SlishaCrazy

Up and down is the same. From up, down is up and from down, up is down. A tale for the time being is the most unique book I've read. Ruth Ozeki takes you on a trip as a reader and she joins you as well. Ruth finds a freezer bag that has washed up to the shore in British Columbia all the way from Japan, which could be from the tsunami debris according to her husband Oliver. In the freezer bag, she finds a few letters in French, a sky soldier watch (a watch for a world war kamakazi soldier) and a French novel that if you open is actually a Japanese diary. It's the diary of Naoko You remember the time when you were so immersed in reading a fiction novel that you dream about the characters in the story, and wake up feeling it was so real that it leaves you flustered? You know that feeling when the character in your novel seems to be falling into trouble and you really wish you could jump into the book and rescue, even it's by just giving advice or simply talking, or ta...

After reading Ruth Ozeki's book I understand Japanese culture more, a tiny bit more. Overlaying it with the urban solidarity and loneliness, Haruki Murakami's writing becomes clearer, a tiny bit. There is always a lot of it I don't understand but that's how it's meant to be I believe. It's not meant to be logical. But it is somehow rational and that's how it's surreal and somehow you believe it's true. If only one could truly disappear the way one can possibly disappear into a surreal world that you make it your reality if it is the only way. To walk out one day and never come back. To wake up one day with silver hair. To believe you can be in two places at the same time. To decide which version of you is real. It's a bit happier in tone than Norwegian Wood. But then again it has the surrealism that makes sad situations sound happy. There is a certain amount of similarity in the later half of the books. A troubled young woman tries to find s...

A close call can be fun. I usually give myself a lot of time to go to the airport. I also check and double check that I have my passport, some money and tickets. Before I leave I stand at the door, look back and think if I've left anything behind. Today I forgot my passport. My cab turned up early and said I should not be late and I hurried. Still no excuse for forgetting my passport. But he refused to turn around when I found out that I forgot my passport and instead went all the way to the airport to a different terminal and got me another cab to go home and come back. I managed. Rather my new cabbie managed, with trance music blasting through the cab. We drove home, picked up my passport, drove back to the airport, ran through fast track security and boarded the flight. On the flight with my head splitting from too much excitement and spinning from two hours of road rash, the food didn't help. I was half sleeping, half reading and all the time feeling queasy. But afte...

I only read fiction. It's not a policy or something. I have tried reading non-fiction but I wasn't able to and I am not proud of it. But I am happy with reading fiction and I read it for a million reasons. Just talking about one for now, teleportation. Transporting yourself into a different world, at a different time, using a good story and the power of your mind, except there is no transfer of matter involved here. I am sitting right here in a bus and yet I am in the middle of a crowded Tokyo slum or in the bush in Africa or on a lonely shore in cold British Columbia or on the streets of London during the colonial times.  You get a similar surreal feeling when you walk around on a foggy day. The very streets you knew so well are suddenly transformed one morning into a different dreamland. You may wonder when you wake up and look outside your window, if you are still asleep and in a dream. Reading on a foggy day can be even more surreal. Like you are floating around on a c...

It had been a while since I blogged. I had many drafts in the making (6 to be precise, so you can expect more soon). But I was lacking that little nudge. You know, the usual reasons: busy work life, busier personal life (for the first time probably), cold weather, holiday season, and most importantly procrastination. Then I got this email the other day  that our dear old Slisha Crazy had been shortlisted for BlogAdda Awards under the category of Creative Writing. Honestly I'm flattered. It's no big deal. And I probably stood a better chance, if it had been 3 years ago when I was contributing to the blog on a daily basis; when you write 10  posts in a week, something is bound to be good. But nevertheless, I'm really excited about this.  There is 80%weight to the content and 20%weight to the social media aspect of it where I publicise the shortlist and try to get likes and tweets for it. As I said I haven't been giving enough time to it to produce creative conten...

Long over due... A writer improves with every single string of words. The transition can be seen in such clarity with Ashwin Sanghi. I was mistaken in wondering why I liked Chanikya's Chant while I found The Rozabal Line terrible. It's important to note the sequence as well. The writing style of The Krishna Key is distinctly better than Chanikya's Chant which is leaps and bounds ahead of The Rozabal Line. All three of them have captivating plots. The Krishna Key brings to fore the interesting possibilities intertwined in our mythology. Over centuries and millennia our legends have transformed many times over, history written and rewritten. Ashwin Sanghi used that to his advantage and takes the reader on a page turning treasure hunt that spans over all the stories our grandmother told us and all the stories we read in history textbooks, and even some of the fiction reading after school. Influenced by The Da Vinci Code, adding to The Shiva Trilogy, The Krishna Ke...

I just finished the book Half a Life by Naipaul. It is beautifully written. And it must probably mean a lot with great detail, of character and places and stories and backdrops, which I don't know are accurate but might have been. However, I am probably not in the league of understanding it. To me it was by far the most pointless book I have read. When I picked it up, I thought it was supposed to be humorous, in a subtle manner. And it was, when the story was revolving around Willie Chandran's father. Then Willie goes to London and it is no longer even remotely funny. The story just goes around for no purpose except to prove that Willie has always been living somebody else's life. But as far as I can see, he lived his own life, the way he wanted to and was plain unhappy all the time. And it was supposed to tell a story but I have no idea what the story was. Writing style was brilliant though. It was easy to read and would keep you turning the pages even when...