Book Review #75: 1Q84 By Haruki Murakami

Title: 1Q84

Author: Haruki Murakami

Publishing year: 2009 and 2010

Translated to English by: Jay Rubin (Book 1 & 2) and Philip Gabriel (Book 3)

Publisher: Schinchosha

Genre: General Fiction/Science Fiction/Fantasy

Pages: 1000+ (All 3 Books) eBook Edition

Source: Personal Copy

When it comes to the Fantasy genre, there are no specific rules on how do you write your story and on what basis does it stands. It all happens too fast and by the time you realized, you've already read something bizarre, something overwhelming and something odd. The book 1Q84 by the author Haruki Murakami fits in this category and breaks all those barriers of standards and gives us an immense and a riveting story that certainly keeps ringing in your head even after finished reading it. Reviewing this book was highly a difficult task considering its massive number of pages and many characters that lurks in the book like a magic.

The protagonists are also somewhat special knowing the kind of the businesses they deal with. Tengo, a mathematician and a teacher who teaches at a cram school and also a writer who aspires to become a full time novelist. Whereas, Aomame, a physical trainer who teaches fitness at a martial school and a murderer in her alternate profession who kills people that might have caused damage to someone or the other. These two protagonists were classmates long back for a brief duration and they have this traumatic childhood that leads them to build their own life from the beginning of their childhood all by themselves.

The main story unfolds in a dramatic way. Aomame was heading to kill someone gets herself stuck in a strange world where she couldn’t really understand. It was the year 1984 in reality, but, for her, this is actually the year 1Q84, because she witnesses some strange activities in her surroundings and not only that, she also sees two moons up in the sky during night times. She didn’t really understood what these two moons really indicated. She somehow realized that she is not in the same world as she was before. She continues what she does best (training in fitness center) and cared less for what was happening.

The Tengo, a part time writer gets a request from one of his friend Komatsu, an editor at a publishing house, with a strange story called “Air Chrysalis” written by a teenage girl called Fuka Eri a.k.a Erika Fukado. Komatsu sensed a strangeness in that story and asked Tengo to ghostwrite this story for a competition. Reluctantly, Tengo agrees to ghostwrite this story after consulting with the guardian of Fuka Eri, Prof. Ebisuno. Tengo didn’t realized initially that, what he was going to rewrite could lead him to a strange problem in later part of his life. He just attracted by the beauty of the story and writes an elaborated copy of the story and submits this story for the competition.

What follows after these events are beyond the level of understanding. The story that Tengo ghostwrites was actually happening in real. Tengo meets this teenage girl who actually wrote the “Air Chrysalis” and tries to understand the story from her point of view. He learnt that, this girl actually narrating a true event that has happened with her. But, he wasn't sure of how these “Little People” emerge from a Goat’s mouth or how they were building the Air Chrysalis and what they actually intended to achieve finally. He believes that, this will lead him to somewhat bigger surprises.

As the story further progresses, the author introduces us to the parents of this young girl Fuka Eri. The father of this girl was a friend of Prof. Ebisuno long back during their younger days. This father figure now heads a communist kind of group, now an officially recognized religion in Japan, called Sakigake. As soon as they found this religion group, they abandoned the entry of normal citizens to their fort and almost became a cult. Soon enough, this father rose to the new heights and became the Leader of this religious group. And, somehow, the girl Fuka Eri escapes from this group and she was well guarded by Prof. Ebisuno.

Due to some strange events, the young girls in the vicinity of this Sakigake group was tortured, raped and mutilated to the core. There was a woman called The Dowager, a powerful, wealthy woman that runs a destitute home for abandoned women and young children. She finds out that this Sakigake group is responsible for those rapes and tortures. She decides to hire someone special to look in to the case. This was handed over to Aomame, a certified fitness expert and a murderer.

As the story keeps us occupied and making us to guess what would happen next, Aomame prepares herself to murder this Leader of Sakigake. Several strange events do happen when she meets this Leader and she was surprised to witness these events with her eyes. She also learns that, she is destined to meet her long last friend, now her boyfriend, Tengo. Even in case of Tengo, he gets the mysterious assurance from this teenage girl Fuka Eri that he will be meeting Aomame.

The climax part of the novel is where the real story or the story inside story is kept hidden. Both Aomame and Tengo unanimously agrees that they are living in their strange world. Aomame termed it as “1Q84” whereas Tengo termed it as “The Cats Town”. What happens to both of them? Will they be able to meet at last? What does this Sakigake group will do once they found out that Aomame was involved in the murder of their Leader? Was Aomame and Tengo will be able to return to the normal world of 1984? These are questions for which the answers should be read from the book alone.

It is highly impossible to write the review of this book in a few lines or paragraphs. The book (including the three books) is more than 1000 pages. For a normal reader, it is even difficult to keep track of the story leave alone consolidate it for a review!! I was immensely impressed at the sheer brilliance of the author to write such bizarre story. The entire story is connected brilliantly at the right time and at the right place. The English translation work is just awesome. For sure, you would actually question yourself whether the story is happening in 1984 or 1Q84!!

I would highly recommend this book to be read by everyone. Though you may not understand it at the beginning, but as you immerse yourself in the story, the experience is vivid and it’s not possible to put down the book. You will certainly enjoy living in this fantasized world of 1Q84 throughout the novel.

My Rating:

5/5

Book Review #69: 2014 The Election That Changed India By Rajdeep Sardesai

Title: 2014: The Election That Changed India

Author: Rajdeep Sardesai

Publishers: Penguin India

Genre: Non-Fiction

Pages: 370+

Source: Personal Copy

2002 Gujarat Riots, Narendra Modi, BJP, Congress, Hinduism, RSS, VHP, Minorities, Moral Compass, etc... These are the main highlights of a book that was being titled “2014: Election that changed India”. As it may sound odd at sometimes, but, Rajdeep a debutant in book writing, has written a well-researched book. His journalistic background has given him an exclusive access to some of the insider information that was accounted in this book in a detailed manner. As one of the controversial figure in the journalists arena in India, Rajdeep has took great care while airing his opinion. At times, one may feel like he is being biased and it seems very true in few chapters. His hatred towards some section of the politician, and his love and care towards other politicians is almost evident in this book.

The book covers everything from post UPA-2 government times and of course he begins his journey with his favorite topic “2002 Gujarat Riots”. I somehow felt, this has been written out of proportion. Rajdeep doesn’t follow the rule of “forget and move on”. Anyways, that’s what made him the man today. He constantly nitpicks about Modi and his Chief ministerial day’s right from the days of 2002 till the 2012 elections where Modi scored convincing 3^rd time win. He writes about his encounters during riot days and also writes his journey as a beginner journalist to his newsroom editor job.

While writing about Modi versus Rahul part, Rajdeep has shown his affinity towards the later one by being apologetic. He was constantly writing about how Rahul Gandhi missed an opportunity to conquer the vacant spot rather than writing about Rahul’s quality as a politician. He has expressed his prejudiced opinion about Narendra Modi and doesn't even care to write about the dumbness of Rahul. All he wanted to showcase was his loyal support towards a much hyped secularism at the cost of being righteous.

What was more fascinating about the book is its detailed explanation of the various strategies that was used by every political party during the 2014 elections, the mother of all elections as he puts it. He constantly reminds us about the unwillingness of Rahul Gandhi to take up the leads of his party and how he remained as a shadow and never shown up his face in the time of crisis and stuff. He goes on mentioning about the various corporate heads that turned and poured their money towards the BJP and Modi. He also writes about the amount of money being spent by each party during election without giving concrete evidence. All he writes about “a close associate from the BJP has said that” or “a senior politician from the party has told me” or “a bureaucrat has updated me on the request on anonymity” and so on. So, it’s understood that he wrote many things just by going with the information leaked. He equated the BJP as cash-rich party of 2014 and congress as a sinking ship.

The book accounts some of the greater details about each political party that has recruited some of the major advertising agencies for their campaign. This is good information from the book that can be taken away. I always suspected that, no major political party could win any election only because of their foot soldiers door to door campaign. It was proved right on the spot after reading the major advertising companies that each party has recruited and spent crores of money on ads and make over of the politicians. The BJP, The Congress and the new entrant AAP has been in this roller coaster ride of campaigning. Rajdeep even writes about the major women politicians of the country such as Mamata Banerjee, Mayawati and Jayalalitha and their strategy and planning in the 2014 elections. It was a detailed, well researched story.

At the end of the book, several astonishing statistics about this 2014 elections juxtaposed with the 2009 elections is quite fascinating. Surely, this 2014 election was mother of all elections considering the preparations and execution. A simple, no nonsense book that can be read easily. However, it seemed like, Rajdeep hasn't left his one liners, mocking high profile people and their political inclinations. Anyways, a good book to learn about the 2014 elections.

My Rating:

3/5

Book Review #48: 1984 (Nineteen-Eighty Four) By George Orwell

“WAR IS PEACE, FREEDOM IS SLAVERY AND IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH”!!

Probably this is one of the most disturbing books that I've ever read in recent times. I had no idea what was happening but I was sure that, I was feeling all those creepiness, all those dreaded ways of torturing people, and most of which, the way an existing government treats its workers for the sole purpose of staying in power.

At the same time, this is one of the classics ever written on socio-political grounds. George Orwell has mastered at the character creation, that it almost felt like the events described in this book might have happened for real. The Dystopia that Orwell had expressed in this novel is quite an amazing thing. Written in 1948, but for the people of 1984 is what makes this book as a unique and class apart.

Winston Smith, the protagonist of our novel, who happened to be an inner party worker. He always hated his government for their way of treating its people. Their totalitarian way of handling things and events resulted in more hatred from among its workers than the normal citizen. Winston was working in Ministry of Truth, a government organization whose purpose is to distort the dates and events and recreate those things as never happened or happened at the behest of the wishes of government. He was often wondering why things are like this and why their government is behaving like this. Their government went a step ahead and created a new kind of dictionary called “NEWSPEAK" that eliminated almost every word that can be used to describe the hatred against their government. This dictionary always uses words such that, there is no way that anyone can write against government, because, those words didn't exist in the NEWSPEAK dictionary.

As the story further progresses, Winston was slogging every day to his work though he hated it. So, he purchased a diary from local market and started to write his hatred against the government in that diary. He had to keep this activity so secret that, his every move, his every step has been watched very closely by his government and Big Brother. Wherever he used to sit, at his home, at office, on the street, there will be special telescreens that will spy on him and often he gets reminders from the same screen whenever they encounter some unusual activities. Not only was him, almost everyone undergoing this surveillance. They are not even allowed to think against their government, otherwise, this will get booked under the act “Thought Crime”. There are few cases like people were booked under “Thought Crimes” and there are “Thought Police” everywhere in the city to keep an eye on these people.

During these events, he meets a female co-worker Julia from his office that expresses her interest towards Winston. Initially he was skeptical that, she might be an inside informant who is spying on him. Later, he comes to know that, even she hated the government. So he accepts her proposal. They usually go to the woods to spend some romantic time together, since, couples who are going together and are not married is a crime according to the government. So, Winston rents an apartment in the 2^nd floor of an antique artefacts seller.

One fine day Winston meets O'Brien, a colleague of him that pretends to hate their government and Big Brother. He befriends him and reveals all his details and his love affair with Julia. Initially, O'Brien acts as if he is the member of secret group and hands over a book of secret group to Winston to study. He collects all the information from Winston and pretends that they can work together and bring down this government. Winston believes in all these things and along with Julia will head back to their apartment and begins to study that book. This is the longest section from the novel where Winston reads and understands everything about their government and the secret group. In all these events, both Winston and Julia were certain of one thing, they believed that they will get caught sooner or later by their government or people from Big Brother and will be executed. During this phase, their apartment door will be kicked open and both of them will be arrested. The owner of the apartment Mr. Charrington, who pretended to be a normal person, is actually one of the “Thought Police”.

So, both Winston and Julia will be arrested and will be put in separate prisons. This section of the novel is the disturbing section. Winston will be tortured like anything and made to accept to all the crimes that he has committed or not. The twist in the novel appears now, O’Brien, who happened to be a member of the secret group is actually a spy working from outside the party and working for Big Brother. He confronts Winston and reveals his true face and explains Winston about all his spying activities. He tortures Winston in all possible ways and forces him to confess everything. O’Brien transfer Winston to Cell 101, a dreaded torture room specifically designed to torture people in the cruelest way and will be made to confess almost anything that they wanted, even though they never committed in the first place. According to O’Brien, Winston and Julia have committed Adultery, they committed thought crime, they are traitors, they worked against the government, etc… But, all O’Brien wanted from Winston was to forget Julia. He tortures Winston and brainwashes him in such a way that, Winston almost nods for everything and even he accepts 2+2=5!!

Finally, O’Brien was able to brainwash Winston successfully. His final resort of torturing Winston by allowing the rats to eat Winston’s face in a closed box proved to be successful. Winston who often gets dreams of eaten by rats was actually coming true. He decides to confess to his final crime and says to O’Brien that he can torture Julia instead of him. This is the final answer that O’Brien was expecting from Winston. Finally, Winston will be released and was allowed to live like normal Proles. Winston encounters Julia in later days after his release, but, he will realize that, he don’t have any feelings left for Julia.

Overall Winston’s journey is completely filled with torture. He realizes that, one alone cannot do anything against the government. The realization from “I hate Big Brother” to “I Love Big Brother” is a complete brainwashed phenomenon.

I recommend this book to be read by everyone. This book is truly a masterpiece and covers the post war details of the country Oceania in greater details. Though it’s a fiction, but, nobody will come to a conclusion that this novel is purely fictional tale oriented!! The 3 sentences from the novel will be reverberated in your head even after finished reading it. “WAR IS PEACE, FREEDOM IS SLAVERY AND IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH”!!

My Rating:

5/5

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