Smorgasbord Fantasia

For all newbies writing their own uber-cool fantastical secondary world settings and think it's best the world has seen ever, after Tolkien dumped the Middle-earth on us, well, think again. Here's what Patrick Rothfuss ( Yeah. the same guy, with genial twinkling eyes set behind an awful lot of facial hair and who also wrote two giant tomes - that are award-winning by the way - called the KingKiller Chronicles - read review of first book here. ) - has to say to you : ( Yeah - finger pointing to you, writing your own Gods, Religion, Culture! ) Jokes apart, it's a pretty fascinating read and told in Pat's usually engaging manner. Get enlightened and come say thanks. http://blog.patrickrothfuss.com/2012/04/fanmail-qa-the-biggest-mistake/ Ta-Freaking-da.

My first travelogue book that I finished completely. I had earlier started the Walk in the Woods, recounting Mr.Bryson's trails on the Apalachian Trails (:D)but never finished it. Anyways - this was a very lively book on a country that I've always been fascinated by. Not just because the Aussies are one helluva Cricket Team or one of my all-time fav movies "Dil Chahta hain" was shot half in Australia. More like, I kept watching Steve Irwine get into ridiculously dangerous situations chasing scale-backed reptiles into the Australian Outback on Animal Planet and Discovery. More coz, one of my friends, Rohit had spent like 2-3 years in this beautiful country and described it to be a glorious piece of heaven right here on Earth. Australia as described by Bill Bryson, is a sunny warm and gorgeously beautiful country - with lots to be explored and discovered, full of amazing people, with a little-known backstory of intrepid explorers and adventurers wh...

Pretty intense and a breathlessly frenetic read. I don't think I have blown through any book this fast in the recent past. ( disclaimer: I have seen the 2007 movie: while I loved it I think the book outdoes it any day!) I am Legend, is a classic. One that has led to a lot of great books & countless movies. For a book originally written in 1954, it has hardly aged at all. A classic that dwells on a number of themes: Vampires/zombie, Post-apocalyptic earth, Survival, Science, the darker side of humanity dealing with loneliness, confusion, fear. I am astounded by the sheer imaginative power of Richard Matheson; a quick google leads me to learn the man is credited with a lot of film-scripts as well as best-selling science fiction books. He's more like your intelligent man's escape into the imagined world. of how things would turn out if you're the only "living" being stuck on earth after it's been wiped out by a plague of unknown origin. Simply love...

Apologies! I know the blogs been empty for a while after the last windstorm called The Bonehunters passed this way. So here's whats been happening in my busy life: 1) Finished "Long Tail" by Chris Anderson - a revised edition : a look at the new-age economy super stars of retail - like Google, eBay, Amazon, iTunes etc that have re-written the rules of engagement by unlocking the much-forgotten "Long tail" of customer demand. Anderson argues that with the advantages of infinite storage space ( esp if your products are purely "digital" - think music? ) retailers can afford to cater to the "niches" - that form micro-categories in that long tail of demand instead of being selective and pruning out a vast majority of products from that "Hit" list. It's a fantastic read - Anderson tries to illustrate his points by pain-staking data points from his wonderfully deep research and presents the same without being too pedantic and...