84,CHARING CROSS ROAD

What do I say about this book!!!?I read it in a few hours yesterday and found it to be utterly charming.
I am so happy to have found a book which talks about the love of books.

84,Charing Cross Road is written in epistolary format.The only other book I have read so far in this format is Bram Stoker's 'Dracula' and while that was macabre and somber ,this turned out to be absolutely endearing.It is just a series of letters spanned over twenty years written by Helene Hanff and posted to 84, Charing Cross Road in London to a lovely little book store Marks and Co.The letters are replied to by Frank Doel,chief buyer of Marks and Co.Hanff, is in search of obscure classics and British literature titles she had been unable to find in New York and therefore orders them from this antiquated book store in London and a lovely friendship develops between her and Frank Doel and all the other people working at Marks and Co.Helene also sends Christmas packages,birthday gifts and food parcels along with the letters and her kindness and thoughtfulness are appreciated by everyone especially at a time when there is a food shortage in London post world war 2.

I loved the way Hanff talks about books.She says ,she does not buy a book she has not already read and she refuses to read fiction which according to her "is a book about something that didn't happen to someone who doesn't exist".I found that very different to the way I read or choose my books,but then I am not Helene, so I let it pass.

Frank Doel is very proper in his replies to the letters,in the manner of the English but he just warms up to Helene over the course of many years.

There are so many lovely bits I liked about this book.Like the way she talks about books, as if they are living things.When she writes back to say a book has arrived she says "The book arrived safely, the Stevenson is so fine it embarrasses my orange-crate bookshelves, I'm almost afraid to handle such soft vellum and heavy cream coloured pages. Being used to the dead-white paper and stiff cardboardy covers of American books, I never knew a book could be such a joy to the touch."

Also "I love inscriptions on flyleaves and notes in margins, I like the comradely sense of turning pages someone else turned, and reading passages someone long gone has called my attention to."That echoes my thoughts exactly.

I loved Helene's feisty spirit and her passion for reading.The book describes how two people from different sides of the Atlantic Ocean can bond over letters and forge a friendship for a lifetime.I was curious up to the end and wanted to know if Helene finally makes it to London to visit the bookstore but the novel ends without telling us that.

However the good news is...Ive got a kind of Omnibus in which there is another book THE DUCHESS OF BLOOMSBURY STREET,which I am yet to read in which Helene does visit the bookstore.I am looking forward to reading it and finding out about her visit soon.

I wonder if the movie is as good.Hope to get a chance to watch it soon.

THE BOOK THIEF

I just finished reading this book and I m writing this review immediately .I got about reading this one as I had heard a lot being said about it and i m so glad that all of it was absolutely true.I loved the book.

This book tells us the story of Liesel a little girl and her life.The backdrop is the holocaust 1939-1942 in Nazi Germany and the narrator of the story is 'Death'.I found this a little strange in the beginning but I was pleasantly surprised to see the story so beautifully told,sometimes even with a sense of humor.

It tells us how Liesel comes to live with foster parents Hans and Rosa Hubermann as her mother cannot afford her upbringing anymore.On the way to the Hubermanns ,her only brother dies in the train.Liesel sees death at close quarters right from the start and the story progresses with her stealing a book,the first of many.She does so,just as a reminder of her brother,as she cannot read.

Liesel's life soon changes as she arrives at the Hubermanns.Hans ,her foster father is very kind right from the beginning and Rosa too has a hard exterior but a big soft heart.She has to deal with change,abandonment by her mother and death at the tender age of nine.She is put in a lower grade in school as she cannot read and that is when Hans Hubermann,her foster father starts teaching her how to.Liesel soon develops a passion for books and reading.However this is Nazi Germany and the Hubermanns are not rich enough to buy books.So Liesel ,gets books by the only way she knows to,by stealing them.

As the story progresses,it tells us about her love for words,how they comfort her,how she loves them and how they save her.It tells us about her life on 33,Himmel Street.Her bond with her foster parents.Her friendship with the boy next door,Rudy.Her connections with the many people that constitute her life and how her life changes irrevocably when her parents decide to hide a jew in their basement.

Liesel helps Max Vandenburg ,a jew, and the power of words creates unbreakable bonds between them.It tells us how a little girl of nine fails to understand why jews are treated differently.Why she has to say Heil Hitler everytime.It is a heart-wrenching story.Everytime I read about the holocaust,I cannot help but say a silent prayer for the times we now live in.That our lives are only ours to live.I cannot even begin to imagine the plight of the jews.

I could not read all of it at a stretch but it still managed to touch the right chords in my heart.In the few days,I took to read this book,I think I actually lived Liesel's story.

There are a very few books,which change your perspective on life.They make you a different person.They compel you to think.The Book Thief,is one such story.I highly recommend it.

THE DUCHESS OF BLOOMSBURY STREET

Most often,it so happens,that I let a book choose me,instead of the other way round.After reading 84,Charing Cross Road,I did not immediately want to pick up the sequel.So I decided to pick up another random book to read.However ,after a couple of days,my attention wavered and I gave up on it.The same thing kept repeating itself with all the other books I picked thereafter and it reached to a point when I felt I was just not interested in reading anymore!That was when I panicked and resolved to find something to read  immediately .Incidentally my attention shifted to the copy of The duchess of Bloomsbury Street lying on the table and as fate would have it,I picked up the book and put it down only after having read it.

Needless to say,It is a charming little book.Something very different from what I have read so far.It is the sequel to 84,Charing Cross road and tells us about Helen's visit to London.I savored every little detail and felt I was right there with Helen!I loved her attitude towards travel in another country.I loved the way she made the most of her stay in London and how she trusted complete strangers to show her around a new country,one she had never visited before.Her free-spirited nature is truly admirable and she truly made the best of her stay in a foreign country.

This book fascinated me and held me captive.I loved to read about the different characters she meets,the places she visits and the food she eats.How she teaches a London bartender to make a martini 'HER' way!How she does not let anyone push her around and throws a tantrum,so that she can see the parts of oxford she wants to see.

In the end,Helen remarks on the plane "suddenly it was as if everything had vanished, Bloomsbury and Regent's park and Russel square and Rutland gate. None of it had happened, none of it was real. Even the people weren't real. It was all imagined, they were all phantoms.I could totally relate with her sentiment.I have felt the same way too.

I know I wont be doing justice to the book even after having written all this.It is just something you need to pick for yourself and discover.I am just happy to have this gem in my collection.