Lila: An Inquiry Into Morals

Lila: An Inquiry Into Morals by Robert M. Pirsig
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Can one review this book? Well, I definitely cannot. Its as much heavy as the author's first book in terms of concentration. The chapters where Phaedrus talks to just himself are the ones to look out for. Those stay my favourite.
My favourite quotes from the book:

1) What makes killing him immoral is that a criminal is not just a biological organism. He is not even just a defective unit of the society. Whenever you kill a human being you are killing a source of thought too. A human being is a collection of ideas, and these ideas take moral precedence over a society. Ideas are patterns of value. They are at a higher level of evolution than social patterns of value. Just as it more moral for a doctor to kill a germ than a patient, so it is more moral for an idea to kill a society than it is for society to kill an idea.
2) When E.B. White wrote, 'If you want to live in New York you should be willing to be lucky', he meant not just 'lucky' but willing to be lucky.
3)It's the lifeboat problem. If you get too involved with too many people with too many problems they drag you under. You don't save them. They sink you.
4) Sanity is not truth. Sanity is conformity to what is socially expected. Truth is sometimes in conformity, sometimes not.
5) That’s what funerals were: theatre. They weren’t for the corpse, certainly, but to help end the longings and old patterns of the living, who has to go on.



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The Silent Dead

The Silent Dead by Tetsuya Honda
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

The book started on a very promising note for me. I enjoyed a large part of the book but the effect diminished at the climax.

Reiko Himekaway is a young, female Lieutant in the police force who delas with the gender bias regularly. Her reasons for becoming a lieutant have a background which is also an essential sub plot in the book. But the primary plot of the book deals with a serial killer who is torturing people and disposing bodies in lakes. Reiko and Stubby(another lieutant's) diverse styles in trying to nab the killer is interesting. The way he admonishes Reiko for her intuitions because she seem to stop applying logic after her bout of intuition is one of the best conversations in the book.


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Binary

Binary by John Lange
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Picked this book solely because I was surprised that its actually a Crichton book. Once upon a time Crichton used the pen name John Lange.

A very fast read; it deals with the personal complexity that arises between state department officer John Graves as he investigates a right wing businessman, John Wright. Graves is sure Wright is planning a big assault but takes sometime to unearth the plot. He also takes the challenge to unravel Wright as a personal one since Wright seems to be playing with his poker genius brain at a game.


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Keepers of the Kalachakra

Keepers of the Kalachakra by Ashwin Sanghi
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Dan Brown gave me the history-fiction genre and I have never stopped hence. When I need a quick read I usually pick up this genre.

Ashwin Sanghi, this time around talks about the concept of Kalachakra. As the heads of state are killed without leaving any trace of the murder the intelligence orgs all over the world are puzzled. In a supposedly independent track, Vijay, a Ph.D. student is hired by a shady company to continue his research for them. But obviously all is not as it seems.

A fast paced read when you want to just go around learning a few things about the Indian/Buddhist mythology.


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Contact

Contact by Carl Sagan
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

My first Carl Sagan book :)
I have never understood why I am such an ardent fiction fan. I devour science fiction so happily as I do Lord of the Rings. I don't understand any of the inter-galactic concepts, am almost primate in my understanding of Einstein, Planck, etc. theories but that doesn’t deter me from thoroughly enjoying science fiction.

Ellie, a radio astronomer is deeply committed to the Argus project which is about listening on different frequencies to search for messages from some other beings. Just as the project is to be shut down, there arrives a message. At first it seems to be an aberration but soon the world joins in and starts noting down the message. It soon reveals itself to be the blueprint of a machine. A machine that probably would take us to them. It gets built and Ellie is one of the chosen five to represent humanity to the other beings. They succeed. Or so they think! When they narrate their experience back on earth it is not taken seriously for they have absolutely no proof.

I particularly like the ending, because the end conversation between Kitz and Ellie is identical to the conversation between Ellie and Rankin/Joss with the tables turned. In Kitz-Ellie conversation Ellie is trying to prove a point to disapprove the hoax theory while Kitz is skeptical to anything she has to say because it’s not backed up by data and in the other case Ellie is the one skeptical of religion/God because others have no data points.

Some personal favourite lines from the book –

I have always thought an agnostic is an atheist without the courage of his convictions.

I know we all have emotions but let’s bear in mind exactly what emotions are. They are motivations for adaptive behaviour from a time when we were too stupid to figure things out.

You are not worried about being lost, Palmer. You are worried about not being central, not the reason the universe was created. There's plenty of order in my universe. Gravitation, electromagnetism, quantum mechanics, superunification, they all involve laws. And as for behaviour, why can't we figure out what's in our best interest-as a species?

Isn't a gram of observation worth a ton of theory?


Update:
Watched the movie that was based on the book. Like all movies that are made from books, it could not create the magic the book did.I cringed at the romantic liaison between Ellie and Plamer......but then got over it simply because Matthew McConaughey played the role :D


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Mandodari: Queen of Lanka

Mandodari: Queen of Lanka by Manini J. Anandani
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Ramayana from the point of view of Ravan's wife. I was expecting a different perspective but it seemed to be the same old story telling of Ramayana. Hence, didn't find it interesting.


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Artemis

Artemis by Andy Weir
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Jazz is estranged from her father and works as a delivery agent in a future world where humans have created a colony on the moon- Artemis. The book is about the brilliant Jazz trying to pull off a heist for some quick money but ends up endangering everything that she holds dear, including life on Artemis.

It is or the sci-fi lovers, with a great deal of physics and chemistry information strewn all over the place. Quite an interesting read.


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Sleeping Beauties

Sleeping Beauties by Stephen King
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

There is a sleeping sickness outbreak in the world. The only casualties are woman of all age groups. Once a woman goes to sleep, she doesn't get up. There is a protective cocoon that engulfs the sleeping women and anyone who forcefully tries to wake them up is in for a rude surprise.

What is this cocoon? Will the women wake up? What if they don't? What role does a small place like Dooling have to do with the future of humankind?

A fantasy novel and a huge one.


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Shanta : The Story of Rama's Sister

Shanta : The Story of Rama's Sister by Anand Neelakantan
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

A quick read about Dashratha's first born and the heir to Ayodhya. However in an era where heirs are only male, she gets adopted by another king who asks her help to end the drought in his kingdom.
Not worrying about authenticity it was just surprising to read about an existence that I never knew in the supremely famous world of Ramayana.


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Sita: Warrior of Mithila

Sita: Warrior of Mithila by Amish Tripathi
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Detailed update after I finish the trilogy


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