happy one and she was the one hesitant into going forward, of course she has to put the boys first, while Logan is sure of what he wants immediately. Such a pleasant divergence from my current reading list.

And, the men are all delicious as always. I have a crush on the name Logan (yes people do!) after Hugh Jackman made it his own, and what can I say, Roberts references it. With 2 little boys can comic books be far behind and once again I found myself marveling over Roberts' innate instinct for what works in her books.

For those still on the fence, yes, there's enough growing and planting and mulching to make this Papaya turn yellow, but the detail never takes away from the story and the story is where the heart is. Go read it. Right now.

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Series Order
1. Blue Dahlia
2. Black Rose
3. Red Lily

Review: The Black Dagger Brotherhood Series

2009-04-14T01:11:00.003-05:00

So much for the anti-vampire rant. After the last post I had vampires on the brain, was browsing for something new to read, laid my hand on Lover Revealed, a novel in the Black Dagger Brotherhood series by author J.R. Ward and proved myself a liar.

I consider the BDB to be a guilty pleasure. I cannot tell you how many times I groaned at the stuff coming out of the character's mouths (You feel me, my brother?) or how I laughed myself silly at the characters' names when they were introduced (Wrath, Tohrment, Rhage, Vishous) ... you see the cringe-factor here??

But, I still kept reading, because the vampires were intriguing, the romance was hot and Ward's fictional world in Caldwell, NY entirely too much fun!! After LR, I immediately got the first book in the series and I havnt stopped yet. Apparently the initial idea was to have a 10 book series, book 7 will release in 2009, however the genre of the novels have changed. Book 7 has been acknowledged by the author to be urban fantasy (??) rather than paranormal romance. Here's the synopsis:

In Caldwell, NY, vampires exist along with humans who are unaware of their existence. Vampires are a species created by their goddess the Scribe Virgin (oy this obsession with virgins as deities), they are born and cannot be made from humans. The Scribe Virgin's opposite is the Omega, created to bring a balance to the world and he leads vampire slayers called the lessers, human undead who have given up their souls devoted to killing the vampires.

For survival, the vampires started selectively breeding until a sub-species of the strongest vampires was formed, called the Black Dagger Brotherhood, who have the responsibility of protecting the civilian vampires from the Lessening Society. The vampires and lessers have only one point they agree upon, their existence MUST be kept a secret from the humans around them.

Vampires cannot survive on human blood which is too weak, they need the blood of another vampire to sustain them. Here's where it gets murky for me, apparently the blood has to be from a member of the opposite sex? Something like that. The vampires, civilian or brother, in the pretrans state (until the age of 25) are lesser bait - short, scrawny, weak, asexual. When the transition hits them their bones break at the joints and elongate, they become huge, muscled, self-healing monsters capable of annihilating lesser butt. This is for the males, I have no idea with the female transitions.

The BDB currently contains 6 brothers, all of them leather wearing, substance-abusing, gangster talking, rap-listening, tattoed and scarred - emotionally and physically, highly trained, fast healing killing machines. I know, I know, but stick with me here, I promise you'll have fun. The first 6 books are their stories.

The Bad: Ward is heavily obsessed with namedropping (Grey Goose, McD's, BMWs), designer wear (Hermes, Gucci) and every single character spouts slang. I have to say the slang irritates me (shitkickers, thank fuck????) as does the author's pretension that adding an 'h' in italics creates a completely different language (sehclusion, cohntest). Ms. Ward, I love your books, I really do but the verbal distractions are killing me!!

The lessers as the source of conflict are dull dull dull. I dont think there's a way to make clumsy undead who smell of baby powder interesting and Ward doesn't try since she gives us an interchangeable cast of lessers over the course of the first 5 books. Additionally, Ward's complex characterisations end with the brothers, most of her heroines are ill-developed and unidimensional. Including the Scribe Virgin who has to be the most inconsistent, demanding, anti-feministic, unlikeable deity ever! And the world building isnt consistent, plot holes abound. I realise that the number of factors I have against these books are huge, but I AM addicted. Now that that's off my chest, let's just move on, shall we ....

Dark Lover Rating: 5 / 5
Wrath, the last of the purebred vampires, vampire king and hater of humans is approached by one of his Brothers, Darius to help his half-breed daughter Beth Randall make her transition. Darius dies soon after making the request, and Wrath after initially refusing, is forced into making contact. Beth a journalist, is good friends with most of Caldwell's PD esp. homicide detective Butch O'Neal.

When the cops start to investigate the bomb that killed her father they eye with suspicion the overloaded-with-weapons-gangster-type hanging around Beth and the plethora of murders which seem to follow him around. With the cops looking for him, a new fore-lesser recouping his forces to go on another offensive against the Brotherhood, his jilted ex-wife Marissa's brother Havers who is determined to avenge his sister and the Scribe Virgin who wishes Wrath to assume the role of the King, Wrath must find a way to protect Beth, help her be born again as a vampire, acknowledge the intense attraction that lies between them and wrap his mind around the ascension to the throne and possibly a new Queen.

Until I tried to condense the story, I didnt realise how many plot elements there actually are here. It's also the main reasons why I like these books, because Ward develops all her characters so well, the plot is involving and there's so many POVs. We're never stuck with just the romance bit of the story, which moves at a fast pace btw.

Wrath has an adequate amount of trauma for being a centuries old vampire, he has problems with trust and emotional attachment which he has to work around to finally acknowledge his love for Beth while Beth has her own dealing to do with the sudden appearance of a father she never knew existed, the knowledge that she is half vampire and the fact that she could die with her transition. The rest of the brothers, Marissa and Butch are also given some time here as setups for the rest of the books. All in all, a fast-paced enjoyable read.

Lover Eternal Rating: 3.5 / 5
Rhage, the strongest and most dangerous of all the warriors, is drop dead gorgeous but underneath the superficiality which attracts scores of women to him and has made him vampire legend, lies a lonely man looking for love and bearing a burden only the rest of the Brothers know about. For Rhage is part man and part beast. Cursed by the Scribe Virgin he is doomed to turn into a monster whenever his emotions become unstable, a beast capable of harming both friend and foe.

Mary Luce is a survivor, she tended her mother through a debilitating illness, works with autistic children and has recently been informed that the cancer she spent battling has returned. Mary's work at a suicide prevention hotline brings her in contact with an angelic young man, John Matthew, a mute, traumatised orphan who seems too fragile to be alone in the world. John Matthew visits Mary at home where he is seen by her vampire neighbor Bella who immediately realises what the young man is. When Mary's services are needed as translator for John she finds herself in the BDB's mansion and suddenly being the target of attention of the most attractive man she has ever laid eyes on, for plain and outspoken Mary is the only one able to tame Rhage's monster.

DL I inhaled in one go, LE for me was a lukewarm book which moved along a tad sluggishly. Mary and Rhage didnt feel like fully developed individuals, both being defined by their respective curses. Rhage was sweet in the beginning, roaming around with a silly grin on his face just because Mary lets him in her house and their love story has a particular poignancy with Mary having a very limited time left to her. But, ultimately all the wallowing in self-pity from both parties lost any empathy I had developed. And I hate couples who cannot communicate.

But I wasnt bored and I wasnt indignant. Alongwith the main romance, the lessers ran around being ineptly murderous and the John Matthew track was interesting, John gets adopted by the Brother Tohr and his wife Wellsie. And, the book had a fabulous buildup for the next one in the series with Bella and Zsadist - I'm SUCH a sucker for Beauty and the Beast stories.

Lover Awakened Rating 4 / 5
Zsadist, the most terrifying of the brothers has an awful reputation. He massacres lessers, kills humans for feeding and can only be with a woman if she is terrified of him. All his emotions and his feelings have been ripped out of him in the century he spent being a blood slave, from which he was ultimately rescued by his twin Phury. Phury, who lives only for Zsadist, had spent his entire life looking for his lost brother, took a vow of celibacy and shot his leg off for Z.

Bella encounters Zsadist in the Brotherhood's mansion and is instantly mesmerised. After she approaches him, Zsadist rejects her even extracting a promise that she wont approach him anymore. But, Bella is then captured by the lessers and Zsadist finds himself almost driven mad by the compulsion he has to find her and punish the lessers who dared lay their hands on her.

LA is a good story of Z's awakening to first trust then intimacy to the two people he loves but hasn't been able to express his love to - Phury and Bella. The lessers have a new strategy for finding out about the Brotherhood, they capture civilians and torture them for information. With the capture of Bella though, a lesser becomes obsessed with her and wants her for his wife. Once she is rescued the war takes a new turn as he tries every means possible to get her back.

So, LA was a great read since having the lesser with some solid motivation introduced a good source of conflict. Also, Phury, John Matthew, Rehvenge Bella's half-breed vampire and sympath brother now have their own stories building up here. While Z's story arc leading to intimacy was believable, I didnt feel the romance so much. Which is the reason for the missing point.

Lover Revealed Rating: 3 / 5
Butch O'Neal, homicide detective for Caldwell PD has been living an empty life until he hooks up with the Brotherhood. Estranged from family and friends, the hard-drinking and hard-living have taken a toll on him. As has the unrequited love he feels for a female vampire.

Marissa is everything he has ever dreamed of, she's vampire aristocracy, rich, beautiful and delicate, completely out of his league. When Butch while trying to rescue a civilian from the lessers is captured, tortured and left for dead, Marissa and his roomate Vishous are the only people who can save him. Marissa with her love and V who is the yin to his yang, the light to his dark.

I didnt enjoy LR as much as the other books, the sole problem being the lead pair. Butch is a stereotypical cop but that didnt bother me until he took up with Vanilla Marissa. Ever since her intro in Dark Lover and the whole virginal act she put up there she seemed one of the TSTL heroines. Plus, the pages with Butch and V fairly sizzle their chemistry is so hot, Marissa seems like an audience-appeasing third wheel here. Whine. But we get to know V better which ups the rating in my book.

Lover Unbound Rating: 2.5 / 5
Vishous, resident clairvoyant and computer genius, is having a meltdown after Butch hooks up with Marissa. Consumed by jealousy and abandonment and a nagging worry that his visions of the future have dried up V takes his aggressions out with a lot of hard sex and hard fighting. He gets shot and lands in Dr. Jane Whitcomb's operating theatre. V instantly feels a connection with Jane while she is fascinated by her new patient - with the 6-chambered heart, fanged mouth and healing powers beyond the ordinary.

But, V has to be able to lay his murky past with a violent, abusive father at rest as well as the demands of the Scribe Virgin that he be the Primale (wed ~40 of the SV's followers, or Chosen) before he and Jane have a shot at being together.

I have to say I didnt like this book. V was my favorite among the brothers (probably because I came in with LR) and I was so angry that he never got a chance at a HEA. He and Jane had a great story arc going, Jane is aggressive from being a trauma surgeon and capable of handling the intensity that is V and both prepared to deal with the fact that Jane would grow old and die and I thought it was realistic and very well portrayed.

Instead, as with all the other books with human love interests, Ward introduces a twist, which I hated .... I'm a traditional kind of gal, this is why I stick to the historicals!!!! I think I would have been much happier if V and Butch ended up together. Much. And I havnt even started on the doormats-as-Chosen track or the angsty, boring John Matthew and friends track.

Lover Enshrined Rating: 3 / 5
Phury who sacrificed himself in LU to become the Primale of the species has brought the Chosen Cormia over to the other side so he can get to know her better. But, with Phury's spiraling descent into addiction and the new turn that the war against the lessers takes with the birth of the vampire son of the Omega it looks as if there will never be a chance to be together. And there's also the problem of the 40 additional mates. With the Lessening Society engaging in an all-out offensive against the vampires and as widespread destruction and horror ensues, Phury comes to realise that it is only Cormia who can silence the demons in his head.

So, poor, noble Phury gets cheated out of a romance even worse than V but honestly both Phury and Cormia are so boring together and apart that I couldnt care. What did sustain my interest is all the other action that is here - Rehvenge is being blackmailed by a sympath Princess, the teenage vampires John Matthew, Blaylock and Quinn surprisingly become strong allies in the war, John Matthew and Xhex (another sympath) have an attraction going on, the Omega's son and a dreary little fore-lesser are running around mucking things up on a much larger scale than before, the Scribe Virgin and her daughter and her Chosen are more fully dealt with, Tohr comes back with a fallen angel ... Ward's paranormal world just gets more crowhded. Heh.

As a transition book from the romance to the UF realm this worked for me, though Ward has now created such a huge cast of characters it remains to be seen if she can do justice to all in the following books. I certainly missed all my old favorites Wrath, Beth, V etc in this one. And I did miss the romance a teeny, tiny bit...

So, while I didnt care for Phury's addiction theme (author's please note - A Drug Addict Does Not A Romance Hero Make), the further development of Ward's world is what made this a good read for me. I know I'll definitely read the next one in the series to see where the author is going to take this series.

Lover Avenged - Rehvenge's story - reviewed here.

Lover Mine - John Matthew and Xhex's story - reviewed here.

Review: Death Angel

2009-03-24T16:50:00.000-05:00

Rating: 1 / 5

Drea Rousseau is a gangster's moll. She's lived for 2 years with Rafael Salinas, a drug smuggling crime-lord, convincing him of her stupidity and her absolute devotion to him, all the while ensuring that she puts by enough money for a secure future when she wont have her looks to trade on. She thinks she has Salinas where she wants him, until Salinas makes a little deal with an assassin he hires. As a reward for a job well done, he agrees to give Drea to him for a couple of hours. Drea, humiliated and in a furious rage swears to make Salinas pay and runs away. With 2 million dollars of his money. Salinas hires the same assassin to kill her, but as the hitman hunts her down neither he nor Drea have an inkling of how radically their lives are going to change.

It's pretty difficult reviewing this novel, without giving a lot of the story away. The rest of the book follows Drea's footsteps as she chases after the money with little side trips into Salinas, the assassin's, some FBI detectives' heads and all the dull details about banking and finance you never knew and could care less about. And a miracle in the middle of the novel which sets up both characters for their ultimate redemption.

I consider Linda Howard to be a hit-or-miss author, when she's good she's unputdownable, but unfortunately has a lot of turkeys too. Considering what it is about her novels I like, I think along with the decent writing and humor I like that she creates strong characters. In fact, one of her books Cover of the Night, has a thoroughly implausible storyline - a handful of goons besiege an entire American town - I still liked it immensely because I liked the lead pair and all the sundry characters of the town.

So, where this book fails is in the premise, creating believable characters whose moral rescue and redemption the reader understands, is involved in and is rooting for. And it's even more dissociative for the reader when the hero is nameless for almost a third of the story. Drea started off as a good character, pretending to be a blond bimbette but actually a shrewd, smart woman who looks out only for herself. But I found it hard to believe that such a street-smart character fell in love, with an assassin no less, over a few hours of sex. And the hero's motivations were even less apparent to this reader. To get the two together Howard employs a spiritual/ psychic plot device which brought the book to a grinding halt for me, and I could only skim thereafter.

I guess that's about all I can discuss without going into major spoilers. The rating is so low because Howard does have some truly good romances out there.

If you are a new reader some of her better titles are Dying to Please, Cover of the Night ... hmm, I'll add more when I think of them. Dont pick up Shades of Twilight, Open Season or this one :)

The week in diet!

2009-03-22T21:01:00.001-05:00

I'd be the first person to tell you that crash diets dont work. In fact, my recommended tried and tested method of losing weight is calorie control. But, with me needing to lose some excess weight by the end of March and only a week to do it in I figured the GM diet/ Cabbage Soup Diet was the diet to go on. Additionally, a friend recently got great results following the same, and I'm gullible that way....

I've done this diet before and lost approx 9 lbs in 1 week (the diet says you will lose between 7-10 lbs in the week) .... and gained 5 lbs back on day 8 when I binged. And developed a 6 month aversion to apples and bananas. So, this time I knew I had to be better organized so that I wouldnt repeat myself. So, here's my notes and plans. Do note that this diet should only be followed for the recommended 7 days and not repeated in a month. Also, I dont endorse any diets, this is just a log of my experience. Please take the claims of the link above with a heavy dose of skepticism. The diet works through starvation and lowering your calorie intake, so I doubt it is healthy.

For me,

1) I knew from my previous experience that I had to plan every meal. Just because it lists fruits and vegetables thinking you can just eat them raw when hungry is misleading. My aversion to certain foods also developed because I didnt take care to have a large variation of fruits & veggies on hand. So, first, plan every meal and shop for the entire week. Also, a very important thing to remember is cook the foods you like, now is not the time to try any exotic untried stuff.

2) You are supposed to make cabbage soup which can be eaten any time of the day in virtually unlimited quantities. The cabbage soup recipe listed sounds pretty horrible. I knew I wouldnt be able to eat it, so I made my own veg soup and ate it for 4 days without getting tired of it. The recipe I followed is here. It freezes well too so if you are sick of it you can always eat it later.

3) Even though you are eating plain meals, make sure you add lots of flavour so you dont feel like you are compromising your meals. Garlic, ginger, spices, condiments are your friends and are allowed on the diet.

4) I would recommend starting it on a Saturday or when you have some days off because I experienced the most weakness on the first 2 days of the diet.

5) The diet recommends drinking 8 glasses of water. I didnt count but I drink a lot of water every day so I kept at the same.

6) My goal was to follow the diet without feeling like I am compromising on food so that after the week was over any weight would remain lost and I wouldnt binge. So, I didnt follow the diet completely but made little adjustments that I dont think added too many calories overall.

Day 1: All fruits except bananas. Your first day will consist of all the fruits you want.

Weighed myself.

Ate a quarter watermelon for breakfast. Lunch was 2 apples+2 pears+1 tsp. honey+cinnamon zapped in microwave for about a minute and a half until the juices started flowing. A great addition to this would be peaches, nectarines, any fruit which can be baked. Felt weak and light-headed during the day so in the afternoon I ate a quarter cup rice with moong dal (yellow lentils). Headache went away immediately. Some grapes around tea time and for dinner 1 small serving butternut squash soup with 5 croutons.

Reccos: Cook fruits in the microwave to whatever level of firmness you like. You can make a fruit salad, or a fruit smoothie with a dollop of non-fat yogurt. For pineapples or grapefruits - Cut the fruit into small pieces, finely chop 1 green chilly, finely chop coriander leaves. Mix together.

Day 2: All vegetables. You are encouraged to eat until you are stuffed with all the raw or cooked vegetables of your choice. There is no limit on the amount or type. For your complex carbohydrate, you will start day two with a large baked potato for breakfast. You may top the potato with one pat of butter.

Same weight as previous day.

1 Baked potato w. a yogurt topping. Ok, baked potatoes are seriously overrated, mine was mealy, maybe I baked it too long? Lunch and dinner was a bowl of chinese stir-fry. 1 cup of soup during the day. Also, drank tea (no sugar, dash of milk) with 3 digestive biscuits. Felt light-headed and and weak again during the day, but the stir fry was tasty and satisfactory. Had no cravings.

Chinese Stir-Fry: Heat 1 tsp oil in a wok. Add minced ginger and garlic and fry till aromatic. Add vegetables (bok choy, mushrooms, carrots, brocolli, french beans, tofu etc) and stir fry them on high heat for 2-3 mins. Season with soy sauce. Take off heat and add scallions and toasted sesame seeds.

Reccos: Try a tofu scramble - small amount of tofu scrambled with onions, garlic, spinach, tomatoes, mushrooms. Roast/grill portabello mushrooms, onions, bell peppers and eat tossed with olive oil and balsamic vinegar.

Day 3: A mixture of fruits and vegetables of your choice. Any amount, any quantity. No bananas yet. No potatoes today.

Lost 1 lb.

Breakfast was a quarter cup dry lentil prep (moong dal) with pumpkin added. Lunch was a large bowl of butternut squash soup with croutons and 2 fat-free crackers. Evening tea + 2 digestives. Dinner was a fruit salad of grapes, 1 apple, 2 pears and 2 oranges. Was very busy through the work day so did not notice any exceptional weakness or headaches as per previous day. No food cravings either.

Reccos: Vary whatever you cooked on previous day so you dont feel like you are eating the same thing.

Day 4: Bananas and milk. Today you will eat as many as eight bananas and drink three glasses of milk. This will be combined with the special soup which may be eaten in limited quantities.

Gained 0.5 lbs :(

Breakfast was 2 bananas+blueberries+almond+chocolate milk shake with a dollop of yogurt for creaminess. Had the same shake in the evening instead of tea. 2 Bananas eaten during the day. Soup for lunch and dinner with croutons. No weakness but suffered a stomach upset.

Reccos: Try different flavours of milkshakes as listed above. A variation is an Indian prep called shikran - mash the bananas a little bit, add milk to it and cardamom powder. My mom would also add sugar but I dont think it's needed. The milk to bananas should feel like eating cereal.

Day 5: You will eat beef and tomatoes. Eat two 10 oz. portions of lean beef. Hamburger is OK. Combine this with six whole tomatoes.

Same weight as previous day.

No time for breakfast, lunch and dinner was 2 cumin crusted chicken breasts (I added 1 tsp. chilli powder to the recipe because I need some heat with my food) with huge quantities of tomato relish (added pepperoncinis to recipe) as side. Chicken was delicious and very satisfying. Stomach was perfectly fine the entire day.

Reccos: I know it says hamburger is ok, but if you have problems with controlling yourself around food eating a burger without the buns can lead to some serious cravings. So, my point, dont try it. For variations on the tomatoes, try frying them like they are served in the English breakfasts. Make a virgin bloody mary. Or stir-fry beef with onions, tomatoes and black pepper powder.

Day 6: Beef and vegetables. Today you may eat an unlimited amount of beef and vegetables. Eat to your hearts content.

Lost 2 lbs.

Breakfast was 1 cup of tea with 2 digestives. Lunch was 1 small slice of meatloaf with stir-fried veggie leftovers from Day 2 and a roasted tomato-red pepper-parsley sauce for the meatloaf. Evening - I had 1 cup of coffee w. 1 tsp. sugar and 2 digestives. Dinner was a meatloaf sandwich with the remainder of the stir-fry as a side.

So, I did badly this day. It's only because while I found a really nice recipe for meatloaf, I forgot that I HATE it. So, I couldnt eat any of the nice lunch I spent about an hour prepping and cooking and had to fill myself up with the veggies. Felt weakish, though this was probably because of my disappointment with the food so added sugar to my coffee to fortify myself. And since I had a mountain of leftovers I put another small slice between bread just to make myself eat it. And unfortunately my soup got over on day 4 and I was too lazy to make any more.

Day 7: Today your food intake will consist of brown rice, fruit juices and all the vegetables you care to consume.

Same weight as previous day.

Ginger tea in the morning and evening with 2 crackers each time. Lunch was a vegetable fried rice w. broccoli, carrots, snap peas, mushrooms, bell peppers, scallions, ginger+garlic. Dinner same fried rice with a side of stir-fried bok choy with cashews. Also drank a grapefruit+orange+lemon juice in the afternoon. No after-effects or weakness or headaches or cravings. Feeling light and happy weight-wise.

Day 8:

Same weight as Day 7.

So, the net result was I lost 2.5 lbs. Yeah, I was pissed initially, the bad vibes starting on day 4 itself. But, on reflection I realise it's because I dont have much weight to lose. I'm 5'3" and 119 lbs which is normal. When I did this before I was carrying some excess weight which is why I saw the more dramatic weight loss. So, basically this just means that the amount of weight loss depends on how much you have to lose.

You know with research how even if you dont get results, it qualifies as a step forward because you just proved a theory isnt possible. Well, if you are thinking of this diet, I hope it will give you an idea if it will work for you or not.

For me I realize that instead of weight loss what I really wanted to do is tone my body. Which means getting my lazy ass off the couch and into the gym. Sigh.

Alien: Resurrection and Firefly/ Serenity

2009-03-20T21:50:00.002-05:00

B got the Alien Quadrilogy for his birthday this year. As an aside, if you are an Alien fan, this DVD set is a great buy. So anyway, the 4th Alien movie is completely different from the rest in terms of tone and sci-fi action and as we kept watching some of the gags unfold I felt this odd deja vu. It hit me a minute later. Albeit darker in tone, the crew of the pirate ship from Aliens could be dead-ringers for the crew of Firefly. There's the same group dynamic, the same humor in the script, even a basketball court on both ships.

	Alien 4	Firefly
Space Pirate ship	Betty	Serenity
Hunky Captain	Elgyn	Mal
Soldierly female second	Hillard/Ripley(maybe)	Zoe
Mercenary crew member	Johner	Jayne
Fragile Mechanic	Annallee Cal	Kaylee
Released	1997	2002
Writer	Joss Whedon	Joss Whedon

Hi, I'm couchpapaya and I'm a nerd .......

Free stuff ....

2009-03-18T20:22:00.001-05:00

and this Papaya get along very well ... eHarlequin is giving away 16 romance ebooks for free.

Enjoy!

Review: Death in Holy Orders

2009-03-12T10:40:00.000-05:00

Rating: 3 / 5

When I started reading Elizabeth George I noticed that other reviewers compared her to PD James all the time. I've read James before (Children of Men), but never got around to reading her mystery series with New Scotland Yard detective Adam Dalgliesh and I figured it was time to pick one up.

Death in Holy Orders is actually book number 11 in the mystery series.

After the accidental death of an ordinand, Ronald Treeves, in St. Anselm's an elite theological college on a remote section of the Suffolk coast, his father unconvinced goes to New Scotland Yard for help in uncovering the truth behind the boys death.

Commander Adam Dalgliesh who has lived at St. Anselm's for a few summers in his youth and has fond memories of the place offers to look into the death on his visit to Suffolk. When he arrives there he learns that the college is hosting a couple of guests for the weekend besides a few ordinances and the resident priests.

If ever there was a case of World's Worst Guests, you'll find it here. There's Archdeacon Crampton who is trying to get St. Anselms shut down, Father Sebastian Morell who has worked very hard to acieve his position as head of St. Anselms and intends to keep it that way. There's Inspector Yarwood who was the examining officer in charge of the suicide of Crampton's first wife. There's Father John who Crampton succeded in putting into prison over charges of sexual abuse and ordinand Raphael Arbuthnot who hates Crampton for what he did to Father John. And there's Arbuthnot and Dalgliesh squaring off over Dr. Emma Lavenham who has arrived to conduct her semi-annual seminars on poetry at the college.

It isnt surprising with this setup that tensions run high, tempers are frayed, emotions are shredded and the murder of one of the guests makes it clear to Dalgliesh that a subtle mind is at work. As Dalgliesh and his team start to investigate they uncover a number of surprising secrets of this small group of unlikely suspects.

Having read both authors it is unsurprising that George is compared to James. Here's the same approach to telling a mystery, delving into the psychologies of the motley group of characters until a motive starts to emerge. I think I prefer James going by this book since with her latter novels George has started delving and padding a bit too much.

Being my first Dalgliesh novel, I enjoyed it quite a bit. James' writing is strong, very descriptive, her characters are interesting and while the ultimate mystery and solution may have been slightly weak it did not diminish my enjoyment of wallowing in her artfully created theological universe.

What did diminish my enjoyment is the character of Father John, a man convicted of paedophilia, who unaccountably gets a very sympathetic treatment from all the characters, except Crampton. Paedophilia is a serious crime and I did not like to see it treated as something which should be acompanied by a slap on the wrist and the person who put the criminal behind bars as someone who hounded a poor, weak old man into prison.

Back and forth on this one. I think I'll recommend with 3 points.

Let there be vampires!

2009-03-03T12:43:00.001-06:00

I dont like vampires much. The Bram Stoker and Stephen King vampires were downright scary, and while Anne Rice's wonderfully graphic and philosophical Vampire Chronicles were intriguing enough, it wasnt until Hollywood made Rice's vision *ing Tom Cruise, Brad Pitt and Antonio Banderas, fanged, long-locked, in period costumes and frankly mouthwateringly gawh-gus that I began to rethink my aversion. I watched the movie with wide eyes, slack-jaws, flushed cheeks and maybe even the hint of drool pooling at the corners of my mouth. Cruise as the Vampire Lestat still retains a special place in my imagination.

But that was it wrt vamps until about a year and a half ago I started reading romance. And noticed a trend among the staid bookshelves of my library. Apparently, while I was in the mystery aisles, vampires had become pop culture phenomena, they were sexy and nobody was bothered by blood breath ala Count Dracula anymore. The paranormal romances outnumbered all the other romance genres being stocked and checked out, vampires had even invaded chick-lit, while the teen market was catered to by shows like Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel.

I'm not that interested in vampire romance mainly because most of them follow the formula of centuries-old vamp meeting the love of his life in a modern woman. Most romance genres are unrealistic towards propagating the stereotype of true love and soulmates, but the immortal who mopes or broods around until said partner appears is difficult for me to stomach. And frankly it seems very lonely too. Not to mention all the sucking and slurping of blood (one wonders which STD class people missed). But I digress.

So, anyway, since it looked like the adults and teen markets were already cornered along came writer Stephanie Meyer who felt that the tweenie age group deserved some of the fun too and penned the Twilight saga, a series which has enjoyed success much like Rowlings' Potter series. Obviously, with all the hype I had to check it out and finally, a couple of weeks ago, I received my copy of Twilight...And was appalled. Meyer's writing is terrible, there is no character development, no dialogue, no action, no impetus to the story.

The story of Twilight is as follows: Bella Swan moves to Forks, Washington to live with her father and is attracted to Edward Cullen, who just happens to be a vampire. Bella and Edward take one look at each other and know they are meant to be together .. the forewer and ewer kinds. There's just the little problem of Edward wanting to kill Bella, more specifically drink her blood, each time he smells her.

And therein lies the conflict of the story touted to have the greatest pair of lovers since Romeo and Juliet. The rest of the story goes on with mundane experiences, Bella meeting Edward's family, enjoying a game of vampire baseball (Quidditch-Fidditch phhooey, we have a real-life game here), being bratty to her friends and ultimately being in some minor, blink-and-you-miss-it danger because she now hangs with the vamps and just smells so goood.

Ms. Meyer reduces her characters to cardboard cutouts with animal instincts - Bella exuding the pheromones that attract the male, while Edward, much like a male peacock or more accurately a carnivorous flower has all the flamboyant physical attributes to make him a successful in attracting her. Intellectual stimulation doesnt play any part in this couple's courtship. So, Bella loves Edward for being beautiful, he sparkles, people (cho pwetty)!! While Edward loves Bella for smelling good. Also, Bella's character is awkward, whiny, selfish, and cannot lift a finger for herself. This is a character who has to have the seat-belt fastened for her and constantly be told when to eat and drink.

There's a lot written about how the books are anti-feminist, abusive and narrow minded with the values and examples she is setting with her characters' behavior and her writing. Parents value Meyer's writing because she apparently (like the Bush government's policies) preaches abstinence, but I don't like the way she endorses it, literally it's do AND die. Again lots of criticism can be found online so I wont go into that - let's just say I agree.

Anyway, I found that I kept reading it just because the story is likeable. The big disconnect for me came towards the end when Bella starts to nag Edward constantly to kill her so she can be with him forewer and .... right we've been here before. And I was shocked to find a character with no goals or aspirations other than suicide in a book purportedly for kids, whatever be the justification - the most popular one being it's mind candy, leave your brain behind. Either way, it's irresponsible.

So, I didnt like Twilight. And I will not read the rest of the series. The IMDB pages for the movie has most fans saying that the book was a whole lot better than the movie, so off I went to Youtube. I didnt watch completely but what I noticed was that they kept the cheesy bits of the dialogue in, the acting was uniformally bad, the chemistry between the lead pair non-existent. And the story remained the same, dull and vapid. And the less said about the Goth lipstick for the 'pale' vamps the better. Despite my disapproval, the movie did very well worldwide, what were they thinking ??!!

So, why is this series doing so well? Time to perform a very rudimentary amateur analysis.

It's written at the perfect time, culturally, when there is an unprecedented fascination with vampires, this might explain the number of adult women drawn to the story, even to Meyer's heavily neutered vampires. It deals with true love and forbidden love which are best-selling themes for romance and it might just be that no one has written a novel with these themes for teens before, but I might be mistaken in this bit.

And teenage girls seem to think that if Bella who is an apparently shy and awkward (the apparently is because this is the author's description, within moments of moving to Forks Bella actually has 5 boys hitting on her) teenager, can get the coolest, handomest, strongest boy in school then there's hope for them too. Couple that with the fact that a vampire is the quintessential bad boy and being helpless and rescued and reforming the male plays on female fantasies somewhere.

Also, Twilight looks pretty fat at 500 pages, but these pages are covered with large font writing and double-spaced paragraphs. Reading the simplistic language and completing such a huge number of pages does give the non-readers a sense of accomplishment and again this is something that can have contributed to the wide scale sales of the book.

In effect, Meyer's success is due to her making use of the opportunity presented to her, and having a decent story idea for fertile imaginations to run away with, it is in no way a tribute to her writing skills. If there are any male fans, it beats me why.

I was explaining to a friend why I didn't like Chetan Bhagat's writing and pat came the accusation 'Or you might just be jealous?' Sure, I'm jealous of Bhagat and Meyer and their franchises while being only admiring of Rowling's much, much, MUCH larger franchise, one which has popular as well as critical acclaim. You have to start small, I guess. So to clarify, the only thing in common between Meyer and Rowling's series is Robert Pattinson, who played Cedric Diggory in the Harry Potter movies and plays Edward Cullen in Twilight.

EISI are you glad you asked?

The food blog ....

2009-02-28T22:34:00.001-06:00

.... is dying, people!!!! Please to update. In the meanwhile, click on the pic below if you are craving some mouth-watering chaat !!

Chuck Norris can divide by zero!

2009-02-27T22:33:00.000-06:00

Thanks E-I-S-I and Avdi for tagging me! The title is just something random, in the spirit of the tag !!!

Rules:Once you've been tagged, you are supposed to write a note with 25 random things, facts, habits, or goals about you. At the end, choose 25 people to be tagged. You have to tag the person who tagged you. If I tagged you, it's because I want to know more about you.

1. If a butterfly flaps it's wings in any corner of the universe, I gain weight.

2. I used to be an adventure sports gal - bungee jumping, para sailing, even swam across the river sharavati once and sky diving was next, until I got onto a freaky ride in a small park in Bath, ended up puking my guts out and they never went back in. The rides at Disney are all I can manage now.

3. I get extremely competitive when playing games

4. I'm a food voyeur. People who have those amazing food blogs, yes, I'm that lurker ....

5. I want to learn to play the piano and then the veena or sitar.

6. Procrastination is my middle name, I've had access to a piano for about a year now ......

7. I'm pretty unartistic - my stained glass instructor had to gulp before he complimented my work.

8. I found recently that not all young adult fantasy fiction can be enjoyed by adults too. Twilight is rubbish.

9. I love buying makeup, when I was single this was where all my money went

10. I can get drunk on a glass of beer

11. I dont forget faces, names yes ....

12. I'm bad at languages ... the ostensible reason is because I had a traumatic incident in high school involving my language teacher, her knuckles, my head ....

13. I get loud when I'm excited or angry.

14. I'm short tempered, but once I've had my say I forgive very easily too and dont harbour grudges

15. I love fashion and designerwear although I'm a huge cheapskate. If it wasnt for B, I would still be ogling the things I lusted after on the internet while convincing myself that I couldnt afford them.

16. I love to get flowers, even if there's no occasion ....

17. I recently developed the biggest obssesion for high heels, my fav pair are animal print slingbacks with 3" heels. Loooove them!!!

18. Yes, yes, yes, I'm obssessed with shoes.

19. I'm always being mistaken for Mexican, I've lost count the number of times random strangers have come upto me and started jabbering away. Even Indians think so sometimes. I've often thought I should just learn Spanish so I can lead an exciting double life. But,but, but .... see point 12.

20. My favorite color changes every year, generally I wont have a clue what it is until I look into my wardrobe and suddenly find every article of clothing in shades of a single color. Currently it's brown.

21. I cry for most movies, but I was dry eyed during Titanic. I hate that movie.

22. I crack up over Chuck Norris jokes ... here's another 'Chuck Norris doesn't read books. He stares them down until he gets the information he wants.'

23. I'm a cat person

24. I love painted toenails .... looking at this list I think I might have a foot fetish.

25. My name is short, and I was thankful for that fact when I moved abroad since (I thought) it would be easy for people to pronounce/ remember/ understand etc. And then I got called Bryan.

I think most people I know have already been tagged so I wont tag anyone but feel free to do this if you want to. Coming up with 25 random things is pretty tough, btw!!

Review: Careless In Red

2009-02-24T11:33:00.000-06:00

Rating: 2.5 / 5

I know I said that I would stop reading Elizabeth George, but after the twist in her last novel - which shocked millions of fans worldwide this Papaya being no exception - I knew that I would have to at least read this one just to see where she was taking the series.

For an introduction to Elizabeth George and her Lynley-Havers mystery series go here.

After the events of the previous book, Lynley has taken some time off from New Scotland Yard and is engaged on a walking tour of the coast of Cornwall, where his ancestral home is located. One day at the foot of a cliff near the picturesque Polcare Cove, the holiday home of vet Daidre Trahair, he finds the body of a climber.

The body is of a local boy, Santo Kerne. Santo is like the Energizer bunny, upto a lot of stuff, none of it good however. Santo has broken up with his girlfriend Madlyn after making her pregnant, has an older lover, a sister who will inherit the family business after him, a father who was suspiciously involved in a similar death years ago and an unstable mother channelling Mrs. Robinson. To add to these are a local boy who loves Madlyn, Madlyn's father and a surrogate grandfather who are mad at what Santo has done to Madlyn. Sex, jealousy, money, rage, the motives for doing away with Santo are plenty and more.

DI Beatrice Hannaford, in charge of the investigation, with a limited number of officers available to her in out-o-the-way Cornwall, quickly realises that she might as well use Lynley's expertise even though he is a suspect. Lynley turns to Barbara Havers for help and soon the duo are doing what they do best.

While George is back to her old style of writing, instead of the police procedural format she chose for the previous one, I didnt find myself getting involved in this story as much. She adds to her repertoire of dysfunctional families, however I knew even while reading that a large number of the sub-plots were getting nowhere and I didnt particularly like any of the characters. And a lot of times the story felt static, even though I skimmed .... a LOT. 620 pages will do that for you.

But, Lynley is back, people!!! And I'm always happy to see Barb who livens up the proceedings the minute she steps in, these two are the sole reason this gets the extra half points in the rating. I did feel it was impossible for him to recover after the last book but George does a great job with continuity for her fans exploring his grief and subsequent re-connection with the world, even having him getting protective of Daidre who the police suspect is lying through her teeth. Of course, this being George she gives that sub-plot no resolution, but at least it shows Lynley almost ready to return to his world.

So, summing up, a book to be read only as part of the series. Others will definitely find it a boring read, and as there are plenty of George's novels in the series which make great reads I see no reason for someone to start here.

I sense George has this evil formula thing going on here, until she keeps cranking out these novels I will be compelled to read them. I'm not going to fight it anymore ....

Review: Holy Cow: An Indian Adventure

2009-02-20T13:32:00.001-06:00

Rating: 2 / 5

Taken from the blurb:
In her twenties, journalist Sarah Macdonald backpacked around India and came away with a lasting impression of heat, pollution and poverty. So, when an airport beggar read her palm and told her she would return to India - and for love - she screamed 'Never!' and gave the country, and him, the finger.

Macdonald's boyfriend, Australian Broadcasting Company news correspondent Jonathan is posted to New Delhi in the year 2000, Macdonald gives up her high profile job to be with the love of her life. What follows is her journey to a mellower-almost-love for India.

Dealing with a lack of focus and feelings of uselessness and vulnerability because she doesn't have a job, she decides to travel all over India to explore the many spiritual avenues available and finds India to be a secular melting pot of Hinduism, Sikhism, Buddhism, Jainism, Christianity, Jews, Islam, Sufism, New Age Philosophy, delving through which she hopes to find a means of attaining salvation for her soul and a way to a better understanding of herself.

You would think that a book with the title of 'Holy Cow' would explain the reverence for the cow a bit more. Sarah Macdonald's Indian Adventure says

'Hindus revere cows probably because one of their favorite gods, Krishna, is a cowherd and Shiva - the Lord of Destruction - has a bull called Nandi.'

That is only part of the explanation, the main one is that Hindus revere the cow as gou mata (Mother Cow) because the cow provides milk to sustain human life from babies onwards, you can make essential food items like yogurt and ghee from the milk, the cow gives birth to bulls and provides the necessary muscle power for farmers to till their fields, provides cow dung which is used as manure, fertilizer, anti-pollutant and pesticide and even cow urine finds use in Ayurveda. But this subtlety is lost to the author who says

'I've always found it hilarious that Indian people chose the most boring, domesticated, compliant and stupid animal on earth to adore..'

And this, unfortunately lazy, journalism forms the the initial part of Macdonald's book. The lurid pink cover should have provided the initial warning. The author spends the entire first half increasing the shock value of her book, bemoaning the superficialities, the dirt, the shit, the poverty, the disease, the pollution, the heat, every page uses the word filthy atleast once, even natural disasters all come under a myopic biased scrutiny.

In Rishikesh, when an earthquake jolts them out of their bed Macdonald wakes up screaming with rage 'That's it, I've had it with this country! This place is unfit for human habitation, it's mad!'

I could have understood the author's dilemma. Stuck in a completely alien culture, away from the solitude and serenity which she so prides in Sydney, and more importantly not having a job or like-minded friends to occupy her time and mind, she is adrift in a number of sensations and experiences which overwhelm her. And I think it is positively intrepid that she chooses to travel alone all over the country in her spiritual quest. However, she lost my sympathy when she chooses to externalize her issues with self-absorption and self-pity and the aforementioned hatred towards the country. A passing aghori chooses to curse her with pneumonia and she moans that she has given India her health and her hair after her hair starts falling.

The author also makes rapid generalizations of everything she encounters, a beggar with a burned face is instantly recognised as a dowry burning victim, when she is ill at the Apollo 'apparently it's not uncommon for women in Indian hospitals to be raped', 'Indian society forces its middle class to live an extended adolescence' and an Indian male telling her that he would like to be friends with women but it wasn't possible in the country, statements which only marginally describe the India of 2000 which I am familiar with and grew up in. Even her experiences in Pakistan make for sweeping statements which she cannot possibly verify 'India's humor is predominantly slapstick but it seems Pakistan understands cynicism and dry wit'.

The second part of the book was a better read for me, once Macdonald gets over the 'culture shock' and starts trying to actually understand and accept the culture. Her writing describes humorously the different people and religions she encounters along with an account of being caught up in the aftermath of the events of Sept 11 with Jonathan being in Afghanistan.

She is still very outspoken against people whose philosophies she doesn't agree with, but the writing style is more critical and irreverent rather than on emphasizing things for shock value. The pot shots this time around however, come at the expense of people's accents and incorrect English, everything being heavily accented or emphasized ... 'Sarrrrrahhhhh'...

The path to spiritual salvation that she undergoes in her journey, however, is dubious. After a Buddhist retreat where she is taught to come to terms with her mortality and embrace the thought of death, a conveniently faulty propeller when flying back home, teaches her she is not yet ready to die. The general format is the same for the rest of her experiences. I got the feeling that while the author was interested and invested enough to search out different religions, she wasn't interested in digging deep into any of the philosophies , she's just looking for what the religions can do for her .... and her book of course.

Macdonald's conceit in the acknowledgments is to offer up thanks 'to India for making me'. Holy Cow follows the bad cop-good cop format in an effort to get the author to that particular state but I cannot recommend it as a journalistic endeavor, it is just a different angle for yet another insightless story on India. I cannot recommend it as a travelogue either because it goes against the spirit of discovery, inquiry and open-mindedness of any travelogue I have read. As an astonishingly honest personal memoir, it might have it's moments.

WHY???

2009-02-12T10:52:00.001-06:00

http://www.amazon.com/Pride-Prejudice-Zombies-Classic-Ultraviolent/dp/1594743347/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1234457534&sr=8-1

and

http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/film/article5683554.ece

From the above,

“It quickly became obvious that Jane [Austen] had laid down the blueprint for a zombie novel,” said Grahame-Smith, a television comedy writer. “Why else in the original should a regiment arrive on Lizzie Bennet’s doorstep when they should have been off fighting Napoleon? It was to protect the family from an invasion of brain-eaters, obviously.”

:(