Agatha Christie was superb at what she made the master detective, Hercule Poirot, do to Captain Hastings...she, too, gives all the information to the reader through the course of the book, and shows us, right at the end, how, as readers, we failed to pick up the clues.

Two prime examples are "A Caribbean Mystery" and "Curtain". It's a joy to read ( Read more... )

We may not admit it, but the truth is that we all seek to be loved by the world. When we are babies, we are loved whether we burp or scream or break our toys. But as we grow up, we are suddenly thrown into a world where people judge us by our achievements or our status (rather than our mothers did ( Read more... )

K2: Paru Sharma is actually Rama.
Me: Oh, really?
K2: Yes, he is Vishnu, born as Rama and then as Krishna.
Me (catching sight of the Amar Chitra Katha in his hand): Oh...that's Parashurama!

He's very annoyed that I am laughing. I am hoping that he doesn't make the Buddha into a Buddhu...

I took her to the public library, and she cuddled up to the teddy bear in the children's section.


( Read more... )

I was looking at a Facebook post, made by Viju JB,of a very old photograph, of a couple, taken at their wedding. This suddenly put me in mind of an old English magazine that was very much a part of our lives...the

Illustrated Weekly of India. The subject title is because we had a Marwari newspaper/magazine agent, who would come regularly to our ( Read more... )

prashanthchengi suddenly changed his Facebook userpic to that of a little devil, red, with cute little horns, a forked tail, and a trident....and that brought my "comic-book" past rushing back to my mind ( Read more... )

This was brought on by a discussion on Facebook, after I'd posted an observation, that the front page headlines of newspapers remain the same all the time... Vikram Hiresavi suggested I begin to get along without newspapers.

( But I still like my newspaper mornings! )

From "The Language Instinct" by Steven Pinker

Beware of heard, a dreadful word
That looks beard and sounds like bird,
And dead: it's said like bed, not bead--
For goodness' sake don't call it "deed"!
Watch out for meat and great and threat
(They rhyme with suite and straight and debt).

Thanks to anushsh for lending me this tough-to-read but interesting

I joined something called Shelfari and had added a few books, including R K Narayan's Swami and Friends , which is one of my all-time favourites. So today I tried to add The Guide to my list and lo and behold (or rather, low and don't behold), it wasn't listed at all!

HUH...that's the last of Shelfari!