Summer reads

I was in back home in India this summer for a couple of months and here was my opportunity to catch up on my much longed for reading activity. So I did read a few books. My first read was the autobiography of the Mahatma. It was very interesting to read about the "Mahatma" as an ordinary human being, who was struggling with his own fears and trying to find the answers to life's questions. Hence the tiltle of his book is "My experiments with truth". It is amazing to note that he describes his innate fear of speaking, but eventually he overcame it to accomplish great deeds of courage. This one was a pretty big book of about 500 pages. This translation by Navjivan trust (Gandhi's autobiograpy was originally written in Gujarati) seems hard to read as the language is too wordy.

Next I read the two bestsellers by Malcom Gladwell-Blink and The tipping point. Both are very interesting books. Both talk about how seemingly insignificant/small things in life matter so much. In blink, he talks about the first instinct and in The Tipping Point he talks about small ideas that can be big. And it is not just real examples that he talks about and theorizes, he supports them with evidence from researches. Both books are good food for thought.

My last read was Superstar India by Shobha De. I am amazed that I finished this book for all it kitschy and gossipy qualities. On the other hand I found myself laboring to move from one page to another of The Argumentative Indian by Amartya Sen, for all its intellectuality. Against the title, Superstar India actually is a trash talk on India, with just one point in support of India-family values. I would'nt want to read such content in a book titled "Superstar" India. Shobha De fooled me with the title.

Currently I am reading "Wild Swans" by Jung Chang. Since I am back in US and my reading is on a halt, I wonder if my summer reads would be all that I read this year!