Book Review: Kite Runner

Title: Kite Runner
Author: Khaled Hosseini
Type: Fiction

The early part of the book is set in Afghanistan, then moves briefly to Pakistan, and then to the US. The lead character spends his early years in Afghanistan with his Dad and then leaves the country during the Russian occupation and later returns during the peak of the Taliban rule. The story revolves around this eventful journey during which the lead character, Amir, transitions from boyhood to a grown up, married man and finally a published author. Circumstances draw him back to Afghanistan, and the story then traces its way back for a US-Pak-Afghanistan-Pak-USA round trip during which he is exposed to life threatening events and deep emotional trauma.

The book appears to be (at least partly) autobiographical. The lead character in the book is referred to in first person ("I") throughout the book. In other words, the story is told in a narrative style. Some parts of the book refer to Fremont, and other parts of the SF bay area. It was nice to read references to places that I could relate to. Incidentally, the author is a physician based in the SF bay area. There are quite a few references to Hindi movies and Hindi music. The author has certainly been influenced to some extent by these films. There are scenes that can be directly adapted into hindi films! Fight scenes, sick person coughing blood yet refusing treatment, display of unusual courage despite fatal consequences, romance despite minimal interaction etc.

I hear that this book is a big success. It also happens to be author's first book. Given all the recent trouble in Afghanistan, the timing of this book could not have been better (it was published sometime in mid 2003). The book is certain to appeal to the western audience, in particular. There are plenty of references to contradictions of mullahs, muslims who drink, atrocities of the Taliban, stoning to death etc. etc.

Overall, a superbly written novel, and a most engaging read. Its only about 350 pages and not one of those long novels. I highly recommend the book especially if you like fiction that involves family drama.

I'll be curious to read the authors next book. The deeply autobiographical nature of most maiden efforts often result in powerful, poignant storylines that often lead to huge successes that are hard to replicate. Also, subsequent books often tend to suffer from high expectations created after a successful first book. In any case, an excellent first novel.

Book Review: Q and A

Title: Q and A
Author: Vikas Swarup
Fiction, story based in India.

An exciting novel! The story revolves around a quiz show (and hence the name Q&A) and the lead character, who works as a waiter in a restaurant, and who wins the quiz show prize of Rs. 1 billion. The quiz organizers suspect foul-play and have the winner arrested. The rest of the book is about how he knew the answers to each of the questions, not by foul play but by a strange series of events in his life. The answer to each question has a story behind it. The author has ingeniously weaved a whole series of stories into one. Very creative and imaginative indeed! The book is fast paced and very engaging.

The book is quite "filmy". In other words, it has a strong bollywood feel to it. Perhaps the author was considering a movie even while writing it (or maybe it began as an attempt at writing a movie script). Its a masala of sorts -- gays, match-fixing, espionage, murder, robbery, romance, suicide, filmstars, child abuse, sex, prostitution, contract killing, incest, you name it-- a comprehensive list of issues du jour are cleverly captured in the book as a part of the story.

Overall a very impressive and commendable effort for a debut novel. Most debut novels have an autobiographical side to it. But this book is the product of a hugely imaginitive mind and has little, and probably no autobiographical side to it.

The author is from the ministry of external affairs in India. Check out his interview.

Book Review: Ignited Minds

Title: Ignited Minds, Unleashing the Power within India
Author: APJ Abdul Kalam (President of India)

I had always heard about Abdul Kalam as a nuclear scientist for a long time prior to his role as President of India. It is unusual for India to not have a conventional politician as the President. Historically, the President's job is "assigned" either to a politician nearing retirement as a reward for loyalty/service, or to a potential PM aspirant (as a way of getting rid of him/her!).

Given the uniqueness of Mr. Kalam's background in comparison to his predecessors, I was curious to get an insight to the person and his thinking. On reading his book, firstly, I was happy for India on a number of counts. Mr. Kalam is certainly inspirational and comes across as someone who really cares about the country, someone who is constantly thinking about how to make a difference, someone who is down to earth and sincere, and someone who has no political leanings whatsoever. I can't think of any other country in the world where the Prime Minister and the President have such good credentials. I think it was a master stroke by Vajpayee to back a scientist for the Presidency. Lastly, a Muslim President from a BJP government is a noteworthy milestone.

This book is primarily meant to be a call to Indians (the younger generation in particular) to come together, "dream" and work towards transforming the country into a developed nation by the year 2020. The book certainly does justice to this goal. He clearly outlines five focus areas for the country to achieve this objective: agriculture and food processing, education and healthcare, IT, strategic sectors (nuclear, space, defence). He then delves into details on their inter-relationships and implications.

Its an easy read and filled with anecdotes about his visits to various part of India. A lot of it is about questions posed by the younger generation to him from various parts of the country. The book also captures his exchange with Swamijis, Sufis, CEOs, politicians, etc. Given his background as a scientist he covers historical information about the various research centers in India (VSSC, TIFR, DRDO, etc. ) .

While responding to specific questions posed to him in the book, the text does tend to wander sometimes without a formal closure to the answer. K. B Chandrasekhar of Exodus fame is mentioned in the book. "One fine morning he sold his 10-billion dollar company to start another enterprise" (As someone who lost $ from an Exodus investment I wonder where the President got his facts checked for this one!) Barring this, the book is a simple, enjoyable, inspirational read. I hope more of India's political leaders took the time to capture their thoughts and vision for the country. Its a must read for India's younger generation.

Prof. C.K Prahalad's talk at Stanford

Attended a talk by CK Prahalad yesterday at Stanford University. "Changing Lifestyles in Asian Countries: Opportunities for Entrepreneurs" presentation and discussion by:

• C.K. Prahalad, Professor, Business School, University of Michigan
• Jonathan Barker, Managing Principal, Center Street Advisors
• Moderated by Richard Dasher, Director, US-ASIA Technology Management Center

The talk was about growth in India and China and opportunities for entrepreneurs that arise from it. While Jonathan Barker focused on China, Prof. Prahalad spoke about India.

Prof. Prahalad is an interesting and extremely articulate speaker. He spewed plenty of facts, figures, quotes and statistics like most B-school Profs. Some catchy ones:

• 20M people travel by train everyday in India.
• The cell phone is more reliable than the watch to keep track of time. A whole generation of people in India and China might growing not ever owning a watch but using the cell phone instead to serve the same purpose in addition to acting as a cell phone, of course.
• Its easier to teach someone something totally new when they don't have to unlearn what they have learned.
• NGOs do very good work in India but they are never good at "scalability".
• A small town in Tamil Nadu is developing into a mostly cash less town (all transactions are done via credit card!).
  

He plugged the benefits of focusing on the "bottom of the pyramid" (which is the basis of his recent book "Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid"). According to him there is great opportunity for entrepreneurs in focusing on the bottom of the pyramid since it is a huge market. The challenge is to provide innovative products at a low cost (meaning: affordable to people in developing countries). He identified a bunch of potential sectors but given the shortage of time discussed only a couple of case studies - one from Hospitality sector and the another from Adult Education.

Hospitality: With 20M people traveling everyday in India by railways there has to be an opportunity for providing hotels at affordable prices. Most people can't afford the conventional hotels. He was a consultant for a study that resulted in the new Indione hotels. These hotels apparently provide excellent quality rooms with internet access etc at an affordable price of around Rs. 900 ($20) per day. They studied the existing hotels and optimized resources to ensure that they can achieve high quality at a low cost. For example, the average Hotel employee per room is about 2.4, but in the IndiOne it is 0.8.

Adult Education: Next he discussed the example of adult education in Tamil Nadu and Andhra. Apparently, most adult education programs require proficiency in the 3Rs (Reading, Writing and Arithmetic). This requires some 400 hours (I think this was the number he mentioned) to achieve an acceptable level of proficiency, and most adults can't and won't make the time for it. So they said, "Why bother with all three aspects, lets just focus on Reading". Then instead of following the conventional -- learn alphabets, learn words, then learn reading" approach they developed a different strategy of seeing, hearing, then learning words and finally the alphabets". All this learning involves computerized content so adults can learn at their own pace as well. TCS and NIIT have embarked on these programs and achieved great success in spreading literacy. However, the business impact of these programs were not discussed.

Audience Question: With all the opportunity being overseas and all jobs going overseas what does the future hold for the middle class here in the US? (there were other questions but this one stood out)

Jonathan Barker in response to this, said that a lot depended on leadership. The US needs to actively invest and explore new fields (like stem cell research) to continue its leadership position.

Prof. Prahalad, agreed with the challenge posed by "the 50 year old who needs to be re-trained" (Tom Friedman's book apparently refers to it too). However, he said he is not too worried about the future of industry here in the US. He compared the present to the times in 80s when manufacturing was headed overseas. The naysayers said the US was doomed, though that never happened.

Questions like this one raised by this member in the audience are very common these days. But I am yet to hear a convincing answer from any of the experts to questions such as these.

The Irony: Both case studies were very interesting and helped re-reinforce Prof. Prahalad's view that innovation and creativity can help take advantage of the large available market. Ironically both case studies were the result of efforts by large conglomerates like the Tatas. This is understandable, given that Prof. Prahalad's "core competency" lies in consulting for large corporations.

In what way does this growth in developing countries translate to opportunities for entrepreneurs?The average Joe on the street with a cool idea will still have to struggle, can't get very far and could eventually drown to the bottom of the pyramid! In theory yes there is opportunity whenever there is a large market, but in reality how can the small guy with the idea get ahead? The talk and discussion that followed didn't quite address this issue. There is no question that the Tatas and Birlas will milk the bottom of the pyramid as more cars, cell phones, TV, refridgerators etc are consumed. It would have been far more helpful had there been some specific examples from one of these developing countries, of up and coming new companies/products that have combined innovation, smart business and bottom up growth to achieve success of a significant scale despite stiff competition from the big guys.

Book Review: Maximum City

Author: Suketu Mehta
Non-fiction, based on the City of Bombay (Mumbai).

The author does a terrific job of identifying a whole bunch of characters based in Mumbai and explores each one of them in great detail, through a series of anecdotes and very deep personal interactions. The amount of time and research spent in this book is truly fascinating. Its a wonderful expression of the author's journalistic talents. To give you an idea, here is a gist of the kind of individuals and their psyche that he has tried to explore: Monolisa, the bar dancer;Babbanji, the teenager poet from Bihar; Bal Thackeray ("a cross between Saddam and Pat Buchanan"), the Shiv Sena supremo; Seventhibhai and family, who give up wordly life; Besides there are others from the underworld ranging from small time killers to top Dons (Chotta Shakeel), Ajay Lal, the ACP (cop), Bollywood folks like Vidhu Vinod Chopra, Mahesh Bhatt, Sanjay Dutt etc.

The author has a nice easy style of writing that makes the book easy to read. He certainly has a great sense of humor as is in display in the early part of the book in particular. The sections which talk about the use of the word "bhenchod" (its various flavors and connotations) is truly hilarious. For instance he describes the mood when India when it tested the nuclear bomb with a simple "We have shown the world, bhenchod".

The only real issue I had about the book was its length. I thought it was a little too long. Personally, I find a 500+ page book a little daunting. I completed most of it on a plane journey. At least for me, on a regular day, its hard to find such uninterrupted time to read such a lengthy piece of work.

If you lived or live in Bombay (Mumbai), have an interest in Indian politics, have wondered about the Bollywood connections with the underworld, or simply care to know more about Mumbai -- how it has transformed over the years, its people and its challenges, this book is a "must read".

There is an interview with the author on NPR which I found very interesting as well.

Book Review: The Lovely Bones

Read the book (fiction) The Lovely Bones, By Alice Sebold.

The story is about is fourteen year old girl who gets raped and killed by a weirdo in the neighborhood. The book focuses on how the parents and others deal with this loss over time. Interestingly, the little girl goes to heaven and gets to see and participate in this process. Great idea and hats of to the author for the wonderful writing style and creativity. The story and writing is truly engaging and depicts the grief and sorrow that the family has to deal with in great detail. Unfortunately, I found that there was very little beyond this! I was hoping that something would come out of the crime and waited the entire book but nothing came about. The story is certainly very moving, but I found myself disappointed overall, because the entire book was pretty much an emotional trip and nothing else. If you are the deeply emotional type, you'll love this book.

My First Online Book Reading Experience

Book Title : We the Media

Author: Dan Gillmor

I am delighted that I actually managed to read this book entirely online in little over a week. The book is about the new internet phenomenon "blogs". The author Dan Gillmor is well know, particularly in the bay area (and on the Internet!) through his articles in the San Jose Mercury News. After reading a recent book by another journalist, I must admit I am a little biased against "journalists turned first time book authors". As journalists, they know what is hot, and they are well connected in the publishing industry. Besides, they are fairly visible, atleast sufficiently enough to promote the book and ensure a worthwhile business proposition for the publisher. It is to a large extent, like the first mover advantage in the dotcom days. All you needed was a new feature and plenty of buzz and you (possibly!) along with a bunch of investors could make a fast buck! In the publishing world, this means a book high on hype, but low on substance, churned out in record time.

To my pleasant surprise Dan Gillmor's book was different. Firstly, its admirable that a journalist has written a book about a new and emerging technology phenomenon. The author has taken pains to research the latest developments in this area and appears to be completely plugged into this in the course of his daily activities, automatically making him an expert of sorts in this area. Besides, the author has done a really nice job of analyzing his thoughts, impressions, and findings and explored the various challenges and implications of this new phenomenon. Overall, it was very interesting and engaging (partly because I am so excited by blogs myself), and this certainly contributed to my completing the book in such a short time.

Given that this is my first cover to cover (or rather web page to web page!) online book reading experience, here are some thoughts that come to mind from my reading experience.

• 
  
  Online Book Reading is Faster: The online version of this book was available as separate PDF files, ie., one PDF for each chapter. This gave me a good sense for where I was in the book at every stage. Besides, I never felt comfortable stopping midway in a chapter. Instead I made sure that whenever I stopped it was after completing a chapter. In fact, I was averaging about 1-2 chapters a day. In short, I believe I read this book much faster than I would have read a hard copy.

• 
  
  No Distractions: The PDF files itself appear to be identical to the final print version. In other words, if you disregard the space allocated for binding, what you see online is plain text restricted right to the center of your browser with lots of empty white space on both sides (the print version needs this to account for the binding). In other words, with no distraction from the main text its very easy to remain focused unlike reading an online newspaper, for instance, where there are so many distracting ads, links to other articles, blurbs etc.

• 
  
  External Links: This book had so many references to other websites, blogs etc that I was tempted frequently to wander away. The PDF file did not however provide links to these sites which would have made it very convenient. On the other hand, I am glad the links weren't provided, because I am sure that would have proved be a huge distraction. I found myself visiting a laundry list of sites after completing each chapter. It would have been useful to list these at the end of each chapter.

• 
  
  Missed the ability to highlight text: When I read books, especially non-fiction, I love to underline/highlight text that I find useful or interesting. This helps me come back to it at a later stage and regain my thoughts that occurred to me when I first read the text. Unfortunately, this was not possible in the online version.

• 
  
  Strain on the eyes: Staring at a computer screen for several hours (which most people in the Bay area especially do these days anyway) has its challenges as everyone is aware. Interestingly, I didn't quite feel the strain because I read the book at a steady pace of one or two chapters a day.

• 
  
  Impact on book sales: As a published author myself, I have often wondered about the impact of providing books online on the actual sale of the book. I am convinced that by and large it will help in the sale of the book. In my case, I don't think I will buy the book (I might choose to buy a used copy or a paper back version if it ever comes out), but I have mentioned this book to so many people, who might otherwise not have known about it. So in the final analysis, I believe that providing the entire book online will only help the sale of the book and won't necessarily hurt it. Its akin to distributing free copies and should be considered as "marketing" for the book.

• 
  
  Makes piracy easier: Just as there is rampant software piracy in many part of the world, making a book available online makes is so much easier to copy and distribute these books. Unfortunately, this only makes it easier for those who indulge in such unlawful practices. The reality is that in the final analysis I don't believe this will negatively impact the book sales. These were sales of pirated copies anyway and will remain so. Given that we don't have a solution to prevent piracy in general, I guess its of little use to worry about this issue.

• 
  
  Online versions of book likely to increase: I am fairly confident that a day will come in the not too distant future where all published books are available for those to prefer to read it online, irrespective of whether they are free of charge or for a price. There might be interesting technologies and creative business models that add variations to how published books are made available online. But I strongly believe that this is an emerging trend that is here to stay. Besides, the whole concept of Creative Commons Licensing (which Dan Gillmor's book is licensed under), there could be a great ripple effect in terms of creative work inspired from writings available through this form of licensing.

In summary, its great that thanks to the Internet, its possible to read a book entirely online. I had always thought about it, but never really gone through the actual experience of reading a book online. I am glad I did, and happy that I actually liked the first book I read online. This article was not necessarily meant to be review of the book, though I feel the author has done a fine job of capturing this new phenomenon of blogs (the concept of grassroots journalism and the citizen journalist is really powerful and cool!), where the there are so many unknowns as the technology and usage matures.

Relevant links you might want to check out:

• Stanford Law school Prof, Lawrence Lessig's website (the spirit behind Creative Commons Licensing)


• Website directory from this book


• Chapter 8 of this book (a great insight into the latest and greatest)


• Sun exec Jonathan Schwartz's blog


• Microsoft's official blogger


• Back to Iraq (the story of how several unknown people contributed $ to sponsor a guys's travel to Iraq to cover the recent Iraq war)

Book Review: The IIT-ians

Book: The IIT-ians -- The Story of a Remarkable Indian Institution and How its Alumni are Reshaping the World

Author: Sandipan Deb

I loved my days at IIT and care deeply about my alma mater, IIT Kharagpur. So the first book on IITs, authored by a fellow KGP-graduate, was automatically of great interest to me. The book has over 350+ pages and thirty-four chapters. Many of the anecdotes described in the book, and the hearsay (of which there are plenty in the book) are largely based in IIT Kharagpur. If you are an IIT Kharagpur gradute from the early to mid 80s and are in the mood for some serious nostalgia this book is a safe bet. Of the thirty-four chapters in the book, I found the one covering the author’s long car ride with Desh Deshpande and Prof Subra Suresh the most interesting. Towards the end of the book, the author offers some valuable recommendations for improving the IITs and highlights the competition from China --both of which are useful for policy makers and influencers (like the alumni) alike. There is no doubt that the IITs are one of India's great achievements, and I want to commend the author for being the first person to publish a book on IITs.


The book offers a perfect "nostalgia trip" for those interested in one. At the same time, the book also has several shortcomings. There is constant ranting and raving about IIT and how great IIT-ians are throughout the book. While this might be acceptable to the reader who is an IIT graduate (though personally, I thought it was a huge overkill), I am not convinced about the non-IITian. I suspect that most would give up quite early on in the process of reading this book.


Given the authors background, the book definitely has a strong journalistic style, that is, reporting style to it. The book is full of "he said so, she said so". In fact, a handful of individuals have been quoted endlessly throughout the book. One chapter is completely dedicated to a bilious outpouring by one alumni! There are others which capture long emails from friends of the author.


The author, despite being married to an IIT woman seems to have done little research to find out if there are any woman IIT-ians who have become hugely successful. Instead, he chose an easy option and described his meeting with a woman friend from IIT KGP and wrote a chapter about it. After 50 years of IITs, so much for the woman IIT-ian's perspective. (No offense to the woman IIT-ian mentioned, who I understand was very popular in her times at KGP). It would have been a lot more purposeful had the author done the required research to identify a woman IIT-ian who has had significant success in her career.


"If I had another chance I would spend a lot less time in class," the second topper from 1986 batch IIT Delhi apparently said. "I learnt very little in class," said another. Throughout the book, there is an obvious glorification of not focusing on academics, and of this being portrayed as cool. This sends a completely wrong message to new entrants to the IIT system. Besides, there is a "Profs suck, while students are smart" message throughout the book. My personal view is that some Profs were good while some were mediocre. This is common in most institutions. A detailed discussion with one or more IIT grads who are currently successful Profs to gather their insights on this topic and what can be done to improve the system, would have been far more helpful than repeated criticism of IIT faculty, their motivations in clamping down on students, and so on.


"A lot of people just copied in the exams and got through." This quote attributed to Purnendu Chatterjee (PC) was outright insulting. Firstly, I am surprised that PC even said this. Besides, even if he did, I am surprised that the author did not exercise some editorial restraint and refrain from mentioning this, because it is insulting to thousands of IIT-ians the world over and it is simply untrue.

Finally, the author says he was approached by the publisher and agreed to write the book primarily because he was an IIT-ian and he writes for a living. With the hype about IITs catching on, especially with the CBS show, articles in the media, etc. perhaps the publisher thought that this was a good time to grab the infamous "first mover" advantage of the dotcom days. Unfortunately, the result is a book trying to ride on the hype, with a generous mix of nostalgia that will appeal to die-hard IIT-ians, but still falling short in effectively showcasing India’s best technical institution.