Ginger drafts...

Private detective Phil Marlow is invited by a wealthy businessman who has just received a note of ransom, anonymous one. His two youthful, sleazy daughters are involved and the wealthy old man cannot approach the police. The old man is suffering from a poor heart, he wheels his way around the home, is affectionate towards his son-in-law who apparently is absconding for some reason. His older daughter thinks she is clever, with her shiny white legs, supple ankles, gorgeous figure and slender waist, attempts to seduce Marlow, the detective. Younger daughter has a boyfriend who finds her posing naked for a book shop owner Geiger and shoots him. The shop owner’s secretary has a notorious boy friend, Brody, who happens to be hiding behind the bushes at the time of the murder; Brody escapes with the naked pictures of younger daughter who stays on dope for the whole night. The wealthy old man’s chauffer is found dead, the car is found in Pacific Ocean. Owen Taylor, younger daughter’s boyfri...

What can I say about the man “K” who is on trial for a crime who knows nothing about? He is on arrest, but can go on with his everyday routine just as well as he used to do prior to that. The judge who summons “K” is clueless, officers who arrest “K” are clue less, and everyone seems to be part of a giant mechanism of portentous network that looms on to people and casts giant shadows, obfuscates the lay man from the authority behind the clouds. The whole novel is reminiscent of “Who are you?” track by “The Who”. The courtroom is filled with people who nonchalantly applaud “K”; the judge, apparently pretends to listen, but is thumbing down the pages of a notebook that has nude pictures of voluptuous females. K’s innocuous remarks (or so he thought at the time) result in two officers whipped officially for a good whole day; his neighbour, a lady who works in the theatre is cross with him, for he accosted her the other night with nonsensical claims of his being put on trial; his landlady ...

Nabokov employs an unconventional narrative style in his magnum opus. The book is considered by intellectuals and common public in general, as one of the ten greatest and most influential books ever written in any language. The protagonist’s morbid fantasy, for nymphets, eleven to thirteen years old girls, has stirred the world in a grip of fiction that portentously swayed outside the novel. Into the world, Lolita issued a word, a phrase, that prancing wildly, melting morals on its way, tramping literary conventions under its rabid feet , attained martyrdom that few books in the history can claim the status of. Rose bud pink cheeks, slender waist, slack limbs, hoisted figure, honey coated soft pale white skin, perfunctory clothing, bare feet, toe nails polished of red, plump under lip, cropped eye lids, pale grey eyes, bobbed hair that sullenly slanted on naked flesh, slim shoulder blades……the protagonist, H.H’s avid, detailed and myriad imagery of Lolita in prismatic patterns fills ...

“You cry, with regret at having to leave the city when you can barely graze it with your glance” notes Marco Polo, in reference to one of the cities. And this can be said of every other city described in the book. So beautiful, adventurous and enticing that before you read the first ten pages, you are already contemplating an adventurous trip to a dreamy city, one that is unique, one that Calvino himself missed in his dreamy evocations. “Cities, like dreams, are made of desires and fears…” observes Marco Polo in his discourse with Kublai Khan. The book follows Marco Polo, the main protagonist, on his journeys through imaginative cities. Cities are described in the form of a desire, or a desire that formed the city; a traveller who was inspired or an inspiration that the city drew from the traveller to recreate itself so the traveller appreciates it even more. A city that has lost its originality and appears as if it were lost in desolate fears, an identity that has collapsed in dreamy ...

Naomi Klein’s “No Logo” is stylish, corrosive and conclusive. In her own words-“Sitting cross-legged on the concrete floor of the tiny dorm room….connected, as is so often the case, by a web of fabrics, shoelaces, franchises, teddy bears and brand names wrapped around the planet”. Klein’s book views the ocean (of consumers), attempts to find out the direction of flow of oceanic currents (market trends) and the effect of these currents on the land (companies) and people. The book takes us through the evolution of Branding, how it all began, where and why? Prior to the Brand world, there were but indistinguishable products. But since the early 20th century, Klein argues, companies felt the need to create euphoric affiliations of their products (not within themselves, but beyond and outside). This period, Klein observes was the premise for the branding But the innocuous idea’s wide spread tentacles began suffocating consumers, she notes. With the advent of globalisation, companies focused...

“Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed” is a book for every student, parent, teacher and business man living on this planet right now. Jared Diamond, before venturing into his comprehensive list of collapse of societies, tries to pacify the readers of an education that will be imparted, and that the readers should not be worried and bang their heads against the nearest walls. But, it doesn’t last long, it only takes the first couple of chapters and we realise the intensity of collapse that is imminent on us. It is all over now; the damage that we have caused to this planet is irreparable. Diamond presents his case promptly, reiterates the findings over and over again to make sure that it has settled on us. But he is a benevolent man, so towards the ending he sits with us readers, and endeavours to grab a thin overhanging glimmer of hope branch to get us out of the quick sand. But, we will have our shoes dirty; he reprimands, and might have to hang them up after we get out o...