Book Review - Unaccustomed Earth

Rating - 5/5

Outstanding. Mature writing. Engrossing stories.

This is Jhumpa Lahiri's third book after The Interpreter of Maladies (Short stories) and The Namesake (Novel).

I read The Interpreter of Maladies a year back and was very impressed by Lahiri's writing. Although her stories are open ended, the prose is very good and you are hooked in the first few pages.

The basic premise is the same in all her stories - bengalis staying in America or returning from America to India. But this common setting is just incidental. The real core of each story is the observations on human relationships - father & daughter, monthers and daughters, brothers and sisters.

While this time the stories are longer, they have more depth and the prose has improved by leaps and bounds.

If I were to rank her books, I would put Unaccustomed Earth on the top followed by The Namesake and last but not the least The Interpreter of Maladies.

The Amulet of Samarakand

This is the first part of a trilogy called 'The Bartimaeus Trilogy' by Jonathan Stroud.

It is far different from Harry Potter.

Though a bit predictable, it is a wonderful read nonetheless.

Rating - 3.5/5

Amazon

Stock Screener

Google Finance has a nifty little stock screener for U.S. companies. It's amazing. Check out the link below

Google Finance Stock Screener

I am so hoping they come up with a similar one for Indian Stocks :-)

Mumbai kicks Chennai's a**

Or rather it should be Jayasuria kicks Chennai's a**. Anyways, the main reason why they lost was a bad start. I am not whining here. It was apparent. They just played bad cricket.

Here are a few of my observations/thoughts : Vidyut needs to play controlled shots. Fleming is not a replacement for Hussey or Hayden. One idea is to experiment a little with the batting order for the next two matches. Since they have a comfortable lead over others in the points table, it may not prove too costly. In the process they might discover the perfect opening pair (Dhoni and Morkel maybe). The bottomline is the CSK side has a very good mix of potentially good batsmen but many of them have just not found their footing in this tournament.

As far as the bowling is concerned, they have a good opening bowler in Manpreet Gony and second change Balaji not to speak of the wily Murali. Morkel needs to pull up his socks and discipline his bowling. All in all, there is a good scope for improvement in the bowling department.

Finally, we come to the man himself, MS Dhoni from Jharkhand Chennai. And he is the only reason why I have faith in the Kings clinching the cup. There is no doubt that he has led from the front. He has a totally cool demeanour even in the most pressure situations. He only needs to get his strategies right. He needs to completely understand the strengths and weaknesses of each member of his team and play his cards accordingly.

Chennai Super Kings ROCK !!!!!!

MIND IT !!!

The end is near......

Mkts plunge; Nifty slips below 4800

S&P 500 Index Closes Below January Low

Asia Bleeds Red, Financials Are Slammed

Oil Prices Near $106 on Record-Low US Dollar

Survivor

2 years in Chennai !!!!!!!!!!!