The Twelfth Imam by Joel C. Rosenberg (Book Review-4.25/5)!!!

       

   Well, you can't help complimenting the week in which you get to read too many novels and actually when you get to read two heart-thrilling novels within two days of time without any disturbance and interruptions. It's a rare occasion in my life that I read a book that's almost 500 pages but when the book is about something that you always wanted to know or of the genre that you always wanted to read, it takes no time for you to go through all the pages in the least time possible. Yesterday I read Bankerupt by Ravi Subramanian that totally surprised me with its perfectness and today I am done with "The Twelfth Imam" by none other than the International Bestseller- "Joel C. Rosenberg". Well, the cover says "The New York Times Bestseller". It is said that a novel shouldn't be judged by its cover page but I think my view about this novel right from when I got my hands on it has not been wrong. :-) The novel is as intense as its cover page. 

Synopsis:

What if the Islamic Messiah Comes to Earth? What if The World Waits too long... and Iran Develops Nuclear Weapons? Tensions are rising in the Middle East. Irans president vows to annihilate the United States and Israel. Israels prime minister says someone must hit Irans nuclear sites before its too late. The American president warns against a preemptive strike on Irans nuclear facilities and says negotiations are the key to finding peace. And amid it all, rumors are swirling throughout the region of a mysterious religious cleric claiming to be the Islamic messiah known as the Mahdi or the Twelfth Imam. Word of his miracles, healings, signs and wonders is spreading like wildfire. CIA operative David Shirazi was born for this moment. He is recruited and sent into Tehran with one objective: use all means necessary to disrupt Irans nuclear weapons program, without leaving American fingerprints and without triggering an apocalyptic new war. But time is running out.The Twelfth Imam is the first novel in a new political thriller series by Joel C. Rosenberg, the New York Times bestselling author of the award-winning Last Jihad series. Rosenberg takes you inside a world few will ever enter, hold on to your seat - the twists and turns never stop coming.

About the Author:- 

Joel C. Rosenberg (born 1967) is an American communications strategist, author of the Last Jihad series, and founder of The Joshua Fund.[3] An Evangelical Christian, he has written five novels about terrorism and how he says it relates to Bible Prophecy, including Gold Medallion Book Award winner The Ezekiel Option,[4] along with two nonfiction books, Epicenter and Inside the Revolution, on the alleged resemblance of biblical prophecies and current events. He and his wife, Lynn, have four sons and reside near Washington, D.C.

     

     The book gives you enough goosebumps to understand why it has been written with such deep research and articulating it with current conditions of the countries it has talked about. Though the book is fictitious but somewhere its the truth in which we are living today. I am quite guilty when I say that I can't review all the things that I have read in 500 pages but I shall give you an overview of my feelings after reading this book. There are very less book that are written on terrorism which really enthralls you and fortunately, this is one of them. Actually, this is more than that. It is a book which can be like an autobiography for many living in the countries that are always at radar of the super-power countries. The communal mentality that has rotten everyone's soul is discussed terrifically in this book. Some incidents can make girls vomit because of the high violence that it describes. :-) Powerful hearts like me will enjoy such incidents as these are the souls of this book.

           Right from the first page, the tension between the parties, communities and segments were discussed which keeps the book focused on the topic at which it is purposely written. The book is divided into parts which makes it little easy to consume otherwise it could have been little hard to understand things. Well, I appreciate the writer's initiative to mention all the characters before starting the book which makes it easy for us to refer them if we are reading the book after taking certain gaps. I must say that pick this book only if you can digest it otherwise if you are possessive about your religion, better skip it. Well, still read it because the book is lot above that. I would give this book 4.25/5.

 Thanks.

 ABHILASH RUHELA - VEERU!!!

Bankerupt by Ravi Subramanian (Book Review-Perfect Page-turner)!!!

       

  If ever I will remember the day 30th October, 2013, I would say that it has been a complete day for me. Because generally what happens is- I spend all my day only in reading a novel if its 320 pages+ because I feel that I am wasting time if I am doing some other chores. But today, I did all my routine yet completed this book which is of 320 pages. The book is so interesting that even when I read it for only 5-6 hours, I managed to complete it because I was reading as speedily as possible because of the book being a perfect page-turner. It's none other than the latest book of Mr. Ravi Subramanian- "Bankerupt" which released a month ago on 20th September, 2013. The book's tagline screams three topics "Desire. Greed. Murder". And I am happy that unlike Chetan Bhagat's Revolution 2020 where all the three subjects that has been mentioned on the cover page is been left incomplete, this novel of Mr. Subramanian takes these topics seriously in his story and gives a finishing end to all of them. Well, I would also like to bring into notice of all that the author has moved from Rupa publications to the India's biggest, Penguin with this book. 

About the Book:-

 A university is an institution for higher education and research. It can also be a place where academic brilliance leads to overinflated egos, bitter politics and finally, murder. Cirisha Narayanan, a professor at MIT Boston, who has risen meteorically, stumbles upon a cryptic message. Aditya Raisinghania, her banker husband, sets up a highly innovative financial hoax. Her profiteering father harvests Australia's largest bird, the emu in India. The US elections are on and the debate on gun control has reached a fever pitch. Set in Mumbai, Coimbatore and Boston, Ravi Subramanian creates an impeccably researched world where everyone has a motive to kill. Nothing is as it seems in this cunningly vicious thriller where the plot turns on a dime.

About the Author:-

Ravi Subramanian an alumnus of IIM Bangalore, has spent two decades working his way up the ladder of power in the amazingly exciting and adrenaline-pumping world of global banks in India. It is but natural that his stories are set against the backdrop of the financial services industry. He lives in Mumbai with his wife Dharini and daughter Anusha. In 2008, he won the Golden Quill Readers Choice award for his debut novel, If God was a Banker. 

         

 Coming to the author, I would like to tell that I have only read his second last release before this i.e. Bankster. It was of 364 pages and I loved that tale too. It had many characters while this book manages to treat character better than Bankster. Even though few characters keep on coming unexpectedly in between but still you manage to remember who they were as the plot isn't much confusing. But the narration and writing style of the author is something that makes it easy for us to read the book in one go even when its quite long. The kind of name the author has, he can use difficult words from his great vocabulary and show how excellent he is in the language but still he keeps his language easy-going which makes it possible to keep us interested in it. For the whole period of time, I wanted the book to finish and the moment it finished, I wanted to read from the author on the same story itself. Haha!

           While reading the book, at many places I wanted the video of the story to be with me so that I can fast-forward the CD and see what's going to happen after 5 minutes from the scene because I lost my patience at many places to know as to what exactly happened after this particular incident. :-) There are many scenarios which can give you goosebumps, heart-attack, panic-attack and I don't know what-what. This has been my first such experience where I found a book so interesting even when its written on an off-topic. Amazing! The great thing about the book is that even after the death of many characters one after another, story still keeps them alive and it seems as if they are not dead in the book still as they play the equivalent part in the story. As the whole story is written in chain with all the chapters connected to the previous ones, I can't share my favorite parts as it might act as spoilers. But I must say that a movie can't handle the kind of long and perfect story this is, a series like "24" should be made on this book and it should continue for a quarter of year. Wow! 

             You can not believe while reading that how a parallel scam of Aditya gets into the way of his wife who is into a different country all together. The Dharawi of Mumbai is connected to the Boston which is connected to gun laws which is again associated with Coimbatore. I was like "How can Mr. Ravi Subramanian create such a plot and that too in such a short period of time while other authors take 2-3 years to come up with something like this!" The research work of the author is completely visible and also his knowledge in miscellaneous fields is evidently pellucid. The certain investigation that keeps on taking place and the kind of facts that keeps on coming out thrills out almost every astonishment you have in you as a reader. The very first WOW moment for me in the book was when Cirisha sees the tag of Snuggles in Dharawi. And since then, the book has over-served me. :-) If someone from Wall Street Journal can call him "The John Grisham of banking", I, as a small portal can undoubtedly call Mr. Ravi Subramanian, "The Abbas-Mustan of Banking Thrillers". Please don't miss it if you have been excited for reading books that keeps on giving you surprises on every alternate page. :-) Looking forward to reading all the previous works of The Ravi Subramanian because missing them is as foolish as choosing Pizza over Chchole-batoore. :-)

 Thanks.

 ABHILASH RUHELA - VEERU!!!

Chapter Eleven by Amit Shankar (Book Review- 4 out of 5)!!!

       

 The second last book that I read and reviewed recently was Amit Shankar's Love is Vodka. I quite liked it and I knew that he is one of the writers who can never disappoint me with the plot of his story. I also liked his writing style. Just after posting his reviews, I got to know a comment that he made for Book Reviewers where he said after the 4 lines of jingle, "Can't write to save your life? Become a Book Reviewer." This shows the disrespect and its evident that the author sees Book reviewer as an inferior class against his position of being an author. Well this is a harsh truth for some of the book reviewers but being an author, he should respect Book Reviewers because the 60% of visibility and popularity that such not-so-popular authors get is because of the book reviewers. My only request to him is that now he's an Author and he should think 100 times before saying or posting something in public. He has to be responsible, no matter what!

          Well, now coming to his 2nd work that I have read out of three that he has written, "Chapter 11" which also has the tagline "Kissa Corporate Bankruptcy Ka". The 353-pages story is published by his home publisher- Vitasta. As I showed my doubt regarding the publisher last time if it's good or not, after reading these 2 books of Amit Shankar, I am sure that they are one of the capable publishers in our literary world. The cover page of this novel is yet made exactly according to how story is. The whole process of how Amit Shankar takes the story ahead is what I like about him. There's a certain confidence that can be made out through the narration skill he has. He knows that every sentence that he is writing is required in the story and he makes it sure that he isn't over-exaggerating anything. A wonderful writer to be followed in future. :-) 

SYNOPSIS:-

Feeling suffocated within the confines of Udaipur, his past and inconsequential job, Virendra Vikram Singh aspires to be a part ofan MNC. However, with dreams having a nasty habit of going haywire, the day he joins his dream company, it files for Chapter Eleven bankruptcy. First of its kind, Chapter Eleven is a bold and honest portrayal of corporate sleaze, dejection, love and self-discovery.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:-

His debut novel Flight of the Hilsa was received exceptionally well by the readers and critics alike. No wonder, in no time it went on to become a national best-seller. Amit Shankar, an advertising professional, has worked with some of the biggest advertising agencies, spearheading the communication for global brands. As a Copywriter and Creative Director, he has bagged some of the biggest advertising awards.

             As I have already said that there's a certain confidence in author that makes him write a story that he himself has faith on and makes readers feel that they are reading something that comes once in a time. I am fan of his narration now. I also loved a new thing that I found about him- the great sense of humor that plays a big part in this book. If you take away the humor from this funny book, there's nothing much left to be read. And that's the USP of Chapter Eleven. Whenever a book is based on Corporate life, there comes a feeling that it might bore us but there are very few books that stands out differently, this is one among them. The protagonist VVS is someone whom I would love to see again in the sequel to this novel or in some other work. His background, his current scenario and his dreams, all are managed so properly that you can actually imagine VVS accurately. :-)

            The starting of the book is itself interesting as it shows how VVS gets his dream job and after joining the office, his wide expressions after seeing all the corporate arrangements is a wonderful thing to read. Then the moment he enters the company, company gets into a situation where they start throwing employees out of the organization, his fear from then onward is what the whole book is all about. His equation with his wife is depicted nicely. His religion- Rajput is shown in a good light with humorous touch- this is something for which I should accolade the author. Then the relation of VVS with Ambica is also narrated beautifully because I thought that it would be too sensuous to handle but author kept it very light and real. Though something related to Ambica became quite obvious at a point of time hence the story became predictable for me since then. It is only then that I got disappointed. Else, the book is a wonderful book in this section of Popular Fiction and I would recommend it to all. I give it 4 out of 5.

 Thanks.

 ABHILASH RUHELA - VEERU!!!