No More Meows 😢 April 5,2025

 Our beloved cat Zeus, constant companion, playmate, instant therapist, compassionate listener, playful trouble maker and independent spirit, has left us for cat heaven on Saturday April 5, 2025. He had turned 12 this February and was going on 13 when a ruthless beast, in the form of Chronic Kidney Disease, snatched him away from us. If you have ever loved a pet, you would understand this feeling of profound loss. He was the happy beating pulse of our home which now stands silent where no beloved face peeps through the corners. There is no familiar thud either of Choobs jumping down from wherever he was to come investigate any ongoing action. He conversed to us with his animated ears and a swishing tail. That intelligent face and those chatty meows will forever be cherished in our hearts. We try to take solace knowing he is not suffering anymore. We love you our sweet little Zeus, rest in peace.

♡♡♡♡♡

And Quiet Flows The Nila : A Salute To M.T

This take on Mikhail Sholokhov's famous title aptly describes my feelings on M.T. Vasudevan Nair's departure at the great age of 91. He was the undisputed emperor of stories in Malayalam, a Dravidian language from the Indian state of Kerala. M.T as he was known, was synonymous with the language itself, such was the might of his pen. Marquez's 'Macondo' was imaginary while M.T's 'Kudallur' was a real village with its inhabitants living on as characters in his books and its river Nila forever his muse.

There was never a time when the name MT did not come up if you were into Malayalam books. To MT, celluloid was as familiar a medium as paper. He directed or did screen play for more than 50 films, almost all of which were hits with the state's highly discerning audience. English translations of his works made him familiar to non-Malayalam readers, but his words truly touch the soul when read in Malayalam. Unfortunately, this might be the reason why this unbelievably gifted author was never considered for the Nobel Prize in Literature. Akin to Dostoevsky, he had an uncanny ability to understand and vividly portray his characters. I have imagined them as emerging fully formed from the tip of his pen after dwelling deeply in his psyche. 

MT was forever in search of true human nature and had a unique gift to absorb everything around him. Another like him may never come by again. Malayalam was quite lucky to have had this giant literary presence for as long as it had. Sleep well MT! Your books will continue their triumphant journey through time even after the Nila stops flowing.

Maui sunset, 2024

Trust By Hernan Diaz

We had gone to the University to pickup our son for Christmas and decided to have lunch there as we sometimes do. There was a 45 minute wait for the table and so we went to checkout the bookstore that was right next to the restaurant. This book immediately caught my eye and I managed to read quite a few pages before we got the call. On the way back I bought the book and came home and finished it. A very novel way of story telling that will catch your attention for sure. The same story is told from four different view points. I was so caught up in the first version that I refused to budge when the second, more sane version came along but warmed up to the idea that the story and characters were changing by the time the third version came along and was fully sold onto the last one. Diaz is quite accomplished in that each of the stories gives the reader a certain closure on the at once enigmatic and pedantic couple around whom the stories are built. You can read this one for sure when you get that urge to read 'something' and want a satisfying read. Almost like a good meal of comfort food.

The Code Breaker: Jennifer Doudna, Gene Editing, and the Future of the Human Race By Walter Isaacson

 I am adding this here just to remember this book. As one gets older, memories become more like tiny pieces of cloud that we try to catch before it fades. I had read this fascinating real story in one sitting almost. But now, a month or so later I couldn't quite remember what was that book I had read with such passion. Took some effort but I have managed to grab that memory back and has now deposited it into the core memory. At least I think so.

It is a great read about the long history of research that resulted in the groundbreaking work of gene editing by Nobel prize winner Jennifer Doudna and team at UC Berkeley, California. Isaacson starts at the earliest spot of research done in this field and ties together various coincidences and efforts of the scientific community across the world with surprising clarity. Then he weaves the life of Doudna into this whole scenario to take it to the astounding conclusion that we all know of . A must read.

A House Without Windows By Nadia Hashimi

I have heard of writer's block but I'd been suffering from a reader's block for a while. Suffice it to say Nadia Hashimi's flavorful prose jolted me out of it and led me to complete her book in under 3 days! Despite a very serious story, Hashimi gently takes hold of the reader's heart with subtly placed details that elicit a craving for more. Who else can describe a plain meal of rice, bread and spinach so well and I quote, "the aromatic steam of the white rice, a blend of cumin and salt" and again, "tore off a piece of bread and shaped it around a lump of spinach, pink threads of rhubarb mixed in". The staunch non-vegetarian that I am, didn't stop me from drooling while reading this even as I worried earnestly about the protagonist's fate. Zeba is the central character who is jailed for killing her husband Kamal on a day described in such refreshing detail that you can feel it as if you were there in person. Through Zeba, Nadia Hashimi tells the story of the women of Afghanistan and to an extent women everywhere who face hardships because of their gender. I have flipped through similarly themed books without picking it up as a read just because of the unavoidable weight it places on one's mood. This book has resolved that dilemma and I find that I can see Zeba's life with a greater awareness. While I think the title didn't do full justice to the superior prose inside, I have gone ahead and ordered "The Pearl That Broke Its Shell" by the same author. Quite telling I'd say as to what I think of the book and the author. 

Two Books

The Ivory Throne By Manu S Pillai

With this book, Pillai has accomplished what many people take years to do. He has become a true blue historian. His well researched book on the last royals of the House of Travancore from the Indian state of Kerala at the cusp of independence is quite expansive and intriguing. Flavored with stories he must have heard from his own ancestors,  the book showcases evidence based research that lends it credence. He had access to British archives from the colonial times while a student in London and seems to have made good use of the State and National archives of India. This is more 'her'story than history as the book is presented around the reign of the last Travancore Queen Sethu Lakshmi Bayi. As a child growing up in post independence Kerala, I had heard a lot about this queen and always wanted to know more of her. The book also starts out with a wonderful chapter on the early history of the Malabar-Kochi-Travancore region with its many kingdoms that were engaged in regular trade with Arabs, Chinese and Europeans from ancient times.  So a big thank you to Pillai for this almost 700 pages long, 2 inches thick paperback that helped satiate a lot of my curiosity. I fervently hope he will come out with a book which further expands on that first early history.

Sugandhi Enna Andal Devanayaki By TD Ramakrishnan

Let me be upfront. There is a good chance that getting through the second half of this difficult to pronounce book may be tough. But the good news is the first half. The scenes, story and premise are quite refreshing and relatively unexplored in Malayalam or for that matter in Indian lit. Before Ondatje I hadn't read anything on the country that lies so close to the southern tip of India. My first international roommate in the US was a Sinhalese from Sri Lanka. I remember how we used to marvel at the fact that a whole lot of people in those times didn't know that Sri Lanka was a whole country!

I asked for this book on a whim along with the Ivory Throne when my dear book friend offered to get me some books on her way back from India. There is nothing more that I need when a book is coming my way. Truly enjoyed the first half with its enchanting stories of the old and new and it was a privilege to learn of both Andal Devanayaki from the old era and Rajani Thiranagama from the new.  The second half felt like a lengthy repetition of the first but I am still glad I read this. Will be looking for more books from this promising author.

The Last Painting Of Sara de Vos by Dominic Smith

The other day my son remarked that I had not posted anything here in a while. This was the right remark at the right time as I'd been meaning to add a book post before 2020 finally wandered off. Not that any of us will miss it but it did have some highlights along with the low light. 2020 election results and the arrival of vaccines at the tail end, all four of us together under one roof and the absence of daily commute are a few of the favorite things of last year. I'll note down just one of the few books I managed to finish in this very busy year.

When a book is being read on Kindle, it is not lying face down where you left off, inviting you in on your return. To add to this, past and present lives of two major characters from two different centuries got intermingled enough for me to get lost and leave. That is, until I took it up again when it showed up in my Kindle library as 57% read. 

The key that holds this book came to me on this second attempt. Each chapter is a beautiful painting by Dominic Smith and each word a masterful brush stroke. Every sentence, part of a scene coming together to create that fully framed painting. 

 Dominic Smith created Sara de Vos out of the life stories of many women painters of 17th century that he had gleaned from research. It was so real that as soon as I finished the book, I started searching for Sara de Vos's painting 'At The Edge of The Wood'. I was frustrated that links for the book kept coming up instead of links to the painting. This is how I found that there was no such artist or painting! Apparently this painting provided some inspiration to the author.

The second protagonist in the story is also a woman painter living in New York in the 20th century. Eleanor Shipley restored paintings in the early phase of her career and the one mistake she did was to do a forgery of the single known painting of Sara de Vos. 

Through Dominic Smith, it dawns on us how skilled one needs to be to do a forgery. I had never thought of this angle before so this was very revealing. To faithfully represent the original painter and to pass through many inspections,  a forger has to have in depth knowledge of old paintings and the tools used to create them in those times. Same skills used by a restorer of paintings. Same difference between hacking and cyber security if you ask me. 

Dominic Smith is a painter of words and writes as if he has a scene right in front of his eyes. You don't want to miss any of the words because then you could very well be missing that little hint of sunshine or the shadow from a tree that gives depth to this masterpiece of a book. If you love paintings, then this is your book without doubt.