Tag Archives: Jesus

Tuesday Text – Labyrinth Review

Image November 11, 2014 jcisnowjs 1 Comment

Labyrinth review by Jyoti Singh — Labyrinth by Kate Mosse

Finally!!! Finally I finished ‘Labyrinth’, not the actual labyrinth but a novel ‘Labyrinth’ by Kate Mosse; again not model Kate Moss but author ‘Kate Mosse’.

Why it was a big deal? Well, to finish a really long novel, which is actually 500+ pages, and almost feel like 5000+ pages; it indeed is a big deal.

‘Labyrinth’ is the famous mystery novel which ‘Kate Mosse’ has written. This novel has received many awards like Best Read of the Year by British Book Awards. This novel seems heavily influenced by the popularity gained by Dan Brown‘s Holy Grail chase in his novel ‘The Da Vinci Code‘.

This book also quest for the pursuit of Holy Grail and use two different time periods set in France, to figure out answer to this centuries long question of, ‘What is Holy Grail?”

‘Labyrinth’ revolves around two of it’s female protagonist, Alice and Alais. Now, what intrigued me more is not only the main character, or shall I say Hero of the story, are two females, but, the villains too are two female characters belonging to two different periods.

Let me simplify it a bit for you. Alice, our present day protagonist, is working as a volunteer at an archeological site, when she accidentally discover a hidden cave and two skeletons. She unearth a century long secret, which she soon start to unravel with every death threatening obstacle on her way.

Alais, the girl from 13^th century time period, is daughter of a prominent man of Carcassonne. In times of turmoil, she came to understand that her father is protector of a secret, and nor it’s her turn to help her father in keeping the secret safe. Her sister Oriane, who hated her free spirit, is sleeping with Alais husband, Guilhem.

Everyone n this story is after the Holy Grail, which can be deciphered with the help of three books. One out of these three books is with Alais, which his father has given her. Alais sacrifice her whole life to protect this book from her very own sister, Oriane. While our present day savior, Alice, has no knowledge of books until she met Audric, but she does got an accidental chance to see the ring of Labyrinth symbol, which can be used to summon Holy Grail. Marie-Cecile is present day vamp, who is after Alice and secrets of Grail.

It is later revealed that Alais is actually ancestor of Alice, and in this story people can live for more than 800 years, without being recognized. Story keeps on fluctuating between past and present, making you more and more confuse. One of the major problem with this novel is, that it is too long, with so many characters that you loose track of them and has to read back to identify their purpose. Characters are not well defined, and still they took so much of time to come across. It’s only near the end that is some fog gets cleared, and you actually can relate them to each other.

This is the major drawback of the novel. Also, there is no great mystery. I am not going to ruin it for you. But, seriously there is no actual mystery and you feel like cheated at the end of read. Language is also a major complication, as sometimes french is used, without any translation. As author is convinced that all her readers know French well enough to understand her book.

I should not compare it to Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code, but still I can not resist; with Robert Langdon, you were solving puzzles and moving ahead in the story, this was making you connect with each page of book; while with Alice/Alais, you are confused, you have only one puzzle and you have to read 500 pages to reach there. You don’t even know what you are looking for. Are you looking for a connection between two Alices? Or, are you looking for Holy Grail? Or, this is just a period drama and story about heretics?

I am disappointed. 😦

The Holy Grail(revmorgan.wordpress.com)
Jesus Gets Married, Again(godfatherpolitics.com)
The Templar Legacy |Book Review(jcisnowjs.wordpress.com)
My take on Inferno – book by Dan Brown(jcisnowjs.wordpress.com)

Life

Wednesday Words – Dedicated to Idealistic Hypocrites

Image September 17, 2014 jcisnowjs 2 Comments

In my life I have got the privilege(yes, I would like it to call it privilege), to meet lots of and different variety of Hypocrites. It’s fun to meet such people, for the sheer point that they are the idiots who keep fueling humor into our dull lives. I love hypocrites; they give me something to talk and laugh about in social gatherings.

Don’t take it the wrong way, but I am a hypocrite too. Just to give you an example I may hate/dislike you but still wherever I will meet you, I will give you a warm welcome and say hi and all the formalities; inside I just want to walk away from you the first moment I can. If I really would have hated you, I won’t even talk to you…. plain. This much of hypocrisy is what we all do. Actually, we have to do, otherwise, we won’t e talking to a lot of people around us. Right??? 😉

Wait, but this post is not dedicated to hypocrites. This one is dedicated to that breed of hypocrites who pretend to be idealistic. This one is not centered around one person, but as they say, “if the shoe fits, be my guest”. 😛

I have also mention, one of my hypocrisies here too…. lets see if you find out which one 😀

Recently, I have got the privilege of experiencing the world’s greatest hypocrite, who always pretended to be full of Indian values… sanskaar, sanskriti and all. Once, he/she (lets just use ‘he’ everywhere, just for the clarity. It could be a ‘she’ too, remember); so this person was like, “Americans/Non Indians have no moral and cultural values, they have no respect for their elders. They leave their parents and lead their own selfish lives….blah blah blah.” Do you know where this person is now??? LOL…. I know you are smart, must have guessed it all… he has shifted to a foreign land, leaving his parents alone to handle everything on their own. Where are your so called Indian Sanskaar now? Facepalm dear.

Same person, different idealism. “Oh schools in foreign are so bad, there is no proper education system. Whatever, Indian schools teach, it can never be learnt in foreign schools. Our(Indian) education system is best, rest of the world is mediocre….blah blah blah.” He now wants to give his son/daughter the best of education, and thus enrolled him/her into a school, which is….. wait for it….. not in India……… by far. Seriously man, grow up!!!

One more idealistic hypocrite – “Oh, we are not into social networking, like facebook, twitter. They are all bullshit, and meant for dramatic people. You know those who like drama in their life and want to show off to the world.” Point taken. Wait, what did I see there…. you are now regularly posting on facebook… pics… daily status…. and all. World is really changing fast. Whoop! 🙄

“We are the perfect couple, so much in love.” Breaking news – your husband is having an affair, with your friend. What, you don’t believe me. Oh, I am wrong, I just wanted to help you. But you are not hypocrite, your husband, who is so much into PDA, and your so called friends, who laugh behind your back; they are hypocrite. BTW, everybody knows. Take care. 😦

Again, same kind of situation, somewhat…. “We are ideal couple on facebook. We will post our mushy mushy pictures daily, and will bombard your timeline with it.” Did I hear it right… you are going through a rough patch and asking for divorce. Take care buddy and just go slow with your social love updates.

“I love my kids. They are the cutest. Infact they are the world’s most beautiful kids. They are my best friends, and I will tell you about them, day in and day out. I will post their numerous pics and if I will talk to you, I will only talk about my kids……” wait, I have kids too, and they are as beautiful as yours, if not more. Why this competition? Hypocrisy, because you think, only your kids are beautiful. (well, I guess we can not call it hypocrisy, it’s called motherhood) 😐

“I am so good with people. I have done only good deeds. I have never hurt anyone in my life. Why does everyone hates me? …..” you don’t know why? Ask me. Because you are so full of s&%t. Seriously, grow up. First be a good person, don’t show, that you are good, be one. You have always pretended that you are good. In reality, you always talk negative of others. You enjoy, if something bad happen to people around you. That’s not done.

“I am so naive and sweet. I speak like a doll. I am so polite. I am like idle bahu, or shall I say, bholi bhaali ladki, sweet and simple….. ” no dear, you are not. I have heard you so many times screeching at the top of your lungs. You are only polite when you are talking on phone. In reality, you have a totally different accent/voice/mannerism whatever you may call it. But you are a different person when you are on phone. Please don’t talk to me like this. I feel like I am talking to a dumb barbie doll, who only says haanji (yes and no) everytime.

I wanted to write so much more…. but control. Control yourself. I am sounding more and more like I am bitching about people. I am a hypocrite too. I am writing about all the things, which I do not want to see in people, but still I am enjoying writing about it. I am like biggest of all. I am a Hypocrite and I am a proud one, because I accept, what I am, publicly. Full-stop now.

Adios!!!

Photographs

A Stroll Around The Lake

Gallery June 25, 2014 jcisnowjs Leave a comment

Life, Spiritual

Religion and My Ignorance

Image May 7, 2014 jcisnowjs 6 Comments

I have read so many mysteries and thrillers, but most mysterious and thrilling stories are from our Religious notions. There is so much that we don’t know, still there is so much that we believe in. Believing in something which we don’t know fully, still we have full faith in our beliefs. I am writing this post cause my curious mind took me to a journey of some of the widely practiced religions and stories behind them.

I am ashamed to say that I knew so little about them, even right now, I am so unsure of my limited knowledge(rather say ignorance), but I am eager to learn.

For instance, I didn’t knew that three of the most popular religions, Christianity, Judaism and Islam, originated from one. But, I did knew that, Hinduism is considered as the oldest Religion and it has given birth to several most widely practiced other religions too, like Buddhism, Jainism and Sikhism. Most astounding fact being, that all these religions emerging from Hinduism are in accord and harmony (as far as I know).

The case is not same with Christinaism, Judaism, and Islam. They started from the same Abrahamic belief, and then along the way they distinguished themselves and took separate paths. A path which now seem, so extreme from each other that one can never imagine that their roots were in the very same area of Jerusalem.

A holy place captured and attacked so many times in history, and now surrounded by walls reaching the sky. A holy place which is the center point for the most controversial religious debates between three major Religions of the world. I wonder if God still resides there, enclosed in those walls.

This actually reminds me of my visit to disputed Ram temple site of Ayodhya, India. A place of worship and faith, surrounded by army and police, guarded in such a way, to make you feel like, distant from your own God. I read about and also watched some documentary on Jerusalem, and the only thought that came to my mind was, why can’t they all live in peace accepting each others Religion. What’s wrong if person of two religion wants to pray in a single place?

It strikes me, how I felt about the Ram Temple and Babri Masjid disorder. How would I feel, if I am praying their and at the same time my Muslim friend is offering his prayers too? Will it create more discord, or, it just won’t matter, as long as we both have a right to express our religious beliefs freely?

It’s too complicated, or maybe not. I am trying to understand, what need not require understanding. Religion is not meant to be interpreted. It’s for believing. It’s for practicing my beliefs, without hurting others. It should be about love and closeness with the Lord, and not about building walls. I believe in that.

Books

The Templar Legacy |Book Review

Image April 28, 2014 jcisnowjs 2 Comments

If you are reading “The Templar Legacy”, without knowing about its author, I can bet that you will most probably think of it as a C grade draft version of Dan Brown‘s novel, something which he used to practice before writing The Da Vinci Code. Sadly, author is not Dan Brown. It’s sad because if it had been the same pathetic novel but written by Brown, I could have enjoyed the company of Robert Langdon.

Steve Berry‘s novel “The Templar Legacy”, is by far just one time read which you would like to forget as soon as you reach the end. It has two male protagonist, Cotton Malone a retired US operative, now a book seller; and another one is Mark, who is next in line to become Master in Templar legacy. Female protagonist is Stephanie who is mother of Mark and previous boss of Cotton Malone.

Stephanie and Cotton got entangled in a thrilling chase running after a riddle to find Templar treasure and secret. Lars, Stephanie’s late husband was searching for the Templar’s great secret, referred as Device in the novel, which can reinstate their power again on the royals and popes of the religious world. Lars, got killed in his hunt for the truth, but he was the nearest to the device in his search when he died. Now, everyone is behind Stephanie and Malone to get their hands on Lars’s journal and decipher the location of device.

Their are other characters too, mostly uninteresting ones. What lacked in this novel was the fact that, chase is one dimensional. It’s not for clues, it’s just running from a villainous character. Most of the time they are just reading from the journal or one of them is remembering the past stories from Templar’s book. They are just reading or running. When they find out the key to unravel the secret location it was too simple, and was almost all over the place, which they couldn’t decipher for so long.(they so needed Robert Langdon in this story)

The big secret, around which the whole device is built upon, is based upon the Resurrection of Jesus. This could be a big secret, if and only if, it would have been less for religious gains but rather for discovering a new kind of faith. Author did tried to do that and justify the resurrection in his own way, through a letter, but it was not as convincing as it should be to instill that long lost faith in humanity rather than supernatural miracles.

I have always enjoyed Dan Brown, but Steve Berry, you are not even near what a real reading zestfulness is.

Waiting for my next read… 😦