64. Doctor Sleep by Stephen King

Halloween 2013#7

My final read this Halloween, and may I say, the best of them all. Saving the best for the last, well, not really. This one also happened to be the most voluminous of my reads this Halloween. Not that the higher word count was unwelcome, there was no endless drudging past long details and explanations, no meaningless characters and characterisations – everything fits nicely into a neat puzzle. For all its length, the book was quite fast paced, or at least it gave the impression to be, and that’s what is important, right?

Finally we know what happened to the kid, Danny, left with his unique gift (?) at the end of The Shining, less a, even if brutal, father. The growing up, the fall, the further fall to rock bottom, repentance, and the eventual redemption. We also gain a little more insight into the mysterious gift, the shining, the advantages and the risks.

Add a vampirish race, with the long tooth, but without the blood-sucking mess. They do suck something, but it is a little less tangible, even if more horrific – these of the True Knot, as they like to be called, have little use for virgin girls, however they relish in torturing and killing small kids.

Then there is an entirely adorable kid, turned teenage girl, Alba – Dan’s protégé – his support, his one last shot at redemption – a girl who is as much his protector, as she needs protection – the focus of the entire book.

Stephen King, not one to waste characters, adds a bunch of them – from kind old men, loving grandmas, loving parents, some characters reaching out from beyond the grave, most of them benign – a bit too much goodness for a King novel. Perhaps, he craves a happy ending too…sometimes…

63. Day Watch by Sergei Lukyanenko

Halloween 2013#7

Night Watch series figures among the best (Urban) fantasy series I have read. I have been reading, savouring, the Night Watch series one book a year, every Halloween. The fulfilling feeling one gets from a book so well conceptualised and written can only be matched by the wait and the expectations built up over a year.

There is the supernatural, then the philosophising about good and evil, and finally some serious action and mind games to top it off. This has been a regular feature with both the books. The world is quite simple and easy to understand, a lesson there for young writers like Samantha Shannon. There are the usual vampires and werewolves, shape-shifters, doing totally unusual things and some very unlikely witches and magicians as well - all categorised under "Others". There is no triumph of good over evil, the entire series is based over the concept of balance of light and dark; note the choice of words "light and dark" in place of "good and evil", a point of differentiation which will become much clearer once one reads the book.

Having read the masters like Tolstoy, Dostoevsky and Gogol, I was always aware of the depth of concepts in Russian literature. This remains, however, my only modern read from a Russian author and I wasn't disappointed in the least. Everything was well thought, even the choice of Russian songs quoted in the book, at various places, under various settings.

A book out of the mould; a book to read in leisure; a book to remember.

60. Sputnik Sweetheart by Haruki Murakami

A tale of unrequited loves, at the surface, Sputnik Sweetheart tracks the disappearance of a young girl from a remote Greek island. This being a Murakami book, the use of adjectives like mysterious, before disappearance would be superfluous - in the world of Murakami, an action as mundane as climbing stairs can be mystifying and an event as big as the disappearance of a cat or a human being, full of possibilities, all of them uncanny if not paranormal.

In this world, overnight changes like, appearance of a blue-black mark on the face, or losing the ability to speak, or all the hair turning white, are taken in stride - we would know that each of such changes have an implication, most of the times, a supernatural one. We learn to appreciate the shape of an ear and in the background of everything else, infidelity holds no shock value or indeed gossip value.

In the undercurrent are, several small pieces woven together, stories in their own, discoveries, characterisations, all neatly bundling into Sputnik Sweetheart, one of his shorter works. And if you were still looking for more, this book will also give you a lesson or two in classical music and wine tasting.

And yet, with the high standards and expectations, I hold Murakami to, this book somewhere fell short of delivering the satisfaction that ordinarily comes from reading a Murakami. This would seem to be an easy way out, but the works of Murakami are too exotic and my skills too rudimentary to even attempt a dissection to establish my lack of satisfaction with the book. 

59. Brother Odd by Dean Koontz

Halloween 2013#4

This was my 3rd consecutive year reading one of the books in the Odd Thomas series. I have been subjected to many series which get progressively worse with each sequel, and I am afraid, this one is no exception. The novelty, that was Odd Thomas, has worn off by now, replaced by a sense of predictability to his actions and the plot of the book.

While the characters in the opening book were all too human, and wonderful for that, the subsequent books have featured characters off a stage performance, delivering well-rehearsed lines with ease and the protagonist follows the pattern all too often. Needless to say, I could not sympathise or relate to any of the characters in this installment.

The plot which used to be good vs. evil has gradually and finally taken a leap into the world of the fantastic, and I can only wish I could have used that expression in a positive sense.

The overall effect being – the book reads like a cross between a Sci-Fi and a paranormal – with some intended dose of philosophy and morality perhaps. The overall effect, to use one of the words referred to in the book, being grotesque. A modern day perversion of Frankenstein perhaps, or it could simply be a badly written book with little lasting value – I have not yet been able to make up my mind about that. 

 

58. The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman

Halloween 2013#3

So, I am lagging by a couple of weeks or so in my reviews, and I am only in my second month of starting this blog, troubling signs indeed.

Less troubling was The Graveyard Book, which read like a walk in a park, or rather, a graveyard. It was just the perfect combination of warm and weird, spooky and funny, a supernatural tale of vendetta like no other. Gaiman possesses the gift of taking out the sting off the grisliest of situations and putting you in that dreamlike haze where everything is possible and the horrible is as fascinating as the fantastic.

The book starts with a triple murder and revolves around the sole survivor in the family, a toddler, over the course of the book, turned young boy, named Nobody Owens (a little Dean Koontzie in the naming convention, aren't we?) who lives, you guessed it, in a Graveyard. With the ghostie people no less. And a lot many more interesting dead and undead species. And then, there is the tale of the revenge, as odd as it can get, against a whole tribe of people, all named Jack (now I am picking A Tale of Two Cities reference). I am quite sure there would be multiple such references which I have missed, and the whole book could have been a spoof, it it weren't so brilliant and coherent. There are plenty of cool characters, and to balance it out, the most cool headed actions in the book end up being despised.

To be honest, after reading two of his books, I am still undecided if Gaiman's works are a spoof or ordinary stories looked through a funny glass, whatever they maybe, they are so damn entertaining.