![Book review: An Unexpected Afterlife]()
Paranormal |
What happens after you die? Depending on your religious beliefs, it may be afterlife, reincarnation or nothing at all. If you read a lot of YA literature zombie life may not be far from your thoughts. What if you were resurrected and your religious world was all ready to believe in it until you literally are resurrected? Would they understand you are the one that fulfills that prophecies? How would the modern world accept it? Moshe Karlin’s life just would answer those questions in An Unexpected Afterlife
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Book Name: An Unexpected Afterlife
Series: The Dry Bones Society #1
Author: Dan Sofer
Genre: Fiction – Paranormal
Characters: Moshe and Galit Karlin, Avi, Rabbi Yosef Lev
Setting: Jerusalem, Israel
Disclaimer: Thanks to the Author for the Review Copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.
Moshe Karlin wakes up naked at a cemetery at the Mount of Olives, Jerusalem the morning after his 40th birthday. He catches a taxi to his house, trying to remember what prank his best friend Avi had pulled on him the previous night, only to find Avi and his wife Gallit in bed together. As if that was not enough to enrage him, Avi throws him off his house, saying Moshe has been dead for two years.
He reaches out to the local Rabbi Yosef, the one who buried Moshe when he was dead and tries to understand his situation. Without an ID, place to live or family to depend upon he stumbles on trying to win his old life, his wife, and his daughter. The Rabbi and Moshe are startled to find more ‘dead’ people are resurrected, and they seek their help. Some remember who they were; many don’t. Some are Jews, and few are not. Didn’t Torah promise that only Jews will be resurrected?
Meanwhile, not far from this chaos, the Prophet Elijah himself is stuck in an unforeseen situation. According to the scriptures and the destiny, he was supposed to save the world, but how can he when His world is changing. To make matters worse for the Rabbi the Great Council (of religious wisemen) discards the Rabbi’s theory of resurrection and pronounces the resurrected as ‘ Sitra Achra!’ (other side / unholy world).
What does the Rabbi choose – his free will and understanding of the Torah or the words of the Council that has guided him all through his life and also can change the stability and peace in a teacher’s life? How do Moshe and his clan move ahead? Did they find what they are seeking? The An Unexpected Afterlife and the series will answer your questions.
An Unexpected Afterlife is a steady paced narrative that kept me engrossed until the end, well, end of the first book of the series. Thankfully the book didn’t end in a cliffhanger perse, though the series would answer many questions. The writing is crisp, and the tiny streak of satire kept things interesting. I loved the strong world building, and all the central characters had depth
The one thing that kinda annoyed me at the was that the stories of Moshe and Elijah did not seem to be related all, at least in the first book. Maybe they will merge somewhere down the lane in the following books of the series. I am not a great fan of fantasy and the zombie/undead world and have avoided them for a while. An Unexpected Afterlife made me realize what I have been missing out.
The story is primarily set in Israel, and I loved how the book let me have a glimpse into the world of Jews and their beliefs and culture. It is one of those things that made say yes when the author Dan Sofer approached for a review of his book, and I am glad I chose it. If you are interested in reading a religious take on the resurrection An Unexpected Afterlife is your pick.
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Drama |
How often do you find people who are gonna travel all the way through your life?
I have a set of friends whom I have known for a decade and a half now. We may not be physically close, but when we meet or talk to each other from different parts of the world, it has always been like we are back to our primary classes, mostly. We know each other’s heartbreak stories, the crushes, and the family issues.
Most of my friends are people with whom I have been for more than four years now. That is quite a huge thing, especially for someone like me, who jumps from one shiny thing to another frequently. Thankfully my friendships have not taken that route.
Why am I converting a book review into a sappy old story of yours truthfully? Nothing much other than sheer narcissism and the fact that Second Acts is a book about the friendship between grown ass adult women.
About the book
Book Name: Second Acts
Author: Teri Emory
Genre: Fiction – Drama
Characters: Sarah, Miriam, Beth
Setting: The USA
Disclaimer: Thanks to the Author and Edelweiss for the Advance Review Copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.
Plot
The story takes through the lives of Sarah, Miriam, and Beth right from their college days. They have spent their lives together for decades, all through their happiness, heartbreaks, the ups and the downs, even when they had lived physically far from each other.
Now the ladies are in their fifties, and their careers and domestic lives are changing. Would their friendship sustain through these storms?
The book alternates between the voices of Sarah, Miriam, and Beth in the first person throughout. Sarah lives with her boyfriend Kevin who wouldn’t commit or even let her in on his life, which seemed convenient for her. She finds out something huge about Kevin and his son and Kevin did not even feel it was important to inform her. And the changes at work makes it impossible for her continue shying away from commitments.
Miriam has had her heart broken once, and she wonders about all the men that she had turned down. She is more than settled with the idea that she is never going to meet the right one. Beth seemingly has it all, until she finds her husband cheated on her. To make her life more fragile the love of her life, the one that got away is back. The group has a second chance in life. Should they trade their old lives?
My initial thoughts
The idea that college friends can stay together well into their fifties is highly romantic. The dynamics among them does not change and if anything, it has become better with age. Though the ladies are all at different points of their life and have chosen different paths, there is no judging and an unwavering support through it all.
Second Acts makes it a point to let us know that 50s are not something to be dreaded about. Lives still go on and about, and exciting things do happen.
Things that worked for me
- The characters were well developed, and even the minor characters had depth.
- I found a part of myself among all the three leads, and I kept rooting for Miriam the most. She was just too cool.
- Several themes like grief over death, lost love, hurt by a loved one, despair over unrequited love, unexpected changes were all dealt with such flair that the reader would feel them.
Things that could have been better
- Though there were too many details and the book as such was tad bit lengthy, I continued through it.
- I would not call the book an un-put-down-able, and it took a lot more than usual to complete the book.
- On the whole, I was not disappointed at all, thanks to the realistic plot and engaging writing.
Bottom – line
Second Acts could be your summer read, the one that you wanna read when you miss your friends in real life or the one you read during your daily commute. If you are up to reading a woman’s fiction with realistic writing this weekend, you should watch out for Second Acts.
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review, Thriller |
Don’t you hate it when life creeps up on you at unexpected times? That is exactly what happened to me and Blood in the Paradise
. I had received from The Tales Pensieve a few months ago for a review. I read it almost immediately. But then life happened. Shifting my residence and then moving out of the country took its toll on me, and I missed reviewing it. So here I am to review a book that I read months ago, would my memory be able to do justice for this whodunnit?
Book Name: Blood in the Paradise – A tale of an impossible murder
Author: Madhav Mahidhar
Genre: Fiction – Thriller
Characters: Madhumitha and Vikas Nandan, DCP Vishwaroop, Anupriya Gautam
Settings: India
Disclaimer: Thanks to the Author and The Tales Pensieve for the free copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.
The story begins with a suicidal note and the eventual suicide attempt of Madhumita Nandan and her husband Vikas calls up for help once he gets to the place. But before the police could reach the area, Vikas is murdered. On a surprising turn of events, Madhu bounces back while Vikas does not. The case is handed to DCP Vishwaroop, a perfect combination of intelligence, honesty, and diligence.
He is suspicious about Madhu’s involvement in her husband’s death, and her persistent marital woes don’t help her either. Her friend Anupriya, an activist herself comes to her rescue by bringing in media’s attention and involving a competent lawyer. To add to the DCP’s problems, he has not found the weapon involved yet. So is it a murder at all? Or is there a simple explanation to all of these and it was indeed just an accident. Read Blood in the Paradise to find out more.
Blood in the Paradise is steady paced, and the author’s efforts to do the ground work on the plot shows well. The characters are etched to perfection, and no one acts out of character which made the plot grounded. The part about Madhu and Vikas’ marital troubles sticks to the reality of the life in an Indian society and is commendable.
Even though guessing the murderer was anyone’s game, the writing kept me through the end. Except for the dialogues that kept interrupting the flow of the story and could have done very well without. Some things were bit of Bollywood-ey, while I agree that there is an audience who might like it, it just didn’t appeal to me.
Blood in the Paradise could have used another round of editing to weed off those typos and errors and could have ended 15 pages earlier, with the right editing effort. The author has made it a point to talk about the meaning of feminism and the impact of media and activists’ intrusion into the legal system. If you like to solve an impossible murder, then you should pick Blood in the Paradise this weekend.
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Drama, review |
I am known to be avoiding the fantasy genre for a while, these days. The number of blood sucking vampires and werewolves and dragons have gone too many on my ARCs shelves that I even have lost count of them. So when I was approached for the review of Harappa – Curse of the Blood River, I took a moment to think over. While I would love to read historical fiction, the blurb explained that the story would be borderline the fantasy, hence the hesitation. But curiosity won over me. Read on to know how it turned out.
Book Name: Harappa – Curse of the Blood River
Author: Vineet Bajpai
Genre: Fiction – Historical, drama
Characters: Vidyut, Damini, Vivasvan Shashtri, Naina, Bala
Disclaimer: This Book Review is a part of The Readers Cosmos Book Review Program and Book Promotions. To know more log on to The Readers Cosmos.
Meet Vidyut, a young and powerful businessman who is a jack of all trades, who lives with the love of his life Damini. His perfect life is disturbed by a call from his great grandfather from Varanasi, who seems to be in his death bed. Vidyut leaves to a place which holds several secrets not only concerning his life but the entire human race. Unbeknownst to him, several events that were set off all over the world once he starts to his journey from Delhi.
We are told of the happenings in the Harappan civilization of the ancient past -the past that sees the effects of treachery and blood thirst. What is the relationship between modern day Vidyut and the fallen civilization? Only one man tell it all, his great grandfather who is running out of time and the strong and treacherous enemies are at bay. Read Harappa – Curse of the Blood River to find out more.
First of the premise is intriguing making us wonder if our school history text books were in fact, nothing but an elaborate ruse? Following the pattern laid by the likes of Dan Brown, Ashwin Sanghi and the new comer Luke Gracias, the story alternates between the past and present and the author does that with quite the flair.
I had known the book was the first of the series of four books, but I had not realized until I came to it, that it ends in a cliffhanger and it doesn’t answer many of the questions. This might be disconcerting to some of the readers, including me. There were few scenes in the middle that were clichéd and could have been very well done without.
The rich history and the strong story line related to Harappan civilization is well executed. The author makes us ponder where does the line between mythology and history lie. The dialogues were kinda off-putting especially the modern day’s, where no one uses that many slangs (yaa, yaar etc) in real life. And the writing gets kinda repetitive after a while. Yet, none of these reduce the pace set by the author until the very last.
The introduction kinda gave away the entire plot, at least the plot of the first book. And then there is a prologue which piqued the interest but again once we have read the introduction there is very little suspense to keep up. There are a few misgivings like how long does it take for a person to narrate a simple tale. But if we do overlook such logical reasoning, I would not be surprised if the Harappa – Curse of the Blood River ends up to be a best seller.
Book Name: An Unexpected Afterlife
written by Georgia Rose attempts to answer these questions through the life of Madaliene Rose.
Maddy lives in a laid back, picturesque village. She has made friends with a few, yet believes she will be considered an outsider whatever she does. She wishes that she blends into their life without arousing any suspicion to escape from her pa
