Between the Lines & Fintan's Tower (Book Review) by Catherine Fisher

Hi everyone!

To everyone who knows me well, I'm addicted to reading books, I love the different worlds that authors take me to, the way they describe them in everlasting detail. Also, it's not only fiction I read, I have on my reading list the 100 best business/ management books of all time + close to a hundred of biographies and autobiographies of cricketers (given the opportunity I can speak about cricket for the entire day).

Reading for me is a way of 1) continually firing my imagination that there's something new, a new idea, a new way of life, a new way to do something 2) a "relatively" inexpensive way of having a new experience daily, and it's for these reasons I enjoy reading so much since I was very young. (4 or five years old)

I have close to two thousand books on my Amazon Kindle Fire HD, I've read probably a couple hundred of these. I get through somewhere in the region of 30 to 40 books a year. Since the advent of the Kindle, this has literally saved me thousands of dollars as the kindle edition of a book is generally 30% - 50% less than the hard copy (physical version) of the same book. Not to mention it has saved me on space (where on earth do I fit 2000 books in my house? I'll need a mansion to fit them all), saved me on books dry-rotting, getting bookworms etc etc. Doing some quick and general maths 2000 books divided by 40 books a year, I have enough books for 50 years. 50 years? that's ridiculous right? At 400 pages per book, that's 800,000 pages! Clearly I'll not be starved of entertainment in the near future and I'll be 80 by the time I finish them all.

It must be said though that while my purchases of books (the physical version) has gone down by 90% in the last five years, I still buy the occasional book because of 1) I can't get the Kindle version as it is an old book, or it hasn't come out as yet on Kindle and I just have to have it to read (desperation times) 2) it's that good of a book in my opinion that I have to have it 3) I buy it to have a book to read just in case my Kindle decides to commit suicide on me and I'll be a few weeks without one. 

Initially this Blog post was supposed to be about a book review by Catherine Fisher, but as you can see, with four paragraphs just talking about reading, clearly I'm extremely passionate about it. 

Onward to the book review!

Spoiler Free!

As the front cover of the book says "A wonderful, unputdownable book" Sunday Times.
Unputdownable, flagged as a spelling error by the blog, so enthralled the reviewer was by the book that they made up a word. Positive signs to start with right? 

At 119 pages, it will be one of the shortest books Fantasy Fiction or otherwise that one can ever hope to read. Having 16 chapters as well, makes this into a book one can literally blow away in an hour. Not a positive sign, but the book was worth every second, literally in all the good ways utterly captivating. 

What first attracted me to the book was the following extract inside the front cover
" 'Now,' Morgant said, 'are you ready?' 
Jamie nodded, but the question was not for him. Unraveling itself across the page like a black thread, the answer wrote itself swiftly:

I am ready.

Now a book like this in 2016 would be lost in the crowd due to the age of the Internet and creativity knows no bounds with anyone. But when you carefully consider this was written in 1991, makes it even more special as the book as years ahead of its time. 

I first read it when I was probably 10 (can't remember these things too well) I was not in the habit of noting down these occasions, which you don't realize until years after how special it was. It all starts off with Jamie (the protagonist of the story - yay I used a big word) being in a library looking for a book to read that he didn't read already and being vaguely pissed off/ upset that the library didn't get new and exciting and different books for him to read. The action starts on the very first page as we get the first look at the other players in the book (Fisher does not waste time). Cleverly written, and every nuance so very well described, the book has no pictures other than the front cover, the reader feels like they're actually there experiencing the things that Jamie experiences.

Stepping back a second when you consider it, a book that has it's own feelings, a book that you can ask any question of and be answered instantaneously? Who wouldn't want a book like that? 

Short, sweet and to the point a brilliant work of fiction which I will recommend to any avid fantasy reader. The scope of the story is huge yet simple in execution. 

I would love to see a movie of this made and further stories from this particular world. 

The blurbs on the back of the book are
"Vivid, unusual... establishes Fisher as a children's writer of rare talent" Sunday Times

"Classic fantasy fiction... inventive and well-written" Sunday Telegraph

I agree with these sentiments wholeheartedly. 

As the Author herself mentions on her website about the book which gives a potential reader on the intriguing ride they're in for.
"Fintan’s Tower was my second novel, again from the Bodley Head in 1991. I remember not liking the original cover art at all! But I enjoyed writing the novel, and found I’d learned a lot from the first one. Fintan’s Tower is a building that lies somewhere in the Otherworld, and holds an age-old prisoner and a magic cauldron. Jamie and Jennie find a magical book that shows them the way, but then are kidnapped by a pair of strangers who know far more about the dangers of the Tower than they do.
As I mention in the Author’s Note, the idea for this book came from an ancient poem called The Spoils of Annwn, so old and broken that it’s hard to read, but it seems to tell the story of a raid, made by Arthur on a tower in the Otherworld. I love the Arthurian myths, especially the Welsh versions, and from them I took a lot of elements of this story- Cai, the Oldest Animals, and the Cauldron itself."

http://www.catherine-fisher.com/pages/books/the_glass_tower/inspiration.asp


Till next time!

Be safe. 

Remember to subscribe for future posts and send me an email at usayd5@gmail.com for any questions or comments. :-)

The Right Stuff (Life)

Hi everyone!

Hope everyone's doing awesome!

My post today is about a primary facet of a person's every day life that they have to do, if they don't do anything else.

That's right, eating.

We all eat in a lot of different ways, according to the food that is available, how readily it's available, how much is available. This means that the food I get in Trinidad & Tobago is different from what someone in New Zealand gets. Food being readily available in every town with supermarkets in appropriate strategic locations etc. Finally, how much food is available, there are so many people living around the world even in 1st world countries that are in poverty, that they don't have the money or the resources to buy or grow their own food and limited food is available in the country they are in.
An easy Google search comes up with an oldish article but still very relevant to the point being made here. Extreme Poverty Facts This post however, is not going to be an advocate for charity or improving the world around us. 

Eating done right. Let's have a stab at putting together some thoughts and perspectives on this important facet of a person's life. Everyone's upbringing would obviously be different, eating habits vary amazingly from person to person. 

Breakfast
Over the years I've had a wide selection of items for the most important meal of the day. They've varied from 1) toast and butter, 2) toast and margarine, 3) toast and eggs, 4) pancakes and honey, 5) toast and honey, 6) bread and honey, 7) paratha and honey, 8) paratha, 9) dahlpourie roti, 10) sada roti and butter, 11) sada roti and zaboca, 12) sada roti and tomato choka, 13) Weetabix and milk, 14) random cereal and milk etc etc. I may have missed out some, but you get the general idea.
To drink with these delicious and delightful combinations, I generally have tea with sugar or Nesquik. 

Now, in an attempt to improve and simplify my life, to eat healthier than before, my breakfast now currently consists of tea (no sugar) and toast with olive oil on one side and honey and cinnamon on the other. I also have a Nature Valley oat bar with breakfast thereby ensuring I have fibre to start my day. Depending on the time I have to eat breakfast in the morning I would add in having a banana as well. To wash this all down I have a glass of water as well. (650 ml) Quite a large meal yes, but it helps to set up my day by having a proper breakfast to keep me on the go for my busy days. 
Occasionally on the weekend or days I'm at home, I would switch it up by having just oats and milk. (for something different but still nourishing and healthy)

I should mention at this time I have breakfast at 5 in the morning as all my life I am a morning person and I get a lot done before 10 every day.

Mid morning
By 10 a.m. every day I am generally now starting to feel the pangs of hunger when I am at work, at this time I would have my banana and 650 ml of water.

Lunch 
This meal I generally have by 1130 to 1200 and generally must consist of a salad (lettuce, cucumber and sweet pepper).
Other things revolve around meat (fish or chicken), channa, squash and basmati or jasmine rice. This would vary between the different foods in the food groups and cooked in a wide variety of ways. 
At this point I'll have 650 ml of water with lunch and another 650 ml between 1 and 4. 
Depending on how things go, I'll go in more detail with how everything is cooked in the future.

Dinner 
An apple and a Nature Valley oat bar. Simple and effective. 
I would add in a small bite of whatever is available, a couple table spoons of squash, channa etc. A few exceptions to this I make is I'll have a bowl of dahl or lentils (if that was cooked that day). 
At 7 every day I have a Multivitamin and also have 3 glasses of water (650 ml each) 
I may have minor snacks afterwards, a taste of a biscuit or a couple brookside dark chocolate depending on how intense my day was. I.e. A reward of sorts. 

Notice how I did not include anything with soft drinks, sugary drinks, sugar, empty and throwaway calories. A couple years back I was having so much unnecessary calories it was ridiculous, now I'm evolving into something better and it's still a work in progress. 

It's better to eat healthy when you're young which helps in the following ways
1) good habits are easier to develop and maintain early in life. 
2) it's cheaper on your wallet by streamlining what your monthly food bill is.
3) by making healthy choices when you're at this stage, you're able to avoid health complications at the age of 60, 70 and having to spend thousands of dollars to control high blood pressure, diabetes etc etc. i.e. it's far cheaper in the long run. 
4) it's also highly less likely to gain weight following a routine like this (recommend to have an active day to maintain an optimum weight)

To note, I follow this routine 90% of the time, but there are always the exceptions for eating unusual or unhealthy food, weddings, birthdays, functions and going out to the cinema or other places. These instances where I allow slack into my diet is the exception rather than the rule. And I always try to be as simple and straightforward with my choices as possible. 

Finally, I always never liked these fad diets that people are always on, needing to lose a certain number of pounds to fit into a wedding dress or a suit by a specific date. While these work for losing the desired weight by a specific date they are never able to keep the weight off as the person's metabolism goes right back to what it was when the diet is over. This article on The Biggest Loser tells the story of this better than I ever could. 
Enjoy and I hope that at least some part of this post proved to be an inspiration to all. 
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/6-years-after-the-biggest-loser-metabolism-is-slower-and-weight-is-back-up/

Fantasy or Reality & Fact or Fiction (Cricket)

Hi everyone!

I'm going to attempt to post once a week (minimum) at least by every Wednesday/ Friday. So there would be some consistency in my posts. Plus I'll be tagging off in the titles what the post is about, Cricket, Life, Book review, Movie etc.

Today's post is a throwback, way back when etc etc, from Tuesday 30th September, 1997. 

My love, maybe obsession, yes, let's call it an obsession of cricket has been on for two whole decades, two! I feel old. 

This is an essay that I wrote in Primary school when I was 10 and I got 12 out of 12, A++ outstanding, plus a sticker saying wonderful! Possibly one of my best works at this age. One of my first forays into writing fiction about cricket (I honestly think so), my memory's fuzzy. 

And now I'm going to reveal it to the entire world. 

Topic - "An Eventful Occasion" 

One day while reaching the turntable at the ticket counter in the Queen's Park Stadium for the Grand Final one day international between West Indies and Sri Lanka. I found my seat and sat down. The two Captains Courtney Walsh and Arjuna Ranatunga came out with the commentator for the toss. 

West Indies won.

The openers Sherwin Campbell and Stuart Williams got off their team to a good start with scoring fifty runs in seven overs before Campbell and Williams fell to two successive balls from Pushpakumara for Sri Lanka. Brian Lara and Chanderpaul carried the score to  two hundred and seventy five for four when the West Indies collapsed from 10 successive balls from Pushpakumara and Silva.

The two opening Sri Lankan batsmen got to twenty five runs before both openers were bowled by Ambrose in the sixth over. Aravinda de Silva and A. Ranatunga carried this score to 200/4 with elegantly struck fours all over the field and mighty sixes. Mahanama and Telekaratne carried the score to 265/5, before the two new bowlers Meryvn Dillon and Franklyn Rose took the wind out the their sails in the forty first and second overs. They ended the exciting Sri Lankan innings dramatically at 265 all out. 

The field was stormed with spectators, even me. The man of the match was Brian Lara with 117 runs and the West Indians got the Champions trophy.

End


Well, there you have it, my fantasies into the fiction world were well and truly working from an early age and has stayed strongly with me over the years. From playing hours of cricket in the yard to playing hours of cricket on the computer to playing hours of cricket with a calculator (including book cricket and a few other variations), the love of cricket has surely given me some pleasurable times. 

Hope everyone's doing well and my next post I'll talk a bit about healthy living and life.

Til next time. :-) 

Harry Potter & the Cursed Child (Book Review)

Hi everyone! 

My first book review, enjoy! Definitely not the last.

Harry Potter & the Cursed Child Book Review

This is a story written by J.K. Rowling, John Tiffany & Jack Thorne. 

Based on the screenplay i.e. official script of the West End Production, it was first first previewed on 7 June, 2016 and it is truly impressive at how no spoilers managed to leak it's way onto the internet.

This is a Spoiler free review by the way.

I can describe this book as many words, so many that I googled "amazing synonyms" and came up with 

astonishing, astounding, surprising, bewildering, stunning, staggering, shocking, startling,
stupefying, breathtaking, perplexing, confounding, dismaying, disconcerting, shattering;
awesome, aweinspiring, sensational, remarkable, spectacular, stupendous, 
phenomenal,prodigious, extraordinary, incredible, unbelievable; wonderful, marvellous; thrilling,exciting; informalmind-blowing, flabbergasting, supercalifragilisticexpialidocious,amazeballs; literarywondrous; raredumbfounding

It was also emotional and literally all these synonyms are applicable.


poignant, moving, touching, affecting, powerful, stirring, emotive, heart-rending,heartbreaking, heart-warming, soul-tirring, uplifting, impassioned, dramatic; harrowing,tragic, haunting, pathetic; sentimental, over-sentimental, mawkish, cloying, sugary,syrupy, saccharine, lachrymose; informaltear-jerking, soppy, mushy, schmaltzy,weepy, cutesy, lovey-dovey, gooey, drippy; informalcornball, sappy, hokey, three-hanky

Nine years after writing Harry Potter & the Deathly Hallows, J.K. Rowling is back with the Harry Potter character and the writing in the script is as haunting and stunning as ever and even more so. The plot twists at the end of Act 2 and in Act 3 & 4, were jaw dropping at how well they were done and at how well they ultimately fit the story to a stage.

To begin with, because this is a script of stage production, the "book" is divided up into four acts, Part one, Act one & two, Part two, Act three and four. And each Act has many gorgeously described scenes.
Act one - 19 scenes.
Act two - 20 scenes.
Act three - 21 scenes.
Act four - 15 scenes.

I will admit I have never sat through a stage production, but reading this book has made me unbelievably excited to see it live. Seeing that I'm from Trinidad and Tobago, makes seeing it live slightly problematic, we'll have to work that out in the future, in addition keeping an eye on how long it's going to be shown for on the stage. 

The connection of this story to the original seven books was impressively done, and since this is a magical world we're talking about, anything is possible, anything!

This book sucked me in and I blew it away in about two and a half hours, it was that good! Can I get a Harry Potter 9 and 10? Pretty please J.K. Rowling?

Act one starts off slowly, introducing the new character of Albus Severus Potter and the trials and tribulations of being the son of Harry Potter, the chosen one. It is soon revealed that a powerful piece of magic, long since thought to have been destroyed still exists in Albus's world. This, amazingly is used as the primary plot device as it is linked to everything, and causes everything, and ultimately fixes everything. Cryptic? Yes, I know, I also said that this is a spoiler free review. :-)

Act two picks up speed after an amazing end to Act one, and sets up effortlessly Act's three and four. This is where connections are made to the original story and intriguingly, just knowing that particular people are cast to play a certain person or that a certain person pops up in Act 2 are spoilers. It's surprising how little I can gushingly say about this book without giving away anything, other than it was a page turner (I read it on my Kindle by the way). The end of Act two leaves audiences in bewilderment, as it is meant for the play to be show over two evenings, and it is a perfect cliff-hanger to leave spectators and readers alike captivated and want to know more.

Starting Act three, I knew I had to finish the book last night in one reading and I was fascinated by every page at how quickly the story was progressing. Act three was the defining moment of the story for me and I was breathless in anticipation over the unfolding drama. Lies, deception, long-dead characters, gasp! 

Act four, why did it have to end? We could've gotten another 7 books! Why?? The conclusion to this story was epic in scale and at the same time the minute attention to every detail, was wow! We learn who is actually the Cursed Child at the start of Act 4 and boy, was I wrong in my guesses during Act 1 and 2, so very wrong. 

A few things I will leave the reader with
1) Not every thing that the reader encounters in the book is critical to the overall story, but it's the things that are least expected.
2) This is a story that will touch the hearts of all fans, young and old, the first generation 19 years ago with Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone and all the successive generations of fans since.
3) I give the book 6 stars out of five, it was that good.
3) Love blinds us... 

I also wait in anticipation of the movie which surely has to come out in a few years after Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them trilogy is done and dusted.

Omigosh... 

https://images.pottermore.com/bxd3o8b291gf/37V0amUuCAqmwAwCkegGUy/a73fe5bed33efde74d0d0132c2133831/HP15_Q4_Square_LS_Pottermore.jpg?w=1200&h=600&fit=thumb&f=center&q=85