Wedding at King's Convenience by Maureen Child
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

The author is a native American writer who loves writing happy ended love stories.

Storyline: Maura Donahue, owner of a large picturesque farmland in Ireland, one day is encountered by the owner of a large film studio from New York, Jefferson King, in order to hire her farm to shoot his forthcoming film. Though initially Maura declines the huge commercial offer from Jefferson, she later budges to the same, when she finds that she is in love with the handsome and powerful King. She signs a contract with King after an irresistible sexual encounter with him. Jefferson leaves, having got his job done. Maura becomes pregnant later but will be unable to reach Jefferson at New York due to his busy schedule. One day, Jefferson learns that Maura is not cooperating with his crew for the shoot at her farm as per the contract signed and so decides to visit Ireland to know the reasons personally. There he discovers the truth of Maura’s pregnancy. Maura in the meanwhile develops deep hatred towards King as he refuses to love her but offers to marry her, just as an obligation, due to his past failed love story. Eventually, with the intervention of King’s family, both of them realize that they are in deep love with each other and cannot live without each other. King, then proposes his love to Maura and offers to marry her and also start living with her in Ireland to which Maura accepts.

Pros: It’s a cool love story of a self centered woman with a highly successful man. The strength of a woman when she wants to be what she is, has been elicited with magnificence here. The truth that even an Alpha male would succumb to a mentally strong woman is well written. Suppressing one’s egos sometimes to continue a relationship is very much necessary nowadays for the benefit of the family as well as society. This is the only link to extension of human race for some more centuries….probably!

Cons: I doubt whether such powerful and successful businessmen nowadays succumb to sentiments like love and marriage. Maura could have avoided the trauma if she was strong enough to avoid the physical contact with Jefferson. Her mental stubbornness was not gelling with her physical intentions….a clear reason for all the woes of her kind.

My favorite quote in the book

“ If every woman waited for a man who was worthy of her, there did be no marriages, would there?”

My rating is 3.5 out of 5


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The Book of Tea by Kakuzō Okakura
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

A classic worth reading that tells everything about TEA and its origin. ‘Tea’, a native drink from China has reached all over the world and is now considered as the most highly consumed liquid after water, by human beings. This Oriental drink is considered sacred by the East due to its colour, odour, taste and medicinal characteristics. It was officially introduced to the European countries in the sixteenth century. It is surprising to learn through this book that teaism has its own schools of evolution, The Boiled Tea (Caked Tea), The Whipped Tea (Powdered Tea) and The Steeped Tea (Leaf Tea), representing the spirit of age they prevailed during the Tang, The Ming and The Sung dynasties of China respectively. Also called as Tou, Tseh, Chung, Kha, Cha and Ming, this drink was highly prized for possessing the virtues of relieving fatigue, delighting the soul, prevent drowsiness, strengthening the will, repairing the eyesight and alleviate rheumatic pains. “Chaking” – the Holy scripture of Tea, written by the famous Chinese poet Luwuh, details everything about the tea plant and its leaves, method of identifying an gathering the suitable leaves for best quality tea and finally the making of the beverage from how to boil to how to drink.
Tea has become a religion of the art of life in Japan also, where it grew to be an excuse for the worship of purity and refinement. Both Taosim and Zennism are said to be associated with the spirit of Tea and entire Chinese ideology seemed to have been influenced by this golden beverage. Finally, the importance and sanctity of a Tea Room (the Sukiya) in the Chinese and Japanese cultures is very impressive. Flowers and their arrangement in the Oriental homes also is linked to the great spiritual depths of knowledge nurtured by great emperors of China like Huensang. The birth and the Art of Flower Arrangement has been simultaneous with that of Teaism in the fifth century. The link is well established by the great Tea masters of China and Japan as a distinct religion by itself.

Pros: The philosophy entwined behind the great history of Tea is mind boggling. No one would ever think that a whole set of ideologies revolved around Chinese dynasties through the influence of Tea. The simplicity of the Oriental cultures is attributed to the doctrine of Teaism in contrast to the explicit display of riches in Western culture. The beauty of flowers and their service to mankind was really fantastic. It is astonishing to learn that all the celebrated gardens of Japan were laid out by its tea masters once upon a time. Even great arts like pottery, textile designing, cooking, serving, painting etc were linked to the involvement of the tea masters of the Orient – simplicity and naturalistic being the catchwords. Nice to learn about the Tea Conferences of Japan.

Cons: There is a lot of philosophy and spiritual teachings included in this book which doesn’t seem to have much relevance to Teaism. It only seemed to have been fitted in for better presentation of the book.

My rating is 2.5 out of 5


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Rendezvous With Hymera by Melinda De Ross
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This Romanian author is a journalist who has a passion to write Romantic Suspense. This is her first book in her career.

Storyline: Clara, a writer by profession decides to spend a vacation in a countryside resort for about a month along with her Golden Retriever, Tony. There she encounters her teenage crush Colin, who now is a successful journalist. They fall in love with each other once again. Meanwhile, Clara experiences some strange feelings of seeing a ghost of a young girl in the resort lake and will be able to feel her presence once in a while. Colin and Clara investigate this mysterious girl and find that this girl named Eva Aris disappeared from this same resort some years ago and her missing case is still unsolved. After more inquiry they arrive at an astonishing fact that there exists three worlds
1. The material world (the one we live in)
2. The Astral World (which corresponds to purgatory) and
3. The spiritual world (Heaven).
This girl Eva died while practicing some dangerous stages of Yoga that could give some paranormal powers if mastered, but at the same time could prove fatal if the practicing person is indecisive, undisciplined and untrained. Eva’s soul which was trapped between some two worlds of existence unable to pass through, has made her soul wander between these worlds unable to get released. Finally, her soul gets released by the Yoga teacher who used to train her in her initial yoga training.

Pros: A good mix of romance with suspense. The story of Eva Aris gives a great moral of the superior and fatal affects of Yoga, unless practiced under able guidance and will power. Many aspects of spiritual interest have been highlighted by the author, with simultaneous insights about the Eastern cultures and her inclination to respect ideologies of other religions other than Christianity. It is nice to read philosophy in-between a Romantic Suspense, a rare phenomenon in many such books. I would like to credit this book as more of knowledge-based than a simple romantic suspense.

Cons: The ending of the story was quite abrupt and simple. The reader might have expected a rather little more longer and sophisticated closing arrangement.

My favourite quote in this book :
“I think being romantic is the capacity to turn an ordinary moment in something dream-like”

My rating is 3 out of 5


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Beneath the Clouds by Shane Goetze
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

A fiction from China comprising of a story of some mysterious flying men who inhabited Southern China many thousand years ago, but now face extinction by the Communist Government of China, who see them as a threat due to their democratic style of living.

Bill Jacks, a journalist in Hong Kong one day receives a SOS email from one of the flying woman of the mysterious flying men called the HU, seeking help to save their species by reporting their story to the world. At the same time, surprisingly, the historic relics of the chief of HU, comprising of his bones, gets stolen from the local museum. Bill Jacks along with the Hong Kong police officer Allen sets off to mainland China to investigate the case and meet the woman who sent the email, with the help of the museum in-charge Chun and a ruthless Russian businessman Petrov. In China, Bill and Allen get duped by Chun only to be saved by Yin Ying, the flying woman of the HU. Petrov actually signs a deal with Chun to sell the HU bones in international market for a huge price, so that the DNA of the same can be used to develop similar flying men across the world and used for any kind of combat including terrorism. Later he discovers that Chun and Petrov used Bill and Allen to trace out the long hidden sanctuary of the HU species somewhere in the cold mountains of Northern China, which remained as a secret till date, in order for them to wipe out the remaining HU species from the face of the earth. Bill somehow with the help of Yin Ying and her remaining HU army will be able to save themselves and remaining flying men from Chun and his bad communist counterparts only to regain their lost glory with the remaining HU army get incorporated as the Flying Guard of Hong Kong Police as special secret forces.

Pros: A good mediocre science fiction that takes into account the unheard flying ability of some men of China. A sincere attempt to elicit the wish of many Chinese provinces, to democratize their country or atleast grant independent self government out of the Communist purview of this great country. The ill affects of the rapid industrialization of China and the kind of huge destruction the country is heading towards is well brought out. The book also portrays the inefficiency of the Chinese Government to contain the internal unrests in many of its provinces spread across its huge mainland.

Cons: The author seemed to have undermined the military and intelligence power of Chinese Army in this book. China is said to have one of the toughest border controls in the world, and hence the ease with which Bill and Allen enter Chinese mainland from Hong Kong cannot be as easy as it was written. It seemed very unreal as very little is known about the HU in world media. The book was quite boring at times.

My favourite quote in the book:
“ China may be better positioned economically than the Soviet Union before its collapse. But it is no less fragile as a country, socially speaking “

My rating is 2 out of 5


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Ajaya: Roll of the Dice by Anand Neelakantan
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

The second book of the famous Indian author, who also brought “Asura, the Tale of the Vanquished”.

Another great experience of the other side of Indian Mythology. The author seems to have been a born rebel as I see a kind of great zeal in him to investigate and bring to light the aspects that would have been hidden in the great epics of Hinduism on which the entire ideology of the religion is based upon.

This is the story of Suyodhana, the great king of the Kuru clan, who is said to be the reason for the great Kurukshethra war and the greatest villain of the Indian mythology after Ravana of Ramayana. In this book, the author has made great effort to reverse the image of Suyodhana and his clan who were pictured and framed as villains against the good Pandavas, who have a common wife Draupadi. Suyodhana’s kind heartedness and his rebellious nature towards the vehement Brahmin dominated caste system in the then India probably has made him a villain and social disgrace to many vernacular kingdoms of India at that time. His affiliation towards the poor and needy made the higher castemen of the society turn against him and befriend the Pandavas, who were more inclined towards usurping the throne rather than being interested in the welfare of the downtrodden of the vast and powerful Hastinapura kingdom. Taking this as an opportunity, Suyodhana was cleverly dragged into a dispute with his cousins (Pandavas) by his cunning uncle Shakuni, who vowed to destroy India as a vengeance for the destruction of his Gandhara kingdom and assassination of his father by the Grand Regent of the Kurus, Bhishma. The book ends at the point where Pandavas lose their entire kingdom along with their wife in a clever game of dice, planned by Shakuni in revenge for Suyodhana’s insult in Pandava capital, Indraprastha, after umpteen number of twists and turns in the tussle for upper hand between Suyodhana and the Pandava brothers. The story is to be continued in the sequel “AJAYA II”

Pros: The best part of the author is that he always sees good in bad and a possible bad in good. The genetic lineage presented in a diagrammatic form at the beginning shows the effort the author has put in to create this book. The story of Suyodhana, just like Ravana, in the author’s previous blockbuster, reveals so many hidden and twisted facts that every Indian grows up to listen as bed time stories from their parents and grandparents. Every minute story of great characters of Mahabharata epic like Suyodhana, Sushashana, Aswathama, Ekalavya, Karna, Takshaka, Guru Drona, Guru Kripa, Parashurama, Lord Krishna, Balarama, Jarasandha, Subhadra, Draupadi, Kunti etc have been exquisitely captured from Kaurava side, rather than the usual Pandava side which almost every Indian heard right from his/her childhood. The author’s ability to create an unparalleled fiction without disturbing the true meaning, from Kaurava point of view is highly commendable, and requires a standing ovation. At the same time, the high handed approach of Brahmins and Kshatriyas in those days over the downtrodden Shudras is well criticized and tactfully opposed. The reader would be highly mesmerized over the facts produced by the author through his extensive research of various books. One would get kindled and angered by the atrocities and inhumane behaviour of the upper castes on the lower castes just to protect their identities and lifestyle, in the name of ‘Dharma’. Even the beloved God of the Hindus, Lord Krishna was not spared for his cunning and tricky methods of proclaiming himself as an Avatar of Vishnu, and favoring the caste system through Pandava affiliation. I really felt glad for having not being born in those days of Mahabharata, described by the author in this wonderful book….that was the kind of effect this book brought upon me. The scientific explanation of the birth of hundred and one Kauravas to a single couple in connection with modern science is mind boggling.

Cons: I bet that there will be scores of young minds that imbibe the author’s books seriously and develop a kind of hatred towards their deep-rooted beliefs on the ideology itself. I also have a feeling that any foreigner who gets a hand on Ajaya and Asura will start mocking at the great Indian culture and tradition, which is greatly influenced by its epics.
Coming to the story, there seems to have been some characters that disappeared suddenly in between, like Guru Drona and no mention of him in the later stages also. The violation of some of the codes of conduct by pious women in Hinduism had been brought out in a raw and unacceptable form, like Kunti bearing one child before marriage and three children through some other men after marriage, whatever may be the reasons, underlying.

My rating is 4.5 out of 5

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