Currently reading: Catch-22 - Joseph Heller

Shantaram - Gregory David Roberts

I was first introduced to this novel (epic is probably the more appropriate term) while on holiday with a rather free spirited friend.

“I’m reading Shantaram,” she said one day while we were basking in the holiday sun. My brain did not quite register this foreign sounding word.

“It’s amazing. It’s about this man who was one of Australia’s most wanted men because he escaped maximum security prison by the front wall.”

Huh? I get up on my elbows and look at her.

“Yeah. And through the work of God, he escaped to India and found salvation.”

Ah.

My cynicism sank back into the sand and washed the novel from my mind as she continued to wax lyrical about this book apparent.

Hello World!

As Mr WordPress once wrote: ‘Hello World!’ I too take on this excellent phrase as a welcome to my reading rambles. I guess this is just a little post to note that, while I have just posted about that excellent book ‘The Book Thief’, will inform that there may be posting of reviews at a speed much faster than the normal speedy reader may complete a 500 or so page novel. This is simply because there are a few books that I have read that have inspired me to write. So don’t worry - I don’t actually have superhuman reading powers. It’s ok. 

The Book Thief - Marcus Zusak

I am generally not ok with Holocaust literature. I find that – no matter if it is a work of fiction or non-fiction – it has a general bad habit of falling into the pit of self-pity and tokenism; not so for The Book Thief. It is a book that launches into a different way of reading about the horrific event of the Holocaust, both in the sense of story and style. There is not even a smidgen of Life is Beautiful (which, to clarify, I hated simply because of said glossy Hollywood-produced navel-gazing sentiments) nor is there the bad grammar of The Diary of Anne Frank. Quite simply, The Book Thief is not only a great read but is also one that is multifaceted in the way that Holocaust storytelling has not been before.