Gaurav's Blog

Good Reads- 2011

 

 Just a short synopsis of what comprised my reading this year. When I compare my list of intended reading to what was in fact read just as the year is coming to a close, it is no doubt full of surprises.  So, while the intended list was meant to comprise more and more on Africa and its history, the actual list ended up looking like this:

1.     59 Seconds- Psychology is a popular subject now- more and more books are being written on consumer psychology and other related areas. 59 Seconds was gifted to me by a friend while we were still holidaying at Clarens, a lovely little hill town in Drakensberg. An old lady runs a smallish bookshop with an above average collection at this town of may be 5000 people. The book overturns some conventionally held psychological beliefs such as  "..Imagining being thin.." and talks about some effective measures one could take, based on real research, to improve one's life. I got through it, but can't say how much I am convinced with its conclusions.

2.     Jetlag -SAA in Andrews Era – Written by Dennis Beckett, A South African Journalist, this just came my way in the local Bedford view community library. For someone working at SAA, this can and did elaborate on a very important period in SAA's history giving insights into what has happened in the past and how it affects the future.

3.     Cry the beloved Country- This needs no introduction. I saw a glimpse of the movie based on the book on TV one night and instantly decided that I wanted to read the book- it has to be the first novel I ever read (Ok, second. The first one was Memoirs of a Geisha). One could almost imagine how life must have been during the apartheid era.

4.     India Yatra- Sometimes a book just mysteriously comes your way. India Yatra is a collection of short essays of local issues that fare in an election in India. If you think you know India, or can ever know or understand it fully, read the book and the illusion will wear off.

5.     Deciding who leads- What was I thinking? Corporate bull. I forgive myself, everyone makes mistakes.

6.     Diagnosis- Tanvi was born. Our world would never be the same. Diagnosis is a good peep into the medical world. How we expect that doctors will be perfect, they will never make any mistakes. The book tells the reader how doctors are still human beings and how diagnosis of a disease is still the most difficult part.

7.     Dubai- This book, which I picked up from the local book shop explained a great deal about Dubai's history- that helps explains its rise. Dubai= no rules.

8.     The case of exploding mangoes- This is a book about Pakistan's ex-dictator's assassination by CIA. While the book is written as fiction, but its plot seems so real.

9.     The Seychelles Affair- Picked from the local library, this is a story of a coup attempt by a South Africa based mercenary soldier on the communist leaning Seychelles government in 1978. If you think about the events today, with a recent invitation to China to set-up a Naval base in this Indian Ocean Island, the story is not just relevant, it seems it could be just as easily written today. Nothing has changed in geo-politics except the state actors. Yesterday it was USSR, today it is China.

10.            Better-   Atul Gawande is a great writer. This book, like diagnosis, is a peep into the medical world, explaining how hospitals and doctors work.

11.            Chile- Death in the South- Every country has had to go through a dark chapter. Chile had its own under General Pinochet. The book describes how people were brutally tortured and murdered during his reign and why it happened. It gives one an insight into Chile's political past.

12.            Fly by Wire- Finally, a book on Aviation. And a great read on the US Airways incident of landing into the Hudson River due to a bird hit.  Great insights into what goes in the cockpit. Can't wait for the Qantas A380 engine failure event to be written into a book.

13.            Following Fish - This book submerged me, gently into slow nostalgia. It is a travelogue along India's coast, starting from West Bengal and ending in Gujarat. Almost written like RK Narayan would have written it.  Simple, elegant, touching on day to day rhythm of life in great detail. I felt I am reading RK Narayan's own travelogue called The Emerald Route.  

14.            Super Freakonomics-  A sequel to the first best seller by Steven Levitt, it started with great promise into examining economics behind every day behaviors of people and patterns but then fizzled out towards the end. I had to make an effort to complete it.

15.            Inflight Science- Finally, the last book of the year too was on Aviation. Great for explaining concepts of physics to a school going child.