Thursday, December 16, 2010

The Immortals of Meluha: A Review

Aah! Just finished with just another book by just another IIM graduate. But the story this time was not just another story that we listen to or read every other day. This story was of none other than that of Lord Shiva who has been portrayed as not the God but a superhuman who earned that status of Lord Shiva through his righteous fight against the evil.

The story is of Shiva, the tribal leader of a Tibetan tribe who’s invited by Nandi to his kingdom of Meluha in the lands of Sapt Sindhu. The people of this land are blessed young-forever because of the treasure called somras that they drink. This civilization is an extremely advanced one where everything seems to be perfect and everyone seems to be rational. They have the most advanced scientific tools at disposal with most intelligent people to develop them further. Everything seems to be fine with them, except one thing. They are Suryavanshis – descendants of Lord Surya and followers of Lord Ram – and they are faced by continuous attacks from their ‘enemies’ – Chandravanshis, descendants of Lord Chandra. This is where the story begins, but it ends with the defeat of Chandravanshis by the Suryavanshis under the guidance of Lord Shiva. To know how and why, you have to read the novel.

The story has been greatly put together. The research has been fantastic. It doesn’t look like the debutant novel by Amish, I thought he’s written atleast half a dozen novels before penning this down. If you are interested in mythology and fiction, this is the best book that you can read where mythology meets fiction and creates a great story. I’m waiting for the next two novels in the Shiva trilogy by Amish.

-Arun Sharma

(Originally published at www.whynothavefun.wordpress.com by Arun Sharma)

Saturday, December 11, 2010

Ambani & Sons by Hamish McDonald

This is another book by Hamish McDonald, the author of 'The Polyester Prince'

The Polyester Prince was banned or is still banned in India since its publication around decade ago. But, you can easily find the pirated copies of it on road side in all the metro cities of India.

Anyway, this sequel has made it easy for the readers to buy the story of Ambani's legally. According to readers, the story is 80% the story of The Polyester Prince, with 20% addition.

The earlier book was focussed on rise of Dhirubhai and covered it till 1998. While this book covers till mid 2010. The new chapters focus more on now two seperate empires of Anil & Mukesh.

And after reading it, I can very well understand why the earlier book was banned. And I think, Hamish is in habbit of writing such open and provocative books, which are banned in the focussed countries.

But, if you want to understand evolution of Business in India post Independence, this is must read