Saturday, June 18, 2005

[Book review] Q and A

I had heard a lot about this book and the lot I had heard were, in general, in praise of the book. But having been deceived by the rave reviews of another book by an Indian author, I was on guard and did not buy the book. I tried to get this book through easylib.com but it was booked for quite a long time and a week ago, I finally got hold of this book.
Ok, the idea is interesting - it is about a pennyless waiter going on to win "Who wants to win a billion?", a fictional quiz show on the lines of KBC.
So how was the book? It was marginally better than Five point someone. Where 5.someone is a book written by a 9.someone about 5.someone, this book is written by a high-powered officer in the IAS about a poor, powerless waiter! An indication of the extreme social, economic, and status difference can be noted by the author's description of the sleeper compartment as containing 6 berths in all but in reality it has 8 berths. Only the First/Second AC compartments, which are the used by the rich and powerful, have 6 berths in each compartment.
The book is poorly wirtten and extremely-bollywoodish, though it was marginally better writing that 5.someone. The plot is so bad that it becomes hardly bearable. I managed to read it completely only in the hope that it would end better but that was not to be. I hated this particular book and I think cynicism regarding the rave reviews it got was well justified.

The book paints a very bad picture of India. Not that I say that India is the best place in the world or even that it is not that bad but it just seems to be quite over the top.

I could say more but I think I will just say this - this book is not worth the time.

2 comments:

Jaya said...

Sleeper class coaches on the trains on meter gauge have only 6 births :-D

You never know what he is talking about :p

Of course, to be taken in lighter vein...

Madhat said...

uh?
The train he described was one that took the protagonist from Delhi to Bombay (well, that was the supposed destination) and I dont think there are any metre guage trains between delhi and mumbai... but then, I might be wrong.

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