Here are some pocket reviews of a few other books I’ve read in the past few months:
Shantaram: Of all the books I’ve read this year, Gregory David Roberts’ Shantaram stands out far above the others, and as I read it a few months ago, I’m shocked to notice that I haven’t mentioned it before. A truly remarkable book in all regards, it is a semi-autobiographical novel of Lin, a young Australian convict and former drug addict who flees to India and is forced to build a new life in Bombay. Starting in the slums, and rising through the criminal underworld, Lin is a character of extraordinary depth, and Roberts is a writer with extraordinary insight and pathos. Almost all of the characters are unforgettable, and the detailed description of the motivation and sensation of heroin abuse about 80% of the way through the novel is among the most harrowing pieces of writing I’ve ever read. Highly recommended.
The New Testament: A Historical Introduction to the Early Christian Writings: I’ve read a few of Bart Ehrman’s popular nonfiction books in the past, and decided to try and gain a deeper knowledge of the early evolution of Christianity by reading through his introductory textbook on the early Christian writings. If you’re interested in the subject, this is an excellent book to read through. The writing is clear and engaging throughout despite its textbook nature. Reading this wouldn’t be everybody’s cup of tea, but I found it to be both entertaining and eye opening.
Crucial Conversations: Tools for Talking when Stakes are High: Business / Life-Skills books like this are really hit and miss, and the vast majority really don’t have much more to say than to find 200 pages of ways to re-state the book’s title. Fortunately, this book rises above that level. It is a quick read, and although there are few meaningless flow charts in it, I generally found it enjoyable and worthwhile. The conversation tools presented are well thought out and elucidated, and it’s clear that the authors spent a lot of time thinking about the essence of making an effective conversation and thinking about how to present their thoughts. Not an absolute must read, but absolutely worthwhile for some food for thought.
Great Expectations: I’ve loaded a few more Dickens novels onto my Kindle lately, and by chance the first of these that I happened to open was Great Expectations. Great Expectations is one of his more famous novels, although critical opinions of it greatly vary. Personally, I found it to be decent, but inferior to some of the other Dickens novels I’ve read, such as A Tale of Two Cities. For whatever reason, I just didn’t find Pip to be a very engaging protagonist. So often he was too dense to understand what was plain in front of him, and similarly too many of the other characters failed to gain my sympathy. Still, this is a Dickens novel and even a mediocre novel of his is better than most other novels out there. Like his other novels, Great Expectations features a long and deeply wound plot, but unlike his other novels that I’ve read, for much of the novel, I simply failed to care strongly about how things wound up. Decent, but not great.
