Rosh's Reviews

AUTHOR: Katherine Eban GENRE: Investigative Nonfiction RATING: 4.75 stars. Everyone knows the lack of ethics in India. Corruption pervades the public and private sectors, and even the most conscientious of citizens can barely escape this now-routine fact of our lives. I had always assumed that certain sectors might still be sacrosanct because of their very nature of their existence. Right now though, after reading this book, I'm terribly depressed and worried and have lost almost all hopes about reform in this country. Bottle of Lies is an exposé by US investigative journalist Katherine Eban about the generic drug industry, its boom and its flaws. Ranbaxy is its primary target, viewed through the eyes of Dinesh Thakur, the whistle-blower who made public the deep-rooted unethical corruption within the company. Though the book primarily focuses on Ranbaxy, the list of companies Eban has named with actual instances of malpractices contains the who's who of the Indian Pharmaceutic...

AUTHOR: Erich Segal SERIES: Love Story, #2 GENRE: Romance. PUBLICATION DATE: January 1, 1977 RATING: 2 stars. Though I was apprehensive about "Oliver's Story" because of its really low rating on Goodreads, I was inquisitive to find out how Erich Segal furthered Oliver's life after such a big tragedy at such a young age. Now that I'm done with the sequel, I honestly regret taking it up. As most people may not have read the sequel, I won't reveal much of the plot except that it is exactly what you would guess it to be: Oliver struggling to regain his happiness after the loss of the love of his life. There are girls, there is a therapist, there is family, there are friends... All predictable so far. The crucial difference being that while opposites were attracted to each other in the first, the second book couple seems to have more points in common. Both hurt by past relationships. Both rich but independent of families, both successful, both desperate for love. D...

AUTHOR: Jhumpa Lahiri GENRE: Nonfiction Essay PUBLICATION DATE: November 15, 2016 RATING: 3.75 stars. Whenever I go book shopping, the first thing that attracts me for newer authors is the book cover. Its colour, its illustrations, its penmanship... I find it very tough to pick up a book where the cover doesn't appeal to me. For some old favourites, I always used to wonder: what made the author go for such a drab cover? Now that I've read "The Clothing of Books" by Jhumpa Lahiri, I feel like I've been judging authors unfairly. She stunned me when she wrote that in this new age of digital publishing, the author didn't have much of a say in choosing covers. In fact, the author and cover designer don't even meet. That is an eye-opener, isn't it? This is a beautiful little book. Actually not even a book, it's more like a non-fiction novella, hardly about 80 pages long. I would not recommend this to everyone. This would appeal to those who are intrigued...

AUTHOR: Grace Lin GENRE: Middle-Grade Fantasy PUBLICATION DATE: June 1, 2009 RATING: 4.25 stars. A little girl, Minly, who stays in a poor dusty village without allowing her poverty to dampen her inner exuberance; A mother who has allowed her expectations to ruin her contentment; A father who looks beyond his lowly existence with his magical stories; A lonely dragon who has a deep-seated discontent because he can't fly; A family who seems to have the secret of perennial happiness even in times of trouble; A tiger who can't let go of his anger even if it destroys him; A wise Old Man who knows how to manoeuvre the fortunes of people with his endless strings, ... What brings these motley mix of characters together is this beautiful little book, "Where the Mountain Meets the Moon". Authored by Grace Lin, the book is a brilliant reimagination of Chinese folk tales she heard during her childhood. Little Minly's dreams of bringing happiness to her family, her brave journ...

AUTHOR: Michelle Obama GENRE: Autobiography. PUBLICATION DATE: November 13, 2018 RATING: 4.75 stars. When I watched the movie "The Mask" in 1994, I was mesmerised by Jim Carrey's performance. I felt almost personal pride to see what he could achieve in his facial expressions and comedy. A similar moment of false vanity came later in the same year when I heard the magnificent "Ek ladki ko dekha to aisa laga" from the movie 1942:A Love Story. The way Javed Akhtar had woven the words together mesmerised me and awoke in me a passion for poetic expression. I probably would have felt equally puffed up about Mohammed Ali winning his boxing bouts against tougher opponents but he was a bit before my time. What is common to this motley mix of names, you ask? Well, all these achievers share the same birth date as me! So you see, I have been weirdly crazy for people born on January 17th ever since I can remember! This craze took a different direction in end-2008 when I disc...