WAY BACK HOME!

I apologize that I haven't posted in a while...I guess I keep apologizing for the same in each of my post. Anyways, so this time the reason for my tardiness is my participation- "my highly appreciated participation"- in Delhi university model united nations crisis summit 2013 and should I say it was pretty much amazing. For my first MUN, I don't think I could have asked for more. From researching like crazy, to breaking a sweat, from intense debating to making new friends and OBVIOUSLY getting to learn and absorb so much knowledge, getting an insight into the working of the international community. I was spell bound with every aspect of it and I can definitely say I am hooked for life.

Coming back to my blog...So I really do not have much to say about books, because I haven't started reading any but I will as soon as I reach back home (which is like in 2 hours, I am in train right now, nothing better to do so I opened my laptop)  and I have 2 new pretty famous authors to read (I havent read any of their work, so I am totally excited), I am looking forward to getting comfortable in my own bed (and not some bed-like cot in a pg) and picking up a book and just loose myself in their world.

So adios my imaginary fanbase...Keep reading!!!!

Happy Women's Day

I have developed a peculiar disease. Insomnia. I call it peculiar because a heavy sleeper like me do not develop insomnia. Its against the law of nature. I love sleep. And now I cant get any. So courtesy insomnia, I am up at 3:20 am writing a random post, switching between watching the sisterhood of the travelling pants 2 and the river wild and just wide awake.


And know what, its march 8th, international women's day, so cheers to the girl power and femininity and tom-boyishness and everything sweet and sour, to the high heels and walking barefoot on the beaches, to the creative side and the dumb one, from messy hair to chic up-do's, from not giving a damn to our insecurities, from loving till our heart breaks to the cruel bitching, cheers to us, cheer to our imperfections, cheers to us being us. The glory of the world.


Here is a collage of few (there are so many more of them I just cant remember them-insomnia doesnt suit me -_-) of the women who I find utterly beautiful and inspiring

Adios my imaginary fanbase, keep reading! 

THE SHOEMAKER'S WIFE

Ironically the day I write a post about reader's block is the day I complete, correction, finally complete reading another book namely THE SHOEMAKER'S WIFE BY ADRIANA TRIGIANI. I never had knowledge of books and authors in the sense I only knew about the books I picked up and read and I always picked up at random and if I liked an author I would pick up another book by him. Simple. And I picked up shoemaker's wife in an instant too.

When I first opened the book and read the reviews (I have a habit of reading the reviews, studying the cover, and then proceeding through the book) there were nothing but good things to be said about the book. And as I read the first page I knew I would enjoy this journey. A shoemaker's wife is an adventure that recounts the story of 2 people Enza and Ciro who were destined to be together yet life came in the way. Set partly in the Italian Alps and mostly in America, the details about the scenic beauty of the mountains almost make me want to pack my bag and go in real and breathe the air Enza and Ciro did.

The story is divided in 3 parts and inspired by author's grandparents love story. As the first part explore their lives in the villages of Italy, Ciro as a convent boy and Enza as the eldest of 5 kids, and how their destinies are twined with a kiss only to be separated and how life force them out of their homes their country to a foreign land. The second part tells the story of Enza and Ciro in their youth and their dreams and anticipation, and how they strive to make a life for themselves and side by side experiencing the finest emotion of human world "Love" in the land of Manhattan And The third part focuses on the Enza and Ciro's lives together in Minnesota and their dreams turning in reality and yet again being swiped by a cruel twist of fate.

All in all, in 3 parts Adriana Trigiani composes a lyrical life story of two individuals very much in love. She beautifully constructs the life of immigrants who made it on their own even in the face of despair, loss and bad luck. A shoemaker's wife is a must read. It will engross you and take you through an emotional journey and might just leave you teary eyed.

You can order the shoemaker's wife here. (You can buy it much cheaper in the stores near you)

P.S: Its a book set in the 20th century and noone loves a period drama more than me.

Sayonara my imaginary fanbase. Keep Reading!

READER'S BLOCK

There was a time when I could read a book in a day, and complete a series in as many books as it had. And now, somehow because of my way too busy schedule
(no its not an excuse, Let me spell it for you:
COLLEGE
TUITION
NGO
INTERNSHIP
SELF STUDY
IRRITATING ROOMMATE
WATCHING GREY"S ANATOMY SEASON FINALE
HOMEWORK ugh.)
I rarely can sit 2 hours straight to just course through the pages of my book . Its hard. And it led me to think, is there something called reader's block too?(Its been 2 weeks, since I am stuck on a single book, and no it isn't a boring book, there is no such thing as a boring book) And it turns out there is. I couldnt finish the last 200 pages of a 800 page book I just couldn't. And you must imagine how it makes me feel like my world is falling apart. I was literally in tears just because I couldn't finish a book forget in a day even in 10. So I searched through google and found I am not the the only one. So if it has happened with you, here are the remedies for it, the cure to that awful, almost cruel, problem:

Try reading correction re-reading something you love

If you are already stressed and are reading a heavy book, take up a light trashy one( something with sex gossip humor and drunk incidents)

Wait it out: wait and when you feel inspired to read a book you'll be able to finish it.

Cut off all communication with the world: Just lock yourself in the room and read sit through and read.

Meditate: it will calm you down and you'll be in a more relaxed state.

Dance it out, run it out, sing it out, cry it out: same reason as for meditating.

Try remembering how elated you feel when you first read your favorite book.

And last but not the least Do Not Be Disheartened.

I still make sure I read, even if its a page, a chapter or maybe 10, I still read and that is something that brings me as much pleasure as it always have even if I haven't been able to finish a book in 2 weeks. Reading is still my breath of fresh air in the world where the walls around you just keep closing you down. Reading still gives me hope.

Farewell my imaginary fanbase, Keep reading (as will I) 

THE WORLD OF TYLER

Its been nearly a week since I posted anything. I apologize for the silence from my side it just have been crazy busy week with assignments and tuition and studies and tests and no time to read *sob* ( I am still just halfway through my next book) but whenever I got time I did post on my fb page and I even explored my tumblr account and found a pretty good poet/ photographer TYLER KNOTT GREGSON.  When I went through his work , I grew a profound likeness for him and some of his work is absolutely amazing. He weaves the words which such ease and brilliance that I fell in love with his writing and I obv have uploaded some of it below:


How curious the things we attach our hearts to…transitory things, things that will break and age, whither and pass on before we are ready.  How curious the cling when they are new and the slow uncurling of your tired fingers as they become commonplace in our days.  Cling, cling while there is strength left in those hands, and shout your love regenerated into the hollow spots where commonplace tries to reside.- Tyler Knott

Can we lose ourselves
and realize that we don’t care
to ever be found?

Daily Haiku on Love by Tyler Knott Gregson

Light has a way, when washing over the old, the broken, the rusted and the lonely, of fixing and healing, finding and giving, if for a moment, a sliver of understanding.  Please find your way through the clouds, and when you do, fall upon me.- Tyler Knott

Isnt he absolutely brilliant? There is so much more of his work that I liked, but then there is only so much I can upload. If you also think he is brilliant check tylerknott.com  for more of his work.

Adios my imaginary fanbase. Keep reading.

READ.

I am a proud owner of 287 books maybe even more, and when anyone who enters my room ask me how can you read so much? I want to ask them how can you exist?

 The love for books is a love born out of curiosity, out of a fear to live in a world that doesn't quench our thirst, that is limited. People who do not read, live a dull monotonous meaningless life, and the sad thing is they don't even know it. They are missing the pleasure to enter into a parallel world while still living in this and experiencing a rush of emotions when they course through the pages of a book. Each book that you read is a life that you'll never have but yet your mind is an evidence to it, its a treasure much more richer than any treasure in this world, its an author's secret diary, its the tears and the love and the joy and grief and guilt and everything else. A book is a world in its own and how can anyone not want to travel it? As soon as I touch the cover of the new book, its like I am touching a new life. Reading enriches your mind and more than that your soul.

I seldom ask myself why we are harboring materialism, why the notion of simplicity is no longer even a notion? And then I get an answer, give a kid a book and not a new gadget, and we might again have a generation of artists and thinkers.

Read. Pick up a book and just start reading, force yourself to sit down and complete few chapters of a book and before you know it you'll be transported to a magical world.
I'll advice the young parents, do not give your 5 year old son your i-pad to play angry birds, do not buy your 10 year old a new phone, do not get your daughter 100 new dresses, and a new i-pod because her friend has one. But get into their bed, read them a fairy tale, kiss them goodnight and gift books on their birthdays. Harbor creativity, not materialism.

Dasvidaniya my imaginary fan base! Keep reading! 

CLASSICS

Poems are the sparrows of the literary world.

I was restless child, an impatient soul, I only sit still when I had a book in my hand, apart from then, I kept rushing here and there, and due to my impatience I could never really understand the beauty of a poem. But when I did enter the world of poetry, I couldn't leave so here are the 3 classics that I absolutely adore:

THE ROAD NOT TAKEN 

- Robert Frost

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,

And sorry I could not travel both

And be one traveler, long I stood

And looked down one as far as I could

To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,

And having perhaps the better claim,

Because it was grassy and wanted wear;

Though as for that the passing there

Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay

In leaves no step had trodden black.

Oh, I kept the first for another day!

Yet knowing how way leads on to way,

I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh

Somewhere ages and ages hence:

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I-

I took the one less traveled by,

Invictus

by William Ernest Henley

Out of the night that covers me, 

Black as the Pit from pole to pole, 

I thank whatever gods may be 

For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance 

I have not winced nor cried aloud. 

Under the bludgeonings of chance 

My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears 

Looms but the Horror of the shade, 

And yet the menace of the years 

Finds, and shall find, me unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate, 

How charged with punishments the scroll. 

I am the master of my fate: 

I am the captain of my soul.

Love Sonnet XVII

by Pablo Neruda

I do not love you as if you were the salt-rose, or topaz, 

or the arrow of carnations the fire shoots off. 

I love you as certain dark things are to be loved, 

in secret, between the shadow and the soul.

I love you as the plant that never blooms 

but carries in itself the light of hidden flowers; 

thanks to your love a certain solid fragrance, 

risen from the earth, lives darkly in my body.

I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where. 

I love you straightforwardly, without complexities or pride; 

so I love you because I know no other way

than this: where I does not exist, nor you, 

so close that your hand on my chest is my hand, 

so close that your eyes close as I fall asleep.

Farewell my imaginary fanbase! Keep reading!