![Hey Dad Meet My Mom: A Book Review]()
Paranormal, review |
How far would you go for love? Would paranormal activities stop you? Would a young boy from the future derail you from your quest for love? Read my book review of Hey Dad! Meet My Mom to know more.
About Hey Dad Meet My Mom
Book Name: Hey Dad Meet My Mom
Authors: Sandeep Sharma and Leepi Agarwal
Genre: Fiction – Paranormal, Romance
Characters: Puneet Agarwal, Rishi, Myra, Roshni, Maya
Setting: India
Disclaimer: Thanks to Sandeep Sharma for lending his book Hey Dad! Meet My Mom for a fair and honest feedback.
Plot summary of Hey Dad Meet My Mom
Puneet, a banker falls in love at his first sight with Myra, and coincidentally or not he starts seeing an image of a 10 year old boy visible to no one else. He is naturally shaken especially since the boy looks and behaves like him and calls him Dad. Puneet assumes it is his work stress that is getting to him while his mother brings in holy men to protect his son.
It becomes easier for him to do that, as he befriends Rishi and they both plot to make Myra fall in love with Puneet. To add to his misery, he constantly dreams of another faceless woman who asking him to seek out his past
Succumbing to the pressure of his mother and Myra he agrees to visit his uncle who is a renowned psychiatrist who prescribes some more sessions and medicine. On a weekday, Rishi just appears at his office asking Puneet to rush to his house, only to find his shrink and his mother discussing him. After the doctor leaves, he confronts his mother who painfully confesses about his past. What happens next forms the rest of the story in Hey Dad Meet My Mom.
Book review of Hey Dad Meet My Mom
I liked the way Hey Dad Meet My Mom began and that the suspense was built up till the very end. There was nowhere that the book lagged in pace or want of depth in the characters (for a short book). The romantic episodes between Puneet and Myra were realistic enough and maybe cute to an extent.
For a 10 year old kid, Rishi does know too much – I would probably have cringed to discuss my love life, much alone take advises from a kid claiming to be my son – that too no one that known else could see. I could sympathize for Puneet that Rishi could read his mind.
On the other hand, I felt the author had too much on the plate for 160 page novel. What started out as a time travel or paranormal story turned out to be a love story, hypnotism, drugs, ragging, holy men, adopted kids – too many themes and extremely sharp turns which made it look like author was unclear with the direction of the story and as though the ending was hurried.
Cliched and completely unnecessary characters like a long haired stranger from the streets asking him to chase his dreams could have very well been avoided.
Writing an intimate scene is supposedly harder than others, but I should confess no other book made me cringe reading as this one, especially crude and unpolished phrases like “cried like hell” and “the slightly hairy organ between the legs”. In fact the entire scene could have been done away with, and no on would have missed a thing. Better none than a half baked scene.
It puts any reader off to find any typos or spelling error while reading the book, how much ever the story might be good and interesting.
Bottomline
If you wanna pick up an easy read through with Bollywood feel – try Hey Dad! Meet My Mom out.
Let’s talk
Have you read Hey Dad! Meet My Mom before? What sorta books do you love reading? What are your favorite genre? Let us chat.
review, Thriller |
The only difference for me as a reader between romance and thriller is the speed and rhythm of your heart beat. A good romance or for that matter a novel on any relationship can and should make your heart beat slightly faster but mixed with gushy gooey mixture of every emotion though not in a heart wrenching way – like when you see hot Poorie masala served on the next table at a hotel and you have not got yours yet. On the other hand, a thriller should make you think of the plot and the heart beat – more like temple run or when the person next to you at the treadmill runs faster than you and you can do nothing but increase your pace even when you really want to just go back to bed. Yeah Poorie and treadmill are so like romance and thriller (somebody has got their priorities right). Pardon my bad examples, I haven’t had my morning coffee yet. But hey.. that says enough about the book, the first thing in the morning, after reading the book until late night, all I want to do is to write about the book.
Disclaimer: I received this book from the author free of cost in return for a honest review.
Now that we got rid of that simple formality, we can get into our usual mode of fun review. I generally don’t review books that I don’t feel like reviewing and there are books from the other extreme – those that I can not wait to push my thoughts out to the world about – be it good or bad. Now this is one of those books. I will do my best not to give out any spoilers along the review.
Main Characters: Rohan, Riya, Avanthika,
The story revolves around the investigation of suicide (or is it murder?) of a college student by Inspector Rohan. His girlfriend Riya, a wannabe writer tags along with him so as to write her book and decides to help him to solve the case through her crazy ideas. She does help him at few instances. But the story takes a turn when they find another girl committing suicide at a different part of the city though there are no apparent similarities or relationship between the girls. If you need to know the climax, here it is: Rohan solves with the case with a great help of Riya and accepts that she is a good writer.
The narration is fast and racy, and the story-line is worth to kill for (if you know what I mean). I picked the book around 2230 hours last night and I couldn’t put the book down until I finished. I could have cheated and turned to the last chapter, (of course I wouldn’t do it to a thriller) – but you get the point. If at all I had a say about it, the book should have been a little more longer (says the girl who couldn’t wait for the last chapter).
The opening of the story is well written, though a little clichéd. I decided am going to like the book once I read that first chapter and I liked Riya enough. I could like her even though she was that stereotypical high strung, dramatic college chick when she tries so hard not to be. I wish I could have known her a little better. Rohan is the typical masala film hero – self righteous, confident yet romantic and sensitive kind. The skeptic in me didn’t buy him. But well this is a thriller not a romance – so I gulp the cynicism down.
The climax is unexpected and appreciated yet I wished it were a little more plausible. I didn’t like the romance angle of the book and almost till the end I was wishing there wasn’t one, though I understood why it was necessary at the climax. I felt it reduced the pace of the thriller by a bit and for a novella of about 120 pages that bit could be a concern. To write an intimate scene or not is almost a do or don’t situation for an author, and kinda I wish she hadn’t. Not only it was very filmy but also seemed to the reader that the author didn’t want one but added one for the heck of having it. Having read the book till then, the reader would by then have understood not to expect any. But to start one and abruptly leave it half way is tortuous, especially when the book didn’t call for one. That is a tease – not in a good evil way.
I wouldn’t want to get into why the climax would work or not (for me, it didn’t), but I would point out why i feel classic whodunits of Agatha Christie or Sherlock Holmes still are so rad. As a reader I want to be personally related to the solution – like I should have seen it coming or at least make me go read the book again to see if I had missed any clue. Once that single knot is undone everything should be apparent to the reader himself – the most intelligent character in any book because he sees what the other characters don’t, he knows more – he knows what other characters think as well. So when I didn’t or couldn’t relate to it even when it has been unraveled, now that is a loose end that I don’t like. I liked all the suspects and theories that the duo cooked up – except the actual one. I have tried very hard to circle around the answer to the mystery that GB had so beautifully maintained till the very end. So I have to stop talking about it right here.
‘A Minute to Death’ is a no nonsense whodunit with a narrative that sags almost at no place and twists and turns that are sorta roller coaster ride for the reader – without wearing out the reader by trying too much. I am looking forward to other books of the author for another thriller.
review, Romance |
I can’t remember the last time I got myself so engrossed myself into anything – let alone a book that I forgot I had other plans for the evening. It so happened yesterday that we barely reached the cinemas to catch the movie on time – thanks to Kavipriya Moorthy’s I don’t wear sunscreen.
Book: I don’t wear sunscreen
Author: Kavipriya Moorthy
Genre: Fiction – Romance
Main Characters: Laksha, Pallavi, Sai Prabhu, Saurav
Setting: Chennai, India
Few really badly written books had let me strive away from Indian authors for a while, so I was little apprehensive about reading the book, when a mutual friend was talking about Kavipriya’s book, as I did not want to my snobby (sometimes) book taste to lead . But “I don’t wear sunscreens” made all my doubts disappear.
The story is about two childhood best friends Laksha and Pallavi who have different aspirations in life, and their respective love lives. The story is just not about friendship, love and career dreams – it tries to shows a life of a typical girl from Chennai, which makes it easier for the reader to feel related to.
The story is extremely fast paced and kept me wanting me not to stop reading till I reached the epilogue. Yeah, that led to few burnt and blackened dosas, but of course who could blame me – I was making them while I was reading – not the other way around. In a little more than an hour (according to my e-reader) I had completed the book and I was dying to write this review as promised to Kavipriya.
I liked that none of the character was pristine or the usual “best in the world” kind. Each had his/ her own explanation for their actions and none of them were too far fetched. Even the so called antagonist (I am not revealing who *spoiler*) had an explanation. And the story did end in a positive note albeit an abrupt one.
For such a short book, it does have quite a pack of characters – and most of them interesting too. In about eleven chapters, the book tries to takes through too many stories, which may or may not work for the other readers. Personally, I would like to be prodded by the characters, their flaws, eccentricities even after I have finished the book. So on that perspective, I would like to have had more than just a glimpse of the Laksha’s parents or even Priyanka.
The story holds its suspense till its epilogue. And I felt everything ended too soon – not that there were any loose ends but still a little bit clumsy, for want of a better word.
But more than everything else, my special kudos to the author for her efforts and perseverance in starting and more importantly complete her first novel. And a special thanks and word of appreciation to your editor – on a job well done. Keep going, Kavi!
P.S What is with the title?
![Hey Dad Meet My Mom: A Book Review]()
Drama, review, YA |
used to love to hate Chetan Bhagat I take back my words, comparing to this book CB looks like a mature writer. I had to finish this book in one shot, so that I wont have to start the next day with Oh Shit Not Again.
About Oh Shit Not Again
Book: Oh Shit Not Again
Author: Mandar Kokate
Genre: Fiction – Drama
Main Characters: Raj, Arti, Seema, Andy, Sam, Neha, Sejal
Setting: India
What I was promised
Have you ever experienced what happens when a porn movie is mistakenly played in front of your grandma and the CD player refuses to stop’
Have you ever experienced what happens when mixture of vodka and soft drink is served to hundreds of people gathered for a party’
Have you ever experienced what happens when a boy is kicked in the groin by a girl when he attempts to kiss her’
Have you ever experienced what happens when a college-going student has an affair with a married woman whose husband carts a gun’
Have you ever experienced what happens when you are conspired into a murder that you had merely witnessed’
Welcome to hilarious story of five friends named Raj (the flirt chap), Arti (the sweet female lead), Andy (the creepy leader), and Sam (the biggest problem of Raj’s messed up life). These people can answer all the above questions in this fun tickling novel. Are you ready to experience the roller coaster ride of events? If yes, then sit back and enjoy!
What I expected
A “Five Point someone / One night at Call centre” (Aka other CB books) type story. And seriously all these instances happening to five different people. I confess that I did like the First “Five Point Someone”.
Reason I say first is because there have been many stories that have followed this pattern, that it lost its charm. It was after I read the Inscrutable Americans that I knew the “first Five Point Someone” was not first of its kind.
What I got:
Take the situations from the blurb + add a dumb.. no no.. pathetic, stupid male protagonist + crappy writing + bad bad bad plots from a badly made B grade Bollywood movies + lots and lots of masala, sleazy moves, sex = Oh shit not again !!!!
Book review of Oh shit not again
Reading through the blurb of Oh Shit Not Again, I thought it should be quite interesting “without reading the reviews”. That is where I went wrong.. The protagonist – a (pathetic) guy in search of “love??”” huh?? Oh, is that why he thinks every time he approaches a girl physically he thinks it is love… Bullshit… How do all the troubles in the world get attracted to him? And he accepts everything? No, I dont want to talk about this guy Raj again.. ever..
Love interest – First of all, there is no love.. He seems to get attracted to every woman in the plot with the same sexual notion and then he calls them love.. Arti, Neha and Sejal.. Oh come on.. and Seema too?
So a few drops of tears and Raj accepts to act as an illicit boyfriend to Sejal, whom he didnt even know a day earlier? It could not become more filmy when Raj announces to marry Sejal. Let me not go into that one..
Is there nothing called sanity in this piece of writing?
And all this crap takes place in a week, maximum?
Note to Self: Never read a book without reading the review(s).
P.S :
‘Beware before you read……
you may die laughing……’
Oh Come on!!! I could not take the irritant look off my face till I closed the book..
P. S (1)
BTW, How do you hold someone’s neck, “from end to end” ?
Drama, review |
After a long time, I am writing a review… In fact, after a long time have read a book worth reviewing – Eat Pray Love… Not that it is a classic or must read… But it just is closer to my heart in many terms…
Title: Eat, Pray, Love
ISBN: 0143038419 (ISBN13: 9780143038412
Author: Elizabeth Gilbert
Genre: Memoir
Setting: Italy, India, Bali
Simply I loved the way the term GOD has been dealt with… My philosophy of God is also more similar to Liz’s, maybe less compulsive and more forgiving… But that’s how God is supposed to be… I hate the clutter around the term GOD and since there was none found in her world, things seemed more acceptable…
Secondly, the lucid style in her narration that wasn’t too hard to imagine, yet very pleasant… Her stay at Bali as well as India were just as fresh in our mind as hers… I simply loved the cheeky Richard from Texas and the plumber/poet though they had not much to give the story in terms of substance or the usual clichés…
Wayan and her simple daughter would easily touch anybody’s heart but the reality in them, in terms of being practical enough to squeeze whatever one could from Liz, was much needed in the “too good to be story”… Because this what is the real life is all about, isn’t it?
But again a year taken as sabbatical, is too much to dream of even, so I am happy enough for Liz… God knows none of us could afford it…
Bottom-line: I loved it – not for the writing style or for the wonderful language or any of the technical stuff – but for the realism maintained in an unrealistic environment… J I could not stop imagining Julia Roberts in every scene, even when I have not seen the film yet, So definitely an “one time read” rating for the surreal fairytale…
