Book Review Part 7- Irrationally Passionate

The book “ Irrationally Passionate” was suggested to me by my favourite blogging community BlogAdda. When I searched for the author information, it came out to be “Jason Kothari”. I had no idea who is Jason Kothari and when I read about him, I felt that I should have known him earlier. When I read that Jason is turn around guy, this caught my attention as in my life I also inspire to an entrepreneur, turning around any business is tough, and here is a guy who turned Valient from Chapter 7 bankruptcy to a money making machine. That is when I decided to purchase this book and go ahead.

Without much expectation but I started to read the book. It never felt boring. The writing style of Jason Kothari is simple, elegant and impressive. His way of story telling is really great, it felt like Jason is a writer who has wrote many books.

You can take this book as either as a self help book or as an autobiography of Jason Kothari. In any of those way the intent and message of the book remains same.

Irrationally Passionate starts from the Jason’s childhood and his struggles in schools days.

Being Indian on a foreign soil can be really tough especially when you face bullying frequently. Let me quote a line from the book, “You’ll never know how fortunate you are to live in India, until you’ve been made to live elsewhere.” This line coming from a Wharton graduate should really make to think those Indian who always demean India and praise the western world. This book shows us the ground reality how Indians and especially average Indian is treated in schools as a kid.

In his childhood his parents encouraged him to take negotiations in life seriously and made him face his bullying by his own. Jason thanks his parents to give him such opportunities in the early ages which shaped him as a better and strong person afterwards.

As a teenage Jason, he was just like every teenager, who fights with parents and every words they say they think as wrong. Jason was similar but he got into his senses quickly. And started to improve. His improvements shows us that no matter how derailed we can be there is always a chance of turn around. His motivation, passion and dedication showed us again and again as that turnaround is possible. Take example of Valiant Comics. No one could have believed that two college kids can turnaround a company who has filed for chapter 7 bankruptcy and which is also facing IP issues. But here our Jason is who did the impossible and showed us the path. A highly recommended book from my side.

Book review part -6 : Being Mortal

This is the second book from Atul Gawande that I have just read, what a thought provoking and ground shaking book it is. Both of the books are distinctly connected to each other. In “checklist Manifasto” he talks about how checklist can save lives and in being mortal he talks about how one should die.

I have read only a few dozens of non-curriculum books but non of them talked about this issue even in small details. The only reason I can conclude is – Death is ultimate fear of one's life, we are scared to core just thinking about it. Hearing “Death” word gives you some or other kind of goosebumps, but can you escape it- No, probably never. If it is unavoidable – do you want to talk about it- there is also a No here.

This is what Atul has accomplished in this book, he talked about it and talked pretty gracefully and interesting. No where in the book it feels boring or too scary.

Book's tag line is -”Medicine and what matters in the end”. And same is the motto of writer. Whatever Atul is trying to conclude can't be covered in this review. This book is highly recommended for people who are more than 50 and for those who are taking care such people.

Some focus points of this book are as follow:

1. This book helps you decide whether you should opt for medical help or not. if taken medical help how long you should be taking it and when you can decide to stop it.
2. This will also help whether to get medical help at home or in hospital or in hospice.
3. This is another book which establishes connection between a healthy person with helping family.
4. You will also notice beside family and medicine, there are other factors that can help you get well
5. It tells you difference between your horizon vs Doctor's horizon.

This is a book of reference of its own kind, if you have it you will definitely revisit it throughout your life. One worthy for book for our bookShelf(physical or digital).

Books in queue for the year 2016

1. The intelligent investor -Benjamin Graham 
2. Fault Line: How Hidden Fractures Still Threaten the World Economy - R Rajan  
3. Denied by Allah- Noor Zaheer
4. The theory of everything - Stephen Hawking
5. The old man and the sea - Ernest hemingway 
6. The Little Book That Beats the Market - Joel Greenblatt 
7. Who moved my interest rate - D Subbarao
8. Being Mortal - Atul Gawande
   
   
   
    
    

Book review Part - 5 : The BestSeller She wrote

Ravi Subramanian was introduced to me by Blogadda.com , by giving me one of his best creation - God is a Gamer. Being not a fan of fictional stories I always search for contents which I usually search inside a book as a technical personal was- technical details of the technical things. God is a gamer didn't disappointed me, so I went forward and applied for his next release : The BestSeller She Wrote. 

I had similar expectation from TBSW as God is a Gamer had created a different impression to me altogether.But this fiction is different from all other Ravi's fiction. You will feel the difference after reading 5-10 pages. This contains all the Bollywood drama emotion and tragedy. This surely meets the Bollywood criteria. 

Story starts as you expected from book tagline and goes with same flow almost till the end but if you have read a Ravi's fiction, things don't go as straight as you would expect, here he does the same. But he could have done better, Ravi is better than this. 

May be that's because I have set my expectations a bit more than previous thriller God is a Gamer. It does not lose it pace in between the reading, although I have read it in 4 days due for time constraints. I know how difficult it was to put the book on table without finishing it. It contains love, sacrifice, betrayal, dedication and redemption - of course. I noticed one more this time- it got more erotica than Ravi's previous creations. I won't spill the beans you have to find it own.

Last but not the least the message from book is clear that Karma hits you back. It does not matter who you are, it will chase you until you get what you have sown. It tells us how important is family is for us and what it matters in the course of life's journey. We may be blind for obvious truth but truth is truth and when it comes to adultery, it is not a compulsion for anyone in any condition it is just a matter of choice. Ebola angle was also a surprise for me and appreciate the detail about the disease written by the author. And another thing I liked the most is in this there is reference of Blogadda.com, that made me feel privileged being part of blogadda family. And I learned a lot about book publishing and writing. It tells us to put our feet on ground when we fly above cloud 9.

 Although in this book there is a happy ending but it won't be in every case in real life. 

 So final verdicts came as it is worth one time read for sure. Pick this one on weekend and you will enjoy the bumpy ride of The Bestseller She Wrote.

Rating : 3.5/5
Amazon link: http://www.amazon.in/Bestseller-She-Wrote-Ravi-Subramanian/dp/9385152386/

Flipkart link:  http://www.flipkart.com/bestseller-she-wrote-english/p/itmeca2xhvfmtdmf

I am reviewing ‘The Bestseller She Wrote’ by Ravi Subramanian as a part of the biggest Book Review Program for Indian Bloggers. Participate now to get free books!

Book review part -4: Volga se Ganga

I have tried two times to write a review about Volga Se Ganga. But on both occasions I lost my track what to write and where to begin. Reasons may be multiple, first thing is – Due to diversity of the content of the book and secondly my slow rate of reception of those philosophies and facts.

I have read multiple books which deal with various problems of society, most of them deal with a single problem and its description and resolution. But this book is totally different. I have become fan of Rahul Sankrityayan immediately when I read how beautifully he has managed so many things inside a single book. Let me illustrate more.

If you ask me what category/genre this book can fall, I will try to name a few

• Fiction
• History
• Suspense thriller(Very small section)
• Economics
• Social Justice
• Gender Equality
• Love Story and relationship guide
• Religion
• Evolution
• Self Help
• Public Administration
• Child marriage
• Casteism
• Politics
• Humour

I may have left some more genre I couldn't recall. What astonishes me is – how he managed to put so much knowledge this book in a concise way. He was an avid reader, traveler, researcher, philosopher e.t.c.. You will get to know his charisma only after reading this book.

This book is written in 1945 and you can still find how much it is relevant this era. You can easily relate what he was trying to tell from his fictional stories.

I wanted to pick one of the genre from it and write about it but I couldn't. Somewhere my mind is saying let the reader purchase the book and decide themselves what they can extract from this book. If I start detailing about any of the genres, it will be hard for me to not to write about others. I simply can't decide this moment which genre should get my first attention.(If I update this review- will let you know for sure). Eg: Can you tell me which is more significant gender equality or public- administration? Can you separate two of them?

If you love Hindi literature or want to invest some quality time on quality content- this is it. Look no further. Grab a coffee and start going from Volga se Ganga.

Previously read books - Before 2015

I always wanted to read a lot of books, but before 2015 I didn't set target for myself. So before 2015 i have read very few of them.

1. God is a gamer
2. LOSER (Life of a software engineer)
3. The test of my life
4. Nothing lasts forever 
5. Romancing with life
6. Malgudi days
7. Private India

Book Review Part 3- Ramayana: The Game of Life - (Shattered Dreams)

When I recall Last time when I did read Ramayana ?-was the class 6th. It was introduced in our curriculum as that time as a complementary of subject Hindi. At that time what we extracted from that book (Sankshipt Ramayana ie Ramayana in short) was the story and adventure of Rama. I think we certainly failed to extract the meaning of our basic things book wanted to convey. Major factor may be our Age. We can't expect ourselves to understand much about life in our standard 6th.

Since my childhood I always wanted to study Ramayana and Bhagwad Geeta to understand the deep philosophy both epics wanted to convey to our society.

There were several factors due which till now I was unable to read any of them. I sincerely want to thank Blogadda for their book review program. I got this book from Blogadda within a week after applying for its review.

This is part 2 of the series Ramayan from Shubha Vilas. Before getting the book I was wondering why the title of book is 'Game of life ' as well as shattered Dreams. Before starting this book I thought "Should I go for the first book or Just start this second part?" I thought I already know much of the Ramayana, so just start the second part at first.

The book starts from the Dashrath's restlessness which leads to his decision of coronation of Rama in hurry. So here we can say that dream of Dashratha was to see Rama as King of Ayodhya. This very dream was in everyone's eye belonging to Ayodhaya except Manthra. And the book ends with shattered dreams of many people when Rama got exiled to Forest for 14 years.

Between these events the writer successfully showed us the Game of life. Game of life title is justified because no one knows when you will face high or low in your life. It's just like you are feeling today on the top of the world and the very next moment you can feel worthless.

Coronation and exile of Rama depicts the same for Rama, Dashratha, Kaushlaya, Sita etc. And same thing can be said about Keikayi when Bharat refused to be king and marched towards Jungle to bring Rama back to Ayodhya.

What I like most about the book is Footnotes. These footnotes provide us clear thinking what philosophy a certain event/author wants to tell us.

These footnotes make this book unique and put this book in a different category. Following are some of important extract fetched from the book.

• Duty of 

1. Father
2. Son
3. Mother
4. Husband
5. Wife
6. Brother
7. King 
8. Teacher
9. Student
10. Follower etc

• Management of

1. Stress
2. Anger
3. Joy
4. Sorrow
5. Confidence
6. Desire etc

And last but not the least one of beautiful line I read was- "All women should be respected and taken care of. Respect towards them is root of all the good happens in society and disrespect towards them is the root of all evil in society."

As I haven't read other Ramayana like Valmiki's or Tulsidas. I cannot say how much engaging those other epics are.

But Game of life by Shubha Vilas Is certainly an interesting read. It keeps you wanting to know more what is going to happen next despite knowledge the story of Ramayana.

Despite Ramayana being a religious book, I would recommend this to any age/gender/race/religion .

Cover: 

Name of Book: Ramayana: The Game of Life -(Shattered Dreams)- Book 2 

Rating : 5 

It is available on amazon. Purchase here

Books in queue for the year 2015

I am always interested to read books of various genre. So here goes the list of books I read this year. Sequence here is not sequential.

1. Annihilation of caste - BR Ambedkar
2. Animal Farm - George Orwell
3. 1984- George Orwell
4. The Hunger Games - Suzanne Collins
5. Rich Dad Poor Dad - Robert Kiyosaki
6. Lajja -Taslima Nasrin
7. How Sachin Destroyed my life - Vikram Sathaye
8. Zero to One  - Peter Thiel
9. Ramayana:The Game of Life-Book 2(Shattered Dreams)-Shubha Vilas
10. In Defence of Food - Michael Pollan
11. Thinking, Fast and Slow - Daniel Kahneman 
12. The CheckList Menifesto -  Atul Gawande 
13. The BestSeller she wrote- Ravi Subramanian 
14. Ashad ka Ek Din - Mohan Rakesh  
15. Volga se Ganga - Rahul Sankrityayan  
16. Banaras Talkies- Satya Vyas  
17. Mrs FunnyBones - Twinkle Khanna 

book review part -2 : God is a Gamer

God is a Gamer no one denies that. No one knows what will be his next move. This is what Ravi Subramanian tried to put and he did pretty well. While reading God is a Gamer you will be never able to guess what is going to happen next. That makes God is a Gamer fun and exciting to read.
If you have read my previous review you may have noticed that I am not a fan of fiction but this fiction has lot of real facts that feel like you are part of the story.

For me this is not a fiction, it is a book that introduces various new and important terms in the fields of computer, internet, banking, social networking, gaming, drugs etc.

While reading the book, I used to often forget that whether I am reading a fiction or it happened or it is happening, there is always thin line differentiating between fiction and reality. This books takes away your breath in the ending sequence. You will be hardly able to guess who did what. This is beauty in the writing.

I would like to recommend this book to everyone whether he is fond of fiction or not. Everybody can get some great findings in it.

Let me introduce each new terminology you can get from God is a Gamer
Bitcoins: I am also a big fan of the concept of the Bitcoins. In India there are few people who know Bitcoins . I am following Bitcoins since its early days. Why didn't I blog about it I don't know. May be I am also afraid of its volatility. Earlier the value of Bitcoins are 50-60$ per Bitcoin and now it is close to 1000$per Bitcoin. I also remember remember the time when it dropped to around 800$ when some countries starting to ban Bitcoins. But regardless of all the idea is pretty cool and world is still searching for Santoshi NaKaMoto

Tor: I used to about Tor since my college days but never used for anything. Using Tor can be helpful if you know that the site you are going to visit is not trusted. It keeps you safe from revealing your personal data. I would also like to introduce duckduckgo.com for those also wants not to be tracked on Internet.

Dark Internet : if you don't surf Internet a lot you are not likely to know Dark Internet as well. In Dark Internet there is a whole new different world. And I would like to suggest to my reader that stay away from this dark matter. For consequences do the book itself.

Magic mushrooms : Do Google or read the book.

Hemlock : Do Google or better read the book.
This is the which made me a fan of fiction. The twists in the plot can make you say wow. How different stories inside this book binds make the reading fun.
The aspects of day to day life described in the book make it total real and details with aspects make you see like movie when you read this.
I was able to extract following extracts from the book.

•  Introduction to Wikileaks
• US diplomacy
• Virtual currency
• Email phishing
• How to/not to get mugged in Brazil
• Online anonymity
• Online gaming industry
• Love, passion and family values
• Drug addiction
• Malwares and IT security
• Betrayal

These aspects make it worth a try. you will be learn many things.
For me it's a 4 out 5 in terms of rating. 1 point is due to my small range of reading in fiction.

Amazon Link 

Book review part1- Private India by Ashwin Sanghi

This is the first time I am writing review for any book. Since my early days I am fond of books no matter what genre. I read almost all kind of books. But I never let their review to be published. I have Geeta, quran ,chacha choudhary......to shades of grey(gave a try just because of hype :P).

But my favourite genre of books are autobiography, biography, comedy humour, science, computer, politics etc. I was/am never a fan of fiction especially murder, horror or mystery.

When I got this newsletter from #Blogadda that it will be autographed by the writer himself and book will be delivered to my place and coauthored by James Patterson then I thought why shouldn't I gave this genre a try. Last time I read such Nobel I was in 7th grade and due to torn cover I even don't know which book I read then.

It will be a new book and got more sense than my 7th grade :P.

The book was delivered on time nicely packed and autographed by Ashwin Sanghi. Thanks #Blogadda to make me feel privileged. Due to my busy scheduled days I read this book in slots.

By reading the first chapter I get involved in this book picturing all those scenes happening just before my eyes. From the very first chapter story get intense as there happened a murder in the posh area(hotel).but the real mystery was that purpose of murder is not found. In these intense moments the author still finds the humor coefficient- this is where I must have to salute the author for its creativeness. Story goes on and on and so is murders.

In all these happening what I appreciate from a reader point of view that the author also got authority of science- means teaching us valuable lessons of some real life investigations.

Being a technical person I always try to learn some science wherever I can extract. I must admit that this book increased my knowledge many folds.

The story revolves around the the various murders happening in Mumbai in a short span of time. These murders are connected by a pattern. Private India tries to find the pattern, motive,clues to reach out the murderer. In the process of investigation author has tried to explain every aspect of Mumbai life- from night life to Underworld,from human trafficking to prostitution,from forged begging to busy hectic life.

The main thrilling point of book is that the reader is completely clueless who can be murderer.
Ashwin has put many twists for suspects, it starts with Hair-dresser to mafia,fraud baba to doctor, singer to attorney general and last but not the least a private india's staff.

Although at some point of time book looses it grip but as soon as you are about to seem disinterested,
Ashwin gives a new twist. Overall this book by Ashwin and James Patterson is a nice thrill to enjoy.
Ashwin has really moved me to add a new genre to my interest . I will wait for Ashwin's next release.

I won't give you any spoilers here. My finals words would be - if you are a fan of fiction you must read this book.

Title: Private India
Author: Ashwin Sanghi | James Patterson
Publisher: Arrow Books
Page Count: 470
My Rating: 4.3/5 

It is available at Flipkart and Amazon.

Here is the cool trailor of the book

Note: This review is a part of the biggest Book Review Program for Indian Bloggers.Participate now to get free books!