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!

Garden Spells

Beautiful cover with an intriguing blurb…the perfect bait for bookworms lurking around the murky depths of a lake called library! The blurb evoked memories of watching this Nicole Kidman – Sandra Bullock film titled “Practical Magic” that I wondered if the film became the source for the book or vice versa.

The Waverleys were always considered different by the residents of Bascom and their garden even more so owing to a mystical apple tree that throws its prophetic fruits at people. While Claire Waverley accepts this fact and lives in the ancestral home with a flourish catering business, her half sister Sydney flees home rejecting her heritage. Claire’s quite life is shaken up like a cocktail mix on the arrival of a stranger who has eyes only for her and it is further rocked by the arrival of her sister. Sydney is on the run again and this time is accompanied by her daughter Bay, a true waverley herself. This time though, Claire is ready to face the changes, adapt and even embrace them. How the Waverley sisters transform their lives for better forms the rest of the story.

I guess this is one book where I rooted for 2 characters who are of course the Waverley sisters. I enjoyed reading about their past, their decisions, they present and how they fight together for the future. Sarah Addison did a wonderful job is keeping the backdrop of the Waverleys simple weaving the characters as ordinary folks yet giving an element of magic to each. The story is strongly women-centric and deals with the life of a woman in every phase of her life…and you see this through the eyes of Bay, Claire, Sydney and Evanelle. Another endearing character that is worth the mention is Evanelle Waverley, a distant cousin of Claire and Sydney. Her uniqueness lies in the element of surprise that she keeps springing on the residents of Bascom. These gifts of hers serve to nudge the sisters along the way onto the path of forgiveness and fresh beginnings. On the whole, Garden Spells is definitely well worth a read!

The Night Circus

The circus arrives without warning.

No announcements precede it, no paper notices on downtown posts and billboards, no mentions or advertisements in local newspapers. It is simply there, when yesterday it was not.

                                                                 Opens at Nightfall
                                                                 Closes at Dawn

Le Cirque des Reves

A night circus whirls out of nowhere…travelling across cities and continents without a moment’s notice. A circus so magical, enchanting that it closes around you, tugging at your wildest dreams and imaginations while tempting you to try out the daring and unimaginable exhibits on display… Illusionists pulling off tricks that you could only watch open-mouthed with wonder, contortionists performing the most inexplicable feats, mazes with an unexpected doorways and bridges and bottles that capture the very essence of memories…they are all there for you to visit and visit again. Wanna visit it again? Ask the Reveurs, for they may be the only ones to know where it may appear next.

Such is Le Cirque des Reves, a mystery and an enigma to both the participants and the Reveurs. It is but a secret venue for a duel between 2 illusionists- Marco and Celia, apprentices to the greatest magicians unknown to mankind. As each tries to surpass the other in their feats of illusion, little do they know that it is a duel unto death.

This lovely piece of historical fiction is set in between the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The story which begins on an ominous note flies swiftly and silently between the past and the present sprinkling abundant notes of enchantments, history with an overall aura of melacholy to the readers. If you don’t pay attention to the dates and years, you will find yourself lost trying to remember the year that you are in. The characters exist somewhere between the conscious and subconscious figments of your imagination…they are present one minute and disappear the next. The only constant is the circus and its monochromatic beauty and the colorful secrets hidden within its massive tents. Every page is a delight to read as the story swings back and forth like a pendulum and your heart simply races to figure out Marco and Celia’s fates…are they doomed or do they find their happy ending?

Erin Morgenstern doesn’t waste time giving an elaborate backdrop to her characters…they just exist. I got the sense that the story was about a circus with the duel and the illusionists laid in as an afterthought…the tiny threads that hold the web together tightly. Despite this flaw, I enjoyed reading the book right from the cover page and that my dear readers is the power of a good story. So if you are looking for some fantastic and magical story that is grounded to reality just a bit then be sure to pick this book!

And if you’d like to take a more interactive approach to your reading then check out this website – http://www.nightcircus.co.uk/signup

The Rose Garden

I’m quite not sure how I picked on Susanna Kearsley’s books but in any case was instantly drawn to her stories. Part history, part mystery, part sci-fi involving time travel, The Rose Garden does away with the boundaries of traditional story-telling.

It is a cold November when Eva loses her sister Katrina, the last living member of her family. When the time comes to scatter Katrina’s ashes, Eva chooses to travel to Trelowarth, Cornwall to return her sister to the place she belongs.The first chapter begins on this sad note with a lyrical description of Eva’s memories of her and Katrina’s childhood. By 2nd chapter, readers are well acquainted with Eva’s history. Eva is warmly welcomed by the Hallets into their draughty crumbling manor, the Trelowarth House.

As Eva starts to settle in and reacquaint herself with her old friends, she stumbles upon an ancient portal which transports her into the 18th century England and into the arms of Daniel Butler, a sea captain and supporter of the Jacobite revolution. Eva’s confusion and her belief that she is hallucinating is soon dissipated and she is left with a sense of impatience at her inability to control her timing of travel and an eagerness to be with Sea Captain. Eva begins to question her connection with the past and the present, and when the time comes to decide whether to return to the past or stay in the present, what does Eva choose?

Woven into this beautiful romance is an account of the Jacobites rising, as told by the Butler brothers – Daniel and Jack. The encounters with the Butler brothers serves to fuel Eva’s research into Trelowarth’s past as she uncovers forgotten records that also provide her with an insight into the outcome. I couldn’t warm up to the principal character much as I tried as I couldn’t agree with her line of thought, the choices that she made…for constantly thinking of a dismal past. Although Ms. Kearsley introduces a dashing hero in the later chapters, I strongly believed that this book was about Eva and of her choices.

My favorite characters though are really the supporting cast – Fergal and Claire. Both exhibit a sense of independence, a fierce loyalty to those they’ve come to love and a sense of comradeship to Eva serving as her guides in the past and the present. They don’t question a lot but when in need of an advice, you’d know they’d be there for Eva. The story setting was enchanting, the plot with its sense of surrealism drew me to Susanna Kearsley‘s writing style so much so that I immediately requested for “The Winter Sea” from NPL. And that had an altogether different tale to tell. So if you happen to stumble upon this book at a store or in your local library, be sure to pick up a copy and do drop me a note on your reading experience! You can also find details and photographs of actual locations that inspired this story on the author’s website.

Ragnarok

Every culture, every religion has its set of myths and legends, a resultant of the tales and adventures of people who seem to have existed before us… perhaps a race of superhumans. Who can be sure right?! Whatever the stories maybe, the way you present them to your readers makes all the difference between a great story and a not-so-great one. And A.S.Byatt does just that…weaving an enchanting tale that speaks of the end of Norse gods.

A thin child finds herself evacuated to a German countryside with her family during WWII. Her father is away fighting while her mother is busy protecting the family. Everyday the thin child walks to school through a meadow often stopping by admire and analyze nature, and on most nights she reads, with the exception of those where she lays listening to the drone of the bomber planes. And then the thin child begins to read about Ragnarok, the final battle of the gods. The book begins with Yggdrasil, the great tree of life which extends from heaves to Midgard to the underworld. It is followed by Randrasil, the gigantic kelp in the ocean and  the birth of the Norse gods – Odin, Baldur, Loki, Frigg and their beautiful fortress in Midgard. The 2nd part of the book describes the dealings of the gods, their whims and follies, the birth of Loki’s fearsome children while the final part describes the final battle between the gods. The battle is neither elegant nor long-drawn but brutal and swift marking the end of gods and the anti-gods.

The tale with its lyrical tone is spun into the musings of the thin girl, her imagination paints a vivid, vibrant picture of the beauty and horrors of Midgard, Asgard and the netherworld that surround Midgard. The sun and the moon being chased by the wolves is so reminiscent of the Indian myths surrounding the cause of solar and lunar eclipses. The bounty of the tree of life and the kelps left me wanting for more words to devour. The tale presents the contrast between order and chaos as seen through the eyes of Odin and Loki, brothers yet enemies standing on opposite ends of a spectrum…one strives for order and peace while other strives to create chaos. Whether its out morbid curiosity or morbid desire to take revenge, we never know.

This book was a delightful read, light yet dark, intense yet light and I enjoyed agreeing with the thin child’s thoughts, her analysis of the gods especially of Loki who both frightens and arouses her curiosity. Byatt refers to Wilhelm Wagner’s work “Asgard and the Gods”, deemed as one of the earliest works on Norse mythology written in German. The book served as an inspiration to Byatt and seems to have influenced her writing style as well. And with this I conclude my musings on this book. A definite must-read and a must-have in your personal library. Wish I could find a first edition!