Blog Update

I have just finished changing the blog schematics. For those of you who are new here's what the blog covers:

Blog Name: The LIT Stop (Name courtesy my good friend Akki.. U bro are a rockstar!!!)
Blog Link: http://thelitstop.blogspot.com/
Blog Sections:

1. Home: All the new posts will appear here.
2. General Updates: All the posts which are labelled as General Updates can be accessed from this section
3. Book Reviews: All my book reviews reviewed under the same label will be available here.
4. Reading Lists: Periodically I embark on reading challenges. Those will be listed and tracked in this section.
5. Author Profile: I will be doing a series of Author Profiles whose writings I don't miss. This section may also contain posts from my friends reviewing their favorite author too...

Thats all the update for now folks.... 3 posts in 1 day... I'm a spree... 

Whoooooooooohooooooooooo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

New Release

Good News for all Ashok Banker fans out there. Ashok is releasing the first book of his Ithihasa Series - Ten Kings (Dararajna). Refer to the communique below for more details.

Have an action-packed summer!

eBOOK AVAILABLE FOR DOWNLOAD BY END-MAY

The Battle That Founded The Bharata Nation!
Based on the Rig-Veda and verified by scholars,
historians and archaeologists, this is the story
of King Sudas and the impossible battle
he was forced to fight against a far superior
force led by Ten Kings (‘Dasarajna’ in Sanskrit)
comprised of his neighbors and allies led by
his friend Anu, instigated by Anu’s guru Vishwamitra,
in a bid to wipe out Sudas and his ‘Shudra’ tribe
and take control of the rich fertile lands they guarded
on behalf of the ‘Bharata’ nation.
The place where they fought later became the
site of the city of Harappa, possibly the first modern
urban center in history, and the nation established
in that region later came to be called…
BHARAT
A rousing battle epic that flags off the Itihasa Series:
A historical fiction series retelling the major landmarks
of Indian history from Vedic times to the present day.

only from
AKB eBOOKS
www.akbebooks.com

Book Your Copy Now!!!
All contents above are the copyright of AKBeBooks.

The Omega Scroll

The Omega Scroll - Adrian d'Hage
A novel set across decades. Lines which converge across religion, brother pitted against brother. Adrian d'Hage's Omega Scroll offers a bold look at religion and the way it is being practiced the world over. d'Hage dares to tread across paths not trod before and tells what every human being on this planet knows inherently, "We are more similar than we are different irrespective of the faiths that we practice"

Be it a Palestinian-Israel conflict or a Christian-Muslim-Jew trifecta, the approach taken is always and without forethough hardline. The belief that there is only 1 true religion and it's being practised by them. The best part of the faith has been lost in the cacophny of personal beliefs being pounded on the masses day in and day out.

"Faith is". Faith co-exists. There is no one true faith, all are equal and equally right and wrong in turns. The ability to learn from our faith and to allow it to evolve with times is what should have made human civilization the pinnacle of achievement and self-assuredness. The message comes across as brilliantly simple, but sometimes the simple things are the ones that are the hardest to practice.

One quote stands out from the novel. Said by Father Giovanni - "The truth will set us free. Let us follow our various paths in peace instead of war. For there is, more than one path to the Omega."

This book makes me believe that we can solve all our problems only if we are willing to listen.

Blog Rejig Plans

I plan to realign the blog on the lines drawn above (pun intended). The plan is to expand the blog from the current random hapharzard way of posting to a more organized and methodical way.

The blog will be divided into different sections like:

1. Author Profile: Here I will be doing a profile of my favourite authors. Why a particular author's books appeals to me more than somebody else? The favourite books from a particular series, the best attributes of the particular author and so on. 
2. Book Reviews: I will be reviewing the books that are I have read. Currently I plan to review only the books that I have read in this year. I also plan to add the reviews of the books that I have read in the past slowly as time progresses. In case any person reading the blog wants to write about their favourite book they would be welcome to post here. All credits will be given to the author of the specific review.
3. Reading As Passion:  I plan to tell my journey into reading and how it has shaped my life as a person in this section. I have been reading for quite sometime now and I plan to share my thoughts through this medium. Purely for personal benefit, if this section convinces a skeptic to start reading for fun, then it would have acheived it's goal.
4. General Updates: Here I will be keeping track of my book challenges, the books being read in a week, the challenge for an year, and so on. I also invite the readers to share their personal goals and committments for the upcoming year and how they are progressing. Maybe we can make a game out of it and make reading more fun all those involved.

All that said and done. This is an ambitious agenda and one that will require a lot of time and effort from my end. To that end I stay committed to work on it as a personal improvement project and also use this medium as an outlet for my thoughts and emotions.

Here's to staying on track and for realization of plans. Amen.

Cheers,
Gopal

Re-org

Planning to re-org & realign my blogs this weekend. Gonna bin the posts which are mediocre and keep only those which are good or provide some information.

I am also going to revamp the entire structure of the reading blog to bring it more inline with my expectations.

As usual suggestions and any other helpful comments/ideas will be appreciated. I am also in deviating from my usual hiding behind the scenes look to post a personal profile too... I hope to make this blog as entertaining as possible and also to make sure that readers are having more fun and feel what I personally feel about reading a book.

Cheers.

Update

The heat is on... I have revised my target of reading 50 books to 60 books this year and so far I'm behind the pace by  5% or by 2 books.

Last week I was reading 5 books here's the update on them:
This week I'm gonna plod my way through the following books:

1. Temple of Gods - Andy McDermott - FINISHED. Rating: 3/5

2. The Best Thing About You is You! - Anupam Kher (Reco by my sis.. Says it;s good. Wait for my review) - FINISHED -  Rating 4/5. Review over the weekend, need to collect all the memorable quotes from this one.

3. The Last Templar - Raymond Khoury (It's been on my reading list forever. The story is good enough, but I haven't found the patience to finish it in 1 go.) - Still in progress.... God When am I going to finish it.

4. The Four-Week Countdown Diet: Now You Choose How you Lose - Namita Jain (Again given to me by my sis. This 1 i'm sure will take a loooong time to be done and over with. Review will come up as usual) - Inprogress

5. Indecent Exposure - Tom Sharpe. Now this one came up from my friend Praveen's Shelfari. It's a supposedly black humor satrical book on aparatheid South Africa. Looked intriguing. - FINISHED. Loved it!!!!! Will Review in a marathon session covering 3 books completed in the week.
 
I am also looking for ideas to revamp my blog maybe categorize it a littel better to help people find what they want to read easily rather than trawl through all the stuff.. Ideas, Suggestions, criticisms welcome....
 
Cheers.......

Reading This Week

This week I'm gonna plod my way through the following books:

1. Temple of Gods - Andy McDermott
2. The Best Thing About You is You! - Anupam Kher (Reco by my sis.. Says it;s good. Wait for my review)
3. The Last Templar - Raymond Khoury (It's been on my reading list forever. The story is good enough, but I haven't found the patience to finish it in 1 go.)
4. The Four-Week Countdown Diet: Now You Choose How you Lose - Namita Jain (Again given to me by my sis. This 1 i'm sure will take a loooong time to be done and over with. Review will come up as usual)
5. Indecent Exposure - Tom Sharpe. Now this one came up from my friend Praveen's Shelfari. It's a supposedly black humor satrical book on aparatheid South Africa. Looked intriguing.

The Lost Story

Rating: 2/5.

Suggestion: Skip it if you have anything better to read.

Read this one courtesy of my sister who had purchased the book. I generally do not read books by Indian Authors. Chetan Bhagat has dented my confidence in Indian Authors so badly that I don't dare buy any books written by them with the exception of Amish Tripathi, Ashok Banker and Ashwin Sanghi.

So the only occasion that I get to read Indian authors is when my sister comes for a visit as she buys Indian authors and digs them as a matter of fact.

The premise for the plot is good, it is a collaboration effort between two authors Gupta & Goyal who write either the first part or the second part of the story. The condition is that they do not discuss the plot lines or the plot progress with each other. The base story is interspersed with short stories. The short stories are well done in patches.

Some stories are good and intriguing enough to read, but there are also stories which give you an headache. The base plot is a combination of both and leaves you with the hangover.

The story crosses over so many times that the entire narration appears to be blotched and ruins the plotline IMO.

Kingdom - Tom Martin

07 April 2012
Book 8 of 50


The book caught my interest because it was based on Tibet. A problem prone and intriguing area geo-politically. The combination of Tibet and Shangri-La in 1 book; it was a given that I was gonna pick this one to read.


I expected something along the lines of adventure cum thriller, but it was a book that was deep in the mysticism, occult, black magic and shamanism. The expose on Shangri-La was much awaited through out the book, but when the characters reach the point we expect them to reach the mystical land all that we find is a third person description of it rather than a first person view point and the story just doesn't work for me.


It has potential but somewhere in the narrative the author was playing with too many angles, occult, Nazism, Shamanism, Tantric Yoga and what not. As a result the plot was sacrificed and the end is not just upto the par on which the story starts.


Overall a disappointment.