Going Postal

Source – Wikipedia

Soon as I started reading Making Money, I realized that following Moist von Lipwig’s adventures is worth every dollar. And I mean literally! The guy has nothing to lose except maybe his life and so he sets out himself to entertain the crowd while filling up the government’s coffers. Going Postal is the 1st book in Lipwig series and the 33rd in the Discworld series.

Moist von Lipwig is a professional conman if there was ever one to grace Discworld…the one of his kind I’d say. Unfortunately for him, his crimes are discovered and he is sentenced to be hanged. A short while later, Moist finds himself before Lord Vetinari, the tyrant and ruler of Ankh-Morpokh who offers him a delicate choice between taking up the job of Post Master of the city’s Post Office vs. a certain painful death. Moist of course chooses the former and so finds himself in a dilapidated relic that is the Post Office with only a Mr. Groat, the Jr. Post Master and Stanley to guide him. Their jolly little team has 2 other members – Moist’s parole officer Mr. Pump and Mr. Tiddles, the office cat with occasional help from Ms. Adora Belle Dearheart, manager of the Golem Trust. And here I must add the introduction given to Tiddles -

“A large black-and-white cat had walked into the room. It paid no attention to Moist or Groat, but progressed slowly across the floor toward a battered and unraveling basket. Moist was in the way. The cat continued until its head butted gently against Moist’s leg, and stopped.
“That’s Mr. Tiddles, sir,” said Groat.
“Tiddles?” said Moist. “You mean that really is a cat’s name? I thought it was just a joke.”
“Not so much the name, sir, more of a description,” said Groat. “You’d better move, sir, otherwise he’ll just stand there all day. Twenty years old, he is, and a bit set in his ways.”

Added to the mess are the thousands of letters and the ghost of their writers’ voices that begin to haunt Moist and of course the one and only competitor – Mr. Reacher Gilt and his company “The Grand Trunk”. Will Moist manage to restore the Post Office to its former glory while evading Gilt and his devious deadly schemes or will he fail and be hanged yet again? And with this description I’ll leave it to you readers to decide whether to pick or drop this book.

Moist von Lipwig is probably one of my most favorite characters after Hercule Poirot and Granny Weatherwax. Once he gets his rhythm going, there’s no stopping him as he sets out to woo the crowds employing some of the oldest tricks in the history of marketing. And to summarize his description – “He had an honest face. And he loved those people who looked him firmly in the eye to see his inner self, because he had a whole set of inner selves, one for every occasion. As for firm handshakes, practice had given him one to which you could moor boats. It was people skills, that was what it was. Special people skills. Before you could sell glass as diamonds you had to make people really want to see diamonds. That was THE trick, the trick of all tricks.”

As for the theme itself, there are several, first and foremost of which is the Post Office. It so reminds me of USPS…perhaps Mr. Pratchett was alluding to the British Govt Post and the possible changes that the postal system may have undergone in the last few decades. Then there is reference to the telegrams and the mobile networks…as described through the improvements to Clacks. And last but the most entertaining is the allusion to Organization and Change management, which features predominantly in the conversations between Mr. Gilt and his associates while discussing the affairs of the Clacks system. The following statement is probably also the most used by CEOs of companies worldwide -
“Gilt waved him into silence, and continued: “ – several hundred thousand dollars in a challenging, relevant, and exciting systemic overhaul of our entire organization, focusing on our core competencies while maintaining full and listening cooperation with the communities we are proud to serve. We fully realize that our energetic attempts to mobilize the flawed infrastructure we inherited have been less than totally satisfactory, and hope and trust that our valued and loyal customers will bear with us in the coming months as we interact synergistically with change management in our striving for excellence. That is our mission.””

And so with enough fodder for thought and plenty of quotes, I’ll conclude my blog post for the book – Going Postal. And to make my experience of this wonderful book complete, I even got hold of the film adaptation aired by BSkyB in Britain which was okay while not on par with the book. A hilarious and thoroughly enjoyable book through and through!

Making Money

Making Money is the 36th novel in the Discworld series by Terry Pratchett, and the 2nd book featuring Moist von Lipwig as the protogonist. To give a brief intro - Moist von Lipwig was a crook who went by the name Albert Spangler. In the novel Going Postal, Lipwig in his job as the Post Master General, transforms the Ankh-Morpokh Post Office into one of the most successful enterprises in the city.

In Making Money, the Patrician tasks Lipwig with reforming the Royal Bank of Ankh-Morpokh and increasing its customer base. Well-acquainted with the Patrician’s methods of persuasion, Lipwig reluctantly visits the bank and acquaints himself with the Chief Cashier Mr. Bent and the Chairman Topsy Lavish.  The following morning Lipwig is visited by Mr. Slant, an advocate who informs him of the death of Mrs. Lavish, and subsequently entrusts him with the duty of protecting the new Chairman, Mr. Fusspot who now owns 51% of the bank’s shares.

A reluctant Mr.Lipwig assumes the ownership of the bank much to the consternation of the rest of the Lavish family and Mr. Bent. His life is further complicated by an unexpected visitor from his shady past. Does Lipwig survive long enough to to succeed and keep the money flowing or does he fail thereby sentencing himself to death once more?

The story was a bit too long with a tendency to describe the mundane stuff but the humor was so good that it kept me going. Lipwig tries to blend it as smoothly as a wallpaper but ends up standing out due to his ability to entertain people and his love to flirt with danger. The book also brings out the humor and patience from Lord Vetinari. The unsung hero/victim of the book though is Mavolio Bent or Mr. Bent the chief cashier with a dark past which is unravelled at a gradual pace.

Setting aside the characters and the plot, this theme of this book is the banking system which thrives in almost every country owing to its rules, regulations, idiosyncrasies and what-nots. And the novel seems to take a jibe at the Bank of England perhaps what with the influence of the old money and old families on the day-to-day running of the bank.

I admire Terry Pratchett for his never-ending sense of humor…the predominant characteristic of all the Discworld books. Now combine that with the various activities/systems in the real-world and you get a brilliant piece on the denizens of the Discworld. I previously resisted reading “Going Postal” simply because it seemed boring but I’ve added it back to my TBR. Making Money is definitely worth reading!

The Wedding Officer

Anthony Capella’s books seem so diverse from title to title in terms of the genre that it is difficult to nail it as a particular genre. His stories appear to be an amalgamation of travelogue, history particularly surrounding a food item and part adventure with a lot of romance thrown in for good measure.

That’s the feeling I had until I read “The Wedding Officer” which digressed from the structure mentioned above that it caught me by surprise. Set in Naples, this tale is woven amidst the WWII when the Allied Forces were deployed to Italy to stop Germany’s siege. Livia Pertini is a happy-go-lucky girl who is known for her culinary skills in Osteria. The scene then cuts to the war-torn Naples introducing us to the hero – Captain James Gould who is stationed newly at Naples in the FSS division as a Wedding Officer. His assignment is to discourage his fellow officers from marrying the Italian prostitutes. And Livia is a war widow struggling to survive on meager means.

James takes up his post with enthusiasm which is certainly dampened by the Americans who collaborate with the Italians, a fact unknown to the British forces. He manages to get a somewhat firm grip of the situation by closing down all the restaurants as well as writing up negative reports on all the “Italian fiances” his officers got engaged to. The frustrated Italians decide on a scheme which intertwines  Livia and James’ lives creating a peach cobbler effect! Now don’t ask how I came up with this term..but then I did.

The book falls under a blend of genre that include travel, food, history, WWII and romance. As for the characters, Livia and James are very interesting characters…their chemistry and passions for each other makes them a perfect couple. James’s naivety creates the perception of being incapable of fighting at the front-lines but he surprises everyone with his brevity, common sense and determination to bring the baddies to justice. On a similar note Livia comes across as self-sufficient, brave with sharp survival instincts and this helps her survive the war and get her happy-ending with James.

Anthony Capella mentions Naples ’44 by the travel writer Norman Lewis. In this, his wartime diary, Lewis relates how as a young Intelligence officer he was sent to the city during the first months of the Allied invasion of Italy. The Germans were in retreat, but slowly, and Naples was the headquarters of the combined Anglo-American Fifth Army as they fought their way up to Rome. This combined with Capella’s visit to Naples and his work with the noted chef Jamie Oliver has inspired his ideas for this novel.

My review won’t be complete if I don’t mention the primary food theme…Italian cooking. And this reminds you of mozzarella, pasta, burrata, red wines, fine dining, siestas and countryside cooking. This book with its mouth-watering tendency is a definite must-read!

The 39 Steps

Having come across this book in a couple of blogs, I was happy to find a mini hard cover copy of The 39 Steps at NPL last weekend. What immensely helped me enjoy this book is the lack of research on the author or the story. Onto the story…

Richard Hannay is a rich Scotsman, who has returned to London from Rhodesia. He finds his London life quite boring and dreadful. One evening, he encounters a stranger in his apartment, who introduces himself as Franklin Scudder, a British Secret Service Agent. Scudder explains that a great conspiracy is afoot involving a secret organization called “Black Stone” including a possible assassination resulting in a war with Germany. Hannay takes in the information in stride but a couple of days later he finds Scudder murdered in his apartment. Fearing arrest and wanting to help Scudder in preventing the war, Hannay disguises himself as a milk-man and escapes in a train bound to Scotland. Thus begins the adventure of Richard Hannay, an amateur detective and a man with many faces. And guiding Hannay in his adventures is a little black book with Scudder’s notes on the conspiracy including a cryptic clue “39 steps” which keeps recurring throughout.

Hannay is one of the most interesting characters I’ve come across so far. He is rich, a bit pompous but intelligent and sensible as well. Hannay retains his commonsense and wit in the face of danger, adapts himself to the situations he gets into and best of all can get away with any disguise…each chapter highlights his adventures in a different disguise.

Another interesting fact is that the story doesn’t have diversions through romance or flights of fancies. The story is quick-paced, the plot is simple and tight, the dialogues are minimal and to the point. As for the people other than Hannay…the author John Bucchan doesn’t go overboard in describing them or elaborating on their role in the story. Everything’s just the right amount. Well worth the read!!

Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children

At first glance, this book might strike as a total random book on some orphan’s home but the blurb and reviews on B&N certainly helped in picking this title. What would you do if you had a dying relative on hand whose last words were something like -

“Find the bird in the loop. On the other side of the old man’s grave. September third, 1940″

Sounds crazy right?! but these are precisely the instructions that Jacob Portman’s grand-dad leaves him at his death. To make matters worse, Jacob spots a monster right out of his nightmares in the woods surrounding his grand-dad’s place at the time of death. So our young protagonist is treated as a loony by parents and friends alike and just when he thinks he’s moving on…he receives a gift from his grand-dad that shatters his already delicate psyche.

So Jacob decides to visit Cairnholm, the isolated island where his grandfather and a lot of peculiar children lived in sheltered from the Nazis. When he gets there though, the cryptic message starts to make sense and as Jacob pieces together the clues, he finds out more that the stories his grand-dad told him in childhood are real through his meeting with Miss Peregrine, the bird in the loop. He also discovers that he shares his grand-dad’s peculiar trait as well but there are monsters out there who are kidnapping the Ymbrynes for a bigger agenda. The adventure that Jacob and his friends set on is a life changing one for all of them…for does Jacob has to leave behind his parents and everything’s he’s ever known. This forms the plot for this book.

Can Jacob and his new friends save themselves or are they too late? This forms the crux of the sequel that Ransom Riggs obviously has underway.

Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children is certainly fast-paced for most part but there are places where the story drags for lack of content. What’s different about this book is Mr.Rigg’s choice to use vintage photographs which only strengthen your belief in these characters’ existence. Once upon a time, a hero was perfect in all ways, the ideal child/man/woman but since the advent of Harry Potter, it appears that the trend has shifted towards portraying the characters as “down-to-earth” and ordinary folks who rise out as extra-ordinary in a situation. Lets just say a new way to write novels in this century! I’d recommend this book for sure and lets say I’m already in line for the sequel.