Colleen at Books in the City is hosting the Immigrant Stories Challenge in 2013. .
The only requirement of the challenge is that the books read for it include an immigrant story. The immigrants can be coming to or from any country – expand your horizons!
For this challenge, I am going to go with the “Just off the boat” level which requires of me to read a max of 3 books.
1. The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini
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I have been holding “The Kite Runner” for a long time; moving it between my different books shelfs, my reading areas and even different bags – but I never really started reading it till last week. When I did start reading it, I finished it even before I realized. The story is about many things, but most importantly it is about friendship. A friendship between Amir; a privileged member of a dominant tribe and Hassan; his devoted servant. To hide an act of cowardice, Amir gives up on his friendship with Hassan and ensures that he is sent out of his house. For Amir too, things change when a war starts and he and his dad flee to the United States. Many years later, after his father’s demise Amir comes to know that Hassan was more than just a devoted servant. It is time for him to return the favor; but will he cave in because of his cowardice or stand up.
To begin with; the book had some excellent descriptions about the country and the places that Hassan and Amir lived in. The ignorance of the children visible in the games they played, Amir’s attempts to please his father and his sadness when things do not work in his favor and the uncle who is more father to him than his dad was; all reminded me of a very serene and normal environment. When the friends drift away from each other abruptly it broke my heart. I thought what every other reader must have, that Amir was a selfish and arrogant child and would grow up to be despicable. When he had to flee to the United States, I thought roles would change and that in a foreign country he would be the underprivileged one. I was glad that the story took a new and different turn. It was anything else but predictable.
I specially liked that the characters were all clearly defined and played their roles with the utmost justice. The emotions were duly sincere and equally raw in all the different scenes. The contrast of events, characters and situations was deep-rooted, honest and real. Like for instance, the portrayal of the area where the children live a carefree life and the drastic change of the same vicinity when Amir visits it after many years. Amir’s act of cowardice when he fails to save Hassan and his courage when he has to save Hassan’s son are just some examples of the contrasts depicted.
In my opinion “The Kite Runner” is a candid book, filled with honesty. The writing is almost flawless and enjoyable. An interesting read and hence a quick one.
Four smiley faces is fair
Filed under: Book Review 2013, Book Reviews | Tagged: Khaled Hosseini, The Kite Runner | 1 Comment »
This is a weekly meme hosted by Sheila from Book Journey.
Books that I read last week.
Books planned for the coming week.
Filed under: Meme's 2013 | 5 Comments »
“The Alchemist” was recommended to me a few years ago but I never got to it. This year it was my book club’s selection and I was thrilled to get to it. Our book club had varied opinions about the book and most of them viewed it the same way I did.
The book is an average read considering the fable like fashion in which it was written. The beginning was captivating and had the promises of an exciting, interesting self-help book (maybe even more). The story is of a shepherd who lives a simple life; taking care of his sheep and selling their fleece to fulfill his basic needs. He is deeply infatuated with the daughter of a businessman in the nearby town and is excited to meet her again this year in the pretext of selling the fleece. This is when he starts dreaming of a treasure. The gypsy woman he meets tells him that he will get his treasure but he will have to share 10% of it with him. An old king, gives him direction and teaches him how to read omens in exchange for 10% of his sheep. His travel from there on gets interesting, he loses his money, works for year at a crystal shop and then starts his journey again. This is when he meets the Alchemist who can transmute common metal into gold; can change into wind and has great wisdom. The Alchemist helps him to get to his treasure literally through a vast desert (numerous hardships).
The book was poorly written. It did have a lot of interesting lessons that were shared at various phases of his journey but not one of them gave me the ‘ah-ha’ feeling. Instances like when he turned himself into the wind annoyed me as there appeared to be a big disconnect between the reality in the beginning of the book and the magic / fantasy afterwards. In spite of the numerous flaws; the message was clear (at least to me) in that if you have a goal and are determined to reach it; the whole world will conspire in your favor. So yes, “The Alchemist” was mildly inspirational not in a spiritual or self-help kind of way; but in a more subtle “read between the lines” way.
3 smiley faces is all it gets
Filed under: Book Review 2013, Book Reviews | 3 Comments »
I am carefully selecting my challenges for this year as I am trying to keep myself honest.
After reviewing the millions of challenges available; the first one I picked is the Library Books Reading Challenge hosted by Book Dragon’s Lair . This challenge suits me as I am a great supporter of my local library. I love everything about the library and visit it atleast once weekly. That is one place I could easily spend hours browsing through the wonderful collection or just unwinding.
For this challenge, I am going to go with the “chapter book” level which requires of me to read 12 books.
1. The Alchemist by Paul Coelho
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Filed under: Challenges 2013, Library Books Reading Challenge | Tagged: Challenges 2013, Library Books Reading Challenge | 3 Comments »
Reading between Pages.. 