Writing A Book Review For Penguin Books..!

Last two days kept me very busy with some thing other than writing blogs. It took me to a related field of writing - writing a book review for Penguin Books.

Shobhaa De, a famous Indian writer is on my blog list; and on one of my regular visits to her blog I came across the launch of 'Blog A Penguin Classic'. The publishers Penguin Books (India) were sending out review copies to selected people for reading their range of 'Modern Classics' and for writing a review of what they have read. This appealed to me immensely. ...what better than to be able to enjoy reading a book, and then to try your hand (or your pen/key board, actually) at writing a review?
The next day after I clicked to show my interest in their promotion, I received in my courier mail, a beautiful and an elegant looking book: Selected Stories by Parashuram. Being a voracious reader, I was lost to the world for two days as the book is a tough read.




..... this is the actual picture of my book while I read it at night.



Some of the stories were fun read and some were serious stuff; but all very interesting.
The serious stories had
intense situations, and many layers of mind blowing characters that it took me two reads for a couple of stories at least, to understand their depth.

Then came the writing part. Having never written a book review before, it was a challenge to write about a masterpiece; that too a translated one. It took me some serious research work and reading other book reviews before I could put my pen to paper. ooops !! my fingers to my key board....God! how things have changed in our lives..!

By the time I had read a few reviews my mind was already racing up. After burning the mid-night lamp (3.00 am), I had a skeleton 'review' sitting on my desktop. That night I slept peacefully over it, and the next morning with a fresh mind I re- read my review. With a bit of editing done, I dashed it off to Penguin Books. And there it is now on their website waiting to be lapped up, and commented upon. Pls do the honors, my friends.

How did the review turn out ? Pls let me know..!

check it here:

http://blogapenguinindiaclassic.blogspot.com/2009/03/parashurams-selected-stories-reviewed.html

If this one doesn't work pls try: http://blogapenguinindiaclassic.blogspot.com/ and look for Parashuram's Selected Stories Reviewed by Shaheen Saeed (that's me)

A wonderful experience : reading and writing this review. I hope I can do more of these in future.