Book Review of 'Being Mortal'

Book- Being Mortal; Medicine and What Matters in the End
Author- Atul Gawande
Pages- 282

Being mortal is about the struggle to cope with the constrains of our biology, with the limits set by genes and cells and flesh and bone. Medical science has given us remarkable power to push against these limits. But again and again, the damage we see in medicine when failed to acknowledge such power is finite and always will be.

There are some people who know what losing someone means. What it feels like watching a person die each day. How it stirs our soul seeing them in pain. How we want them to live normally again, without any pain, without any sufferings. There are some countries having Euthanasia in their policy wherein, slowly the person would be drifted towards death withdrawing them from the ventilator or by giving them an overdose of morphine or as per their policy guidelines.

The book, ‘Being Mortal’ comprises of stories of many lives which the author has witnessed. Although, the stories the author depicted in the book, none of them could win from the nature. Life is quite unpredictable if you think. People who never have smoked a single cigarette gets cancer while the one who is a chronic smoker lives longer. People who have never had a family history of cancer catch hold of a chronic incurable form of cancer wherein people having history of cancer in their family stays safe. People who have been an active person in youth become quadriplegic and wheel chair bound due to some kind of tumor growing inside the spine which has high mortality rate even if a surgery is performed whereas people with paralysis are slowly drifting towards well being through physical therapy. The continuum of health keeps on drifting towards both positive as well as negative side.

Ruth developed health issues. A lifetime smoker, she was diagnosed with lung cancer, she survived, and kept smoking. Three years after, she had a stroke that she never wholly recovered from. She became increasingly dependent on her husband – for transportation, for shopping, for managing the house, for everything. Then she developed a lump under her arm and a biopsy result revealed metastatic cancer and then at the age of seventy three, she died.

Jewel Douglass, suffered from ovarian cancer wherein she was operated by removing the ovaries and then followed by total hysterectomy. Just when she thought she is well into life, her cancer reappeared. The metastasized fragments of the cancer cells have developed bigger that was causing her problem. The constant bouts of pain, nausea, intestinal obstruction made her difficult to carry on her activities. She didn’t like narcotics because they made her feel drowsy and weak that’s why she was just taking Tylenol. Then after few months, Atul gets a note from Douglass’s daughter which read ‘Mom died on Friday morning. She drifted quietly to sleep and took her last breath. It was peaceful. My dad was alone by her side with the rest of us in the living room. This was such a perfect ending and in keeping with the relationship they shared.’ Thus, she ended her life which she wanted since the inception of this disease.

Sara Thomas who was just thirty four and pregnant with her first child when the doctors learned that she was going to die. It started with a cough and pain in her back. Then a chest X-ray showed that her left lung had collapsed and her chest was filled with fluid. A sample of the fluid was  drawn off with a long needle and send for testing. Instead of an infection, as everyone was suspecting, it was a lung cancer and had already spread to the lining of her chest. The oncologist broke that she had a non-small cell lung cancer that had started in her left lung. Nothing she had done had brought the disease on. More than 15% of lung cancers occur in nonsmokers. Hers was advanced, having metastasized to multiple lymph nodes in her chest and its lining. The cancer was inoperable but there was an option of chemotherapy which she was started with. But, the chemo failed and the lung cancer had spread from the left chest to the right, to the liver, to the lining of her abdomen, and to her spine. Time was running out and later on after successive failure on using three different regimen of chemotherapy, she died.  

Again, howsoever you live a happy life by the progressing old age, a person becomes forced to take assistance. Independence is lost. Willingly or unwillingly a person has to accept what others think is best for him/her instead of the person himself taking a decision himself/ herself. Sometimes old age is a curse and sometimes it is not.  

  

One morning, Alice had a fall while alone in her apartment. She was not found until many hours later when Nan, who was puzzled at not being able to reach her by phone, sent Jim to investigate. He discovered that Alice laid out beside the living room couch, nearly unconscious. There was no explanation for her fall beyond general frailty.

Though the concept of nursing homes and assisted living homes have improved and helped people in getting the care they actually required, family support and home treatment still serves as a satisfaction in old age.

The book Being Mortal not only teaches the importance of time but also the fate of medicine and the limitation of medical studies. No one wants to die with pain. Everyone of us will want to live a happy life without any stress, without any problems, without any diseases or without any insecurities. Although we do not want any of them, Life is tragic and unpredictable. Sometimes it is too late when we learn we have an chronic incurable disease and sometimes it happens that we are lucky enough to get cured of them.

The book also describes about the hospice and palliative care team and the care provided by them to the terminally ill patients so as to provide them as much as comfort as possible.

This book is among one of those books I would like to recommend everyone to read.

Go and grab it if you haven’t read it yet.

P.S.- Depends on the taste you have on books.

Overall rating- 4.5/5

Book Review of 'The Year I Met You'

Book- The Year I Met You

Author- Cecelia Ahern

Pages-416

Jasmine, when she was five years old she learned that she was going to die. Not now. But eventually someday. She learned of her impending death from her older cousin Kevin on the day of her granddad’s funeral.

She was thirty- three when she was terminated from employment, six weeks before Christmas—which is a highly undignified time to let somebody go off employment. She began working as an accountant from the ride age of twenty four and then she shifted to a company which provided financial advice and guidance to individuals wishing to start their own business. Thereafter, she started a startup of building business and sold them once the business was successful.

The job she was being fired, she was a co-founder with Larry. She was thirty-three years old and on a gardening leave for a year, which doesn’t allow her to catch up on another job till her leave was over. This was from the contract of the business when they started it together.

Matt Marshal, DJ on Ireland’s biggest radio station was one of the neighbour of Jasmine, She stalked him every day when he returned back from his work. His show airs from eleven p.m. to one a.m. and receives the highest numbers of listeners of any show on Irish radio. He has been the helm of late night talk shows for the past ten years. Jasmine didn’t know he lived on this street when she moved in, but when she heard the voice travel to her across the road one day, she knew it was him.

Matt Marshal was fired after the New Year’s Eve show that he and his team felt would be hilarious to ring in the new year with the sound of a woman’s orgasm along with a quiz to guess the sound of a fake orgasm from a real orgasm. (Although it was a fake sound make by a woman, it costs his job).

One day, when a call came in her apartment, the number of which is only with Heather (her elder sister who is a year older than her and suffering from Down’s syndrome) and her Dad. She picked up the phone thinking it would be either of them, only to realize it was someone she never actually knew.

Meanwhile Kevin visits her only to make her more comfortable. Kevin was her cousin, but he was adopted and he fell in love with Jasmine right from their childhood and even kissed her in their backyard garden. Jasmine thought Kevin would forget those memories and start with a fresh new start, but, he repeated those words and convinced her that he love her as much as he loved her when they were young.  But she rejects and moves forward.

With the gardening leave going on, she found her hobby in gardening (quite interesting isn’t it? Because gardening leave doesn’t mean you have to start gardening in that leave. Seems Jasmine took it seriously!’  And started to make her garden more presentable when one day, Monday visits her (the one who called her in her apartment). He is from a renowned company which wants to build a new startup for the welfare of people. He described himself as a headhunter for people with capabilities to give them the position they deserve.

Jasmine felt proud of herself because she felt important and somewhat started falling for Monday.

Meanwhile, Matt Marshal’s ‘Paradise City’, the song which can be heard from the other side of the road made jasmine’s heart flutter. Whenever she heard the song, she went near the windowpane to stalk Matt.

One day while she was drunk, she writes a letter to Matt, which she doesn’t recall properly for which she sneaks into his house to get the letter which has been exchanged with the letter his wife gave him.

 

''Dear Matt,

We all have stand-out moments in our lives, periods which influenced small or profound changes in us. I can think of four life-changing moments for me:  the year I was born, the year I learned I would die, the year my mother dies and now I have a new one- the year I met you.

‘I have heard your voice everyday, listened to the unsavory words that formulate your tasteless thoughts and make a judgment on you. I did not like you. But you are proof that you can think you know someone yet never really know them at all. What I have learnt is that you are more, more than what you pretend to be, more than what you believe yourself to be you are less an awful lot of time, but being less has driven people away. I think sometimes you like doing that and I understand that too. Hurt people hurt people.

But when you think no one is listening or when you think no one is paying you any attention, you are so much more. It’s a pity that you don’t believe that yourself, or show the people you love.

The year I met you, I met myself. You should do the same, because I think you will find a good man’’

I am really awestruck after reading the piece of letter Jasmine wrote for Matt. Just imagine a person drunk and writing such a long letter.  Although the story ended with Heather inviting everyone Jasmine knows what she calls it a support group to support Jasmine in whatever she is doing. The story leaves a great impact you know? Like for instance it teaches take a break from your life and know what your hobbies are. What your likes and dislikes are. Take time out for yourself so that you won’t have any grudges for the life afterwards.

The story is predictable if you go on with the flow. But, at a point of time I thought Jasmine would share a bond with Matt (who was already married) but the protagonist fell in love with Monday instead.

The story is great, it has a good start and a good ending and teaches that sometimes it’s okay to just sit idle and think nothing.

Overall rating- 3.5/5

Little Happiness

In three years nothing have changed in this house, the same faded coloured walls, the same ceiling, the same scent of the incense stick lit near the temple. Everything was the same.

Other than the blue coloured drape on the window and the matching bedcover on the bed, which was new, nothing have changed in this house. There was still the same calendar hung in the wall, which I had hung 4 years ago to hide the stain which was mistakenly done by me. Near the door of the living room, the same clothes of Dad was hanging which he used to wear above his clothes at the time of painting. At one corner, bundles of different size of brushes were kept and along with it some petite cans of colours were kept arranged.

Nothing has changed and even Dad was still the same.

After 4 years, today, I reached home. From a busy schedule, I somehow managed to take leave for a few days so that I could visit my hometown. Being in a MNC and working in shifts, it’s a tough work to manage the time. From the last 4 years, this was the first time I came back after I got my job in Tokyo.

My Dad was a painter and my Mom died when I was too small. Even though his income wasn’t sufficient enough for us, he never made me feel that we were poor.

Pratik was one of my best friends in school days. Even though he was rich and he got anything he wished for from his parents, I too was rich in the same way. My shirts were ironed every day. My shoes were polished regularly and my homework’s were completed on time. I never thought that I was poor until one day when Pratik came up to me, when he was shifting to a private school and told “Raj you know what? Your Dad can’t admit you in my private school because you are poor”. I told nothing and kept quite but eventually later I was admitted in the same school in which Pratik was.

Later on, I realized that when I topped in the class or when it was my birthday, Dad used to bring sweets just for me, saying he already ate one. That day I realized that we were poor.

Doing overtime, just to satisfy the fees of my school, he never made me feel that we don’t have anything.

After I finished my graduation and got a job abroad, his happiness knew no bond. We had our dinner at a restaurant that day and he ordered the same thing for himself as mine.

I bought the same spectacles and watch for him after I reached my hometown. I knew he would like it. But he resisted saying he don’t need them. When I insisted him, he came forward and hugged me and kept the things in the cupboard. I know he would keep it preserved and would never use it.

Time kept passing, days went running by and it was my last day at home. I knew Dad was going to miss me badly. May be much more than before. But no matter what, he won’t show it.

We went to one of the finest hotel that day. I ordered the things and waited for the servings. I kept looking at Dad. He had grown old. He was feeling uncomfortable perhaps. I asked him if he was okay, he smiled. I can sense he didn’t like it. His expressions were showing the actuality. After having our food, we came out of the hotel, and then I can notice the wide smile on my Dad’s face looking at the “vada pao” vendor. At that moment I realized that he is happy in this land. With the little happiness in his life, never complaining even a bit and living as normal as possible. Insisting him to come along with me to Tokyo would be inappropriate. I smiled and joined him for the “vada pao”. Life isn’t about the big things you achieve; it’s about the happiness you get in the small little things. That day, I realized that even if you are poor, you can be rich with happiness in your basket. Dad was happy with my success, but was also happy living in the same small village with the little of happiness in his daily life. The next day, I decided to do something in the village for its betterment. To share the knowledge I have gained in these years. Without a second thought, I decided that the best way was to open a school where children’s would be able to learn. As it is said, they are the future of the country. So why not start a little step towards making them a better individual for the future of our country?

Life isn’t static. Find out the things that make you happy and always find time for the things that makes you feel happy to be alive.

Book Review of 'One Life To Ride'

Book- ‘ONE LIFE TO RIDE- A Journey To The High Himalayas’
Author-AJIT HARISINGHANI
Pages-234

Jeremy D’Costa was a successful and polished man of the corporate world. Facial palsy has skewed the symmetry of his own features but he still managed to look benign and handsome. His visiting card said that he was a CEO of a company. But, since his stroke, his work had been taken over by Mr. Desai, his assistant, in what was said to be a purely temporary arrangement until the boss recovered. As a speech therapist, it was obvious to Ajit that the day of his supposed return to his office was a distant dream. His stroke had left him severely handicapped. Aside from the physical disability it has caused to the right half of his body, it had damaged his memory circuits, which store the basic concept of human language and speech.

Six months of speech therapy sessions has helped him regain a portion of his communication abilities, but he still had a long way to go. A man who had been an expert at high-level finance was now just able to add single digit numbers. Brain strokes frequently cause severe disturbances of intellectual functions. Abstract thinking, analytical abilities that processes data, emotional parity and everything that is intimate about personality is altered. Family members find it difficult to come to terms with this new person who has replaced the one they knew.

Mr. Jeremy had two sons both living abroad, so it was his wife, Esther who took the charge of him.

He had been passionate about his BMW and Ajit about his Enfield. So they got along like a bushfire. Six months after the therapy, Mr. Jeremy was leaving Pune for San Francisco to live with his son’s family for a year. A rehab centre, which specialized in treating stroke patients, had agreed to evaluate his case and suggest advanced therapy procedures which had shown promising results in many other similarly afflicted people.

When he last came for the therapy session, he in his broken speech said something to Ajit, ‘What are you… when are you… adventure… do it for me. Motorcycle’ after hearing Mr. Jeremy he smiled and answered saying that he would definitely do it for Mr. Jeremy and for his ownself.
Three days later, just a day before he was to leave for the US, Mr Jeremy D’Costa died in his sleep.

This book is a travelogue which beautifully describes the journey of Mr. Ajit from Pune to the High Himalayas where he went with his Royal Enfield for a lone journey to satisfy his inner craving for travel. His journey to the Leh , Srinagar, Patnitop, Kargil, Khardung La, Hunder, Hermis, Kasol, Baralacha la, Pang, and many such places of the great Himalayas can be lived by reading this book. His stay at different places, the way he describes himself lucky enough for having grey hair, the problems he faced with his motorcycle, and infinite beauty of the high Himalayas is beautifully penned down in this book.

Suggesting everyone who haven’t gone through this book to go for it.

Overall rating: 4/5

Book Review of 'I Think I Am In Love'

Book- I Think I Am In Love

Author- Devanshi Sharma

Pages- 195

The book has three main characters- Meera, Kavya (Meera’s younger sister) and Ishaan.

This book begins with the journey of Meera, Ishaan and rest of their group (consisting of 6 people) to Ranchi for one of their colleagues’ wedding. While the rest of the gang was overjoyed and excited to explore the new city in the evening, these two weirdoes (Meera and Ishaan) sat inside the hotel room, pretending to look into their phones with awkwardness freely flowing in the room, accompanied with silence and anger.

The room was bursting with unheard feelings, unsaid emotions, open-ended conversations and an orphaned friendship which was hopefully waiting for both of them to adopt it. In a room hypnotized by silence, Meera’s words were piercing. But, as always, Ishaan’s silence was sharper than her words. He made sure his reply was as wry as it could be.

Meera wasn’t a lover of wedding as such, but the fact that she was travelling to one of her closest colleague’s wedding gave her exciting vibes. She was a popular fashion blogger. And with a good thirty-two thousand people following her, the moment she posted her picture with the status stating ‘Travelling to my best friend’s wedding! By the way, travelling on a train after five long years’, there was a flood of likes and comments. She replied to a few comments with a dazzling smile that shone through her lips. For others, recreation was in enjoying a vacation while for Meera, recreation was hidden in her work.

Ishaan, on the other hand, was a serious guy who kept himself different to different people. He knew he could not focus on anything else but her innocent eyes which demanded answers to many unanswered questions. Which he didn’t have. He always said he did not care; he always said he could replace people and he always mentioned bluntly how she was just another friend to him.

Meera was bent on ignoring those words, inferring from his actions instead. Who would consider such words when everything was so beautiful that the chances of what was happening right then were as bleak as rain on an absolutely sunny day?

Wiping that tear away, Meera remembered how miserably she had pleaded with him to stay normal in front of others. She knew she wouldn’t be able to take sympathy of known eyes, the sympathy which would remind her that she was outrightly ignored by her best friend. There were some mistakes which she had made earlier, and now when she started solving them, he had sworn to make some.

The sudden change in Ishaan, after she visited his home was unacceptable by Meera. She couldn’t think of one thing which would lead to the change in his behaviour. Every day, Meera wouldn’t sleep on time but, she would get up at sharp 4. She would work endlessly and then leave for her office. For her blogging was her dream and the work at the office was an experience to learn new things which would help her in her life.  Every day by evening, she would fall less on energy and would struggle to survive with the feeling of loneliness and she wouldn’t fail in failing herself every single day.

That feeling of failing yourself each and every moment of the day- that kills you inside out, especially when you know your worth is much beyond what you are limiting yourself to. When you disappoint no one else, but yourself; when you trouble no one else but yourself; when you demean nobody but the self sitting quietly inside you. That was exactly how Meera was feeling.

This book is a turmoil of emotion. Read it further to know how was it Ishaan’s fault if she had taken a vow to disappoint herself? How is it anyone else’s responsibility if she had vowed to fall in her eyes? What was the issue that was stopping Ishaan to act normally?

Overall rating: 3/5

Book review of "A Place Called Here"

Name of the book: A PLACE CALLED HERE

Author: CECELIA AHERN

Pages: 484

At 10 years of age, Jenny-May Butler went missing causing eyes to fill with tears and parents to hug their children an extra bit tighter before they sent them off to bed. She was in everyone’s dreams and everyone’s prayers.  She was never found- not her body, not a trace of her, it was as though she had disappeared into thin air. No suspicious characters had been seen lurking around, no CCTV was available to show her last movements. There was no witness, no suspect. It was a blank case for everyone.

Sandy Shortt was a girl who remains aloof from everyone, be it her classmates, be it her neighbours or be it her own parents. She missed Jenny-May, the idea of her going missing and wondered if she was somewhere nearby, throwing stones at someone else and laughing loudly.

After Jenny-May going missing, she took to searching for everything that has been mislaid. When her favourite pair of shocks went missing she turned the house upside down when her worried parents looked on, not knowing what to do but eventually settling on helping her. It disturbed her that frequently missing possessions were nowhere to be found.

She thought about the odd pairs of shocks as much as Mrs. Butler worried about her daughter. Perhaps this is why she chooses to run a missing people agency where she used to search for all the missing people who disappeared in the thin of air.

Sandy Shortt, six foot one, ever since she was a child, she was towering just above everyone. She could never get lost in a shopping center, could never hide properly, was never asked to dance at discos and perhaps was the only teenager who wasn’t aching to buy her first favourite pair of heels.

According to Sandy Shortt, her parents called her Sandy because she was born with a head of sandy- coloured hair, which later on turned into back coloured coal. They didn’t know either that those cute podgy little legs would soon stop kicking and start growing at such a fast rate, towering above anything.

As for her obsession of finding lost things, her parents ask her to meet Dr. Burton who is a counsellor and can help her with that. Sandy was sad because she thought her parents can’t understand her. Though she agreed on meeting with Dr. Burton, inside her mind, she didn’t want to go for counselling to a person who sounded like an old man. Although after meeting the counsellor, she changed her mind because Dr. Burton was more of Dr. Gregory than Dr. Burton as he didn’t look that old and his first name matched with him more than his last.

After 24 years of Jenny-May missing, she picked up a case of Donal Ruttle, who is the younger brother of Jack Ruttle. Searching and going through the files, she reached a place where she found the five students who went missing after disappearing during a school camping trip in Roundwood, Country Wicklow, sixteen years ago.

Strange she went to the village with Helena, one among the five students who showed her the way towards the entrance of the village only to find more people who went missing. She was curious to know why these people came here without any information and without and cue leaving their family to spend sleepless nights crying and thinking about them.

To her surprise when Helena told that no things can go missing from here, she was kept agape because the watch she was wearing on her wrist went missing while she came to the place called here.

Bobby who was the person taking care of the things that were 'lost and found', was another person whom Sandy was searching in her missing cases. Discovering the fact that all her missing socks, her teddy, her purple diary which she lost while she was at her home was stored by Bobby she felt a strange feeling.

After discovering so many people from her missing list, the one on her priority now being Jenny-May, she found her in another village lead by Bobby and Helena where she forgot all the hard feeling of childhood and let the emotions stored flow like tears. They both hugged each other and took a picture with the Polaroid camera which Bobby gave from the lost and found things.

When she reached her own place, Glin in Limerick, almost no one believed her until Dr. Burton got the picture of Sandy and Jenny-May together.

This story will not only make you entangled with the vastness of the place called here where all the missing things and the missing people go but also with the search that Sandy runs to find all the missing cases.

Read the story to know where Sandy Shortt disappears. And was she successful in finding all the people she has wished for?  Did she find Donald Ruttle?

Overall rating: 4/5

Book Review of "The reason is you"

Book- The Reason Is You
Author- Nikita Singh

'Having no answer is always better than a clear negative answer. At least, hope remains'

'The reason is you', is a sequel to the book 'Like a love song'. The characters involved in this book are- Siddhant, Priyesh, Akriti, Maahi and Akriti's stepmom.

The prequel of the book ends with Siddhant and Maahi parting their ways. There were no hard feelings between them. They knew this had to happen and with mutual understanding, without any explanation, without any deliberation they separated and then, they had never been in contact with each other. 

Siddhant was doing his senior residency at AIIMS where he gets to meet Akriti and with time, they connect with each other.
At their first date, Akriti gets a call from her stepmom where she learnt that her father got an attack and he couldn't make it. 

Akriti was too close with her Dad and the news of her father's death broke her into pieces. 

Siddhant was there in every phase of her life. Without any dedication to his own self, he dedicated most of his time to Akriti, just to make sure that she was doing good. Even after having a hectic day at the surgery, when his bone hurts to infinity, he cared for her without even thinking about himself.

Akriti was deteriorating day by day. Her emotional turmoil was taking over her and she wasn't able to control her emotions. Her sudden outburst on Siddhant for no reasons made him aware that Akriti needed some help.  Her mental health wasn't coping with the loss of her Dad. 

Unable to cope up with her sudden mood swings and depression, she used to get angry on Siddhant at very small issues which could have been kept aside, whatever Siddhant did for her to make her happy ended up being the opposite. Meanwhile, Siddhant met Maahi at a birthday party where he went with Akriti. The feelings which he kept suppressed inside him played like a hurricane inside him. 

What will he do? will he keep that feeling suppressed or will that be the beginning of another story?

On the other hand, Priyesh kept telling Siddhant that he was in a wrong relationship where he is giving his everything but getting nothing in return. Priyesh kept telling him to get out of this trap before its late. But Siddhant didn't listen to him. He couldn't leave Akriti alone in this situation. He wanted to be the support she wanted. He wanted to help her so that she could cope up with the situations. 

Months after the death of her father, she was still not able to cope up. 

One day, while they went for a retirement party of a doctor, Akriti created a whole mess where she was crying thinking about her father and Siddhant trying to console her ended up in a fight, where Akriti fought with Siddhant in front of hundreds of people after which she fired out and drove her car so fast that she hit it with Siddhant's and ended up being in a hospital. Siddhant suffers from a hairline fracture and Akriti from some injuries. Although, Priyesh was lucky to come out safe. Priyesh tried to convince Siddhant to case an FIR on Akriti but he didn't. Meanwhile, Maahi remains as support to Siddhant during his course of hospitalization.

The book isn't just a love story but more about the importance of mental health.

Read the book to know more about Akriti and Siddhant and loosen the knot yourself between Maahi and Siddhant, their past and their relationship.

Overall rating: 4/5