Book Review: The Night Diary By Veera Hiranandani

 

Have you read The Diary of Anne Frank? Did you like it? If you did then I would recommend you to read The Night Diary by Veera Hirandani. An young Adult historical fiction which has won Newbery Honor in 2019.

Some of my favorite lines from the book:

👉“Everyone knows who is Muslim, Hindu, or Sikh by the clothes they wear or the names they have. But we all have lived together in this town for so long, I just never thought much about people’s religions before.”

👉The British people are going to free India  but there is a talk of India being separated into two countries where Muslim have to go one place and the Hindus  the Sikh and everybody else have to go to another place. I told him that sounded insane why would India suddenly become 2 countries?

👉You don’t underdstand .You could be killed ! you cant change people’s mind s now.Its the only way to protect yourself. When we leave for the New India,things will be better. I hope"

👉Pakistan is for Muslims and everybody else will go to India, which isnt here anymore.  I wonder if any Hindus were staying  anyways. Papa says its not safe and the fighting will probably get worse. Papa says it was a group decision between Lord Mountbatten for thebritish , Jinaah for Muslims and Nehru for everyone else,They all agreed to the partition. 

Nisha , who is  twelve years old  writes a  diary dedicated to her mom, who died while giving birth . Nisha’s father is a doctor and works for a hospital in Mirkhaspur. Nisha lives with her grandmother, Kazi the cook, her brother Amil  and father.

Though Nisha was  Hindu but Nisha’s mom was muslim.  This novel has been written as documents/ recordinsgs. It recounts  India’s independence and the horror of Partition through Nisha’s  recordings.

At times this book  just gave me shiver on how much people had to struggle to be in the country they want to live.

As per Nehru, Jinnah and MountBatten, Muslims must move to Pakistan, while Hindu  Sikh Christian, Jain, Parsis should move to New India. 14 million people crossed the border  and atlest 1 million died.  Partition was one of the largest Mass movement in the history. The book is loosely based fiction..so when you read remember  there are things which are true and happened  to the author's father''s side.. The locality she lived everyone stayed united until the killing started.  It was beautifully expressed how Muslim and Hindu friends saved each other life in the misdt of all the chaos, staying together.

On 15 Aug 1947, Nisha and her family had to leave  Mirpur Khas which became part of Pakistan… Millions of people started walking  leaving everything behind, to enter New India as refugee without food and water .

From a child's point of view reading about  the partition, you can feel the innocence in every question Nisha ask to her mom in the diary. 

Highly recommended for Young adults and also Adults.

3 Short Stories You Do not want to Miss

 

Many a times I don’t feel like reading too much. Also there are times when I am burdened with household chores and do not get time even to  touch a book.  So  a quick read  is what I generally do. While having my morning cup of tea or even before going to bed, I generally prefer reading such books. It makes me feel satisfied / accomplished, and I donot feel guilty of not touching a book.  A well told tale with a fine beginning, middle and a good ending is what I look for. Few days back I read some short stories, which I thought to share with you all in case you just want to relax and enjoy a good book.

Also  there  are many booklovers who don’t get much time  to read novels because of jobs or school college and henceforth even though they want to , so why not pick these short stories  and keep yourself into reading habits rather than detaching yourself from books?So here are my recommendations -3  quick reads to you all .Each one has different emotions which you will be drowned while reading, and I am sure you will enjoy these three books. 

Things my Son needs to know about the world by Frederick Backman 

One of my  favorite

 The author pens down his thoughts to his son about how it was to become a father for the first time .Lets read it as how it is to become a parent for the first time. This book is so hilariously relatable that I am sure new parents out there will definitely have a grin on their face after reading this chat-pata 30 min read. From first day’s memorable dark poop in the hospital ( calls it as an evil poop ) to Google search on a problem, don’t we parents  all  go through such crazy stuff?.  Humorously written yet touched every bit of life's aspect which we all want to pass on to our next generation, a must read to new father and mother’s out there.

Favorite Quotes: ( wish I could share all of them)

👉“Having kids is in many ways like trying to drive a bulldozer through a china shop. With broken legs. Wearing a back-to-front ski mask. While drunk.”

👉“Remember, a good friend helps you move, but a great friend helps you move a dead body.”

👉"I know that in a year or two, you’ll learn how to talk, and after that you’ll pretty quickly enter that phase where, regardless of what I say, you’ll always ask “Why?” Well, I can help you out right now by telling you that in 95 percent of the cases, the answer to “Why?” will be “Because people are really bloody stupid.”

Winter by Alice Oseman –

How do siblings support each other when parents and relatives become judgemental? This book talks about mental health on eating disorder. Charlie ( teenager) returns from hospital before Christmas and faces his family and relatives questioning him about his disorder and also his relationship with Nick (cute couple and super supportive).  Don’t we all face those relatives or parental pressure?  Charlie too did. His siblings  Oliver and Tori gave him the best  emotional support one can imagine. An emotional Christmassy quick read which will melt your heart.

 

  A Deal of a lifetime and other stories:

 Collection of short stories ,with thought provoking  beautiful lines which I definitely would re read. Though the story was cold and focuses mostly  on death ,  oldage,   memories ,letting things go,  fear and love   it also talks about depression. An  impactful read, and I am sure at some point of time you would too, have tears in your eyes because the author have beautifully caprtured emotions. The story which touched my heart the most was the little girl with cancer  and  a short story of oldage.  It definetly gives me goosebumps thinking how  at some point of my life when I will be growing old , I will be loosing my memories and ideas.I will be loosing time and missing people around me. Such a wonderful read!

Some thought provoking Quotes from the book:

👉Human's are strange breed  in a way our fear  of getting old seems to be even greater than our fear of dying.

👉The only thing of value on eath is time. One second will always be a second , there is no negotiating with that.

👉“Happy people don’t create anything, their world is one without art and music and skyscrapers, without discoveries and innovations. All leaders, all of your heroes, they’ve been obsessed. Happy people don’t get obsessed, they don’t devote their lives to curing illnesses or making planes take off. The happy leave nothing behind. They live for the sake of living, they’re only on earth as consumers. Not me.”

I hope you will enjoy these as much as I did.   Short stories are like having an extramaritial affair while reading  a novel is getting tied up in marriage. As Neil Gaiman says

"Short stories are tiny windows into other worlds and other minds and other dreams. They are journeys you can make to the far side of the universe and still be back in time for dinner.”

Keep reading and  follow my instagram page @thegirlwithkindle for updates.

Bookreview: Home Before Dark By Riley Sager

 

I have become Riley Sager’s fan now, and I cannot wait to read the other three books which also became best seller. The final girls, the last time I lied and lock every door.

If you are a horror thriller lover like me, do give this one a try ( read alone in the dark), I am sure you will love it too. At some point of reading this, I felt this was somewhat close to Amityville Horror, Haunting of the hill house and some movies which includes Netflix original type writer by Sujoy Ghosh. Reading it at night the  story literally spooked me out  with its haunted description.

“Every house has a story to tell and a secret to share. Ours is a ghost story. It is also a lie, and now that yet another person has died within these walls, it’s finally time to tell the truth.”

Home before Dark by Riley Sager

  This book kept my spine straight from the beginning till the end!   With few characters and incredible twist Home before dark just won my heart with its horror/ thriller essence. Does it have ghost in yet ? Yes a lot? If you are going through reading slump I am sure this book will help you to come out of it.  

The entire story revolves around the Victorian estate Baneberry with dark secrets .Though it seems the house is lifeless and gloomy but the walls got a lot of stories to share.

Families have come and lived in this house for decades and the walls have remembers every event which took place and it never forgotten its incidents.

Twenty Five years  ago Maggie Holt ,who was just 5 years old then , came to live in the baneberry house with her parents Jess and Ewan. Just a few weeks of stay and one night they fled away from the house, claiming it to be haunted.  Ewan ( father) who was a nonfiction writer, wrote a book about the House of horror, there ghastly experience and what the little girl went through. The book became the best seller. Everything which he wrote in the book was claimed to be true. Maggie, didn’t believe the book. She felt the book was  fiction and there was nothing called ghost  and the claims were completely fake.

Before her father died she wanted to know the truth. The truth that there was no ghost and everything written was just for fame or may be something her parents are hiding from her. But unfortunately she didn’t get the satisfying answer and there she goes herself to find the truth.

The plot has been written from 2 point of view. The story from the book and the current story of Maggie holt facing the situation.’ The style of writing by Riley Sager was very creative weaving the story so beautifully matching  the past and the present situation together. What I didn’t know was coming to me was the twist.  Yes. I didn’t expect the twist. It’s different from all the horrors I have been reading all these years.

Over all, a 400 page book will not make you bore and fly you through the pages for the answer, did little  Maggie actually see ghost while living in Braneberry estate?

  Rating 4.5/5

Buy the Book 

Book Review: The First to Lie by Hank Phillipi Ryan

Date of Publish: 4 August 2020

Publisher: Forge Books

A drug company comes up with a " miracle drug "  which is a fertility drug  where a women who is unable to have a child can conceive easily.

The dark side effect of this medicine can ruin a women's life but this has not been mentioned by the company nor does the doctors talks about it to their  patient. And there are many who actually had side effect and there life has been ruined.

The charecters now wants to destroy Pharminex  ( the company)

The plot is this simple !

This little plot get twisted till your brain burst ! With four point of views and charecters having double life made it hard for me to keep track at times. s I was writing down the charecters to remember their goals, but then the plot had so much twist  and lies that it made me clueless at times, Though there were times were it was so predictable yet the charecter didnt understand whats going on . I wish it was more clear in terms of writing to enjoy the bumpy ride. 

If you have the ability to take this roller coster ride with charecters and their secrets go ahead I dare you.

Rating 3/5

Thank You Netgalley and Forge Books for the ARC.