Book Review - As a God Might Be by Neil Griffith

In 1964 William Golding published The Spire, a novel that traced the journey of a dean who believes God has directed him to erect a spire above Salisbury Cathedral. 

It’s a meditation on faith but also a study of those who question the sanity of believers and, as with all novels that examine our relationship with God, it ends on an inconclusive note, for who can ever profess to know the truth?

More than 50 years later, Neil Griffiths explores a similar concept in As a God Might Be, when middle-aged Proctor McCullough abandons his family to build a church on English common ground. 

He’s quickly joined by four young misfits – Terry, Nat, Rebecca and Rich – each of whom has reason to escape their daily lives. They arrive early, work hard and although they’re not religious, they have faith in their leader and are committed to seeing the project through to completion.

Placing theology at the core of a novel can be a risky business. Griffiths has written of the difficulties he faced in finding a publisher for this book, stating that one admired it but “as an atheist, materialist and humanist” couldn’t support it, while its focus on religion also appears to have cost him his agent. 

I’m not convinced there’s any subject matter that alienates publishers as long as the material is presented in a thoughtful and original manner, and such assertions can come across as a little self-aggrandising. 

Recent novels by Michel Faber, Sarah Perry and Thomas Keneally, for example, have considered church doctrine and spirituality and all found a wide readership, while Richard Beard’s Lazarus Is Dead and Acts of the Assassins have been acclaimed for their unorthodox interpretation of biblical stories.

Although Griffiths’ novel is less metaphysical than any of these, he explores his theme with a commitment that is both interrogative and passionate. Mac is a complex creation, uncertain why he feels compelled to build his church and unable to answer his critics, who fear he has simply gone insane. 

Many of the best scenes take place when he’s in discussion on site with his four disciples, moments that never descend into turgid debates but are authentic dialogues with each character striving to understand the place of the divine in a mortal world.

Sharp distinctions

There are sharp distinctions drawn between the curiosity of the young and the disillusionment of their parents. Mac’s own peer group are a dislikable lot, arrogant and preening, while his youthful workers search quietly for meaning through hard labour.

If there’s a problem with the characterisations, however, it’s one that afflicts the work of so many male novelists: the depiction of women. Rebecca, the only girl in the crew, is constantly defined by her beauty and her sexual relationships with men. 

When she is annoyed by the romantic attentions of Rich, for example, Mac consoles her by saying that her presence has allowed the boy to get in touch with his heart, suggesting that God “places women like you around the world to do this very job”. 

I’m not privy to what God’s thoughts were when he removed Adam’s rib but I doubt this was top of his agenda.

Similarly, Holly, Mac’s wife, is portrayed as unsupportive, despite her husband quitting his job, spending their life savings and abandoning her with two small children, one of whom is autistic. 

‘The terrible truth for Holly was that if she really loved him – loved him at his deepest – she would understand that he was always going to have done this,’ we are told. I’m not so sure about that either.

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Original review on: www.irishtimes.com

Book Review: Found Dead by Shantanu Guha Ray

Jiah Khan, Sheena Bora, Sunanda Pushkar, Ponty Chadha – These have been some of the many high profile murder/suicide cases that have remained unsolved till date. In fact there has been a high degree of uncertainty around even the motive in many cases. 

Journalist Shantanu Guha Ray picks up these cases thread by thread and comes up with an impartial view around facts that are already in public domain and spins a tale that makes for a very intriguing read. He narrates it all as a thriller and the storytelling is such that you ate truly immersed into the proceedings.

He picks up nine such high profile cases and packs them all in a 250 odd page book. Other than the aforementioned victims, he also talks about Rizwanur Rahman, Neeraj Grover, Shivani Bhatnagar, Shakereh Khaleeli and Vijay Palande. 

Except for the last two cases, former being an old case and latter being relatively recent, rest all have been reasonably high profile and are being talked about till date. As a matter of fact, some of these have already seen movies made around the killings.

What Shantanu establishes quite well is that the common element in each of these killings is the adage that goes as ‘jar joru aur zameen’. There is either wealth involved or a romantic angle, and this is what has led to many a crime that took place. 

However, since most of these cases are still being fought in the court, Shantanu stays away from announcing a verdict per se though he does drop more than a hint or two around what could have possibly happened.

Jiah Khan’s tale has a love story and professional pressure involved, Sheena Bora has greed as the central element, Sunanda Pushkar’s story has a rocky marriage in the middle of affairs, Ponty Chadha’s killing is narrated as a war between brothers, Rizwanur Rahman’s murder is about a classic ‘ameer-gareeb’ love story gone wrong, Neeraj Grover’s death has a triangular romantic liaison playing truant, and so on and so forth.

What makes Found Dead special is the fact that it relies entirely on facts while being told as a fiction. 

What could have emerged as a pure documentary tale is brought to fore as an engaging affair due to sheer manner in which Shantanu spins it all together. There is good continuity that emerges from one series of events to another and that constantly hooks you as a reader.

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Original review on: http://www.bollywoodhungama.com

Book Review - Ramses The Damned by Anne Rice

He was once known as Ramses the Great, pharaoh of all Egypt, but after discovering the elixir to immortality he has now become Ramses the Damned.

After serving advisor to well noted pharaohs that reigned after him, Ramses fell in love with Cleopatra – the last queen of Egypt, but that was all a distance memory.

Now, we jump forward centuries to the Edwardian age where Ramses goes by the alias of “Reginald Ramsey,” and is engaged to Julie Stratford. 

But there is one person that stands between the happy couple and that is Cleopatra who was resurrected by Ramses when he found her as a shriveled up, unidentified mummy in the Cairo museum.

Unlike her creator, Cleopatra is having troubles “reviving” properly and is more of a soulless, murderess who struggles to remember bits about her past life. But one person she does remember is Ramses.

But instead of turning their wrath on each other, a new threat has also arisen in the form of two other immortals. One is named Saqnos, an ancient statesman whose goal is to use the elixir to wield unimaginable power through an unstoppable army of slaves. 

His former queen, Baktaten, who discovered the elixir’s secret, is the other immortal who is step to stop him. Another interesting character that’s added in this mix is the writer Sybil Parke who is set out to discover unexplainable connection to Cleopatra.

Sybilis in search of Cleopatra, in order to save herself from going mad, due to her visions of a life in Alexandria, from some distant past.

After all the main characters meet at the party hosted to honour the engagement of Julie and Ramses, the rest of the novel really picks up and gets interesting.

This can be a difficult book if you haven’t written the prequel, The Mummy, which was published in 2004. But after all, this is the second installment written by the queen of horror herself and her son – so better late than never right?

If you’re in the mood for a good mix of characters, fast paced plot (during the second part of the book), exotic location, this is the novel for you.

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Original review on: http://www.reddeeradvocate.com

Review - An Inconvenient Sequel: Truth to Power by

Though the consensus has long been that climate change is indeed taking place, and at an alarming rate, there still exist some skeptics who refuse to accept the overwhelming accumulation of data that counters their narrow-minded or ill-informed thinking. 

Yet, since Al Gore's landmark documentary "An Inconvenient Truth" was released in 2006, there has been a shift of understanding that time is of the essence when considering the best steps to take to reverse the planet's current course into unchartered climate territory.

Gore's passion for the environment has only increased over the years, highlighted by his recently released follow-up movie and its companion book, "An Inconvenient Sequel: Truth to Power."

 Though released into a world that has not made the forward progress he advocated for a decade ago, the tone of this latest book is still hopeful. Despair, he says, "is simply another form of denial and can serve to paralyze the will we need to fight our way out of this crisis."

And if anything, 2017 has emphasized how deeply into crisis-mode the planet has shifted. Just the news of the past year's weather is enough to remind us of the escalation of systemic changes. 

Historic storms have unfolded, one after the other, each one breaking records; fires have raged across the western United States for much of the year, consuming 2 million acres of land, and damaging or destroying iconic landmarks, towns, and cities. 

Countering this, but serving as another stark reminder of how serious the global community is taking the warnings of the world's leading scientists is the all-hands-on-deck commitment to the Paris Climate Accord by every single one of the nations on Earth — minus one.

In spite of the lack of political will in the United States, Gore still sees a way forward. "Because many governments in the world — especially the United States government in 2017 — are still controlled by fossil fuel interests, the growing citizen activist movement pushing for more rapid change is actually the most important." 

Where the U.S. is failing to lead, states and cities are stepping up, as are other countries who are motivated by the alarming changes they are seeing within their own borders.

For example, parts of the world that rely on monsoonal moisture for agriculture are suffering, and vital aquifers are being depleted at alarming rates. 

Water pollution — run-off from pesticides, fracking chemicals, as well as waste from heavy industrials are harming water supplies, viruses and diseases, like Zika, and West Nile, are spreading, and air pollution around the world is reaching unsustainable levels. 

While countries like the U.S. are arguing about saving the coal industry, some poorer areas of the world are "leap-frogging" over developed nations, wisely bypassing the dirty effects of fossil fuels to head straight for the cleaner technologies.

Renewable energy is booming, and Gore insists that the "Sustainability Revolution" is where the real profits lie. The solutions are ready, the will and commitment are now needed. 

Since leadership from the top is not happening in many places around the world, people like Al Gore have been focusing their efforts on a more local, community-based level. 

Much of Gore's book highlights his Climate Reality Project, a decade-old training program, designed to train and arm people with the data and resources to address the problems of climate change that are impacting their own corners of the world.

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Original review on: www.summitdaily.com

Book Review – Marvel Superhero Adventures: Deck the Malls!

Marvel Superhero Adventures is a new early reader series from Marvel Press. The first volume follows Spider-Man and his friends in a holiday story. Marvel Super Hero Adventures: Deck the Malls! is the perfect way to get kids reading and get them into the Christmas spirit.

Peter Parker and Aunt May are in line for the new Stark Watch and Peter is being a little selfish, leaving Aunt May to wait in line while he goes off to make a list of things he wants. 

But while browsing for books with Gwen, Venom arrives to try and latch on to Peter! Now Spider-Man and Spider-Gwen have to fight through the mall to stop Venom and keep the shoppers safe. Through this fight, Peter also learns that at Christmas, it's better to give than to receive.

Comic artist Sean Ryan has created some eye popping artwork that features these characters in a younger-looking, kid-friendly style. The story is by MacKenzie Cadenhead, a former editor for Marvel Comics, and she has fun creating a story based on Marvel's most iconic character for kids, Spider-Man.

If your kids are learning to read and love watching Spider-Man on Disney XD, then they will love Marvel Super Hero Adventures: Deck the Malls! This series is also a great way to introduce kids to Marvel characters in a kid-friendly way. 

Future volumes will feature other Marvel characters along with more Spider-Man adventures, allowing these classic comic icons to be part of their lives before they graduate to comics.

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Original review on: www.laughingplace.com

Book Review - Chasing Smoke: A Wildfire Memoir by Aaron Williams

“Above that, trees burn. They flare up in groups of two or three, the taller balsams being the most impressive to watch. Sheets of flame unfurl from their branches, sending black smoke into the sky to join the mothership cloud of grey smoke hanging permanently in the air above us.” — Aaron Williams, Chasing Smoke

Imagine waking at dawn in a cold tent, bolting down breakfast and jumping into a mud-splattered truck that carries you to the edge of a raging fire.

Picture spending the next 16 hours hauling hoses, spraying water, falling trees with chainsaws and grubbing out underground embers with hand tools, choking on bitter smoke. Welcome to the world of B.C.’s forest firefighters.

If you have ever wondered what it is like to fight fires on the steeply pitched mountainsides of the province, Aaron Williams’ new memoir Chasing Smoke is for you.

Williams, already an experienced firefighter in 2014 when he was hired to work the season he records in Chasing Smoke, provides the reader with vivid, richly observed stories about the hectic, dirty, exhilarating and exhausting adventures he and his team, the Telkwa Rangers, experienced during the season.

Every year, our province hires close to 1,000 workers to fight forest fires. And the challenge seems to worsen each season. In 2017, for example, wildfires charred 1,216,197 hectares of B.C., more than a third of the land burnt out across the country.

Global warming is making wildfires more extensive, and the incursion of human habitations into what was formerly untouched bush means that more fires start and more of them threaten settlements.

Williams is a born storyteller and his colourful anecdotes capture the high-energy work under terrible conditions that he and his workmates endured every year.

He also provides vivid character sketches of the brave women and men who share the smoky side hills and cut blocks with him, and chronicles with admirable honesty the moments of spite and competitiveness that inevitably occur as stress and exhaustion mount. This is a fast and entertaining read and important background as we think about the public policy challenges for a province in flames. 

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Original review on: http://www.ottawacitizen.com

Book Review - My Absolute Darling by Gabriel Tallent

There are two camps of readers when it comes to Gabriel Tallent’s breakthrough debut novel “My Absolute Darling” — those who are naming it among the best of the year (the Washington Post, Amazon.com, Stephen King, to name a few — and I’m sure it will hit more best-of lists before the year is up) and those who are infuriated by the content and think it should never have been written at all. If you’re not a follower of the book review community, it’s not the gentle, quiet, cardigan-wearing group you might imagine.

Julia “Turtle” Alveston is a 14-year-old being raised by her father on the northern California coast. Her mother died when she was young; her father, a survivalist, keeps her mainly isolated in their home in the woods. 

She attends school, but he’s instilled a strong suspicion of everyone in her so she keeps to herself. Her father and her grandfather, whose health is declining, are her whole world — and her father fluctuates between being her best friend and abusing her in every way you can imagine.

Turtle meets a pair of local boys in the woods, and through her relationship with them, she begins to see a larger world outside of the one her father has built for the two of them — but her father, sensing her pulling away, becomes more violent and begins drawing others into his warped definition of love. Turtle has to draw on strength she isn’t sure she has in order to survive.

The issue a number of readers are having with this book is that they don’t believe a male author has the ability to write a female victim of sexual violence — they see it as exploitative, written for shock value rather than literary value, and offensive, lessening the experiences of these victims. 

I’m not going to completely discount this point of view — I believe that there are books like this, where the characters are two-dimensional and the authors have no business writing about such things, where they are just for the attention such books bring.

However, I also strongly believe that this is not one of those books.

Although Turtle’s story is shocking and Tallent pulls no punches in telling it, it wouldn’t be as brilliant of a book (and it is a brilliant, breathtaking book) if he were to tiptoe around the dark, ugly shadows that make up her life. We need to experience her entire character arc in order for it to punch us in the gut as hard as it does.

As for whether a male author has the right — or ability — to write from a female point of view, especially about topics such as this (or vice-versa) ... a good author doesn’t have to be the same gender as the characters they’re writing about. 

A good author doesn’t have to have experienced everything their characters have. A good author doesn’t have to have lived where their characters have. 

A good author will research these things, talk to people who have had these experiences, visit these places — and then use their imagination and make up a world for us to fall into.

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Original review on: http://www.watertowndailytimes.com