34 Bubblegums and Candies

From the book blurb

Sometimes you have to keep on chewing so that you can extract whatever you can out of it. At times, the bubble you blow bursts unexpectedly and you are left with a sticky mess. Sometimes you lick it slowly and relish it. When you greedily bite off more than you can chew or a hard boiled sugar candy slips down inadvertently, you bear the pain as it makes its way down the food pipe. At rare times, when you manage to strike just the right balance, a feeling of contentment reigns supreme. Life does not come with an instruction manual, but you can still convert it to 'Do it yourself' kit! It throws you surprises. When it trips you, you figure out that the best way to deal with it, is to just lie there and laugh, before bouncing right back.

Author

Preeti Shenoy, is among the best-selling authors in India (Source Nielsen scan) weaves magic with her words and pictures. An extremely talented and versatile individual, her Twitter bio reads:

“Best-selling Author, Artist specializing in pencil portraits, Poet, Yoga-Buff, Ex-basketball player, Blogger, Dobe-owner, Nature lover, Ted X speaker and a Mother.”

34 Bubble gums and Candies is her first. Life is What You Make it, The One You Cannot Have are among others!

What I think

To begin with, the cover page is interesting which has both bubble gums and candies. The book blurb crisply explains what can be expected from the book and the title complements the same.

The book is nicely divided into 34 chapters. Each chapter talks about author’s personal experience – Some funny and some others thought provoking. It contains author’s memories associated with her parents, children, husband, friends and neighbors.

The narrative flows with ease and it keeps the readers hooked. Some makes you nod, some laugh and some to ponder over. It is a tiny book with as less as 145pages. This is surely not a work of literature, but it connects to the readers at a very personal level.

I enjoyed chapters like “Phone Therapy” (I could not agree more), “Free Wheelie” (It was funny), “It happened One Night” (It made me laught), and “The Stranger” (It re-ensured that such people are still there).

OKAY. I was a little offended too (Kind of) when I read about CA’s in one of the chapters. I am a CA myself and, I felt weird to read that. Its not like professionals are not creative. It’s just that they are professionals too! (On a lighter note!)

I was super-happy when I finished the book. The last chapter nailed it all!

But...

The book is more like a few posts compiled together from the author’s personal blog. As an avid blogger myself, I felt like a printed copy of a few interesting blog posts. So, it feels more like a random musing than a serious book. 

Should you read it?

Having said that, the book is an assured page turner which demands a couple hours to finish the same. So, it will not bore you.

You can doubtlessly go for it!

Rating

3.5/5

Some words that stole my heart

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