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Ghachar Ghochar

Book Review of Ghachar Ghochar, by Vivek Shanbhag

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I won a copy of Vivek Shanbhag‘s Ghachar Ghochar through Goodreads.

Description:
For readers of Akhil Sharma, Mohsin Hamid, and Teju Cole, a haunting, masterly novel about a family splintered by success in rapidly changing India.

A young man’s close-knit family is nearly destitute when his uncle founds a successful spice company, changing their fortunes overnight. As they move from a cramped, ant-infested shack to a larger house on the other side of Bangalore, and try to adjust to a new way of life, allegiances realign; marriages are arranged and begin to falter; and conflict brews ominously in the background. Things become “ghachar ghochar” – a nonsense phrase uttered by one of the characters that comes to mean something tangled beyond repair, a knot that can’t be untied.

Review:
Interesting, I think that’s the right way to explain my thoughts on this book. It’s an interesting look into the lives of a somewhat dysfunctional family. But it also leaves you wondering and speculating at the end. What really happened? Did anything really happen. If it did, who is responsible and who actually knows.

Ghachar Ghochar is a quick read, but packs a lot of punch in it’s pages. Well worth picking up.

Review of Reflection in the Music, by LeTara Moore

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I won a copy of Reflection in the Music, by LeTara Moore, through Goodreads.

Description:
Melissa is lost and hasn’t the first clue of where to find herself. Pea can’t let go of her past mistakes, which is suffering her present and future. Sherri thrives on her vanity, but even the most vain finds herself falling short. Jane just wants to start over and make amends, but how does one mend a broken heart? Life has a funny way of connecting the lost and confused. Some mistakes are meant to be made and some wounds aren’t meant to be healed. Some wounds don’t want to heal. Despite the shortcomings and differences, these ladies find themselves all singing the same tune. Beauty, passion, art, fear and love all had their hands in the composition of the ladies’ song—a song that reveals the deepest layer of each one’s being.

Review:
This was….well, honestly I don’t know what this was. True to it’s title it contained a lot of music references and the characters used songs to illicit memories. But rather than a story, it’s almost more a series of interconnected vignettes. The problem is that it reads as if this was not what the author intended, but what resulted from poor development and storytelling. Maybe I’m wrong, but that’s what it felt like to me. Further, the book could do with another round of editing. Especially to look at consistency in tense and page numbering.

There are those who will likely enjoy this more than me, especially readers who gravitate toward innocent, slightly religious characterization. But this was bust for me.

Review of The Gifted Storyteller: The Power Is in the Story You Tell, by Gregg Korrol

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I won a copy of Gregg Korrol‘s The Gifted Storyteller through Goodreads:

Description:
What if a Genie popped out of a bottle and gave you the power to create your life as it happened?

Michael followed “the plan” and did everything he was supposed to for life to be successful; great job, money, dates, yet despite it all, everything wasn’t the dream he expected. One night after work, he meets a beautiful and mysterious woman named Jeannie, who introduces him to the Gifted Storyteller, and changes his life forever.

Review:
This isn’t so much a review as documenting I’ve read this book, because I just don’t like this sort of book. I knew that I didn’t like a certain sort of book, but didn’t know this would be a book of the sort I don’t like. By this sort of book, I mean the sort where someone meets a stranger who opts to impart sacred knowledge to some random sap and this is presented to the reader as ultimately enlightening. There’s a quote on page 91 that states, “What she is saying is mind blowing.” and that’s how the reader is meant to feel about the book and it’s lessons. Here’s the thing, I almost never feel that they are. I didn’t here either.

I could take that fact to mean this is a pointless self-help book, but maybe it’s just imparting lessons I don’t need—to be mindful of the reality you build yourself and be careful of the fictions you build in your head (very Deepak Chopra).

Some will likely call this a sexist generalization, but I think men are especially in danger of this. After all, how many women have died because they didn’t live up to the fantasy of some strange man? (Certainly Korrol uses his character’s relationship to the opposite sex to make this point.) So, maybe these are lessons some people actually need, while some of us had to learn them growing up or risk never making it to adulthood.