A Heart So White by Javier Marías My Rating: 4 of 5 Stars What do I wish to hear? About the present? The past, may be? Or a little tune on the waiting future? Do I wish to eavesdrop on my best friend to find out what she thinks of me when I am not … More Book Review: A Heart So White by Javier Marías (1992)
Autumn by Ali Smith My Rating: 3.5 of 5 stars [Originally appeared here.] She has done it in the past; and she does it again here. Ali Smith’s fixation on, and a visible mastery of, story-telling across timeline, in no particular order, shines in this experimental, breezy novel as well. Centred around the 30-something Elisabeth … More Book Review: Autumn by Ali Smith (2016)
It’s not a belated birthday wish. It’s a continuing one. Breathing in the Proustian air is one of my most favorite stress-busters since the time I have been introduced to it. An air so rich yet so clear, it permeates into my lungs with its slight, caressing bend, filling me with a sense of beauty … More HAPPY BIRTHDAY, MARCEL PROUST!
Honeymoon by Patrick Modiano My Rating: 2 of 5 stars I felt a vague twinge of remorse: has a reader the right to criticize certain details under the pretext that she considers them superfluous? Beginning my review by borrowing a line from the novel and infusing it with my words means two things: one, the … More Book Review: Honeymoon by Patrick Modiano (1990)
Dancing Lessons for the Advanced in Age by Bohumil Hrabal My Rating: 4 of 5 stars This little novella can, at once, be discarded as a long, never-ending chapter on corporeal pursuits from the life book of a mindless rambler, a libidinous exhorter, a senile raconteur. And for some part, one might be right in … More Book Review: Dancing Lessons for the Advanced in Age by Bohumil Hrabal (1964)
Embers by Sándor Márai My Rating: 5 of 5 stars My fingers were interlocked around my Baba’s arm and my head was resting on his shoulders. I was stealing a glimpse of his face every now and then, convinced that the lines of exhaustion were going to creep upto his tongue any moment, tendering me … More Book Review: Embers by Sándor Márai (1942)
The World Doesn’t End by Charles Simic My Rating: 4 of 5 stars Throw a pebble into the pool and see it dissolve into shimmering currents, carrying burdens of ashen leaves that autumn has swept beneath the silent tremors, teaming to cry their laments; Or hide behind a ripe tree and cast a glance, all … More Book Review: The World Doesn’t End by Charles Simic (1989)
The Loser by Thomas Bernhard My Rating: 3 of 5 stars Grey – The color that most of the characters created during large part of twentieth century and whole of twenty-first century till date, are painted in. Cruelly banishing the evergreen Black and all-star White to secondary positions,Grey has risen in ranks to be the … More Book Review: The Loser by Thomas Bernhard (1983)
Pnin by Vladimir Nabokov My Rating: 4 of 5 stars The evening lessons were always the most difficult. Drained of ambulating the willing grey cells throughout the carnage of day classes, the young readers, almost resignedly, filled the quiet room at the end of the corridor. A subdued tête-à-tête, almost at once, broke into … More Book Review: Pnin by Vladimir Nabokov (1953)
Happy Birthday, Mr. Zweig! I am so glad to have met you this year. Through your stupendously masterful Chess Story, you got into my book world like a summer rain; unexpected but alluring. Discovering multiple angles of psychological reflections in a slim novella of 80 pages was like hitting a jackpot; that sudden halt one … More HAPPY BIRTHDAY, STEFAN ZWEIG!
SEEMITA DAS 